Skin Deep (6 page)

“I do,” Kylie replied. “Do you remember the update you gave me six weeks ago?”

“Of course.”

Confusion combined with curiosity, both of them pushing Kellan’s irritation to the wayside. “What update?”

Kylie split a glance between him and Moreno, her eyes remaining on the detective as she said, “I know you told me a lot of the details wouldn’t be public because the FBI is pursuing federal charges, but what you told me isn’t confidential or anything, right?”

Isabella took another slow breath, and Jesus, the neckline of her shirt was going to destroy him. Or at the very least, keep rendering him mute and mostly stupid. “No,” she said slowly. “The FBI is obviously keeping the details as quiet as they can since they’re pretty sensitive, but the charges are a matter of public record.”

Kylie’s smile turned cat-in-cream satisfied. “So you can tell Kellan what you told me.”

“I…guess,” Moreno hedged, although she didn’t elaborate, and finally, his brain overrode the dark, indecent part of him secretly wondering what she had on under that deceptively low-cut top of hers.

“Okay, you two. What the hell is going on?”

“You need to hear what Isabella has to say, that’s what.” His sister turned toward Devon, who come to think of it had remained suspiciously quiet for the last few minutes, and pulled him from his bar stool to his feet. “Come on, Dev. I love this song.”

Kylie nodded at the open space by the jukebox where a few couples had twined their arms and other various body parts around each other while they swayed to the slow ballad that had just started.

“You hate this song,” Devon said, his forehead creased in total confusion, but Kylie moved beside him and looped her arm around his.

“No. I don’t.” The smile she speared him with was one hundred percent lethal. “I
love
it. In fact, I think you guys should dance, too.” She pointed from Kellan to Isabella, her expression turning sugar-sweet. “It’ll be the perfect chance for Detective Moreno to fill you in on things.”

Kellan’s chin jerked to attention, his pulse tagging along for the ride. “Kylie,” he warned, but funny, it was Moreno who saved his bacon.

“I’m not sure us dancing is a good idea. I wouldn’t want to make your brother uncomfortable.”

“I’m not
uncomfortable
,” he argued, and Kylie’s smile became downright beatific. “Perfect. Then it’s settled. We’re all dancing.”

Fuck.

“Is your sister always like this?” Moreno asked after Kylie had tightened her squeeze on Devon’s arm, leading him toward the dance floor and out of earshot.

“You mean like a barracuda? Yeah, pretty much.” Kellan looked at the boot-scuffed floorboards, unsure whether to laugh or pull out every last hair on his head. “Sorry if she put you on the spot.”

“Oh, don’t be. I actually like her a lot.” At the look of surprise that had to be pinging over his face, Moreno added, “It looks like she gives you a run for your money.”

“I guess that makes you two best friends by default.”

Moreno’s unexpected peal of laughter tagged Kellan right in the sternum. “And I guess I earned that.”

Whether it was the sudden ease amidst all their tension or the provocative pretty-factor of her lingering smile, Kellan couldn’t be sure, but all of a sudden, he heard himself ask, “So
do
you want to dance?”

The words seemed to shock them both equally, and God, he needed some damage control, stat. “Uh, we don’t have to, obviously. But Kylie seems to think I need to hear this update, or whatever, right from you, so, you know…”

“Yes,” she said, blinking twice before blanking her expression and lifting one shoulder in an approximation of a shrug. “I mean, it’s just a little dancing, so sure. Why not?”

And wasn’t
that
question more loaded than a Glock at a gun range. Still, he’d asked (albeit gracelessly) and she’d accepted, so Kellan slid off his bar stool and moved toward the dance floor. Isabella walked right beside him, and even though he thought the transition to actual dancing would be chock full of awkward, she simply slipped her hands over his shoulders as his found her waist, their bodies neatly lined up and starting to move in slow, easy rhythm. Her caramel-colored hair spilled over her shoulders, teasing his senses with the warm, heady scent of coconuts as she adjusted to the sway of them dancing, and he instinctively spread his hands wider in search of something concrete to keep him grounded.

