Birds of Prey (7 page)

“They need to leave the investigation to us. This is what we’re here for,” he argued.

“It’s not like they are complete amateurs,” Ryder maintained.

Cody didn’t reply. He knew that Ryder was right, but that didn’t help him any. It wasn’t just the fact that they’d been looking for something. Cody had a feeling he knew exactly who had found the file.

Aubrey. She couldn’t leave anything alone.

And he hadn’t been able to get her out of his mind. After speaking to Anton, Cody had been completely devastated. He’d had a few minutes with Zak and Jamie and that had helped, but he’d wanted Aubrey.

Really, he should have predicted that she would stick her pretty little nose into his investigation.

He wasn’t surprised, just irritated. And he hoped that she would be there when he went to get the file. He would make sure she understood that she needed to stay out of the investigation.

They pulled up to the gate—he noted it had been repaired—and he pulled out his ID for the guard. He remembered the woman from the interview.

“Yes, sir.” She nodded respectfully. “Mike is expecting you and will meet you at the front door.”

Cody thanked her before driving through the gates that were opening.

He pushed down the feeling of disappointment that Aubrey hadn’t been at the gate or the one greeting him. That didn’t mean he couldn’t enquire about her.

If she had found the file, it would be proper procedure to ask her about it.

Satisfied, he brought his vehicle to a stop.

As he and Ryder climbed out, the front door opened. Cody heard Ryder draw in a sharp breath.

Cody glanced over at Ryder, who was staring at Mike with what could only be hunger on his face.

Cody did his best not to smirk.

He suspected that Mike was the reason Ryder had volunteered to come with him. Cody strode up the front steps, bumping into Ryder purposely to wake his partner up.

Ryder grumbled, but quickly followed behind him. Cody couldn’t stop his chuckle.

“Agents, thank you for coming.” Mike held out a hand.

“We appreciate the call,” Cody replied.

“Sure.” Mike motioned them into the house. “Come on in.”

“Agent Evans,” Mike said to Ryder as Cody entered the house.

“Mr Williams.” Ryder’s voice was surprisingly low.

Cody turned in the entrance, stuffing his hands in his pockets. Ryder was gripping Mike’s hand and both men were staring into each other’s eyes.

He cleared his throat.

Ryder and Mike released each other, then Ryder scurried over to Cody.

During all the months that Cody had known Ryder, he’d never seen him act this way.

Cody had to have missed it the day before. His seeing Aubrey again and his own turmoil had blinded him to what was going on with his partner. Ryder was always so calm and controlled. Years of teaching the military hand-to-hand combat lessons had left him hardened. The abrupt change in Ryder’s demeanour amused Cody.

“You called us about a file you found?” Cody asked, turning his attention to Mike.

Still grinning at Ryder, Mike answered Cody in a distracted manner. “Yes, one of my security team came across this earlier.”

Cody took the folder that Mike held out then opened it. He flipped through the pictures and handwritten notes.

“Who found it?” he asked, looking up.

Mike pressed his lips together.

“Come on, man,” Cody encouraged. “You know I’m going to have to talk to them.”

Mike sighed. “Aubrey Reynolds.”

He nodded. Just as he’d suspected. “Where she’d find it?”

“In Gregory’s room,” Mike supplied.

“We searched his room,” Cody reminded him.

Mike shrugged.

That wasn’t a good enough answer. Cody stared at him.

“You know how Aubrey is.” Mike advanced while lowering his voice.

So Mike was aware of their past relationship.

“Yes.”

“So you can understand when I say she knew where to look,” he told Cody.

“Okay,” Cody conceded. “I still want to talk to her.”

Mike stared at him with a hard look in his eyes. Cody wasn’t up for taking him on right then. His frustration was with Aubrey not Mike. Since he wasn’t sure what exactly Mike wanted from him, Cody remained silent until the other man sighed.

“Your call, Agent.”

“Can you take Ryder and show him where this was located?” he asked, waving the file.

“Sure.” Mike smiled widely.

“And just point me in Aubrey’s direction.”

