“You were,” he says. “I’m just…observant.”
I arch a brow. “I’m impressed.”
“I would have thought you’d be annoyed.”
“Me, too,” I admit. “But we’re on the same team. It’s nice to know my partner is good at reading people.” I wrinkle my nose. “And you did basically just admit you noticed the dress and everything in it, so…”
He leans forward, his elbows braced on his knees. “And that pleases you? That I noticed?”
“I’m just used to people noticing. That’s all.”
“To men noticing,” he corrects.
“To people,” I insist. “If boobs are out for show and tell, most people will take a look at them. That’s typical human behavior, and it’s troubling when people don’t behave the way you expect them to.”
“Troubling in what way?” he presses.
“Like…people who don’t laugh at the funny parts in movies,” I add. “That’s odd. Suspicious. It sets off alarm bells in the people around them.”
His eyes bore into mine, making me feel exposed in a way that has nothing to do with the amount of my cleavage currently on offer. “Is that why you learned to make yourself laugh when everyone else did?”
My jaw drops, and my next breath gets stuck in my throat for a moment before I shake my head with a huff. “I’ve changed my mind. I don’t like your powers of observation. At all.”
He bites his bottom lip, but the smile he’s holding at bay bursts through. “No, sorry, don’t give me credit for that one. I have to confess—Sabrina ratted you out. We were watching something ridiculous in the theater a few weeks ago, and Andrew wasn’t laughing. She said it reminded her of when you were little, how you forced yourself to laugh during movie night so your nanny would stop threatening to take you to a psychiatrist.”
“Nanny Veronica. She thought I was depressed.” I roll my eyes. “But I just didn’t share her sense of humor. That pet detective movie isn’t funny. Neither is Drop Dead Fred. Or Caddyshack.”
Nick presses a hand to his chest. “Caddyshack is a classic. You’ve wounded my Chevy Chase-loving heart. And right when we were getting along so well, too.”
I snort. “We were not.”
“Were, too,” he counters, reaching out to squeeze my bare knee only to flinch away with a scowl. “Your skin is like ice.”
“It’s winter. And you insisted I dress to seduce drug lords in the tropics.”
“You could have changed into the dress after we landed.” He unbuckles his seat belt and crosses to the couch on the other side of the plane.
“I wasn’t sure how much time we’d have to spare.”
“There’s always time for a costume change, Zan. Especially if it prevents you from getting frostbite.” He raises one cushion to reveal a compartment filled with blankets and a few small pillows. He lifts the top blanket, grabbing an even softer looking one from underneath, then returns to my side, flinging it over my legs with a dramatic shudder. “There. Warm yourself, Ice Princess.”
“Thank you.” I tuck the blanket around my legs, my chest strangely tight.
It’s nice that he noticed my chill and fetched a blanket. The fact that he went to the trouble to select the softest one?
Well, that’s flat out…charming.
“And you won’t be seducing any drug lords,” he adds, buckling in again as the engines whir to life. “You’ll be distracting them with your stone-cold sex vibe while we unearth their secrets.” I wonder if he really thinks I have a “stone-cold” sex vibe and then berate myself for being so juvenile, when he adds, “But no one touches you, or they lose a hand. Or an arm. Perhaps part of their torso, as well.”
I arch a brow. “Because you have a reputation for being territorial with your girlfriends?”
“Because I’m territorial about you,” he says in a tone that invites no teasing. “You’re not just my partner on this, Alexandra. You’re family. Family first before anything else.”
I take a breath, a part of me tempted to challenge him. To ask how he can say he’s putting his family first when he allows his work to get so close to home.
Maybe I don’t have to go behind his back. Maybe we can talk this through and agree about how best to protect the people we love.
But before I can speak, the captain comes over the intercom. “Hello, back there. It’s Captain Maddox. Hope you’re having a wonderful morning. We’ll be taxiing in just a few minutes, so please make sure your seat belts are fastened for takeoff. We may hit a few bumps on the way out, but once we pass through the last of this lingering cloud system, it looks like smooth sailing all the way to Bali. So settle in, relax, and feel free to buzz me if you have any questions. Excited to see some sunny skies this afternoon.”
Nick grins widely. “Me, too. I’m telling you, Zan. If we finish early, we have to hop over to Nusa Penida and do some scuba diving. They have schools of manta rays there, just hundreds of them, flying underwater. It’ll take your breath away.”
And just like that, I’m relieved I kept my mouth shut.
Nick is never going to take this job as seriously as he should. We’re headed into the lion’s den, and all he can think about is the goofing off he wants to do after.
But I don’t goof off.
Not before the mission or after.
I get in, get the job done, and then disappear into my unobtrusive life in Zurich as a brown-suit-wearing, buttoned-up corporate drone. I blend into the background until it’s time to go to work. That’s what’s safest. It’s the best way to protect myself from criminals out for revenge and protect my family from the danger of associating with spies.
Especially flashy, well-known spies.
I keep that thought tucked away in my mind as we take to the air. Once we reach cruising altitude, Nick makes coffee, and we share breakfast at the bar—freshly squeezed orange juice, mixed berries, and bacon parmesan quiche with a perfectly flaky crust—and then settle in to read our separate novels. Nick, true to his word, is incapable of going more than twenty or thirty minutes at a stretch without making conversation, but those silent interludes give me plenty of opportunity to think.
And to plan.
I don’t have to expose Nick while we’re in danger. All I have to do is make sure gossip that Nick Von Bergen is a spy reaches the right tabloid reporter, along with just enough evidence to make it believable, and his days in the field will be over.
It will be easy. Simple. Efficient.
And…awful.
It would be a horrible thing to do to the man. There’s no getting around that. It would be a betrayal of his trust and my vows of secrecy to Union Ten, and betrayal isn’t something I take lightly.
Silently, I promise not to pull the lever on the nuclear option unless I have no other choice. Unless it’s the only way to protect the people I love.
I won’t enjoy outing Nick if it comes to that, but it feels good to have an ace tucked into my back pocket. Just in case. I can’t control other people or foresee twists of fate, but I can prepare for the worst and be armed and ready to fight back when the ones I’ve trusted disappoint me.