Her chin lifts. "You're scaring me."
"Good. You should be scared. Because if you're what I think you are, we have a serious problem."
"What do you think I am?"
"Federal agent. Maybe FBI. Maybe DEA." I brace my hands on either side of her head. "The question is whether you're hunting me or using me."
Her pulse hammers in her throat. "You're wrong."
"Then prove it." I lean closer, mouth inches from hers. "Tell me why a bartender knows tactical hand signals. Why you fight like someone with military training. Why your work emergencies sound like law enforcement briefings."
"I don't know what?—"
"Stop lying." My voice drops to a whisper. "I've killed federal agents before, Sorcha. What makes you think I won't kill another one?"
Fear flickers in her eyes, but underneath it burns something else. Defiance. Attraction. The same hunger that nearly consumed us minutes ago.
"Because you want me too much," she says.
The truth of it hits like a physical blow. I do want her. More than my next breath. More than safety or sanity or survival.
"That's the problem," I admit. "I want you so much I might let you destroy me."
Her eyes soften. "I'm not here to destroy you."
"Then what are you here for?"
She opens her mouth to answer when my phone explodes with alerts. Emergency notifications from every security system we own.
"Fuck." I grab my gun, checking the messages. "Warehouse hit. Docks compromised. They're moving on all our operations."
"Who?"
"Doesn't matter." I shove ammunition into my pockets. "You're staying here. Lock the door. Don't open it for anyone."
"Eamon, wait?—"
I pause at the door, looking back at her. Standing in my bedroom wearing my shirt, looking like everything I never knew I wanted and can't afford to keep.
"When I get back," I say, "we finish this conversation. All of it."
"And if you don't come back?"
The question stops me cold. "Then you disappear. New name, new city, new life. Whatever you're really after, it dies with me."
I leave her there, surrounded by my things, holding my secrets. Either the most dangerous woman I've ever met or the only one worth dying for.
Time will tell which.
CHAPTER
EIGHT
The pub closes,but Eamon doesn't leave. He sits at the far end of the bar, nursing whiskey while his eyes track every shadow, every movement outside the windows. Three days since the warehouse attack, and he's appointed himself my personal guardian.
"Time to go," he says, draining his glass.
"I can walk to my car."
