PLAYED - A BRITISH BAD BOY ROMANCE (47 page)

I stared at him. Not a single iota of me cared one bit
about his fancy goddamn ninja shoes. Two seconds with this guy and I was
already ready to shove one of them down his throat.

He must have seen the look on my face, because he
quickly summed up:

“Anyway, they don’t make much sound. So that’s
probably why you didn’t hear me.”

“Well, I imagine I’ll be hearing a lot of you very
soon, not to mention seeing,” I said, moving past him. He fell into step beside
me. “Your demands have been met. I’ll be your handler for the next seven days.”

“I thought it’d be for the best,” Nathan explained,
handing me a Starbucks cup with my name across it. “You know, we made a pretty
good team back there. And besides, it’ll look good for you—the woman who took
down the Irish mafia and convinced billionaire Nathan Hale to testify,” he
added, spelling out the headline with his free hand while using an overblown
radio-style voice. “And besides… I wasn’t really sure who else I could trust.”

I sniffed the contents of the cup through the little
opening in the lid. Whatever it was smelled sweet. I took a tentative sip and
nearly melted. Mocha
anything
was my jam. How the hell did he know?

“That’s only if it all goes as planned,” I reminded
him, quickly taking the steps down to the lobby. “Hopefully there won’t be too
much more excitement. But I gotta ask,” I whirled to face him once I hit the
bottom, “did you come up with our cover story, too?”

Nathan paused two steps above me, clutching his own
Starbucks cup to his chest like a shield, like it would protect him from my question,
and possibly from me. He hadn’t stopped grinning since he saw me come out of
Captain Pierce’s office, but I watched the corners of his mouth curl even more
mischievously.

“No,” he said. “Scout’s honor—I would’ve never picked
a name like Candy. I think
somebody
thought he was being funny.”

I felt my own lips betray me, pulling into a faint
smile. “And the other thing? I’m supposed to play house as your girlfriend?”

He shrugged and took a long drink from his cup. “That
might have been my idea,” he said calmly. “Besides, you said it yourself, I
don’t have a girlfriend right now. I thought I’d treat myself.”

I already wanted to throttle him, but when I realized
he wasn’t going to elaborate further, I simply rolled my eyes and turned away.

“Right. Well, I’ve got to go pack for our little
vacation at the Peachtree Overlook.”

“The Peachtree Overlook, huh?” Nathan called out
behind me. “Sounds like a nice little place.”

I could have corrected him, but I only smiled. Nathan
had inflicted quite a few surprises on me today. It was only fair that I got to
inflict one on him.

CHAPTER THREE

“You
can’t be
serious.”

I couldn’t stop smiling as Nathan and I pulled into
the parking lot of the Peachtree Overlook, which must have looked like a dump
compared to the estates he’d lived in his whole life. His mansion just outside
the city wasn’t his family home, and given that it was meant for only one
person, I couldn’t begin to imagine what the house he’d grown up in had looked
like.

“This is it,” I told him, trying to keep the demented
glee out of my tone as I parked the old sky blue Honda the department had lent
me in one of the narrow spots. The car was an auction vehicle, a prize seized
from a dealer or some other low-level criminal who couldn’t afford anything better.

It was all part of the plan to make Nathan and I look
like a couple just barely keeping our heads above the poverty line. Those were
the kinds of people nobody saw, the ones who weren’t homeless, but who stood
one small disaster away from losing everything. Nobody wanted to talk about
those people, because that meant they’d have to acknowledge they existed and
might need help. And nobody wanted to be inconvenienced enough to actually help
them. It was easier just to forget about them and move on.

Nathan was, quite clearly, one of
those
people.
As I killed the engine and stepped out of the car, he kept staring at the
apartments with a wrinkled nose and slack jaw. There was nothing but contempt
in his eyes for the place. I couldn’t resist making a remark.

“You know, some people would be damn grateful to live
in a place like this.”

I’d expected him to scoff and say something about how
he wasn’t one of
them
, but instead, he only sighed and opened his door,
muttering that it would have to do.

We took our duffel bags stuffed with only our
necessities out of the trunk and lugged them up the stairs to the second floor.
Our room was 213, situated in the perfect spot in the middle of the hall where
we had a view of the stairs, the lot, and partway around the corner from our
living room window. It would make keeping an eye on the activity outside our
apartment easy enough, and I immediately felt my nerves settle.

If you need anything, just holler,
Captain Pierce
had said. As close together as these units were, I figured the other officers
would have no problem hearing me.

“Do you want to do the honors?” I asked Nathan,
offering him the dirty bronze key to our new home.

He smiled at me and plucked the key from my hand.
“Sure,
Candy,
” he answered, but his smug grin faded a moment later when
we saw what lay in wait for us inside.

Captain Pierce had failed to mention that this unit
was an efficiency. The bedroom—if it could even be called that—was right on the
other side of the living room and separated only by an old floor screen with
tattered cloth panels. The kitchen had about six inches of counter space on
either side of a Fifties-style stove beneath a microwave stained yellow from a
previous tenant’s tobacco addiction.

At least, I hoped it was a
tobacco
addiction.
Anything harder could leave a place coated in the kind of nasty things you
definitely
didn’t want to touch.

The single, small bathroom set off from both the
living room and bedroom looked snug—or rather, claustrophobic—and included an
all-in-one shower and tub combo with a fixed showerhead covered in limescale
buildup. The toilet, thankfully, was clean, but it had one of those cushioned
seats with little tears in it that reminded me of the nursing home my
grandmother had died in.