But all that did was increase their contact, and despite knowing damn well that he should, he couldn’t make his body obey the command from his brain to change it. Kellan inhaled, taking in the strong, lean muscles under the soft material of her shirt, the slight change in texture that signaled the edge of her bra beneath it, and fuck, he needed to put a pin in his emotions if he was going to have a prayer of making it through the next five minutes.

“So.” He cleared his throat.
Focus. The FBI. Charges. Facts.
“There was an update on Kylie’s case?”

“Of sorts, yeah.” Moreno’s voice was as metered as her words, and a thought slammed through Kellan’s mind with all the subtlety of a wrecking ball on demolition day.

“Don’t try to tell me the Feds aren’t calling Fagan’s death a clean shoot.” The suits in DC must be out of their freaking minds if they thought for one second that there had been an option other than putting a kill shot on that son of a bitch.

But Moreno erased his concern with a quick shake of her head. “Oh God, no. The bastard had Kylie at gunpoint, and he’d clearly been tracking her with the intent to keep her quiet, permanently. Collins and his superiors examined both Kylie and Devon’s statements and determined the force was warranted. That part of the case is closed.”

The tension in Kellan’s shoulders unwound by a fraction, making him all too aware of the press of Isabella’s fingers over the thin cotton of his T-shirt. “Okay, so what the hell is Kylie talking about with new details then?”

Half of the song’s chorus floated through the warm, dimly lit air in the bar before Moreno answered. “The agent who gave up Kylie to Fagan was identified and arrested. He’s being indicted on federal charges.”

No less than a trillion questions burst through Kellan’s brain, but for right now, he settled on the big three. “What? Who?
How
?” Last he’d heard a couple of months ago, the case had been so cold, the Feds could’ve carved an ice sculpture out of the damned thing.

“The agent’s name is Mike Burton. He’d been with Collins for two and a half years, and he was slick as hell about playing both sides. It took a ton of surveillance and some really serious digging by our tech guy and a forensic accountant, but we were finally able to catch him siphoning money to an offshore bank account in Seychelles.”

“Jesus,” Kellan managed, his mind still loaded with questions.

Thankfully, Moreno continued, answering at least some of them as she said, “We grabbed him three days before he was set to fly out of the country on a one-way ride. Of course he’s denying everything, but the evidence is pretty damning. We made a good bust, and the FBI indicted him. Burton’s currently in solitary at the federal prison in Chicago, awaiting trial.”

“Wait.” Kellan’s pulse sped through his veins, and no way. She couldn’t possibly have said—“We? Did intelligence work this case somehow?”

A pause opened up to fill the slight space between them, but Moreno didn’t allow it to last for more than a song beat. “Oh. Yeah. No. Not exactly.”

“Then who’s ‘we’,
exactly
?”

“I guess ‘we’ is, um. Me. Collins was too close to the investigation since someone on his team was clearly involved, so I went out to Chicago to lead the task force team that took Burton down.”

And here Kellan had thought he’d reached his you’ve-got-to-be-kidding-me limit for the day. “A case like that couldn’t have been a nine to five. How long did the investigation last?”

“I don’t know. A few days.” At his arched brow, she released a sigh, her breath coasting over his shoulder in a soft puff. “Fine. It might have been eight.”

His jaw unhinged. “The FBI just let you waltz on out and lead an extended investigation on one of their own?”

“The investigation was a team effort within the FBI task force,” Moreno said, although hell if that wasn’t a non-answer to the question. “I’d been in on the original case, so I knew the players, and I’ve been a cop for over ten years. Burton was a dirty agent who needed to go down. I was happy to work the investigation.”

“And Sinclair was cool with that?” Kellan asked, and her body went just rigid enough beneath his hands for him to take notice.

“Sinclair didn’t really get a say.”

Right. Anyone who’d met the man even for a minute knew there was zero chance she was being straight about that one. “Try again.”

“Fine. No one else from the Thirty-Third was involved in the task force. I used personal leave to go,” Isabella said, her lashes fanning upward to frame her chocolate-brown stare as she looked him directly in the eyes. “I told Sinclair about the investigation as a professional courtesy. He’s my boss and I respect the hell out of him. But as far as whether or not I went, no. Sam didn’t get a say.”

The same fierceness Kellan had seen outside the row house this morning resurfaced on her face, sending a hard tug through the center of his chest. What kind of cop would burn her vacation time to haul halfway across the country so she could work a case cold enough to warrant its own slab at the morgue?

