About That Night (27 page)

“Uh-uh. No way.” Rae grabbed her purse and drink off the table. “You know I hate these kinds of things. They’re so artificial and forced.”

“Come on. After all the matchmaking schemes you’ve put me through since college, you owe me.”

“That’s probably true. But still, I’m out of here.” Rae took a step back from the table.

As if in slow motion, Rylann saw what was about to happen. “Rae, look—”

“Nice try, Pierce. But you’re going to have to try a little
harder to get the jump on me.” With a satisfied grin, she whirled around and—

—ran smack into the chest of one designer-suit-wearing Special Agent Sam Wilkins.

A chest now drenched in iced cappuccino.

“Oh my gosh, I am
so
sorry,” Rae blurted out.

He sighed. “It would have to be one of the Varvatos suits.” Then he peered down at Rae, seeing her face for the first time. “Oh. Hello.”

Rae’s gaze lingered several seconds, seemingly mesmerized by his dazzling smile. She held up the soggy napkin from her drink. “Napkin?”

He took the napkin from her. “Assault with a loaded cappuccino. That’s a new one.”

Just in time, Rae recovered her wits. “Purely self-defense. You sidled up on me without warning.”

“Those would be my stealth moves.” He held out his hand. “Special Agent Sam Wilkins.”

“Rae Ellen Mendoza.”

Back at the table, Rylann watched this interaction with interest. Rae
Ellen
? This was getting serious. She waved cheerfully at Wilkins. “Good to see you again, Sam.”

Rae shot her a look. “You two know each other?”

“Sure do.” Wilkins blotted the coffee on his suit with the wet napkin. “We work together.”

“How interesting,” Rae said. “And you just happened to be in the area?”

“Actually, yes,” Wilkins said. “I was in front of the grand jury this afternoon for three hours and needed some caffeine before heading back to the FBI office. Saw Rylann and thought I’d come over to say hi.”

“Oh.” Rae pointed to his wet suit, making an apologetic face. “Sorry you have to go back to the office like that.”

“Since I’m by far the best-dressed agent in the office, you’re really putting my reputation on the line here. Luckily, I know how you can make it up to me.” Wilkins reached into the inner pocket of his blazer, exposing a glimpse of his gun harness. He pulled out his business card and handed it to Rae.
“That’s my info. Call me—so I know where to send my dry cleaning bill,” he added with an amused sparkle in his light brown eyes.

Rae looked at the card, then back at Sam. “I’ll think about it.”

“You do that.” He handed her back the soggy napkin. “Because if you don’t call, Rae Ellen Mendoza, you’re going to ruin a really good meet-cute story.”

She smiled. “Since when do FBI agents know about meet-cutes?”

Wilkins winked as he turned to leave. “I think you’ll find that I’m not the average FBI agent.” He raised his hand in good-bye. “See you later, Rylann.”

And just as quickly as he appeared, he was gone.

“Well. That was fun.” Rylann picked up her latte and stood up from the table. Clearly, her business here was done.

Rae was silent as the two of them walked out of the Starbucks together. When they stepped outside, she finally caved. “All right. Tell me.”

“Yale Law School, joined the FBI last year. He works in the violent crimes division and specializes in homicide cases.”

Rae digested all that. “He’s a little young. But that smile is deadly.” She shot Rylann a coy look. “That was actually pretty smooth.”

The true tactical details of Operation Setup would go with Rylann to her grave. “Of course it was. You’re not the only one who’s a matchmaking evil genius.”

“I meant Agent Wilkins was pretty smooth.”

“So he passed the five-minute test?”

“We’ll see.” But Rae’s Cheshire Cat-like grin said it all as she walked away, heading in the direction of her office.

Rylann stood on the sidewalk, watching her friend go.

And all was right with the world.

“Rylann—hey.”

She looked over and saw Cade Morgan approaching.

He gestured behind him. “I just ran into Sam Wilkins, covered in cappuccino. He said something about a meet-cute?
No clue what that means.” He stopped next to her in front of the Starbucks. “So what did I miss?”

Rylann smiled.
Poor Cade.
So close and yet so far.

Maybe next time.

TO ENTERTAIN CLIENTS, Rhodes Network Consulting LLC—aka Kyle—had purchased a premium theater box at the United Center. The box included four private seats with perfect views just twenty-eight rows above the floor, in-seat wait service, and a reserved table at the stadium’s exclusive lounge and bar.

