To Die for... Honor

FOUR

FOUR

HUGO DID KNOW HOW TO have a good time. The next two weeks were filled with events and parties in some of the most exclusive corners of the popular town. As was the rule, they were always back at the house before dark.

Each night, as soon as they got home, Tess would soak in her private hot tub or go straight to bed. Keeping up with Hugo wasn’t easy; he’d been raised in the Vegas lifestyle. She was more used to quiet nights in or working her butt off, cash-in-hand, to make sure she and her mom could survive.

Being occupied was better than doing nothing. She didn’t get time to construct any new garments but did talk about her passion with the billionaire.

Whether Hugo listened or not, he appeared engaged, as a consummate host always should. In their conversations, whenever she could sneak it in, she’d ask about Olympus. Learning more would be useful in the long run.

As for Daire, she’d barely seen him. It could be for the best. They couldn’t be together and weren’t so great at maintaining distance when they were in each other’s orbit. Still, with them no longer sharing a room and him training while she was out with Hugo, their paths didn’t often cross.

Each night Hugo took her out for an early dinner, or they’d eat alone in the atrium at the front of the house, overlooking the water garden. Harry wanted her out of the way, and he’d gotten his wish. The Olympus men were embracing the opportunity to reconnect, which would be for the greater good of everyone.

That day they’d gone out for coffee and had a wander through the Bellagio Conservatory until stopping for lunch. It was only a light bite because apparently Hugo had made big plans for dinner. Not that he’d tell her what they were.

The afternoon was rolling on. Hugo was making calls, conducting business for the first time since his return from South America. That left Tess at a loose end.

What were the options? Work? Read? Swim? Donning a bikini and oversized shirt, the last won out. Until she was halfway down the stairs anyway. What she really wanted to do was catch up with the man she missed.

Figuring the opportunity was too good to pass up, she found herself in the garage next to the Airstream. Not long after she and Hugo had returned earlier, Tess had seen the other Olympus guys traipsing downstairs to their training space in the basement. Still, she didn’t know for sure that Daire was inside the Beast. She held her breath and knocked, only breathing out when she got a “yeah” in response.

Wearing a smile, she reached for the handle. That “yeah” had a lot to answer for.

She opened the door and peeked inside; Daire was sitting in the dinette. Music played quietly in the background, keeping him company while he worked. It took a few seconds for him to glance up from whatever he was frowning at.

“You haven’t learned your lesson,” she said. “Your ‘yeah’ brought me into your trailer before… You never got rid of me, remember?”

“You don’t still live here,” he said, returning to whatever he’d been doing.

“Can I come in?”

“Harry’s been sleeping in the room upstairs. I think he’s in the office with Garrick.”

“I’m not looking for Harry,” she said, ascending the stairs even though he hadn’t actually granted her entry. “I’m looking for you.”

“Is there a problem?”

“No… not exactly.” Approaching, she angled her head to get a better look at the plans laid out on the table. When she realized they were building blueprints, she gasped and leaped forward. “Are these the plans for the new Olympus compound? How long until they build it?”

“It’s built,” he said, folding over the sheets to conceal the contents.

She frowned. “But I thought—”

“It’s a shell. We put it up a few years back. There’s more than one site… After losing Olympus A, it was decided there should be other sites set up in case it happened again.”

Which worked out for the best. The beta site might not have been destroyed, but she doubted any of them would trust it while things were so ambiguous among the key players.

“Hugo said it’s not far from here.” Though he hadn’t been explicit in telling her the structure existed. “Have you been there?”

“More than once,” Daire said, picking up his water glass to drink. “What do you need?”

Tess drew a fingertip along the edge of the table. “That’s a loaded question.”

But when she peeked up at him, expecting mischief, she got nothing other than the professional, detached Ares in return.

Daire put his glass on the table. “What do you need?” he asked again, slower and more deliberate in his question.

“I have a security concern,” she said. Daire just waited for her to elaborate. “You don’t include my room in your security sweep.”

