back, do you?”
Wetness fills Phillipa’s eyes as a remorseful mask slips over her face. “I’m sorry. Trying to get out of a father’s shadow can make some people really bitchy. By some people, I mean me. I’m some people.” To show she didn’t mean any harm by her comment, she explains how much trouble Isabelle could be in if anything Alex presented to her is true. “She won’t just be suspended, Brandon. She could face charges.”
“For what? Doing the job Alex recruited her for?”
“This goes way beyond that, and if you’re honest with yourself, you’d agree with me.”
I do, but it doesn’t make it any easier to swallow.
“I need to go to Tiburon.” Nothing against Isabelle. I assured Tobias I’d take care of her, but I made promises to the Greggs long before I knew the meaning of the word. “I could have a greater chance of identifying the man in the photos with Melody if I go to Tiburon. Then I can keep her safe as promised.”
“I don’t believe he wants to hurt Melody, Brandon. More times than not, he’s protected her.”
That piques my interest. “What do you mean he’s protected her?”
Phillipa takes a huge gulp of her glass of wine before confessing, “Melody took a shortcut home down a side alley one day. She wasn’t alone. The… gent…” she looks as uncomfortable calling him a gentleman as I feel knowing there’s another man stepping up to the plate to protect Melody, “… stopped her from being followed.”
I wash off my toothbrush, dump it in its holder, then make my way out of the attached bathroom. “Do you think he could have been hired by Melody’s fiancé? He’s not short of a penny. He could afford a security detail not afraid of a little rough-handling.”
She apprehensibly squirms. “Possibly. I did look into the angle when I noticed the same guy in the background of the photos my surveillance team took, but I didn’t get any solid leads.”
“Did you ask Melody?”
“No.” Guilt lines her face. “We’re not really on speaking terms.”
I lick my lips before putting out an offer that could benefit me as much as it could Phillipa. “Do you want me to reach out to her?”
She waits a beat before shaking her head. “Unless you want another IAs’ agent looking at you with the same murky glasses I was wearing only weeks ago, I would suggest you hold out for a bit. There’s a lot of shit going on right now.” Although she doesn’t exactly admit she was wrong accusing me of murder, her roundabout way of saying she was loosened the weight on my chest.
Phillipa eyes me with apprehension slashed across her features when I ask, “Do you have any plans this weekend?”
“Is this whole push-up bra, unbrushed hair, and no makeup thing working for you?”
I laugh when she swivels her index finger around her scrubbed-clean face. “I wouldn’t necessarily say it’ll have you slotted into my dreams, but it does have me looking at you differently.” She nods in agreement when I add, “It’s amazing how much you can see someone when they’re not hiding behind a title.”
She returns my compliment by issuing one of her own. “Spell out your terms, Agent James. I’m listening.”
“I won’t go to Tiburon…” the excitement flaring through her eyes dims when I add, “… if you go on my behalf.”
25
Brandon
“Hurry the fuck up, Grayson. How long does this shit take?”
“Are you serious, punk? If it’s so fucking easy, why didn’t you hack in?” he replies, whispering.
While accepting a coffee from Isabelle, I smile like she didn’t bust me requesting a fellow agent to hack into the Bureau’s mainframe to interrupt surveillance at HQ. When she disappears to deliver the rest of the coffees to our teammates, I jump up from my seat and make my way to the corridor for some privacy.
“I can’t keep ears out of a room I’m in, that’s why I asked for your help, dipshit.”
Grayson makes a pfft noise. “Whatever.” A few seconds later, he coughs up the words I’m dying to hear. “I’m in…” I would have preferred for them not to be followed by, “… but directing the feed to another server is proving problematic.”
After glancing down the hallway, ensuring our conversation isn’t being overheard by anyone in my team, much less the IA agent approaching Isabelle near the coat rack, I squash my phone closer to my ear. “Can you terminate the feed altogether? Make it look like a glitch?”
“Maybe.” Keys being frantically