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He went to grab the keys to the rental car, but Poppy beat him to it.
“I’ll drive,” Poppy said, snatching the keys. “Being a passenger makes me carsick.”
Since when?
The little liar.
He always used to drive.
But someone was proving a point.
“Be my guest,” he said, following her out the door.
Yeah, this was going to suck.
Thanks a lot for ruining what could’ve been a cool undercover gig, Poppy Jones.
* * *
Having Shaine in the car was unnerving. Her plan had been to treat him like any other undercover agent.
Dispassionate.
Professional.
But the humid air lifted the scent of his skin straight to her nose and she was awash with memories.
Her breath caught.
No. She wasn’t going to do that—no going backward.
Do the job. Stay focused. Be chill.
As it turned out, Shaine broke the unbearable silence first.
“How’d you get this gig?” he asked.
“The usual way. Working harder than everyone else. Harder than every other man in my way.”
“Still the ballbuster. Glad to see some things never change.”
“That’s where you’re wrong. I’ve changed plenty. I no longer care what small-minded people think of me.”
“Whoa, right out the barrel, an insult. I was trying to make polite conversation.”
“Right. You forget I know you, Shaine. You don’t do polite and you certainly don’t do idle conversation. Your question was a dig at me. A bit passive-aggressive for my taste, but you got your point across.”
“Since you seem to know the inner workings of my mind, why don’t you enlighten me with what I was thinking when I passive-aggressively asked you a polite question,” he suggested, his tone laced with sarcasm. “Personally, I thought I was being nice to a person who certainly didn’t deserve my niceness.”
Why was she arguing with him? Two seconds into an enclosed space alone and they were ripping into each other. She was not about to let her personal feelings about Shaine ruin the biggest case of her life.
“Just stop. We need to get into character. We are not Poppy Jones and Shaine Kelly, former lovers. We are two college kids without a care in the world, ready for a good time. Let’s keep to the script, shall we?”
“And what if I don’t think you’re up for this part?”
“Oh, that old argument again? Please, get some new material—that bit is tired.”
“I’m not kidding around. You’re not ready to take on a case like this. You can’t even be around me without switching to bitch-mode. How are you supposed to pull off melting into someone else’s skin when you can’t even handle your own?”
Poppy’s cheeks heated with embarrassment. Swallowing the bile that’d risen in her throat, she said stiffly, “I didn’t expect you to be on this case. It’s just taken me a minute to adjust. I worked my ass off to get on to this detail and nothing is going to keep me from closing it. Not even you. So if that means I have to pretend that there’s no history between us, I’ll find a way to do it.”
“You sure you can?”
This time she had the wherewithal to send him a withering glance. “Yes,” she answered. “I’ve managed to put you in my past before, I can do it again.”
“Good,” Shaine said. “Maybe that’ll keep you from getting shot this time.”
“Now who can’t let go of the past?” she retorted, freshly irritated even though she knew she needed to put a cap on it. “I’m not the only agent who’s been shot in the line of duty.”
“No. But you were the only one I was in love with,” Shaine said.
“That was a long time ago.”
“Yeah, it was.”
“So don’t bring it up again. I’m a better agent today than I was then. Leave it at that.”
Shaine accepted her answer with a short nod and did, indeed, leave it, which was surprising. To her memory, Shaine rarely let anyone else have the final word—on that topic.
Only because he had another bone to pick.
“You really think you can pull off being a stripper?” he asked.
“And why is that so hard to believe?”
“Because you’re more modest than most. You wore a one-piece to the beach.”
“I also wore a hat. Skin cancer is no joke. It had nothing to do with my comfort level. If the ozone layer wasn’t an issue, I’d run around naked if I could.”
“Oh, c’mon, who are you trying to convince? Me or yourself? This is dangerous, Poppy.”
His condescension scraped against her nerves. “It kills you that I’m on this team, not because of my qualifications, but because of our history. If anyone can’t let go of the past, it’s you,” Poppy said.