“Last time I saw her, she was in the kitchen.”

Cody remembered the way from his earlier search of the house. He nodded at Ryder to go ahead and went to find Aubrey.

He picked up her scent right away. She’d walked down the same hall less than an hour ago.

Bent over a sheet of paper, Aubrey wrote furiously while mumbling under her breath. He paused at the doorway leading into the kitchen, leaned against the wall and watched.

The minute she knew he was there was obvious. Her entire demeanour changed and she tensed before she looked up with narrowed eyes. “Yes?”

He shook the folder. “We need to talk.”

Aubrey glanced from the file to his face and back again. After several moments, she nodded.

Cody pushed off the wall and made his way over to the table. She shut her laptop and placed it over the papers she’d been working on.

He slapped down the packet and sat right next to her.

“So, Mike gave you the papers and photos,” she said. “What do you want from me?”

Cody tapped his finger on the table. He was an expert in interrogation, but his heart pounded frantically just from his being close to her. He needed to collect himself.

His proximity to Aubrey was testing him in every way. His hard cock pressed against the zipper of his pants and he ached to touch her.

She sat back in her chair before crossing her arms.

Her uncooperative gesture helped to cool him down.

“Where did you find this?”

“In Gregory’s room,” she responded with a roll of her eyes. “Guess you missed it.”

Her challenge hung between them. And Cody was up for the confrontation. He had no doubt that he’d come up ahead.

Aubrey was stubborn, but he’d been trained by the best. He knew her attitude came from the shock of seeing him again. Cody was trying to rein in his own temper because he understood why she was so angry.

“How’d you know where to look? Or did you even find this?” He opened the file and pulled out the photos. “Who’s this?”

She didn’t even glance down. “If I knew who that was, I wouldn’t be sitting here.”

He didn’t react to her sharp tone. He picked up the loose papers. “What’s all this about?”

“Do you want me to do all of your work for you?” she snapped, leaning towards him. “I found the folder under Gregory’s mattress.”

“Under his mattress? Hmm, yeah, why didn’t we look there? Probably because we did and nothing was there.” He was baiting her, wanting her to let something slip and give him some kind of information. “Why don’t you try the truth?”

“Look—”

He pounded the table with his fist. “No, you look,” he ordered in a low tone. “If I’d had this information earlier, it would have given us a connection to the Flock. I didn’t have a connection, so I didn’t warn them. Now one of my good friends is dead.”

She paled.

“So you are going to stop giving me a hard time and start talking.”

She took a deep breath. Her breasts rose and Cody couldn’t help but drop his gaze. She shifted in her seat and looked unsure for the first time.

“Start from the beginning,” he demanded, but his anger had passed. If Aubrey had actually been trying to gather information, he didn’t want to have her close off.

“I had already looked through Gregory’s room after you left yesterday. I didn’t find anything. But I kept asking myself—if he wanted to hide something, where would he?” she started to explain.

“He had a safe,” Cody pointed out.

“Too many people knew about the safe. All the security team plus anyone in the inner circle. There had to be somewhere else,” she added. “Then I remembered.”

“Remembered what?”

“About a year ago, Gregory and I were discussing the possibility of trouble when we went public with the other shifters. Although we were supposed to have support from the government, I was concerned we would all be taken in and used for experiments.”

So Aubrey hadn’t supported the shifter’s exposure. That was something to think about.

He had been behind the reveal from the start. He believed it was time for the shifter communities to stop hiding. They deserved the same freedom and rights as any other person. People shouldn’t live in fear because they were shifters.

They had to be more careful.

Now, with the public knowledge of shifters and the new laws protecting them, Cody felt good about supporting the movement.

“So we started to make plans to protect the Cast in case something happened. One of the ideas we discussed was hiding the Cast files on our members,” Aubrey told him.

“And?”

“We never talked about it again, but I remembered suggesting, as a joke, taping the files under the mattress. When I got here this morning, I looked.” She tilted her head towards the pages on the file. “That’s what I found.”

Cody believed her. She looked him in the eye as she spoke.