“There’s no need,” he said. “With the security tech positioned outside and my guys monitoring the feed at all times, there’s no need for me to—”

“Okay, what’s going on?” Tess asked. “I’ve missed you. I came to see you because I wanted to know how you’re doing.”

Daire folded his arms. “How I’m doing? How do you think I’m doing seeing you going out with him every day?”

“He’s talking to me,” she said. “Nothing’s happened. He’s never even tried to kiss me.”

“You want him to?”

“No!” she objected, flattening a hand on the table near him. “I’m saying that whatever his interest in me, it’s not sexual.”

“He has an agenda.”

“You told me that before and I don’t doubt you’re right,” she said, giving that a second to settle in the air. “What’s going on with Six?”

“No,” he said, grabbing his glass to stand up and put it in the sink.

“No, what?”

Daire turned to face her. “You can’t come in here and ask for intel.” His head shook slowly. “You can’t do that to me. What was it you said? You don’t get to use what I feel for you.”

“I said that and then let you use what I felt for you,” she said, approaching one careful inch at a time. “Baby, I don’t care about intelligence. I care that you wanted Six out and it’s not happening. I asked Three about it and he’s vague. From the way he talks, he doesn’t seem to think Six is going anywhere.” Daire didn’t respond. Infuriated, she pinned a glare on him and slapped a palm onto his chest. “It’s easy for you. You know you can handle yourself. You know you can take care of whatever needs to be taken care of.”

“You’re protected. I’m monitoring your safety. You think I trust those chump bodyguards of his?”

Though he wasn’t exactly happy about it, Tess relaxed a little on learning he wasn’t done caring about her. “It’s your safety I’m worried about,” she said, getting closer. “Six is a threat. He will always be a threat.”

“To Olympus? I bet he’d argue Zeus is Olympus.”

“To you,” she said, sliding her hand up and down. “Six is a threat to you. Do you think I want you going out there on some mission and Lowell whoever-Six-is, leaking those details to Zeus so he can hurt you?”

“There’s no chance of anyone going on missions. Not until Zeus is dealt with.”

“I suppose the argument is you need Six’s money.”

“That and unless we kill him, he could expose the organization.”

She exhaled. “I thought about that with Zeus. He knows enough to cause problems.”

“Yeah.”

Hugo enjoyed talking about his business and regaling her with tales of his past. His father had been the one to get involved with Olympus and he’d passed that responsibility to his son after receiving a terminal diagnosis.

“Three’s been in contact with One. I don’t know how recently, but he said they’re trying to vet whoever the new Six members will be. Is it smart to do that while Zeus is still out there? How do you know he hasn’t gotten to them already? He must know who they are.”

“That’s above my paygrade.”

“There is no above your paygrade,” she said, curling her fingers to dig her nails into him. “This is your life we’re talking about. I don’t care about respecting those above you, I care about you being safe. Three says there are ‘opinions’ on how Zeus should be dealt with… Please tell me you’re in those discussions. Everyone seems to think as long as he’s in Europe you’re—”

Laying a finger on her lips, Daire silenced her. “Watch that mouth,” he said, keeping his finger in place. “You’re sharing privileged information.”

His finger left her lips when he chose to rest his hand on her shoulder instead. “I’m not sharing privileged information. I’m having a conversation.”

“You have conversations like this with Three or any of his buddies, you could get yourself in trouble.”

“Like that’s anything new,” she said, pleased to see him relax. “I listen and ask questions with Three. I only run my mouth with you.” He let her go to move around her. “Intel is the key to survival you know.” She moved aside when he got closer to the sink to rinse his glass. The corner of his mouth rose. Tess sighed. “So much I could teach you…”

“Okay, sensei, teach me,” he said, grabbing a towel to dry his hands as he propped a hip on the counter. “He talked to One, when?”

Tess shrugged. “The night we met, he said he and One had been in contact. That they were trying to hold things together. Then…” Drawing in a breath, her eyes rose as she thought back. “On Wednesday he said something about staying up into the wee hours. We always come home before it’s dark, I asked why he was up late, he said he and One had a lot to catch up on and time zones sucked.” That brought Daire’s brow down. “Interesting, right?”