Of course, since Rhodes Network Consulting LLC currently had no clients, the box hadn’t seen a lot of action as of late. Thus, after Jordan had essentially decreed that he and Nick have a guy’s night out to “bond,” Kyle had offered up the seats and told Nick to feel free to bring along a friend. He’d also asked Dex to join them—the more the merrier, he’d figured.

Perhaps not always the best words to live by.

Kyle warily eyed the two FBI agents—yes, now there were two; apparently they multiplied like wet gremlins—as they pushed open the red privacy curtain and entered the theater box.

“How nice,” he said to Nick. “You brought the guy who nearly snapped my ankle off putting on a monitoring device.”

Nick turned to the tall guy with dark hair and dark eyes next to him. “I totally forgot about that.”

The other agent—Special Agent Jack Pallas, if memory served—looked just as surprised. “You only said you had an extra ticket,” he said to Nick. “You didn’t say who else would be here.”

Nick looked between Jack and Kyle. “This is a little awkward.”

The waitress stepped into the box, having seen the two agents arrive. “Can I get anyone something to drink?”

Four hands shot up. “A beer.”

After the waitress left, Nick and Jack took the two seats in the back row, directly behind Kyle and Dex.

“In my defense,” Jack said to Kyle, “you were flirting with my girlfriend at the time. And you called me Wolverine.”

Kyle smiled to himself, having forgotten that part of the story. On the night he’d been released from prison, the U.S. attorney, Cameron Lynde, along with Agent Pallas, had met with him to explain that she’d arranged for him to serve out the remainder of his sentence on supervised release—all part of Jordan’s deal with the FBI and U.S. Attorney’s Office, although Kyle hadn’t known that at the time.

Seeing as how the U.S. attorney had been the first woman other than Jordan Kyle had seen in four months, and not having realized that she and Pallas were involved, he may have thrown one or two perfectly harmless, mildly flirtatious comments in her direction.

“Maybe you boys could call it even?” Nick suggested, looking between Kyle and Jack.

With a shrug, Jack turned to Kyle. “Not like I have much choice in the matter.” He nodded in Nick’s direction. “McCall here was just promoted to special agent in charge. I don’t want to get shipped off to Peoria on some two-year grunt-work assignment because I screwed things up with the boss’s future brother-in-law.”

Kyle shot Nick a horrified look. “Brother-in-law?”

From the seat next to him, Dex slapped Kyle on the shoulder. “See? And you were worried we wouldn’t have things to talk about.”

FORTUNATELY, ALL NEED for nuanced conversation fell by the wayside once the game started. As part of his promise to Jordan to make an “effort,” Kyle had specifically chosen a Bulls-Knicks game, since Nick was from New York and apparently a huge fan.

And so the lines were drawn. Team rivalry prevailed, replacing the former divide between ex-con and FBI agent, and the trash talk began to fly. They were men, after all—rare
was the issue that could not be at least temporarily set aside within the confines of a sports arena.

Just before halftime, however, they hit their first glitch during a time-out.

“So what’s going on with you and Rylann these days?” Dex asked casually.

Kyle froze with his beer halfway to his mouth.

Such a
stupid
way to get caught.

He’d been out of town since Wednesday and hadn’t had the opportunity to fill Dex in on the clandestine nature of his goings-on with Prosecutrix Pierce. Nor had he had any idea that Nick would bring Rylann’s boss’s boyfriend to the game.

Still, he’d be damned if their cover would be blown on his watch. He’d promised Rylann that he would keep their relationshi—er, hot, no-strings-attached fling—a secret, and he intended to keep that promise. Because if
she
thought that her boss thought something was up, she would undoubtedly put the kibosh on all future rendezvous.

And he wasn’t ready to give up Rylann quite yet.

So he stretched out in his chair, playing it casual. “Nothing’s going on, unfortunately. She shot me down that night at the club. Something about not mixing business with pleasure.”

Dex frowned, understandably confused, since Kyle had told him he was going to Rylann’s that night, and opened his mouth to say something.

Kyle subtly shook his head.

Dex paused for a split second, then his eyes flickered over to Jack and Nick, seeming to catch on that something was up. So he, too, played it casual. “That sucks. I thought you were in there that night.”

“You weren’t the only one,” Kyle said with a chuckle. “Just wasn’t meant to be, I guess.”