“Honey, I let go a long time ago,” he disagreed. “I just don’t feel like dying because you don’t know what you’re doing. There’s an art to going deep cover and I don’t think you have what it takes.”
Poppy resisted the urge to snap back. He was baiting her purposefully.
What an ass.
“Well, thankfully, you’re not in charge and it wasn’t your call. I’m here... Get used to it.”
Shaine shook his head as if he wasn’t going to waste more time arguing and she was glad. She didn’t know how much longer she could keep her cool and the last thing she wanted to do was give Shaine any kind of valid reason to have her tossed from the case.
They arrived at the apartment fourplex, a gray building with nothing charming or exciting about it, and walked around to the back where the two apartments they were to occupy were situated.
From a defensive standpoint, the place was deceptively secure, which was why it was owned by the Miami DEA office as the newest safe house used for informants needing a place to hide before their testimony.
There were also hidden cameras in the narrow alleyway that fed into the four apartments so no one could sneak up on anyone inside.
No more words were exchanged as they each disappeared into their apartments.
Poppy set her suitcase down and took a minute to compose herself.
Damn it.
Around Shaine she devolved into someone she swore she’d never be.
Surveying her new living environment, she saw it’d already been decorated to reflect the tastes of someone much younger, which was the part she was playing.
Shabby chic, repurposed furniture, a thrift-store sofa and a few picture frames featuring people she didn’t know were placed here and there.
This operation was costing a pretty penny.
Everyone expected results.
“So failure isn’t an option,” she murmured to herself as a reminder. “Time to get your game face on.”
Suddenly a door, which she’d assumed was a closet, opened and Shaine walked in.
“What the hell?” she exclaimed, not expecting Shaine to walk into her living room.
“Adjoining rooms,” he explained, surprised himself.
“Is there a lock?” she asked. The last thing she wanted was Shaine Kelly traipsing through her living room as if he had the right.
“Looks similar to a hotel room door.” He showed her how to lock it and then exited again. The sound of him locking the door from his side made her exhale. Had she actually been holding her breath?
Okay, so it made sense to have an adjoining room, for safety purposes if the DEA was housing someone who needed protection, but she could take care of herself.
Poppy grabbed her suitcase and went to the bedroom, finding more shabby chic, girly stuff—stuff for someone who was stuck between wanting to be an adult and still wanting to be a kid.
But she supposed that was pretty much what some college girls felt like.
Not that she had.
She’d been more than happy to leave behind all that crap.
Opening her closet she saw clothes already chosen to match her cover story.
Poppy lifted a skimpy shirt from the rack and frowned at how barely there it was.
Sure, she could pull it off, but it’d been a long time since she’d purposefully worn something so revealing.
Shaine’s earlier comment about the one-piece bathing suit came back to poke at her. Okay, so she preferred tailored suits to string bikinis and microminis. Sue me.
Poppy liked to leave something to the imagination, but there was no hiding the goods in these outfits.
“Good Lord,” Poppy murmured in faint distress as she pulled a tiny dress from the closet. A tight, formfitting number with a cutout where her cleavage would show, she wondered how she was supposed to wear a bra with this thing.
Or underwear for that matter.
Even a damn panty line would show.
Oh, well.
Her new motto was, “When in Miami...do as the party girls do.”
Time to make some friends.
Chapter 3
Rosa Ramirez was Miami born and bred and she’d made it her business to clean up her beautiful city.
When the opportunity came around to take down El Escorpion, she didn’t hesitate, but in truth, this operation had been a long time coming.
And she wasn’t blind to the fact that if a certain senator’s daughter hadn’t gotten herself doped up on Bliss and put on life support from her last party, taking down that piece of shit drug dealer wouldn’t have gotten so much attention.
But Rosa never looked a gift horse in the mouth.
The operation was in play and she was going to see it succeed.
But she had a bad feeling in her gut about some of the people involved.
Mainly Agent Kelly and DEA agent Jones.
Now, she hated to think one of her own might be dirty, but El Escorpion had a long reach and a deep pocket.
Times are hard, people slip.
