The voices were closer now. So close. What the hell were we going to say?

  He kept one hand on his weapon, and I shook my head. A single shot was going to bring unwanted visitors. We would have no answers as to what the underground party was and we'd be nowhere near bringing in Disick.

  When the doorknob started to twist, my heart jumped against my ribs, hammering, begging for freedom, as if it was going to make its escape whether the rest of my body could follow or not.

  As the door started to creak open, knowing we were up against a wall, I acted on instinct, grabbing Gabe by his robe. I yanked him down, pushed us close together, and in one bold move I crashed my lips onto his.

  5

  Gabe

  Shut together in that confined wardrobe, my whole world shifted in a moment. All sense of control and order melted away, and my body was a raging fire of passion and need, burning like an unholy flame.

  Tabatha's sassy wit and delectable, smart mouth tugged at something deep inside me. She was my sister's best friend, and I was her commander.

  Touching her was never, ever an option. But in a split second, the control I'd held onto from the moment I’d seen her flouncing around her university campus finally snapped, the floodgates bursting the moment she joined her lips to mine.

  Was this the first time I’d yielded to my emotions since my parents died? Since I'd left MI5? I couldn't remember. All that mattered was the intense, consuming, all-encompassing craving for Tabatha that only grew stronger with each second. I wanted to devour her until my hunger was sated. If it ever could be sated.

  My arousal raged out of control when Tabatha fisted my shirt and pulled me closer, the heat of her body driving me over the edge. With one hand in her hair, I hitched her leg over my hip, feeling my cock twitch feverishly with anticipation as I reached up that slit in her dress that drove me insane on the dance floor earlier.

  As I traveled further up her thigh, not even fully aware we were being watched, my cock demanded I free him, so eager to be inside her. I fought the urge to snatch her dress off and slide into her, balls deep. I desperately wanted to make her wet and sticky with me. No condom. No barrier between the pulse of her pussy squeezing me.

  Finally, voices filtered in through the haze of lust and I realized where we were. The mission. This fucking closet. Tabatha had kissed me, and I’d let myself forget we were on the trail of a criminal.

  And you kissed her back.

  A fact I was sure she was going to make me regret.

  Anything for the mission, right?

  Slowly, I pulled my lips from hers. Tabatha's eyes were cloudy, and she looked dazed with her lips full and bruised. She quickly came around and registered there were other men here when she heard one speak up rather loudly. "You two are getting started without the rest of us. The real ceremony is downstairs. Bring her down. We'll tie her up with the other offerings."

  And well, if that wasn't like a bucket of ice water on my libido, hearing these freak jobs had women tied up for their disposal.

  "For fuck's sake," I grunted and nodded. "Be there in a moment."

  I waited until they were gone and the door closed again before I set Tabatha back on her feet.

  "Did you hear that? You need to relay the message to Saff and have her bring Amelia down here fast." When I spoke, my voice was gravelly. It didn't even bloody sound like me.

  Yeah, genius, that's what happens when you snog one of your goddamn agents.

  "Yeah, we’ve gotta get to the women they have tied up." Tabatha's breath was still coming out short and choppy.

  Before I opened the door again, I turned to her. "You all right, Monarch?"

  She nodded, her eyes still glazed, but her lips were set in a grim line. She had already let go of the moment.

  There was no moment. She kissed you to save the bloody mission, not because she wants you, dipshit.

  Had to give it to Tabs, it was a pretty brilliant move because those twats hadn't seen our faces. But there was no accounting for the sting I was feeling from the obvious rejection. I usually didn't care that much about the women I kissed, but I didn't remember that ache happening before.

  Well, this is Tabatha, maybe you care a little more than you are letting on.

  She was my agent, and I had to trust her, but I couldn't bring myself to fully care for her.

  Silently we stepped out of the closet, our eyes never meeting, instead scanning the area for additional possible threats. Finally, our coms were back online and our phones vibrated. We looked down hastily and saw a text that Saff was on her way to us because Rook had obtained plans to the facility that included this underground area.

  We walked in our usual protection pattern. Taking turns being point, but still, when a robed figure stepped out into the hall, reaching for Tabatha, my fury sprang to the surface. My gun was out in a flash.

  He tightened his arm around Tabatha’s neck. For her part, she was smart and had tucked her chin.

  “Monarch, move.”

  Her eyes went wide, and I watched her hand slide up under her dress for her knives. She was capable, but my gun was faster. She did not move, however.

  Instead, she jabbed her knife into his thigh, and when he loosened his grip, she twisted his arm away from her, leaving me a clear shot… which I took.

  Two tranqs to the chest. “Next time I tell you to move, bloody move.”

  “I thought you were going to use real bullets. Which are loud and ill-advised right now.”

  She grabbed his arms, and I grabbed his feet as we carried him to the wardrobe we’d just vacated. “You think I would use real bullets?”

  “Never know with you.”

  She had a point.

  By the time we read the text, Saff was almost to us and Tabatha pointed toward the pathway to the right. "We know what’s down the other way, let’s have a look this direction."

