No one else was showing any sign of cracking open to clue in Gennifer about the lads’ insults, and all of us stayed completely neutral.

  I loved us so fucking much.

  "Alrighty. Well then, the scenario we have before us aligns with a gala tomorrow night at Wheelman House. We are told Disick and his partners will be gathering for a meeting about moving a shipment.”

  With this information, I sat forward, asking, “Your source, she's reliable?”

  “It's his daughter. She recently discovered his activities and is understandably very concerned. She's not trained, but her evidence is compelling. Enough so that Interpol was willing to move on it. They've asked us to be their extra muscle. As you know, Interpol only has a certain lever they can pull, but we can pull the levers they can't. And yes, we also believe her information is sound.”

  I nodded. Once I heard Interpol was involved, at least I knew we weren't being sent on a wild goose chase.

  The lads sat forward too, and Rook tapped on his tablet. “All right, I'll start working with Devlin. See what we can dig up on the parties that'll be there.”

  Gennifer nodded. “Your team is the best of the best. I knew I’d come to the right place.”

  Gabe nodded. “Tomorrow night. Usual partnering. Saff, Lock, Saint, you will be on the ground. Kaya, you'll be in the van.”

  Kaya rolled her eyes, and with exasperation she said, “I’m always in the bloody van.”

  Rook chortled. “Trust me, eventually you'll make it out of the van. And then you'll get to be fancy and in the fray with me.”

  Saint scowled and shook his head at that. “No. Not in the fray and never with you.”

  I wondered how he was going to take it when her training was over and she was a full-fledged active field agent.

  Gennifer interjected. “We might not even need that many. Interpol will be there. Amelia Jansen specifically, whom, I believe, you have all met before if I recall correctly. Maybe the Kings and the Saints can all stay in the van.”

  Rook narrowed his eyes. "Oh yeah, I've met her. Half her team, too. We will need to be on the ground, Gabe.”

  Gabe shrugged. "Gennifer, we know how to play nice with Interpol, but I only trust my team. We all go. We all play our normal roles.”

  Sure, Amelia was technically a friendly and was playing on the right side of the law, but she would forever be on Rook's shit list. When Rook's fiancée, Nissa, went to Interpol about her father, Amelia almost got her killed with the behind-the-back tactics she’d pulled. Rook would never let that one go.

  Gabe nodded. “Tabatha, Saff, head to wardrobe tonight. Pick out what you'll wear to the gala tomorrow. Lads, get the tuxes steamed.”

  Saff sighed dramatically, tossing her arms up. “And here I thought we were escaping this place for a proper honeymoon.”

  Gennifer gave her a weak smile. “Very sorry, Saff. We'll have you and Lock in and out before you know it. I hope you're going somewhere fun?”

  Saff shrugged. “Classified. We're keeping it a secret. All you need to know is we’ll be unavailable. Phones off with no big brothers of any type tracking us.”

  I knew where they were going, but like hell I would offer that up, especially to Gee-Gennifer.

  And like summoning the blonde devil with that snide thought, Gennifer turned to me with a sly smile. "You'll be Gabe's partner, Tabs?”

  I met the clear blue of her gaze. “It's Tabatha. And yes, I get paired with the boss. I make him the least grumpy. If that’s saying anything.”

  “Do try to keep him out of trouble for me now, would you?"

  I smirked to cover what I really wanted to say. "You know Gabe. Always running into trouble headfirst.”

  I needed to go find an outfit. Tomorrow, I would dance with Gabe once again. Though, unlike tonight, I wouldn't lose sight of who I was, or what I was doing. Tomorrow, I would lock down my feelings.

  All I had to do was avoid touching his dick again. Easy.

  4

  Tabatha

  Hell of a way to spend my birthday. All dressed up, drinking champagne, and stiff-as-a-board dancing to a boring-as-bloody-hell band. I needed to dance to an Afro Beats DJ to really feel alive and celebratory.

  Unfortunately, we had been called in to extract billionaire Seth Disick because of the players involved. Hopefully this would be a simple mission. Grab him, question him, and have him turn informant on his coconspirators. Hell, I might still have time to actually celebrate.

