Page 22

She was right.

“We’ll get that. We’ll start tomorrow.”

Her head snapped toward me, her warm chocolate eyes narrowed to slits. “You’ll start now.”

Marco scoffed. “What are we supposed to do?”

She turned only her head to look at him. It was borderline creepy how the rest of her body remained perfectly still. “Find him. Follow him. Take notes.”

None of them reacted until Cruz looked at me with a question in his eyes.

“You and Derek, trail him.”

Derek dropped the trash bag he’d been filling. “Now?”

“He has a reservation for dinner at eight.” Marco faced him. “I’ll send you the address.”

“Start there,” I agreed. “Take pictures of who he’s with and where he goes.”

Emilia stepped forward. “What he’s wearing, the women with him, how he touches them. I want the details, not just a list of destinations.”

“This isn’t our first time, cariño,” Derek scoffed.

Emilia tensed beside me. Her fingers going to her hip, but I caught her hand. “No more knives.” I turned to my brothers. “She’s a part of our team. All of you need to accept that and move on. She’s right about needing more information than we’re used to providing for a mission. This is all new territory. We can’t mess up.”

One misstep and Emilia’s life was at risk.

We’d been warned of the consequences of failing.

It wasn’t an option.

“On it.” Cruz, the much more amicable of the two, swept his arm over the counter, collecting the old beer cans, bottles, and pizza boxes in his bag. “We’ll take these out.”

He nodded to Derek, who grumbled under his breath as they finished in the kitchen. He walked a basket of laundry down the hall and then grabbed two bags.

Emilia waited until they were gone before facing me. “Where’s my room? I’d like to unpack before figuring out dinner.”

Marco covered a laugh with a cough and wiped down the counter.

She narrowed her eyes at his back, then looked up at me.

“There are only two bedrooms.” Hadn’t Rod filled her in on the situation?

She went toward her bags. “No, there are four. Which one’s mine?”

“You don’t have one.” Marco enjoyed dropping that bomb a bit too much.

She closed her eyes and inhaled deeply before opening them. “What?”

“We’re sharing. Marco and I are in one, and Cruz and Derek are in the other.”

Her jaw rocked. “So I’ll use one of the other two.”

“No, we converted one into the training room, and the other is the surveillance room. Neither has enough room for a bed.”

I swear I saw her claws come out, but they were gone before I could confirm.

I must have been imagining things. That wasn’t even possible.