  We barged into the room with Saff and Amelia following right behind. There we found three naked women, blindfolded, bound, and on their knees. Saff and Tabatha ran forward. I yanked off my robe, immediately covering one of the women. Tabatha did the same. And then I also chucked off my tuxedo suit jacket and placed it on the other one.

  We took off their blindfolds, and Saff spoke first. "You're free. You're safe. We're here to help you."

  One of the women's eyes went wide. "What? No, I was promised."

  Saff frowned. "Promised what?"

  "I was promised I'd be purified with love through my blood bond. I’m ready to sacrifice my pussy.”

  Saff and Amelia exchanged glances. Tabatha glanced back at me, like I knew what the fuck to do. Cult activity was not my forte.

  "Let's get them out of here. We'll sort it out later."

  Amelia had called in the rest of her team, and that was how the gala ended. With Interpol riding in on their white horses.

  What the hell had just happened here?

  Whatever it was, it was not what we thought and not completely in line with the supposed evidence we’d been given.

  A full thirty minutes later, Amelia and I had the chance to interview one of the supposed victims, a woman named Mariah Cunning. She was pissed off at us for ruining the "ceremony."

  Tonight was to be her purification ritual that we interrupted. And as it turned out, our would-be human trafficker wasn't trafficking anyone. The women we found bound were all volunteers, above age eighteen and happily joining a sex cult.

  Yup, that was right.

  A sex cult.

  Lachlan and Saint were going to be dining on this one for weeks. Fucking weeks dragging my arse through the mud.

  We had been called in on false evidence.

  So far, we'd only found the three women. Other attendees of the gala hadn't even known what the hell was going on. Which, I supposed, was promising. It wasn't like they had knowingly attended a sex cult party.

  For fuck's sake, what the hell was wrong with people?

  I liked to think things were simple. Bad guys, good guys. We ran in and stopped something truly evil from happening.

  But oh no! We didn't stop anything actually evil. Unless the true evil was some of the haircuts that we'd seen in there.

  Nothing untoward was going on there at all. Just your everyday, run-of-the-mill idiots doing dumb things voluntarily.

  So I hadn't kissed Tabatha for Queen and Country after all.

  Oh no, you kissed her because you wanted to.

  I found my team, shoes in hand, getting a debrief from Amelia. "Um, we want to thank Rogues for your assistance. Sorry there was no trafficker here for you to apprehend."

  I shrugged. "It was a joint effort, and we are part of the team."

  She laughed. "Yes, but I know you’re part of the team that we only call for extreme emergencies. Which is what I honestly thought this was."

  I shrugged. "No harm, no foul. Glad to be of service."

  She nodded. "Why don't you all get some rest? It's been a long night, and my feet are killing me."

  Just when I turned to dismiss the team, I caught sight of Tabatha chatting with Phineas Devlin, who had been in the van with Kaya for training purposes. He casually threw his jumper over her shoulder, and I gritted my teeth.

  If he didn’t get his bloody hands off her, I was going to separate them from his body.

  6

  Gabe

  I jolted awake with my heart racing and sweat pouring down my face. It was the same nightmare I’d had a hundred times before. The burning plane, the smoke, the screams… and my father.

  In the dream, I was trying to save him, but he wouldn’t let me. Instead, he made me swear to protect my sister Saffron and her legacy. I had no idea what he meant by that, but the urgency in his voice always left me shaken.

  I took a deep breath and tried to shake off the feeling of dread. It was just a dream, nothing more. But no matter how many times I told myself that, the images always lingered.

  My heart wouldn’t stop hammering. Didn’t dare slow. As if I was the one who had watched them die without being able to say goodbye.

  The minutes ticked by, and I employed all the deep breathing techniques meant to keep an operative calm in the field until I could breathe again.

  But the moment I could let go of the fear, something else was back.

  My bloody lips still tingled. They hadn’t stopped tingling since she’d kissed me.

  Tabatha had bloody kissed me.

  For a mission.

  Anyone in recovery would tell you it was best to not even get a taste of whatever your vice was, or it could have dire consequences. Like if I had a gambling addiction, even small dares and bets with mates was a bad idea.

  I’d had a taste now, and the taste of her was never leaving my tongue.

  I rubbed my eyes. I was bloody knackered and needed some damn sleep. After the stag do the other night, the wedding, and then tonight, I could have used a night of turning off the adrenaline spigot. Maybe it was time to head out to the house in Hampshire. I’d get some fresh air and a couple of days of solace and forget that I knew Tabatha tasted of spun sugar and the strongest spiced rum.

  And maybe, after I cleared my mind, I’d get some clarity on why Oversight had gotten tonight so wrong. Rogues were the team you called in for the darkest, dirtiest, most difficult missions. Tonight had been a waste of time and resources.

  That happens sometimes.

  Yes, sometimes we got bad intel. But bad intel always ended up blowing up in our faces. Not fizzling like a limp dick. Something was off. Very off.

  The shit soup of the mission churned in my skull as I tried to go back to sleep. That's when the wretched phone pinged with a coded text from Gennifer Goode.