  Normally, Seth would just get the regular treatment. Police and all that. But what Gennifer wanted, Gennifer got. She’d provided a neat little file of evidence to Interpol, including copies of checks, pictures of banned artifacts being imported, and most importantly, the women missing. Hell, she should have worked for Scotland Yard.

  As I sashayed around the edge of the ballroom, I kept eyes on Disick, my feet and arches aching in my Manolo's. Okay fine, they weren't mine in the strict sense. The fashion room at Rogues was fully stocked, and more often than not, for these types of missions, borrowing from Rogues was like an extravagant mini shopping trip.

  You are on a mission. This isn't a fun trip.

  I hated it when logic prevailed and ruined my imaginary fun. No, it wasn't a fun trip or a birthday dance party. Interpol had come to Rogues to do the extraction and questioning of a high run-risk criminal. Amelia Jansen came along to represent Interpol on the op as well. She was by the bar, pretending to sip on a gimlet, her braids coiled and piled high on top of her head. Across the room, Saint and Kaya danced, keeping a tight circle around Disick.

  “Can these twats get the show on the road? I would like to get out and celebrate before I turn back into a pumpkin,” I snickered to myself.

  In my com, Gabe's voice was terse. "What the fuck is so funny, Monarch?"

  I tried to ignore the thrill of him using my call sign, but it was there just the same. During our graduation ceremony, those of us going into field ops were given our call signs. Usually, they were nicknames assigned by trainers or your fellow recruits. One guy's name was Onyx, not because he was dark-skinned or had dark hair, but because he had a penchant for singing the lyrics from the rap group whenever he made something go boom. He would hum it incessantly. ‘Let the boys be boys. Slam.’ So everyone called him Onyx, and that became his call sign.

  I'd been surprised when I'd seen mine. It hardly said badass, but somehow it seemed to fit. Especially when Gabe looked at me and said, "You're a monarch." I always assumed he meant I was regal. But when he called me butterfly, I recognized he was talking about the South African monarchs. Their wings were the exact color of my hair. It always warmed me a little bit thinking about the time I asked who had named me. He'd simply looked at me and said he had. As if that was perfectly reasonable.

  I forced a smile as I sipped my champagne and answered him. "None of your business, Spy."

  Gabe was my partner, like on most missions. It was like I had been punished by the fates to always be at his side in these situations. Or more like he wanted to keep an eye on me.

  I was pretty sure he thought I was a bad influence on Saffron. But I was a damn good agent. I didn’t need to be babysat. For years, he'd made Saff's life miserable, and by proxy, mine too.

  We butted heads constantly, and it didn't help that he was my Ops Command. On missions, I followed orders just fine. But for some odd reason, he also seemed to think that I needed to follow those orders outside of missions. Whatever. I ignored him as much as possible.

  Regrettably, his annoying sex-on-a-stick status was harder to ignore. The man was gorgeous and he damned well knew it. Thick, dark hair that if he ever let it grow long enough curled ever so slightly on the ends. He normally kept it in a buzz cut, but when it started to grow in, it was thick and luscious. I was always tempted to run my hands through it.

  The longer hair also made him look much younger. Just tipping over thirty, God, the man looked absolutely fit.

  I thought we weren’t going to lust after him anymore.

  Hell, I was just observing.

  Just because he was my boss it didn't exclude me from the nearly constant illicit fantasies about him. Walking around looking and sounding like that.

  Not my fault at all. I was a hetero woman, after all, with perfectly functioning eyeballs. Gabe was hot.

  And sadly, in possession of skills and qualities that we'd all grown to hate. Without even trying, he could be a massive arsehole. He thought he was always right. Our personalities neutralized each other most times. But to make matters worse, he loved to poke at me just to rile my blood pressure. Almost like family, so there was that.

  Off. Fucking. Limits.

  I was not going to think about his enormous cock either. Nope. Absolutely not. That was information I was not meant to have.

  But you have it now.

  I forced myself to focus. "Do we have him? Have you made your pass?"