I ran a hand through my shoulder-length hair and
thanked God I’d recently splurged to have it styled at a salon. There was no
way I would’ve been able to do it properly in this place. It was going to be a
long
week.

“Home sweet home,” Nathan mumbled, breaking the
silence that had fallen between us.

“I guess so,” I said, looking at the twin-sized bed
just beyond the shoddy divider. “You go on and take the bed. I’m good with the
couch.”

“Oh, that’s not fair,” Nathan answered, inspecting the
floral comforter. “The couch is in better condition!”

I smiled and shrugged, tossing my duffel bag onto the
cushions to claim it. “One of the perks of being the girl in charge, I guess.
Anyway, it puts me nearest the door in case anything goes wrong, and I can use
the window to make sure no more of Wallace’s men come tromping up the stairs
without our knowledge.”

“Fair point,” he begrudgingly agreed, setting his own
high-end luggage case on the mattress. It groaned in protest. “Well,
Candy,
given the state of things here, I’d say it’s either takeout or starve.”

“In here, it’s detective,” I said, opening my bag and
fishing out my fake ID and credit cards. “Or Sandra, if you’re feeling lucky.”

“Let’s go with that last one,” he said. “If we’re
going to be spending this much time together in such a small space, I think
‘detective’ and ‘Mr. Hale’ are going to wear thin pretty fast. Besides, I’d
like to think we can get along on a first name basis, seeing as I already know
every curve on your body.”

“Don’t
push your luck. You know damn well that little fling ended years ago and I’m
not about to go jumping back into bed with you.”

“We’ve
been a new couple for less than two hours! You’re telling me you aren’t
committed to this relationship?”

I looked at him over my shoulder. There was something
about the way he said it, something about his inflection or the soft purr of
his voice that made him almost sound hurt.

“Look,
Sandra, I get it. I’m not your favorite person. I never meant to hurt you. I
took you for granted… And I’m sorry.”

“There
was a time when I wanted to hear you say those words, Nathan, but I’m not that
girl anymore. I’m here for one reason and one reason only,” I replied, turning
away from him.

“I’ll
stop making light of the situation. This must be uncomfortable for you, but
it’s terrifying for me. I’ve barely slept in weeks. You’re the only one I can
trust right now. I just thought since we’d be living here together for a few
days, we might clear the air.”

His words made me equal parts uneasy and flattered.
I’d never seen Nathaniel Hale as anything less than in control. In his little
world, things happened the way he wanted them to happen. I’d fallen into that
circle of influence once, and it had taken me years to break free. Now, he had
no control. I was responsible for his safety, and there were no nets strung out
beneath this trapeze act. His eyes were drilling into my own, but the look on
his face was grateful, rather than self-satisfied... It almost made him seem…
Human…

I lingered in the heat of Nathan’s stare just a little
longer. Some secret part of me was reveling in his attention. All those times
we had been together, I was so desperate for this man to look at me like this…
Like someone he
respected
, instead of
someone he
fucked
. Breaking away from
his gaze, I flipped my hair and stood up straight, reaching out to hand him the
credit card with
Candy Love
printed on it.

“What do you
like—Chinese?”

“Seems like the easiest choice,” he said, taking the
card from my hand.

Our fingers met for one single, glorious instant, and
I felt the ripples of his touch race all the way up my arm and into my chest,
heat blooming near my heart. I swallowed hard, my mouth suddenly dry and my
stomach suddenly filled with a thousand anxious butterflies.

What the hell
is wrong with me? He’s an asshole, remember? The man who took what he wanted
and used you like some kind of call girl?

Maybe it was because he was starting to change. Maybe
it was because he was demonstrating concern for others and a willingness to sacrifice
his comfort for the good of the city. Maybe it was because I’d never truly
expected him to accept any responsibility for anything…

It wasn’t fair. He wasn’t supposed to change my mind,
especially not this quickly. Was he manipulating me? Was all of this just a
ruse because he needed protection?

I pulled my hand away and tried to temper my
expectations as he pulled the burner phone out of his pocket and began rifling
through the kitchen drawers in search of a menu. A few moments later I was on
the couch with the TV on, trying to lose myself in some trashy ‘reality’ show
while he placed his order with whatever restaurant he’d managed to dig up.

He covered the phone with one hand and called to me
from the kitchen-cum-bedroom. “What about you? Maybe some orange chicken?”

I narrowed my eyes at him. “How’d you know I like
orange chicken?”

He grinned and shrugged. “Who doesn’t like orange
chicken?” he said, the moved his hand away and began speaking to the restaurant
again.

“You know, we
could
go out,” he added a moment
later, presumably while he was on hold. “I’m pretty sure the Paddies aren’t
going to be hanging around some two-bit Chinese place after what happened
today. We should be safe as houses. And it’d be a lot nicer than hanging around
in here all day.”

“I’m not up for it,” I answered, which was the sad
truth. After what had happened this afternoon, I wasn’t in the mood to put
myself in a room full of completely unpredictable people. “Besides, we’re safer
here with the other officers around. Laying low right now is not the worst idea
in the world, you know.”

He shrugged.
“It’s no fun, either.”

I rolled my eyes. “We can worry about fun after you’ve
testified.”

Nathan smirked as he got back on the line. “Then it’s
a date.”

I was going to object, but he was already speaking to
the restaurant again. That hadn’t been what I’d meant, but the longer I let it
settle, the less I wanted to correct him. Sure, we had fucked, but that’s all
we’d ever done. A date was never on the table…

I curled up against the armrest of the couch and hide
my smile behind my hand. One date when this was all over? That couldn’t hurt,
could it?