“Mike took the file and called you.”

“After you both read through it.”

She shrugged.

“So what do you make of it?” He knew she would already be working on her own investigation. There was no way that Aubrey was willing to let anything go. She hadn’t changed that much, he was sure of that.

“I don’t know. I really don’t. The only name I knew was your Flock leader.”

Cody was certain that Aubrey had already started a search on the other names, but he knew better than to ask. They’d just have to beat her to it. Take her out of the enquiry. He wanted to order her away, but seeing the determination on her face, he recognised the sheer resolve.

He rose from the chair and started to gather everything. “Okay.”

“Wait!” Aubrey jumped to her feet. “That’s it?”

“You told me what I needed to know. I believe your story.”

“What are you going to do now?” she questioned. “Are you going to talk to Anton?”

Cody lifted a brow. “I will investigate this lead.”

She moved quickly, pushing into his personal space. “That’s all you’re giving me?”

Cody didn’t back down. Instead, he stepped forward. If she wanted a battle, he would give it to her. It was the least he could do. But she needed to remember her place.

He was the professional.

“I don’t have to give you anything. You’re not involved with this case. You are a witness only.”

Her gaze narrowed and she grabbed his arm.

Cody pivoted before he placed both hands on her shoulders, pushing her into the table. He situated himself between her thighs, leaning in. “You’re doing your best to punish me for what happened between us in the past. I’ve let you get away with more disrespect than I would anyone else. But I won’t let that continue. I won’t take much more verbal abuse from you.”

Her hands gripped his wrists. “And I don’t like being manhandled. This is twice now.”

Cody lessened his hold, but did not release her. “And yet we keep finding ourselves in this situation. As I recall, you do, in fact, like to be manhandled, as you call it. I have to say you’ve been pushing me to this.”

She looked up and blinked. Her scent changed from outrage to arousal.

Cody’s cock pulsed.

Aubrey tightened her hold on his wrists. Cody knew that if he could smell her excitement, she could smell his.

“For Christ’s sake, stop pushing me,” he warned.

She smiled. Actually, she smirked. “You’re too easy to provoke. That hasn’t changed.”

She was so sassy. Damn, that turned him on. “You’re going to bite off more than you can handle.”

She licked her bottom lip. He followed the action.

“Promise?” she asked huskily.

He was done. He couldn’t resist her any longer. He slammed his mouth down on hers.

She gasped and opened for him.

Sweet hell, her taste… He’d missed her unique flavour.

Aubrey had never been a passive lover and was no different now. She gripped his hair and held his head firmly as she licked at the inside of his mouth.

Cody groaned at the move. He pumped his hips, sliding his cock against her.

She yanked away before dropping her head back.

Cody slid his lips down her neck as she lifted her hips to encourage his thrusts.

If they were naked, he’d be buried deep inside her. He wanted that. Had to have her.

He pushed her shirt up, planning to feast on her perfect, full breasts.

Just as he started to bend towards her again, he heard footsteps heading in their direction.

Cody backed away, which had to be the most difficult thing he’d ever done.

He was so fucking hard he ached.

She frowned at him as she sat up from the table. Her face was flushed and she was panting. She looked wrecked.

Part of him was proud. The other part, the one that recognised his loss of control, was worried.

“Stay out of this investigation, Aubrey,” he ordered. He had to get back on track.

She grinned. “Of course, Agent.”

He knew she wasn’t going to listen. But he had to put distance between them before he did something he would regret.

He left her still on top of the kitchen table, as Ryder’s steps came closer.

Walk away
, he told himself.
Just walk away
.

Chapter Six

Aubrey had no intention of leaving anything alone. If Cody thought that she was going to, he wasn’t as smart as he used to be.

She pulled up to the Flock house and looked around the spacious land.

She’d never been there before, but she’d heard stories from friends. The Flock land was beautiful. Wide open spaces with a small creek and plenty of trees.

It must be an amazing view from the air. She liked to fly over the large lake that was close to her Cast’s property. However, she wouldn’t mind getting the chance to sweep over the Flock estate.