“My name’s Cale Lane.”
The words could be a lie. Other EOD agents had given her false names before. “All right, fine, Cale.” She headed toward him, her steps angry, a little too hard, but their sound was swallowed by the thick carpeting. “We’re ending this farce right now.”
She’d get Mercer on the phone. He could call off his attack dog.
“Why were those men after you?”
He didn’t know?
Her steps slowed.
“Two men died tonight,” he continued. “Two men who seem to have no identities. Their fingerprints had been burned away, and, so far, no one can figure out a single thing about their pasts.”
Her mouth was getting dry. “The EOD can figure out plenty. Just give them time.”
“Are you part of the EOD?”
He seemed so doubting that it was actually insulting. But she bit her lip before she snapped back a response at him. He obviously thought she was nothing but a piece of fluff, flitting around from party to party.
After all, wasn’t that exactly what she’d been doing for the past week, ever since she’d arrived in Rio? One party after another.
But that was her cover. What she was supposed to do.
Pity no one ever actually looked beneath her cover appearance.
Not even Mercer.
“I stood between you and a bullet tonight,” Cale sa
id. His voice seemed even rougher, and it sent a shiver over her. “Don’t you think that entitles me to some explanations?”
No, she didn’t. “I don’t remember telling you to stand there.” Actually, if he hadn’t gotten in her way, then she would have finally made the headway that she needed on this case. Instead, he’d gotten all tough and alpha male, and she’d had to act defenseless as he’d carried her away.
If she’d fought him too hard, if she’d broken free, then all that she’d worked for would have been destroyed in an instant.
He rose slowly, a lethal shadow that came toward her with slow, stalking steps. She refused to retreat from him, but when he closed in, every cell in her body flashed on high alert.
Being near him made her feel too on edge.
Too aware.
She shoved back that awareness. Locked it deep inside.
“Two men got away tonight,” Cale told her. “Doesn’t that worry you?”
Yes. “No.”
“Liar.”
He seemed so sure. No one had seen past her lies before, so why would he be any different? “I want you out of my room.”
He didn’t move.
Fine. She skirted around him, made it to her nightstand and grabbed the smart phone there. One press of her fingers and— “Mercer?” she said when the EOD’s director answered the call. “What have you done now?”
She heard Cale’s sharp inhale.
“You’ve got the EOD director on speed dial?” he asked, seemingly shocked.