  Lock came across the coms. He was about to make his pass by Disick to swipe his phone, clone it, and then drop it on the floor so Disick could find it later. “Yep. Got him.”

  Saff's voice was tight over the coms. "What the fuck is going on?"

  Just as Lock was making his pass and accidentally bumping into Disick, the lights went out.

  As if timed, a number of glasses shattered, women squeaked and squealed, and people started to frantically move around the large room.

  Gabe was terse. "Lights are out. Something is happening."

  Because I'd been keeping a strict eye on him, I knew exactly where Gabe was, and when I touched his elbow, he tensed.

  "It's just me," I assured him.

  "I know."

  "Then why the hell did you jump?"

  Saff's voice was steady. "King, do you have the phone?"

  "Yes, I got it. Problem though."

  "Yeah?"

  "I got the phone when Disick was on the move. I have no idea where he's gone now."

  "Fuck." Gabe muttered and started moving across the room.

  I stayed in step with him, my hand on his elbow, following along rapidly. My heels made a clipping sound even in the din of the darkened ballroom. Suddenly, the lights flickered back on, and everybody relaxed and quieted down.

  Waiters now leaned down to scoop up shattered glasses. More staff were running to gather clean-up supplies. Several women clutched at their brooches and their purses. Did everyone think this was a heist?

  "Where are we going, Spy?"

  "This way," he said angling his head toward the stairs.

  I followed him because his instincts were uncanny, but the idiot had to learn to communicate better to his team, especially to me. I wasn't a mind reader.

  "Any particular reason why we're going this way? I'm your partner here. Can you let me in on any of your thought process?"

  He sighed, and I could see his shoulders tense. Well, that was his problem not mine. He had to communicate with me, whether he wanted to or not.

  I wasn't the one making the assignments on this mission. I could have easily been paired with Lock. Hell, it was a lot easier to get Lock to mingle in crowds. People wanted to be near Lachlan King, the famous billionaire. Everybody wanted a piece of him, which made it simple and not at all suspicious for him to be at a charity function.

  As we proceeded down the hall, there were three exit options. One led to the kitchens, not somewhere Disick would probably head in the dark. One led to the other end of the hallway where the bathrooms were now busy with people rearranging themselves after the surprise lights out. Disick took off in the dark, so more than likely he was headed somewhere other than the loo.

  No one moved like that in the dark unless they were trying to make some kind of escape, which meant he’d gone down to the last exit. From our schematic study earlier in the day, we knew it led to a set of stairs.

  “He’s headed downstairs. Nowhere else to go,” Gabe muttered through clenched teeth.

  I pursed my lips. "See? Was that so hard? All you had to do was talk to me."

  He cut me a glare, and I narrowed my gaze back at him. The two of us were essentially oil and water. Really was a shame because I couldn't even enjoy admiring his good looks when he acted like a twat.

  The two of us rushed down the hallway. And as we marched, Gabe's voice was low. "Saff, cut the cameras in the main hall. We’ll use the downstairs loo for holding him."

  "Copy."

  King's voice came on the line then. "Do you have eyes on him?"

  As Gabe was busy trying the locks on the doors, I responded. "No, we don't. But we're on his tail. Amelia, Lock, just to be safe, double-check the front exits."

  Amelia muttered, “Copy.”

  Lock said, “Roger.”

  Finally, the door that Gabe was working on nudged open, leading into a darker tunnel of some sort. I frowned even as Gabe hesitated, saying, "What the fuck is this?"

  "Please tell me your Spidey sense gave you a reason to select this door from all the others?"

  He sighed as he looked around and assessed the other doors in the hallway. "Well, that one is clearly a broom closet, and that one looks like a door to an office. There’s a name placard on it.” It did, in fact, have the name John Huxley on it. “And then there is this one. A little too ornate for an office, but not storage.”

  "Awesome. Dark creepy hallway for the win. You really think I'm going first in there?"

  He smirked at me. "All right, fine, no ladies first this time. I'll go."

  Stepping past the threshold, he reached toward his back, palming his weapon before pulling it out of the holster.

  This mission was meant to be recon and grab. Simple. Easy. Get the details off his phone, clone it, and snatch him up.

