Page 21 of Jonas

To her credit, she didn’t play dumb. She knew what I was asking and didn’t prevaricate.

“Just what I said, it must be nice working with a team. I’ve always been a one-woman show.”

There had been a long stretch of time where I’d worked solo. though I still had a team to call on. So I knew she was right—working with a team day in and day out was better.

“And why the look?” I pushed.

“I was surprised that slipped out. Normally, I have better control of my tongue.”

I didn’t bother stopping my smile, though I did have enough sense to stop my comeback.

Her gaze dropped to my mouth, which only made it more difficult to keep my comments to myself.

“What?”

“Nothing, babe.”

“Seriously, what’s with that smile?”

“Seriously, Derrika, you don’t wanna know.”

There was that brow lift again, this time in a challenge.

“If I didn’t before, now I really wanna know. And just to say, if I didn’t want to know I wouldn’t’ve asked in the first place.”

Thankfully, her phone rang, breaking the standoff.

There was only so much of her brand of cute I could take before I broke and told her exactly what I thought about taking control of her tongue, or alternately, what I’d like her to do with that tongue while she lost control.

None of that would be smart. There was no doubt Derrika Layne was my type. There was also no doubt I wanted to take her to my bed and do a number of filthy things to her that would leave us both satisfied. But that wasn’t going to happen. Not with her keen ability to read a situation. She saw too much which meant I’d be too exposed. I took great pains never to feel that. The only person who saw through my bullshit was Cash and that was already one too many.

So Derrika Layne was out of the question.

That was my life, from a young age, I’d learned nothing good came from wanting things you couldn’t have. It was more important to protect myself than it was to wish shit was different. Normally, I had this down to a science. I could keep my shit locked tight and not give it a second thought. Yet for some reason, Derrika with her see-too-much eyes held me captive. I couldn’t look away. I couldn’t stop myself from wanting what I couldn’t have.

And that made her detrimental to my well-being.

Totally off-limits.

Though in another life…if I was a different man, with a different past, Derrika Layne would be mine.

CHAPTER SIX

I knew I’d like Kira Cain.

When you ran in the circles I did, had the job I had, you paid a goodly amount of attention. You listened. You filed away information that could help you in the present and in the future. If you were smart, which I was (and that wasn’t me being conceited. My job just came naturally to me.) you not only paid attention, listened, filed away information, you also dug deep into a person of interest.

Kira had been a person of interest. Talk was, she was highly intelligent. The truth was she was brilliant. The facial recognition software she’d designed was next level. Not only did it run facial points but vein patterns. Which meant if the person was wearing a disguise, unless they were covered chin to feet she could get a hit. Rumor had it she was a recluse. Those rumors proved to be incorrect. It had taken a lot of digging, legwork, connecting dots that were so faint it was shocking I’d found them, and a healthy dose of dumb luck to hit the mother lode. Kira wasn’t a recluse, she’d been half of the stateside team that ran an off-the-books, far removed from any defense money, years-long mission. The guys she helped run were ghosts. She’d named the team Patheon after the software she’d developed. When she sold the program to the government—more like leased it, because she was smart and didn’t sell it outright—she continued to receive a monthly fee for use and maintenance. The money was funneled to keep the men and their mission afloat. It also gave her access to all of the information being run through the program. Which wasn’t brilliant, it was genius. I knew that the Patheon team, including Layla, the other half of the stateside team, now worked for Z Corps. What I didn’t know and could never find was what Patheon’s mission was or where they operated. Just that there was a team, they were so dark they were pitch black, and whatever they were doing our government could have no part in and there was absolutely no oversight.

I wanted to know but I knew better then to ask.

All of that to say, with everything I’d learned about Kira, I knew I’d like her. The brief conversation I’d had with her over the phone while she was on her way to my apartment confirmed what I suspected. But coming face to face with her, experiencing all that was her firsthand meant I didn’t only like her, I wished I lived the kind of life where I could have friends. If I lived that kind of life, I’d beg her to be my best friend.

Not that I knew anything about having a best friend. The last time I had an actual friend, I was seventeen and I was positive that adult friendships were different from teenage ones. I was pretty sure adult friends went out and had coffee together—something I hadn’t tried until I was twenty. It had taken me two years after I’d been cast out to attempt any kind of real rebellion. Coffee, or any kind of caffeine was against the rules—which I always thought was contradictory since the whole point of living the way I’d grown up was to buck the system, live free without society’s laws and rules. However, there was a laundry list of “family” rules—no caffeine was one of them. No piercings was another. No alcohol. No swearing. No shorts for girls. No bathing suits. In other words, I’d grown up subjugated and overpowered by the men in the “family.” These men went beyond my father or my brother. Any male who lived at the ranch was to be obeyed. Their word was gospel.

Red light.

Full stop.