Miki nodded. “Okay. Thanks.”
“That’s it? ‘Okay. Thanks.’ That’s all we’re getting?” Amy looked at her. “You’re not freaking out, which tells me you’re not surprised.”
“I’m not surprised. But that’s all I can really tell you.”
“Bullshit.”
“I’m not going to argue about this with you, Amy. So let it fuckin’ go.”
“What else do you need us to do?” Kenny Liu cut in before Amy could start ranting.
For the first time since her friends arrived, Conall spoke, “Nothing. Don’t do anything. And clean up your tracks. They should never know you were there.”
“They? Who’s they?” As the King of Paranoia, Craig was all over that little statement. But Miki knew she couldn’t tell him the truth. It wasn’t her truth to tell. So she lied.
“Mafia.”
Conall’s head snapped around and stared at her. She gave the smallest eyebrow raise.
“Mafia?” Amy turned her body in the booth so she could stare Miki in the face. “The Mafia? You expect us to buy that the Mafia is out to get you?”
Conall leaned forward, his most innocent expression on that dangerously misleading face. “Hey. That’s not something we’d lie about.”
Miki looked at Amy. She had to. If she stared at Conall a second longer, she would start giggling hysterically.
He returned his gaze to Craig. “And if they find out you were there, we’ll find your body in the back of a Cadillac with your tongue cut out.”
Miki bit the inside of her cheek and kicked Conall under the table.
She watched the range of emotions pass over her friends’ faces. Ben had stopped listening, which meant he was bored. Kenny Liu appeared truly concerned. Craig looked like he would pass out from the panic. And Amy restlessly tapped her fingers against the Formica table and glowered.
“You must be insane if you expect us to buy that load of shit.”
“There’s a lot about me you guys don’t know.”
“You’re lying, Kendrick. You and Conan the Barbarian.”
Miki and Conall looked innocently at each other then back at her friends.
She shook her head sadly. “It hurts me that you think I’m lying.”
Conall sighed. “It hurts us both.”
She would have really lost it then if she and Conall weren’t busy kicking each other under the table.
“The Mafia? Was that the best you could do?” They’d started laughing as soon as Amy and the rest of them left. Ten minutes later and they were still laughing.
“Dude, I was desperate. I needed something and Amy wasn’t backing off. I know her.”
“Fine. Whatever.” Conall grabbed her hand. “Let’s go back to the hotel and fuck some more.”
“Actually, I have another idea.”
Why didn’t he like the sound of that? “A better idea?”
“Probably not.” She held up a small slip of paper. “But an idea just the same.”
“What’s that?”
“Leucrotta’s address. Let’s do a drive-by.”
“Shooting?” He wouldn’t put it past her.
“No, you nut case. Let’s go check him out.”
“No way, baby. Something happens to you, Zach will have my ass because Sara will have his.” He looked down into that adorable face of hers. “And I might miss you a little myself.”
“Gee. Thanks.” Miki smirked at him. “Look. We can do this one of two ways. We can go there now. Together. Check it out for our amusement. Or you can find yourself passed out in a pool of your own vomit in the bathroom while I risk life and limb going there by myself.”
Conall stared down at her. “You’d drug me again?”
“Sure. I’d only have to wrap it in bacon.”
Conall wanted to be insulted, but she was just so damn cute. “I can’t afford to have you traipsing that tight ass of yours around a Clan den.”
“And I have no desire to get too close. I have no guns. No knives. No hand grenades. I’m defenseless. But we need to check out the enemy. We need to find out who these people are. I don’t believe in spending my life hiding or running.”
He believed that. He saw why Sara and Miki were friends. Miki was as tough as any wolf he knew, she simply found a different way to survive. But still, he didn’t want her to get hurt. “I don’t know, Mik.”
She smiled at him and he felt his cock rear its ugly head. “Please, Conall…baby. For me.”
He laughed again. “You’re fuckin’ shameless.”
She took the car keys out of his jean pocket. “Come on, baby.” She jangled the keys at him. “Come on. Let’s go for a ride!”
“I swear to God, woman. You make one crack about hanging my head out the window…”
She frowned and he could tell she’d been all set to do just that. “Damn.”
She wondered how long they would play twenty questions as she led him to Leucrotta’s house. She’d memorized every street map of Seattle and the surrounding areas. Didn’t take much. She only had to examine a map once to know every detail.
“Where did you learn to shoot?” Again with more questions. Why was he so interested? They’d already gone through these types of questions just the other night, but then he was still trying to get into her pants. Now that he was in, she wasn’t quite sure why he was still so curious.
Are booty calls supposed to be this chatty?
“The Marines.”
“You were in the Marines?” He didn’t have to sound so shocked.
“No.”
“Did you date a Marine?”
“No.”
He seemed relieved by that answer, which confused her even more.
“Was your father a Marine?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t know the man.”
“Really?”
“He tried to contact me once after high school. But I told him to go to hell. I had no desire to meet a man who at twenty-six dated a sixteen-year-old girl, got her pregnant and then dumped her.”
It had been a good thing she didn’t meet her father then. Nineteen years old, in college, with full access to the biotech labs. Between that and her association with Craig and the guys, she would have hurt the man. As it was she remembered a late night of hiding one of her creations in what was now Craig’s personal lab. Had to. The military wanted to get their hands on it. Of course, Sara and Angelina still thought she was delusional when she said Black Ops would be coming for her one day. Little did they know.
“I can understand that. Did your mother love him?”
“Tragically, yes.”
He fell silent on that point and apparently decided to let it go. “Angelina dated a Marine?”
Miki rolled her eyes. “Nope. They’re on the List.”
“What List?”
“You know, it’s right in your face. You just refuse to see.”
Conall stopped at a red light and looked at her. Then he grinned. A big, beautiful grin. “Your mother was a Marine.”
“And finally my Cro-Magnon man enters the twenty-first century where women are in the military.”
“Your Cro-Magnon man?”
She stared out the window so she didn’t have to see his Viking grin. She wasn’t going to start liking him. Not really liking him. A passing “I don’t hate you enough to kill you” association was fine and dandy. But liking him like she liked Sara or Amy or Angelina or even Craig was out of the question.