At every turn, Dirk Falcon had shown me his giant heart. And even after me fucking him over multiple times, he’d continued to remain rock steady and give me the benefit of the doubt. I wanted to run to him and tell him I was finally done with all of the stupid things I’d asked him to put up with. I wanted to feel his strong arms around me and his deep, rumbling voice reassuring me I hadn’t used up the last of his forgiveness.
I didn’t know what the hell I would do if I had.
As I moved through the streets toward the public locker that held my stuff, I knew it was time to prove to Dirk Falcon that the trust between us went both ways.
It was the only move I had left.
33
Falcon
After catching up with the van several blocks over and regrouping, Nadine finally felt free to speak freely.
“Are you out of your fucking mind? No, I’m the crazy one giving you another chance after showing such piss-poor judgment on the Van Gogh job. You clearly misread this situation, misjudged your own asset. How could your entire team be so far off on this one, Agent Falcon?”
I’d been expecting this, but it still hurt like hell to hear the words out of her mouth. By trusting King, I’d betrayed my job and screwed over my team.
“The end result is exactly what you wanted,” I said calmly, trying to do damage control. “A Hungarian national is caught at the scene of the crown heist. There’s no connection to us. Win-win all around.”
“And your asset? Where the hell is King Wilde?”
I cleared my throat, wondering whether I’d ever get the chance to spank the fuck out of King for putting me in this position.
“He seems to have taken a different way out of the building than originally agreed upon.”
On the one hand, I was glad he hadn’t gotten trapped inside with Elek. On the other, the FBI would now consider him a fugitive asset who’d bailed in the middle of a mission after handing over a valuable antiquity to a known criminal.
To put it mildly, I’d never be able to bring him to the company picnic.
“I’ve already spoken to local police,” Nadine said.
My head spun. “Already?”
“They called in help from the task force. I explained we already had a team in Budapest investigating the theft of the crown. According to the police, the suspect they caught inside the rotunda was found in possession of a painting he claims is a forgery sold to him by Le Chaton. Needless to say, the man has offered all kinds of information about the notorious thief in exchange for his own freedom.”
Fuck.
“Okay, we need to get over there before Elek says anything else,” I said quickly.
“You mean Elek, King’s partner?” she asked. “Because there’s no other way they would have been there in that room at the exact same time unless they’d coordinated it.”
I’d thought the same thing, so it was driving me crazy that my heart still wanted to trust King when all evidence pointed to just how much I shouldn’t.
I was being an idiot. He’d already proven more interest in either revenge or partnership with Elek than in following my own damned orders or, hell, even being honest with me about his plans. I couldn’t have it both ways.
Either he was still working with Elek for some reason—in which case he’d played me yet again and I’d definitely be out of a job—or he wasn’t in cahoots with Elek but had, instead, arranged some kind of revenge rendezvous he didn’t trust me enough to tell me about.
Neither option was the behavior of someone who gave a shit about me.
To make matters worse? I was so worried about him, I felt like I was losing my mind. I slipped my phone out of my pocket and glanced at it in hopes of some crazy miracle scenario in which King had a phone on him and could reassure me with a call or text.
Assuming he cared enough to do even that.
Nothing. And the more time that passed without contact, the more I had to acknowledge King had his own agenda the whole time.
“So, you’re now in charge of this,” Nadine continued. “Get over there and prosecute an art thief. Thank god the man they have in custody is the Hungarian and not the American.”
What could I do but laugh?
Nadine’s mouth quirked up at the edges when I did. “This isn’t funny.”
“No, I know. It’s just… you have to admit, this is kind of exactly the scenario we wanted… Elek Kemény alone in the rotunda with the crown.”
“According to the inspector, there’s no sign of the crown yet,” Nadine warned. “If there is no crown and no King Wilde, this is going to turn into a real shitshow, Agent Falcon,” she said, packing up a small laptop into her shoulder bag before slinging it over her shoulder and checking her watch. “I’m giving you the benefit of the doubt right now because I refuse to believe we just handed a thousand-year-old priceless antiquity over to a known art thief. I hope they got that detail wrong. Need I remind you that the last time these two worked together, they stole a two-hundred-million-dollar original Van Gogh off the interior minister’s own wall? It’s probably in some drug lord’s sex den right about now, never to be seen again.”