“You’re talking about Rylann Pierce?”

The question came from Jack. Kyle looked over his shoulder and saw the FBI agent studying him curiously.

“Good guess,” Kyle said, maintaining a look of nonchalance.

Jack shrugged. “Not really. Unusual name. Plus, I know you worked with her. My partner is Sam Wilkins—he mentioned that Rylann had interviewed you as part of the Quinn investigation.”

Damn FBI agents and assistant U.S. attorneys. Apparently, they were thick as thieves when it came to knowing everyone else’s business. “Oh. Right.”

Jack took a sip of his beer. “When you were working with Rylann, did she ever tell you the meth lab story?”

Kyle studied the agent, thinking he suddenly seemed awfully chatty. He also noticed that Nick was watching both of them closely. “Not that I recall.”

“It’s a good one. Made its way around all the FBI offices,” Jack said. “Apparently, a few years ago, your friend Rylann worked on a big drug case in San Francisco—an organized crime group that was running an underground meth lab in the middle of this overgrown wooded area. Anyway, she tells the agents working the investigation that she wants to see the lab in person. But on the day they’re set to go out to the lab, she’s running late because of court or something, and she shows up to meet them wearing a skirt suit and heels.”

Kyle smiled at that part. Of course she did.

“So these two agents, who were likely being smug and cocky about the situation, decide not to tell Rylann the exact setup of this meth lab,” Jack continued. “Then they drive her out to the middle of the forest and take her to this three-foot-wide hole in the ground that’s covered by a metal door—kind of like a submarine hatch. And when they open the door, there’s nothing but a ladder that goes fifteen feet underground.”

“Sounds like something out of
Lost
,” Dex said.

“Exactly.” Jack cocked his head and looked at Kyle. “Hey, has anyone ever told you—”

“Only people who need to get
lives
, since the show ended two years ago,” Kyle growled. He rolled his hand, gesturing impatiently. “Let’s get back to this underground hatch.” He could picture Rylann, in one of her skirt suits and heels, standing in the forest with two dickhead FBI agents who were trying to rattle her.

Jack went on with the story. “So Rylann and these two agents are standing over the hatch, and she points to the hole in the ground and asks, ‘Is that where we’re going?’ And they say yes, and of course they’re looking at her in her suit and heels and thinking she’s going to balk at the whole thing. But instead, she takes off her shoes and tucks them into the back of her skirt like it’s nothing, and says, ‘How about if I go first? That way you boys aren’t tempted to look up my skirt.’ And then down the ladder she went.”

Kyle laughed hard at that. Man, this girl impressed the hell out of him sometimes.

Actually, all the time.

“You were right. That
is
a good story.” Mindful of the role he still needed to play, he shook his head with mock regret. “Too bad it didn’t work out. She and I could’ve had a lot of fun.”

“Maybe, maybe not,” Jack said dismissively. “I heard a rumor that she and Cade Morgan are getting close. Really close, if you know what I mean.”

Morgan.

His nemesis.

Kyle gripped the arm of his seat so tightly he was surprised it didn’t break off in his hand. “Good for Morgan,” he managed coolly.

Just then, the halftime buzzer rang.

Nick stood up. “The scoreboard doesn’t lie, sports fans,” he said, gloating over the fact that the Knicks were up by eight. “Which means, if I remember correctly, that one of you boys owes me a drink.” He clasped Kyle’s shoulder. “I’ll let you have the honor, Sawyer. Come join me at the bar.”

AS SOON AS Kyle and Nick got to the bar in the stadium’s private lounge, the FBI agent’s expression turned more serious. “You do realize that you’re being interrogated, don’t you?”

“Thanks, I’m aware of that,” Kyle said dryly. And he didn’t like it one bit.

“Pallas softens you up with the meth lab story, then hits
you with the comment about Morgan to see your reaction. One of the oldest tricks in the book.” Nick gestured to the bartender. “Two Maker’s Marks, neat.”

“I think your friend Jack needs to mind his own business.”

“Jack’s a good guy. And he’s a fantastic agent,” Nick said. “But his number-one priority is, and will always be, to protect the U.S. attorney. And if he thinks there’s something Cameron would want to know about—like the fact that one of her top prosecutors is fooling around with the Twitter Terrorist—he’s going to be on top of it.”

He nodded when the bartender slid the two whiskeys in front of them and handed one to Kyle. “Here. You look like you need it.”