  Why did things never go as easy as they were supposed to?

  Saff's voice was muffled now. Garbled. "I'm losing you two. What's happening?"

  "Gabe is dragging me down a deep dark hallway. If I die, you’ll know he murdered me."

  I could almost feel Gabe's eyeroll even though I couldn't see his face.

  Saff started to talk again but it cut out.

  "Shit. Coms are down. Where do you think this is leading us?" I asked.

  The hall grew dimmer and dimmer and eventually, the floor changed from white marble to a darker stone or concrete maybe. The blend was smooth but delineated by some kind of logo or crest on the ground. In the circle, an eagle was holding an animal in its talons with a sword blade dripping blood beneath pointing up toward the eagle.

  As the light from the hall darkened, Gabe clutched my hand in his. A shot of electricity zinged up my arm at the unexpected contact, and I quickly bit off a sharp gasp.

  This was entirely unexpected. Gabe visibly made an effort to never touch me. Ever. Our relationship wasn't built on hugs, side kisses, or handshakes. Hell, he could barely spare anything nice to say to me, let alone a hug.

  Even when we met socially at Saff's, it was always a head nod, and he'd mutter, "Smith," or, “Monarch.” That was all I was deemed worthy of having from the man.

  Whatever.

  Yet now as I stepped slowly down this grim hallway, I felt the enveloping warmth of his enormous hand. His fingers were long and thick, his palm slightly calloused. I wanted it wrapped around more than just my small hand. Unfortunately, that led me to the funny thoughts about all those women who insisted you could tell the size of a man's cock by examining his hands, and now I knew they were right.

  I bit back a snicker and his hand tightened on mine. "What's wrong?" he asked.

  "Nothing."

  He turned to frown at me, his gaze disapproving as always.

  But suddenly the floor dipped down a ramp and we were looped into a wardrobe style room. Wood shelves were attached to the walls, rods between them with bright vermilion robes hanging down. Based on the number of empty hangers, many of the robes were missing.

  I frowned. "What in the Eyes Wide Shut is going on here?"

  "No fucking clue. What is this shit?"

  The Wheelman house had been built on the outskirts of West London by James and Frida Wheelman as a location for them to host their benefit galas and other charitable events. But by and large, most of the time, it wasn't even in use. It had lots of offices for charity work, but no one lived there.

  The longer we looked around, we realized we were in some kind of anti-chamber. Over to the right, we heard some kind of chanting. A song?

  Our gazes locked and we shrugged at each other as we inched forward toward an open archway that led into what looked like a cavern. No, it was more like a wine cellar. It seemed as If part of the building was older and somehow the temperature dropped.

  We could see several people shrouded in robes. I couldn't tell if any of them were men, or women, or what. However, in the center, I could clearly see a middle-aged man, lying fully naked in a bed with his gut paunch hanging down over a very small dick.

  I shuddered at the sight. Gabe cut me another glance, and I shrugged as if to say, What?

  The people standing around the bed started swaying back and forth, chanting louder. Then two young women came out. In their twenties, maybe. They were naked as well, and completely hairless except for their heads. One was a redhead, the other one a blonde. They climbed up on the bed and started to touch him, writhing all over his body.

  Gabe looked at me curiously, and I whispered, "Why do you think I know what the hell is going on?"

  But before either one of us could say anything more, we heard voices distantly behind us, and we panicked.

  "Tabs, do you see another way out? Another doorway?"

  I hooked my hand back toward the way we’d come, as I remembered seeing one next to the robes. I led the way back, and the voices were getting closer.

  I found the door. But when I opened it, it led to another closet, this one with several more of the dark red robes. I dragged Gabe into the small space with me.

  We could hear the voices drawing nearer, and looking up at Gabe, I bit my lip. "We're going to get caught."

  "What the fuck is going on here?" Gabe mumbled as he grabbed one of the robes, threw it around my shoulders, brought the hood up, and tied it around my neck. When I opened my mouth to say something, he placed a finger over my lips and shook his head. He grabbed another one and threw it on himself, and we were both completely shrouded.