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Page 55 of Maneater (The Mavens #1)

THIRTY-SIX

ROWAN

It’s all out on the table, and somehow, despite my going into this knowing for the most part what I was going to hear, I’m thrown a curve.

But that could just be because I finally came inside Josie and made her mine, whether she knows it or not. I’m not letting this woman go, assignment or not.

I found Josie Montgomery in a bar, and then fate forced us back together over and over until finally, I got the hint.

“So you’re a spy?”

She lets out a loud laugh at my question before rolling over and on top of me. It feels…strange, knowing I just fucked her within an inch of her life while trying to get her to confess who she was to me.

I could have just been a normal human and asked her point-blank, and there’s a good chance she would have told me, but this was much more fun—and somehow, much more us .

We’re chest-to-chest when she speaks, and I can feel the vibration of each word against my body as she speaks.

“I mean… yeah.” She says it as if it feels strange to admit, which it may be, considering how secretive she is. “But not in like a James Bond, super-spy-gadgets, save-the-world-from-impending-doom kind of way.”

My hand glides over her hair, so soft and silky, I can’t find the will to stop sifting my fingers through it. She lets out a little sigh, her eyes drifting shut as she does. “What is it, then?”

“It’s more…investigations. Most of my assignments are smaller-scale PI-type shit.

Find out if a husband is cheating, if someone is hiding money, or proof of fraud.

We all have our own specialties: Rory excels in cybersecurity and hacking.

Although I will say that the Daydream Resorts systems are great.

She’s been able to get into a few things, but not all. It’s driving her insane.”

I smile at that with a bit of pride.

“I’m the one who hired that out and made sure it was perfect. A friend of my assistant runs a top-notch security firm and set it up.”

“Well, she hates you for that. Another friend of ours is great at ingratiating herself into the craziest situations to gather information; she’s a chameleon. Another can lie so efficiently, even I’m not convinced I know her well.”

“And you?”

“I’m the man-eater,” she says with a wide smile.

I raise an eyebrow at her. “Excuse me?”

She lets out a happy laugh. “We all have titles. Specialties. I’m the man-eater. A few smiles and flips of my hair, I have a man eating out of my hand and confessing all of his deepest, darkest secrets.” She moves her fingers along my chest.

“You don’t say.” I smile, and she returns it. “What else do you do besides flirting your way to get idiotic men to spill everything to you?”

That easy smile fades, and I worry I may have gone too far, asked things I shouldn’t have. Her hand lifts, a thumb caressing over my cheek before she bites her lip.

“More often than not, I put on a skin-tight dress that leaves little to the imagination and a full face of makeup and work it. I go to a party or a bar or even a fucking dog park, and I find whoever I think could give me the intel I need. Sometimes it’s our actual target; sometimes it’s their best friend, older brother, or coworker.

Anyone who might know something about what I need.

I flirt, charm, and work my skills, seamlessly getting them to confess something I need, and then I disappear. ”

“The bar?”

She smiles then. “The bar was me brushing up on my skills. I’d just gotten off an assignment where we determined a man was hiding money from his soon-to-be ex-wife to avoid alimony.”

Rowan makes a disgusted face, further endearing him to me, and I nod.

“Yup. So I went to the bar, saw that guy, and knew he was married. I have already shared all our information and my knowledge with his wife. The bartender—she’s a friend of mine—got pictures.

The wife can now file her own divorce or hire the Mavens to do more of a deep dive and make her a winning case file. ”

“So that was pro bono?”

She shrugs. “Sometimes I can’t help it. It’s too easy, too fun. I’ve been like this since college, stealing people’s secrets from them.”

“You said that once. That you wanted to get all of my secrets from me.”

It was when I caught her flirting with the bartender the day the pool filled with suds. When, for a split, finite second, I thought about throwing her over my shoulder and locking her in my room for the day, trying to get her out of my system.

Except now that I’ve had her, I have a sneaking suspicion I won’t be able to get her out of my system . Not for a long, long time.

“I…” She pauses, and I wait patiently for her to answer.

“It’s not li ke that, not with you. I know…

all of this is a lot. The spy stuff, the man-eater stuff.

” Her face screws up adorably. “But it’s not like that with you.

I swear. You’re not…a target.” I raise an eyebrow in disbelief, but she shakes her head.

“Not really. I tried, trust me. I wanted to compartmentalize, but I couldn’t.

Ask Rory. You have to believe me, Rowan. I swear, I?—”

Her voice goes frantic with nerves and panic, and I run a hand over her hair, trying to soothe her.

“Hey, hey,” I say, shifting to grab her chin and force her to look at me. She hesitates for a beat before her body relaxes, seeing something in my gaze that soothes her.

