I catch sight of a brown-haired man, nearing an exit.
I don’t think before rushing after the figure.
“Hawthorne left out the back. We gotta go,” I bark into my comms.
I just royally screwed up.
Chapter 1
Serena
Location: Phoenix Arizona
One month later
I know one hundred and seventeen different ways to kill a man. On any given day, the likelihood of doing so is a healthy fifteen to thirty percent. Today, I’m at eighty-five. Though, we are in the car, and the person I dream of assassinating is driving, which reduces the number of ways I can execute at the moment.
This is what I do when I’m stressed: I calculate exit strategies. In this case, the quickest way out may be murder.
“And then,” Agent Hadley continues with a story he’s been telling in aggravating detail for the last thirty minutes, talking to me as if I’m one of the bros. Something about being six feet tall in a male-dominated industry puts me in thebrocategory far too often. “She tried to wrap both of her hands around my bicep but couldn’t reach because I’m so ripped—”
“Or she had small hands,” I retort.
He frowns at the road. “Anyway, she said she wanted to go to my place—”
I can’t do it. I whirl on him. “Hadley, I swear if you do not shut up, I will shoot you right now.” In the arm. My risk calculation shows that target poses the least threat to my life.
Hadley glances over the middle console, his blue eyes narrowing. “Be honest, you’re the one who shot Agent Harris, right?”
“If I’d known his injury meant I’d be stuck with you, I would have jumped in front of the bullet myself.”
Did I fail to protect my partner? No. He was stupid and let love get in the way of thinking straight.
Should I have been there to help? Yes.
He shoves a hand through his thick black hair. “Didn’t your first partner get shot, too? That’s why you transferred a year ago, right? Did you shoot him, and that’s why your file is confidential?”
My skin goes cold, and my heart all but stops beating.
How does he know that?
There were rumors. There always are when an agent requests an immediate transfer. But how does heknow? He can’t. Unless S-A-C Ford told him. They are good friends, the classic ‘bros’ in bromance. But not even Ford has access to my confidential file.
“I did not shoot my partner.” I clamp my lips shut, refusing to confirm or deny anything more. Whatever I say will make it back to Ford. I’m sure Hadley has told him every undesirable thing about me since being stuck with me the last couple of weeks.
I take a deep breath. Two more days. Two more days, and this torture will end. I’ll have Agent Harris back as my partner, and this will all be a bad memory.
A message pops up on my phone. Speak of the devil. Caleb sent me a picture… of Liam? At a hotel?
“Take that left!” I yell at Hadley while texting Caleb. “Chateau Limone, and step on it.”
I study the picture again. That’s Liam; it has to be. I would know his side profile anywhere. Since he disappeared a couple of weeks ago, I’ve had plenty of time to study the images from his file, which capture him from every angle. Caleb nearly caught him but got shot, and where was I? Looking for the rogue agent who is still at large instead of being with my partner. My superiors have reprimanded me repeatedly for my errors.
I will not let Liam get away again.
“What’s going on?” Hadley asks.
“Liam was spotted there.”
