Page 42 of Cuckoo (Kindred)
He’d shut down, and Zara had learned her lesson about pushing him. “I’m sorry I was an idiot. But if you want to talk… I can keep a secret. You should hear the soppy shit Raven says to me all the time. I never tell anyone about that.”
This time she got a laugh, and she appreciated his smile. “That I’d love to hear.”
“You and me both. It’s wishful thinking on my part,” she said. “Seriously, the most romantic thing he’s ever said to me is, ‘On your knees, bitch.’ Honestly.” Tuck laughed again, and she appreciated it when he put his arm around her neck to pull her forward.
He was still laughing. “We always wondered how he seduced you.”
The time for serious discussion was over. She wanted to return to their ease, so she kept joking. “There was a lack of sleep involved, alcohol, too, I’m sure. He definitely took advantage of me when I was at my weakest.”
“Ah, now it all makes sense.”
The knock at the door caused Tuck to let her go, giving her clearance to answer it. Zara went over to open the door to Brodie, who moved to come inside, but she didn’t budge out of his way, keeping him in the hallway. “Newcomers must submit to a strip search.”
He groaned. “I knew you were in this kind of mood. I just knew it. I should know better than to fuck you on an empty stomach.”
“Maybe you should’ve let me swallow,” she said, walking her fingers up his torso.
Grabbing her wrist, he spun her around and marched her into the room, slamming the door behind himself. “I paid the room for the rest of the week,” he said, keeping her arm loosely twisted up her back all the way over to the couch. “I told him we were gonna party, there might be noise, music, banging—”
“Banging?” she asked, elevating her chin in hope.
“Yes,” he said, squeezing tighter and wrapping his other arm around her waist. “You’re in for a wild ride this week, baby. Any time we need cover, we’re calling on you to do more of that screaming.”
“You’re calling her for that,” Tuck said, turning away from them. “The mark hasn’t lifted his head, you got in and out clean.
Brodie lowered his lips into her hair. “What did I tell you, baby? We’re pros and we’re in for the long haul.”
While the men setup the audio equipment to monitor the bugs Brodie had planted, she laid herself down on the bed. She must have fallen asleep because the next thing she became aware of was the light glowing through her eyelids. She yawned and stretched, dropping a hand onto the torso of the man lying beside her.
“Wrong guy,” a voice beside her muttered. A strong hand took her wrist to shunt her hand back over to her own side. As soon as he released her, she sat up in a flash.
Tuck was the one lying beside her, fully clothed but still asleep. He rolled over, putting his back to her and continuing to snooze. Whipping her attention around, she saw Brodie on guard duty with one hand on the back of the couch so he could check out the sleeping pair.
“Why didn’t you move me?” she whispered, grabbing her pillow and schlepping across the room to sink onto the couch on her side. Putting her head in his lap, she hugged her pillow for warmth, drawing her knees up around it.
“Because when your mouth is that close to my dick I get distracted,” he said but stroked her hair away from her face while she slipped into slumber.
“What’s the plan today?” she asked on another yawn.
“Swift and I will keep watch. Tracking Kahlil’s movements will give us more information, and he might lead us to the other players.”
It beat sitting around and waiting for attack. Brodie needed to be doing something practical that didn’t involve him thinking too hard about what he did or didn’t know about his parents’ death.
“Did Wren and Falcon find out anything more from the data at base?” she asked. They’d gone through most of it before facial recognition had brought them here. But if Grant knew something about Future’s Hope, they needed to know it too. That answer would weigh heavily on their ultimate decision of how to deal with Kahlil.
“Wren took a commercial flight back west this morning,” Brodie said.
Her eyes were still closed, but she presumed he was still watching Kahlil. “That’s a shame,” she said, because Thad was a fun guy to be around and he always injected a bit of humor into tense situations. With guys like Brodie, Zave, and even Tuck, she was often left smiling alone.
“He asked if you wanted to go with him. Something you should tell me?”
She smiled. “Bess invited me to visit.”
“What did you say?”
“I didn’t commit to anything. I had other things on my mind.”
“Do me a favor,” he said, coiling his fingers in her hair. “Check with me before you jet off. I want to check Zave’s calendar to see what he’s got going on before I let you go over there alone. There are certain times that his place is just plain off-limits, hear me?”