Here’s a hint: not the kind who’s as incompetent as you thought
.

The realization brought him sharply back to the moment. “Why would you go so far above and beyond for a case outside of your jurisdiction?”

“Because I promised I’d keep Kylie safe. I had no reason not to trust Collins, and he had no reason not to trust Burton, but shit still went sideways. Nailing Burton was the only way to make that right.” Isabella lifted her shoulders, and the honesty in her words didn’t lessen their punch to Kellan’s gut. “So that’s what I did.”

“How come you never told me?” he asked. He’d seen her here at the Crooked Angel no less than a dozen times since they’d returned from Chicago, and she clearly knew how to find him at Seventeen easily enough.

Her laughter was self-deprecating enough to put another dent in his armor. “First of all, I didn’t go back to Chicago for the recognition. I’d have worked the investigation that led to Burton’s indictment regardless of whether or not you or Kylie ever found out. Secondly”—the edges of her mouth tipped up just enough to take her smile into smirk territory—“you made your dislike for me pretty clear. To be honest, I didn’t think you’d listen to anything I had to say about your sister’s case, even if the news was good.”

“I don’t dislike you,” Kellan hedged, only to be thwarted again by her soft, throaty laugh.

“Walker, please. You went up one side of me and down the other in the motel parking lot as soon as Kylie got the all-clear, and every time you’ve seen me since, you’ve evil-eyed me into next week. I think it’s safe to say you’re not my biggest fan.”

For a second, then two, nothing but the song and the ambient noise from the bar passed between them. The familiar crossroads was right in front of him, the one with the fork that led to all the boxes where he locked shit away and the fork with the road he couldn’t think about if he wanted to retain his sanity. He had reasons for never taking that path, never digging at anything that would trigger his emotions, and they weren’t shitty. Still, Moreno had been straight with him about Burton when she could’ve just as easily clammed up.

The least he could do was return the favor.

“I was upset that Kylie was in danger three months ago, and yeah, I was pretty pissed at you and Collins over how things shook out. But my sister’s all the family I’ve got. We spent almost seven years apart when I was in the Army, and even though I know she’s tough enough to stand on her own two feet, I still want to look out for her.”

A flicker moved through Moreno’s gaze, coloring it a deep mahogany brown in the low light of the Crooked Angel. “I get that, Walker. I really do, and I’m sorry. I can’t tell you enough how much I hate that Fagan got his hands on her, even for a second.”

He thought of the vow she’d made to find whoever was hurting those girls, and damn, she really
was
a good cop. “I know. I’m sorry I flew off the handle in Chicago, and that I was rough on you after that. You didn’t have any way of knowing someone on Collins’s team would put Kylie in danger. I see that now.”

Moreno’s lips parted. “You do?”

“Yeah,” he said, and as much as he thought the admission might sting, his words came out with ease. “I do.”

Of course, he should’ve known better than to think Isabella would take them without dishing back. “You sure you’re feeling okay?” she asked, sliding one hand over his forehead. “You don’t have a fever, do you? Should I call a doctor?”

“Funny,” Kellan said. He meant to add on to his sarcasm, after all, Moreno was clearly tough enough to take it. But all at once he realized how close they were, their bodies suddenly flush, her fingers cradling his face with her smart, sinful mouth right there in front of his, and every thought in his brain shorted out to head south.

Her smile slipped, awareness edging over her pretty features as if she’d landed in the same place Kellan had. But rather than pulling away, Isabella stood firm, replacing her arm around his shoulder while they swayed to something far more primal than some pop ballad. She pressed against him, her body moving with slow, hot suggestion, and even though he knew it made him a bastard of the highest order, Kellan didn’t budge. He tested his grasp on her waist, increasing the pressure of his fingers in slow increments. Moreno’s chest melted against his even harder with the weight of her exhale, and a dark thread of satisfaction uncurled in Kellan’s belly, taunting his fingers to dig even harder over her T-shirt.

So he let them. And when Isabella cut out another heady breath that warmed his neck and stirred his cock, curling her fingertips into his shoulders with just as much provocative intention, he realized that if they kept upping the ante, neither one of them would back down.