  Oversight wants your cock:

  "Are you still up? We need to talk about tonight. Meet me."

  For fuck's sake, what the hell did she want? Was her name in my contacts immature? Yes. Was it accurate? Also, yes. She had made no bones about it. Call me a fool, but I liked the idea of my cock still being there when I woke up in the morning.

  You know what she wants. Ignore it, mate. You don't want to do this.

  I didn’t. But I couldn’t ignore a summons either.

  Rogues operated mostly independently. As Ops Command, I was the head of Rogues. We worked for the British government and served at the pleasure of the monarch. In this case, Chuck, as I liked to call him. I received assignments from the Prime Minister and Home Office, and occasionally directly through the particular arm of government that needed our assistance. But all missions were vetted and scrutinized by a panel of representatives from each arm called Oversight.

  Oversight was designed to move quickly without much of the bureaucracy our government was known for. I was often dragged in to explain myself or give mission profiles. Sometimes I was called in to advise on other Home Office concerns.

  However, the charter Grandfather had set up when he created Rogues stated only a full-blooded Abott could sit as Operations Command. But if an Abott was not yet twenty-five, an interim Ops Command would be chosen. And in the case that there was no full-blooded Abott to take over, the division would be disbanded. All personnel would be dispersed into the standard government divisions.

  I was just the temporary Ops Command until Saffron Abott-King was ready to take the helm. If she felt ready, she could take over now, but she’d only been a field agent for a little over two years. She needed seasoning. More time. So until then, I kept the promise I’d made to my father and watched over her legacy.

  I kept the seat warm for Saff and made sure she had a seat to fill when all was said and done.

  Lately, Oversight was gunning for control over Rogues since technically a blooded Abott wasn't Ops Command. To fight off that takeover, I had been trying to speed up Saff's training. I wanted to make sure those who wanted control over Rogues wouldn't be able to take it easily. Or worse, black box the division.

  A black box would wipe the Rogues clean as if we never existed and allocate agents worth keeping to other agencies. Likely, Saff, Lock, Saint, Rook, Tabs, and myself. They’d terminate all others and wipe Rogues effectively off the map.

  Which was never going to happen. Not as long as I was alive.

  Gabe:

  Not tonight.

  Oversight wants your cock:

  It's important.

  Gabe:

  Then why aren't you calling on the secure channel?

  I knew how the game was played.

  Oversight wants your cock:

  It's about your mission. There's an important question.

  I glowered at my text messages. I should ignore this. I needed to ignore this, but if it really did involve my team, I needed to at least talk to her.

  Gabe:

  I'm knackered.

  Oversight wants your cock:

  Understood. Meet me briefly. End of the path along the tree line. I'm waiting.

  Fuck. She was here? Christ.

  I shoved out of bed and grabbed my usual black cargos and long-sleeved black pullover. Saff seemed to think my wardrobe was a travesty, but I didn’t need other clothes. Besides, I had real clothes at home. I didn’t keep anything real about me here… except for my sister.

  As soon as I changed, I picked up my phone and texted, On my way.

  The idea of meeting up with Gennifer in the dark had my cock softening compared to the aroused state I had been in all night. All that motherfucker wanted was Tabatha and her flaming red hair.

  Not tonight mate. Not tonight.

  When I reached the trees, I saw Gennifer leaning against her car, clad in a soft gray sweater dress, her blonde hair secured in a topknot. "Gennifer, you got me here, so what's the emergency?"

  "Gabe, you look knackered."

  "Yeah, we had a mission tonight, remember?"

  "Yes, but last I checked, you were in a tuxedo, weren't you?"

  "It's the standard operating procedure to change and return the fancy gear."

  She eyed me up and down, and I got the distinct impression I was very much a piece of steak she wanted to grill. "The sex cult thing, what happened?"

  I frowned. "It's all in the report, Gennifer. No trafficking. The women were there voluntarily. The men were handed off to Interpol for questioning about past activities, but we couldn't find evidence of any actual wrongdoing except them just being weird. But from what we could tell, everyone was there of their own accord. We turned that place over good and have nothing to show for it."

  She nodded. "Just your average, everyday sex cult? Is there any chance they were warned?"

  I frowned and crossed my arms. "Warned of what? That we were coming?”

  She pressed her lips together and pulled out a tablet. It showed an aerial shot of the grounds we’d just left a few hours ago about ten minutes before we arrived, and something was being moved across the back of the property. It appeared as if about ten people were scuttled into a van, and then the van drove off.

  “What the hell is this?”

  She shrugged. “We believe that the people being trafficked were moved just before your arrival.”

  “You think someone told them? Who?”

  She leveled her gaze on me. “How well was your team vetted? Tabatha Smith especially. From my understanding she has unusual access to you and Saffron. Or Westin O’Rourke, also known as Westin St. James. His file is patchy at best. My main concern is Tabatha though. There were several moments when her comm feedback was sketchy.”

  I blinked slowly at her, trying to force my brain to comprehend what she was saying.

  “You think one of my team notified them.”