All it takes is once.
One agreement to look the other way for a handful of cash and you were hooked.
Cash was a persuasive bargaining tool.
Rosa had seen too many good agents get caught up in bad shit because the allure of quick cash was too hard to ignore.
She poured herself two fingers of scotch and nursed it while reading the personnel files of both Kelly and Jones.
Both were exceptionally nice to look at—something Rosa hadn’t been graced with—not that it mattered to her.
Rosa was the job and the job was her.
And she was good with that.
But even Rosa had to admit Shaine Kelly had that enigmatic quality of a bad boy wearing a badge, with a devil-may-care attitude that instantly drew women like a flower bathed in pollen drew bees.
Dark, wavy hair, deep blue eyes—shit, this guy was sex on a stick.
Rosa flicked away Kelly’s file and picked up Jones’s.
White-blond hair like a fairy-tale princess, long, lean body and cornflower blue eyes. California prom queen material.
It should be a cosmic law that if graced with physical perfection, they couldn’t also be smart and well accomplished.
Hell, bitter much?
Rosa sighed at her own thoughts, ready to call it a night when something in Jones’s file caught her eye.
Shot on the job.
Now, that’s interesting. Rosa sat a little straighter.
Bullet to the chest; missed the heart by inches.
“You’ve got a guardian angel, kid,” Rosa murmured before sipping her scotch.
Savoring the burn in her throat, she leaned back in her chair to read the details of the operation that’d gotten Jones shot.
First undercover gig with the FBI.
Rough start.
Then she left the FBI to work for the DEA in Los Angeles.
Rosa double-checked which FBI office she worked for—Washington.
Same as Kelly.
Coincidence?
True, the FBI headquarters was huge. It was possible to work in the same office and never know every employee there.
But two highly skilled undercover agents?
What were the odds of that?
Rosa didn’t believe in coincidences.
Her hunch had been that Jones and Kelly were hiding something.
And her hunches were rarely wrong.
Was Hobbs aware that Jones was from Washington?
Likely not.
Hobbs was relatively new—transferred in from the New York office when the previous chief retired.
And clearly, neither Kelly nor Jones had been eager to cough up the information.
Which meant, they had history they were trying to hide.
Rosa finished her scotch.
That wasn’t going to work.
No secrets. No hiding.
The stakes were too high to mess around with unknown variables.
She wasn’t one to knee-jerk react, but she was very good at watching and waiting. In her experience, people revealed their biases, prejudices and their dirty laundry if you were patient. All she had to do was watch and wait.
And if it turned out that Kelly and Jones were hiding something, they’d be on the first plane back to where they came from.
Rosa Ramirez didn’t mess around.
* * *
Shaine finger combed his hair, grabbed his wallet and fake ID and headed out.
There was no way he was going to sit in that apartment all night, stewing about the fact that he couldn’t shake the certainty that Poppy was in over her head in some lame attempt to prove something.
She was an adult.
And capable of making her own decisions—she’d made that abundantly clear when she’d walked out on him.
If she got herself shot again, why should he worry about her welfare? All he owed her was the same amount of professional courtesy that he would give any agent.
Undercover work was risky business.
Not everyone was cut out for it.
It wasn’t that Poppy was weak or afraid. She lacked that certain something—intuition—that guided an undercover agent and kept them from getting killed.
A good undercover agent knew when to cut bait and run and when to bluff.
Shaine could take things to the edge and stare down into the abyss without fearing a fall.
Poppy just had crazy determination and a thirst for adventure.
Hell, he’d liked that about her.
Until she’d started going undercover.
Then, he’d hated it.
Because that didn’t keep you alive.
“I can do this,” Poppy had insisted. “Lachlan doesn’t know I’m wearing a wire and he has no reason to suspect it, either.”
“The intel is bad,” Shaine had nearly shouted, wanting to grab her by the shoulders and shake her stubborn head off. “Can’t you tell that you’ve been made? Why else would Lachlan invite you back to his place even after someone recognized you?”
