Total pages in book: 131
Estimated words: 122609 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 613(@200wpm)___ 490(@250wpm)___ 409(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 122609 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 613(@200wpm)___ 490(@250wpm)___ 409(@300wpm)
“Yes. Yes!” He smiled as he slowly stood back up, removed the jewelry from the box, and slipped the dazzling ring on her finger. She hugged him tight, staring adoringly at the ring from over his shoulder, and cried herself to delirium. When she heard shuffling, she caught the shop owner going to the checkout counter with the camera she’d been holding minutes earlier.
“It’s yours. He bought it for you,” the man declared. He produced a gorgeous white box with satin ribbon and wrapped it up for her.
Meanwhile, she blinked away another wave of tears away.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Archer could not recall the last time he’d been this nervous. He hadn’t even broken a sweat when he’d asked the woman who now stood beside him in the garage to marry him. They belonged together—they both felt this—so this union was a logical next step. But today was the day that emotion of unrest consumed him. Not for himself, but for her…
He bit his tongue as he watched this woman move just as calm as she pleased, preparing to get into the rental car she’d be using for their much-anticipated undertaking. Honey was checking her earpiece that Irish had fashioned. It looked like an earring—a little white pearl. It was incredible, really. Irish was such an amazingly talented sneaky bastard. A smart egg. Honey readjusted both “earrings.” She had another one on the other ear, the same beautiful pearl stud, but it was a decoy. Nonfunctional.
Another recorder had been placed in the heel of her shoe, and inside her purse sat a small run-of-the-mill camera that she believed would do the job. She’d insisted she didn’t need anything fancy—just something quiet, fast, and with a long battery life. Kind of like her vibrator, she’d teased, but he wasn’t in the mood for jokes.
So she’d have nothing too obvious as far as her gear or recording devices. Nothing that would tip someone off in case they were to look through her belongings, or her purse fell off a table. She was dressed seductively in a crop top, tight jeans, and red heels—the kind of attire that a disreputable deviant like Dr. Bannon would enjoy. Her makeup was a bit more dramatic with dark eyeliner and colorful eyeshadow, and she wore a dark burgundy bone straight wig, with bangs.
She opened her purse and peeked inside, making sure she’d placed a pair of comfortable black ballet flats to use when she was on the prowl. Archer crossed his arms, fighting all of his instincts that screamed at him to stop her from going. She was about to walk into the lion’s den, willingly, like a piece of meaty bait.
“It’s not too late to cancel the whole thing. You don’t have to do this.”
She flung her arms around him, kissed him all over his face, then leaned back and stroked his cheek real slow, her gaze adoring and intense.
“Don’t you worry, James. Nothin’ is going to happen, and if it does, I’ll handle it.” He supposed his unconvinced expression betrayed him. “We’ve been over this a million times and I’ve done this shit, in different capacities, a million times over, too.”
“If you say the wrong thing, appear too smart, anything like that, he’s going to be suspicious. He always has to feel like the smartest person in the room. You don’t play dumb well, Honey. Not in the least.”
“I can play any role I put my mind to.” She thumbed his nose. “I think quick on my feet, too. I’m not easily intimidated, and I don’t give up when faced with a challenge. This has been my real life, Archer, before I even knew you. Think of it like this: you gave me a tip for a story, and now I’m investigating it. I will stay on schedule. Please, trust me.”
“I trust you. I don’t trust him. Say the word if you need help. The code word.”
“Yes, the code word. I know that if anything doesn’t go as planned, I must alert you. You’ll be just a skip and a hop away.” She gave him one more kiss, winked, then got into the driver’s seat of the rental pickup truck.
As soon as he saw her drive off his property, he got into an old car he’d bought from an auction for this purpose—a beat up Ford Focus. After donning his baseball cap and a pair of sunglasses, he got behind the wheel, cranked up the engine and started off, staying a good distance behind her. He stopped trailing her a couple of blocks away, but knew his guys were already on site. The last thing he’d do was leave this all to chance. He wanted someone there in case she got trapped in the building, or was followed.
She means too much to me, and this is all my fault. I put the idea in her head, and now that I love her, I tried to take it away, but she wouldn’t let me. She has her own mind and it’s made up, but I have my own two hands, and I’ll be damned if I don’t put ’em to use…