“She’s a gem,” he says, voice soft and tender, cutting into the normal briskness of his British accent. “Are you going to stay in one of the apartments?”
I shrug, because I’ve been waffling on this. “I’m not sure it’s necessary. I know Jess can’t be any safer than here.”
“And the new guy just moved into one of them,” Cage says and looks over to Jackson. “What’s his name?”
“Kellen McCord,” Jackson replies.
I’d forgotten all about the dude who is starting this week. He’s a former K9 cop with the military, moving here from the West Coast.
“Yeah,” Cage says, looking across the table at me. “Kellen’s here, so you won’t have to worry about evenings.”
“Then it looks like I’m good to stay at my place,” I say, now having no legitimate reason to use one of the empty HQ apartments. I’ve decided I need some space from Jess as insecurities leak back in.
Bebe coughs into her hand. “Bullshit.”
I turn my attention to her, calling her out. “Why’s that bullshit?”
“Well, first,” she says, looking me dead in the eye, “Jess, Claire, and Thea are completely out of their element, and it’s only polite that you stay here in the building with them so they don’t feel out of place.”
It’s a good point. Her best one, really, because my consideration in staying at my place rather than here has everything to do with the fact I’m not sure how to be around Jess.
Last night on the patio, I said we needed to talk, and her reaction to that—the shimmer in her eyes—told me it would be a talk that would drastically change our lives.
And I fucking got scared.
By the time I read Thea a story and Jess tucked her in, I was freaking myself out that there could actually be potential to be with the woman I’ve loved for what seems like forever.
So I slipped away, mumbling some excuse about wanting to hang with my dad and catch up.
Which was not a complete untruth. Yesterday I saw a different side to my dad, and it’s frankly made me curious about him.
But that’s neither here nor there.
“And your other point?” I prompt her.
She glances at Kynan, Jackson, and Cage for a moment before bringing her eyes back to me. “I just think you have personal things you need to work through and proximity is your best friend.”
There have been many times since meeting Bebe that I’ve had great respect and admiration for her, but now it’s at an all-time high. I knew she was going to throw in my face my nonexistent relationship on the romantic side with Jess, but I’m glad she did it in such a way and with such vagueness that the other three men staring at us in puzzlement don’t really know what’s going on.
I lock eyes with Bebe, my expression warning her not to go any further. “Perhaps you and I can find a minute to discuss that later.”
“Of course,” she says, tipping her head in understanding.
“All right,” Kynan drawls sarcastically, “if you two are done talking in code, let’s address the issue at hand—how we solve the problem of Ivan Borovsky.”
“We need to find him,” Jackson says.
The most obvious.
But definitely not the easiest thing to do.
Kynan proceeds to give us a new update based on conversations he had with law enforcement agencies this morning while we were in the air from Miami to Pittsburgh. No further tips have panned out, and there’s not been a legitimate sighting in over twelve hours.
“It could mean he’s reached Miami and is in hiding,” Cage suggests.
“If there’s a God, maybe Borovsky got attacked by a pack of coyotes and is rotting in a forest somewhere,” Jackson says.
We all chuckle at the thought, but we know he probably has had some help from his Russian connections for his journey south.
Bebe taps her pen on the table. “I’ve got my facial recognition software running full tilt. It’s going to be unlikely, though, that we catch a glimpse of him because he’ll be staying far away from public places. If he’s traveling via rural roads to Miami, Podunk towns won’t have traffic cameras I can tap into.”
“But if he’s in Miami,” I point out, “he might start feeling a bit safer and pop his head out.”
“So we have to depend on Borovsky doing something stupid in order to pick him up through the software,” Bebe concludes.
“Unfortunately, he’s not a stupid man,” I rumble.
He’s a skillful adversary.
“It’s not just Borovsky we have to worry about,” Kynan interjects. “He has any number of men willing to go out and find Jess and bring her in at any cost. Granted, I’m sure their instructions are to bring her in alive, but until he’s back in custody, she must remain in hiding.”
“Who exactly is heading up the manhunt?” I ask Kynan. Despite there being a lot of agencies involved, one will take the lead.