“I know,” I murmur. “I know, Troublemaker.” Her lips tip up. “So I’m dating the man-eater, huh?”

“We’re dating?” she asks, a self-satisfied smile on her lips. “That’s so weird. I don’t remember having that conversation with you.”

I shake my head at her, already realizing that if this stands the test of time, the way I have a gut feeling it will, this is my future. Constantly being needled about everything, a contest, a competition at every turn.

God, I can’t wait.

“I wasn’t planning to ask you, I figured it was kind of a given. But if you want, I can tie you up again and pull an answer out of you if you’d like.”

There’s contemplation in her eyes, and I let out a laugh, pulling her closer to me and pressing my lips to hers. “You need recovery time. But if that’s what I need to do to get you to agree we’re dating…” I say, my words trailing off.

She considers it for a moment longer before laughing and shaking her head. “No, no, I think you’ve earned me.”

My chest goes warm with her words. “Finally,” I say, pressing my lips to her neck. “I feel like I’ve been trying to earn you for fucking years.”

“Years?”

I shrug because who am I to deny it now?

She shifts then to get a better look at me and smiles.

“Speaking of that, what was your deal with me?” She asks a question I was hoping we could avoid, but I guess it’s as good a time as ever to answer.

If she puts her cards on the table, I need to do the same.

“You hated me from the start, even before you moved to Hudson City. You’d see me out in college and glower at me.

I didn’t get it, because we’d only ever met in passing before that. ”

I sigh and take in a deep breath. “We spent a whole night together. Your twenty-first birthday,” I say, starting slow. “You were at Park Seven, and I bumped into you. We danced pretty much the whole night.”

“What?” she asks, eyes wide, confirming something I realized pretty recently: Josie doesn’t remember that night. She was obviously drunk, but I guess I’d never realized just how drunk.

“Yeah,” I confirm, then her brows furrow and she speaks low, almost to herself.

“Ten, twenty-four, eighteen. Your passcode.” My lips tip in a smile. I should have known it wouldn’t take long for my brilliant girl to understand.

“The day I met you,” I say. “I didn’t realize until recently, I swear. I think that day has always just stuck with me.”

“Sure, Rowan,” she says with a laugh, and I can’t be annoyed: I wouldn’t believe me either. “And that tattoo is just, what?” So she did notice that one. “A coincidence?”

“My luckiest charm,” I whisper, then, because I can’t resist, I brush my lips across hers once more. That seems to stun her, and I smile at finally getting one up on her. When she seems to clear her mind and get her footing back, she speaks again.

“So what happened next?”

“You were leaving, your friends saying it was time to head out. I tried to get your number, set up something so we could have a date.”

“ I don’t date,” she whispers.

“Yeah, that’s what you said then, too,” I tell her with a smile. “And then a week later you were out with some frat asshole and…I took it personally.”

I run an embarrassed hand through my hair.

It was years ago, and I’d held on to it for years.

I wonder what would have happened if I’d just been an adult at any point between then and now and talked to her about it?

“He was some rich asshole I knew from class, and I thought you’d turned me down because he had what I didn’t. ”

I let the words hang between us before she shakes her head vehemently.

“Oh my god, no. Rowan… If anything, not coming from money is what keeps you in the running,” she says, and I can’t help but let out a laugh.

“Thank you?” I question.

“I just mean…with my job, and even back then, I met a lot of assholes with more money than common sense. They’re all the same, and they’re all assholes.”

“Back then? Were you a Maven then?” She shakes her head.

“In college, I had a bit of a…side hustle. I’d tempt girls’ boyfriends. A loyalty test, so to speak. See if they’d fall for it before they got in too deep with him and got their hearts broken. You’d be shocked how many did,” she says, and I shake my head.

“No, I wouldn’t. I’ve seen you work.”

She smiles like it’s a compliment, which I meant it as. Now that I have the full picture of what she’s been doing on all those dates, I see it for the game it is, the trap it is, and she is amazing at it.

“But once they fell for it, I still had to follow through on the dates or else they’d start to add things up, you know?”

Slowly, I nod, understanding.

“So you weren’t on dates? They were just so you could keep your cover?” She nods. “Good practice, I suppose. How’d you go from that to the Mavens?”

She shrugs. “No one really knows how Gabriel finds us. I was about to try and enter the FBI academy after graduation, but he offered me a job first. It was the perfect opportunity to use my unique skills.”

“Flirting?”

“Conning men out of whatever I want them to give me.”

“Mmm, well, it’s worked on me,” I say, rolling to my back and pulling her on top of me. “What do you want?”

“What have you got?” she asks with a smile.

“I think it’s better I show you,” I say low, rolling once more until I’m hovering over her. Her own smile widens, and as I start to kiss a trail down her body, she puts her hands behind her head.

“I think that’s a great idea.”

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