“I’ll slip in, grab the file and be gone. It’ll be quick. Lachlan is having a huge party. He’ll be too busy to even think about me.”
“You’re naive, Poppy. Don’t go. My gut is saying he’s luring you into a trap.”
Poppy’s gaze narrowed. “You don’t believe I have what it takes to be a hotshot like you. Well, I do. I can do this and I’m going to do it.”
The events of that night were etched in his memory, but Poppy bore the scars.
He’d thought taking a bullet would’ve cooled her jets about undercover work, but it’d only made her more determined than ever.
That’d been the beginning of the end for them.
Now it was happening all over again and he was supposed to just let it happen because now it wasn’t any of his business?
Talk about a messed up déjà vu.
But it is what it is.
They weren’t dating. They hadn’t even spoken to each other since the night she bailed.
Up until yesterday when Poppy walked into the debriefing, she’d faded like mist from his life.
So...whatever.
Shaine hailed a cab, telling the driver, “Take me to the hottest nightclub in Miami,” and leaned back to get his head on straight.
Time for a little research.
Game play level: professional.
Chapter 4
Poppy heard the door on the other side of the apartment close and she briefly perked up, wondering where Shaine was going.
They weren’t scheduled to start until tomorrow but that was the thing about Shaine, he did as he pleased and went where his gut told him to.
Which then also made her wonder why he was stepping out on his own.
Did he know something? Was he trying to get the jump on the investigation so he didn’t have to work with her?
Stop panicking, she told herself. Second-guessing every move was a rookie mistake, and if it weren’t Shaine, she wouldn’t think twice about her partner acting as he should undercover.
Forcing herself to relax, Poppy grabbed her file and started reading, committing her identity to heart.
Name: Laci Langford, 22, from Connecticut. Moved to Miami to escape the cold East Coast winters.
Major: Marketing.
Parents: Sara and John Langford, deceased. No siblings.
She perused the rest of the file, closing it as she tried to envision herself as the person described in the file.
Laci Langford...definitely sounded like a stripper name.
She’d have to remember to answer to Laci, not Poppy. Getting tripped up by a simple detail was usually the way rookies got made.
The phantom ache pierced her chest again and she rubbed at the small scar beneath her blouse.
Would she always feel as if she were running from that one event in her life?
She’d made a mistake—screwed up and paid the price.
The upside of getting shot? Poppy worked hard to make sure it wouldn’t happen again.
Unlike her persona, Laci, Poppy’s parents were still alive and well.
And they’d been as unsupportive as Shaine about her decision to remain in her line of work.
“Your father is worried,” her mother had said after her father had stormed from Poppy’s house during her recovery, trying to soften the blow. “You know he doesn’t understand this job of yours.”
“He doesn’t have to understand the job. He just has to understand me.”
“Well, you know that’s always been a challenge,” her mother, Dottie, admitted, her hands fluttering as she straightened everything she could get her fingers on. “Frankly, sweetheart, we’re all a little surprised that after this incident you’re not ready to get into a less dangerous line of work. I mean, Poppy...in all the years I’ve been a nurse, I’ve never been shot at.”
Yes, but Dottie had been shit on, spit on, yelled at and otherwise abused by her patients, and Poppy had never wanted any piece of that.
“I love my job,” Poppy said firmly, holding back the wince as she shifted her weight, trying not to agitate her healing wound. The doctor said it would be weeks before she could even think about returning to work, which sounded like an interminable amount of time to her ears, but she couldn’t exactly go against the doctor’s orders.
Of course, that left her to suffer the opinions of her parents and friends who didn’t understand her job, nor did they appreciate that Poppy absolutely loved what she did.
She tried to tell herself that they meant well, but after gritting her teeth through the same conversation for the umpteenth time, she’d practically worn her teeth down to nubs.
“Of course you do, sweetheart,” Dottie said with open distress. “But some people aren’t cut out for these types of jobs. You’ve always been a delicate thing... Surely the Bureau could find a suitable desk job? Maybe a secretary position?”