“Means One isn’t in the Americas,” he said. “One won’t take calls between midnight and eight in the morning, wherever he is in the world. If he was local or on the east coast, even in Brazil, the time wouldn’t match up.”

“Which means what?” she asked, reaching for him without really thinking about laying her hands on him again.

“Could mean a lot of things. Could be he’s running for his life, or he’s found himself a place that feels safe… or it could mean he’s putting together his own team elsewhere…”

“Which would mean…”

Daire’s concentration waned as his focus slipped to hers. “You know we shouldn’t be talking about this.”

“I’m not an agent. It can’t be against Olympus rules to talk.”

“It’s very against Olympus rules to talk to a civilian at all.”

Coiling her arms around his torso, she held herself against him. “I’m not a civilian… I’m your something.”

“Yeah,” he said, laying his hands on the back of her shoulders as he bowed to kiss her head. “I didn’t forget. But s*x for secrets is the oldest trick in the book.”

Without loosening her embrace, Tess leaned back, full of innocence, to look up at him. “Who said anything about secrets?”

It didn’t take long for her innocent blink to become a saucy smile.

“No s*x for anything,” he said, taking her arms to separate their bodies. With his grip sure, he pushed her back a few feet and held her there, giving her arms a squeeze before letting go to straighten up. “I have less than an hour and I have work to do.”

So they couldn’t have s*x because he was busy, not because he didn’t want to… Not being together wasn’t so bad if it meant they could still talk and get busy with each other.

“I can be quick,” she said, containing a laugh behind her taut lips that begged to open.

That was a Danny line and Daire didn’t miss it. He arched a brow. “Temptress.”

Both accusation and warning, the word sent a shiver through her.

“Okay,” Tess said on a teasing exhale, retreating until the recliner came up against the back of her legs. She dropped down into it, even though it was the one nearest the door that he preferred. “I’ll just sit here.”

“Okay,” Daire said, going back to his previous place at the dinette. Opening out the plans, he retrieved a notepad from beneath to jot things down. “You don’t have plans?”

“Not until later,” she said, twisting around to stretch her legs across the seats. “And it’s easier for you to keep me safe if I’m in your eyeline.”

“Harder for me to concentrate,” he muttered.

“Do you know the replacements for Two and Five?”

“I know of them.”

“Harry talked about it?”

Daire smacked his pen down and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Babe, you’ve gotta work with me here.”

“I’m here for whatever you need,” she said, undoing a couple of buttons of the loose shirt she wore over her bikini.

“It’s bad enough that you’re sexy all over the place all the time. I spend a lot of time thinking about how I’d love to compromise your honor.” It shouldn’t, but the notion tickled her excitement. “But now I gotta deal with you offering intelligence? That means I gotta think about compromising your safety too.”

She frowned. “What do you mean? I’ll tell you whatever I know.”

“Yeah, baby,” he said, linking his fingers over the plans. “But if you tell me something that leads to me taking action, then what? Do you know what would happen to you if One or Six thought you were a danger to them?”

“Nothing, because you’ll always keep me safe,” Tess said, though he didn’t seem eager to play. “I’m no danger and Three has never told me to keep anything quiet.”

“Three isn’t an operative. He’s never been an operative. He talks because it’s what men like him do. Flash is their specialty. Maybe he’s trying to impress you. More likely he doesn’t understand how what he says can be interpreted by people like me.”

Sitting up, she put her feet on the floor. “Like saying he was up in the wee hours talking to One?”

“Doesn’t seem like a big deal.”

“But you figured it out straight away.”

“Because I know how to read between the lines. I know how to pick out important details.”

Three told her that a few days ago. Even she hadn’t realized how it was relevant. Three wouldn’t think she’d talk to Daire. From what he’d seen, her interactions with anyone in the house, other than him, were minimal.