Poppy glared. “Do you realize how offensive that is to me? I didn’t work my ass off to sit behind a desk.” When her mother’s eyes started to water, Poppy bit back the rest of the hot words dancing on her tongue. Her parents would never understand—and honestly, she never expected them to—so their opinion wasn’t a huge shock. But the one person she’d thought would understand...
Unwelcome tears crowded her sinuses and she sniffed them back.
Dottie seemed to understand where the tears were coming from and tried to comfort her. “You two can work things out,” she assured Poppy, but Dottie didn’t know that there was absolutely zero chance of that happening. “It was probably very scary to see the woman he loves almost die. You really need to think of how this situation has affected those who love you.”
“Damn it, Mom,” she muttered, pulling away with a curse. “Just stop.”
“What did I say?”
“You always turn it around back on me. As if I should be thinking of everyone else when no one seems to give a damn about how I feel about the situation. Shaine is just as bad as you, demanding that I give up a career I love without considering how doing so would kill me faster than any bullet. If you can’t support me, then stop pretending that you care. I’m done with all of you.”
“Poppy Jones, what has gotten into you? You were never this aggressive, or so rude. This job has changed you and not for the better.” Dottie gathered her purse, her upper lip stiff. “I hope you come to your senses soon. Otherwise, I just don’t think my heart can take it. I didn’t raise my daughter to want a career she’s so ill-suited for.”
Ill-suited? she’d wanted to scream. I was top of my class in Quantico, ranked in the top five in intelligence training and broke the record for fastest time running the eight-mile Hell Run.
But none of that mattered to her parents, which was why Poppy hadn’t bothered.
A sigh escaped her parted lips as she roused herself from that terrible memory. Moving away from DC, leaving behind everything she’d ever known, had been her only choice.
Facing Shaine after their breakup would’ve been a torture she wasn’t up to and having to listen to her parents berate her for her choices would’ve been the straw that broke her.
Since moving to LA, her relationship with her parents remained stilted. She made obligatory phone calls now and then just to check in, but for the most part Poppy had cut ties.
It’d been easier that way.
She liked to think that it was easier for her parents, too.
A kindness.
Now they no longer had to lament the fact that their only daughter had become a “ballbusting man-hater” as her father liked to put it, and her mother didn’t have to hide her head in shame when her nosy, gossipy nurse friends pestered her for why Poppy hadn’t married or had kids by now.
For cripes’ sake, they weren’t living in the ’50s.
But you’d never know it from the way her parents were acting.
The truth was, she could probably forgive her parents for their ignorant thinking, but she could never forgive Shaine for his.
Up until this moment, Poppy had managed to shove Shaine and everything that came with the memory of their time together into the deepest, darkest, most remote part of her brain.
But that all changed the minute he was assigned to her case.
And yes, it was her case.
El Escorpion was a DEA target and the FBI was assisting, as far as Poppy was concerned.
Maybe she did have something to prove, but one thing she knew for certain—Poppy wasn’t going to let anything, or anyone, get in her way of closing this case.
Not even Shaine Kelly.
* * *
Shaine walked into the slick, upscale strip bar Lit, where he and Poppy were supposed to be embedded, and observed the crowd, his body loose but his observation skills sharp.
The blast of cool air was a welcome respite from the sticky Miami heat, but the place was crowded with half-dressed people with banging bodies. The bar should’ve been named Sin because that’s what oozed from the walls.
He grinned suggestively at hot women, allowing his gaze to linger as if he wanted to imagine what it would be like to run his hands up and down those smoking curves, but actually, he was simply taking in the scene, gauging who may or may not be someone he needed to put on his radar.
Shaine’s gaze snagged on the raised platform where the dancers were dominating the floor, and he realized with a grim start that some of the girls were topless. And while he enjoyed the view, he knew that Poppy was going to be up on that stage and he didn’t like that idea at all.
Suck it up.
Poppy wasn’t anything to him. Just another agent undercover.
He shouldn’t care if she was gyrating on a pole as naked as the day she was born, as long as she was doing her job.