My stomach dropped in a good way.

“Now, phone him, baby,” he ordered, sliding down my body.

“Sebring—”

He pushed one of my legs wide at the same time running his hand down my inner thigh.

His body fell through.

I quickly lifted up my phone and engaged it.

Nick kissed the inside of my opposite thigh.

My lip quivered and I hit buttons on my screen.

I put the phone to my ear.

Dustin answered on the second ring.

Nick lapped at me.

My voice was throaty and strained as I made up some excuse I forgot what it was seconds after it came out of my mouth, ending things.

I did note, albeit vaguely, Dustin sounded disappointed and it seemed he was going to push it but instead he asked, “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. You’re a good man and saying things like this to a man I respect isn’t easy,” I replied, then swallowed the noise I wanted to make when Nick sucked deep at my clit. I forced out to finish, “And I’m coming down with a cold.”

Dustin said more and it was nice because he was a nice man.

But mostly, I hurried it along so I could get him off the phone and I could concentrate on Nick going down on me.

I managed this, hitting the button to end the call and tossing the phone to the bed beside me, my other hand moving to Nick’s head to hold him to me.

But he lifted away.

I got up on an elbow to look down at him to see his eyes on me.

“It over?” he asked.

“Yes,” I answered impatiently.

His face got lazy as he whispered, “Good, baby.”

Then he rolled, doing it clamped on to me, forcing me with him so we ended with him on his back and I was up, straddling his head.

He yanked down on my hips.

I rode his face.

It wasn’t a lie I’d told Dustin. Breaking things off with a nice guy wasn’t easy.

It was just, for the first time in my life, as luck would have it, doing something not easy led to a reward.

A really good one.

And that led to another reward.

Sleeping next to Nick Sebring.

So for the first time in my life, it was worth it to do something not easy.

It made me feel almost happy.

Except for the part that I feared down deep in my bones that it would end for both of us in misery.

Chapter Nineteen

Clean Up on Aisle Five

Nick

8:03 – That Next Monday Morning

Nick barely got to his desk in his office before his man Curt was at the door.

“A minute?” Curt requested.

Nick caught the look on his face and lifted his chin.

He didn’t take his seat behind his desk while Curt moved in and closed the door.

He walked to Nick’s desk and stood opposite it.

“Georgia Shade ordered a sweep of their offices this weekend,” he reported.

The itch that was beginning to creep up Nick’s neck stopped.

“Standard practice for them, Curt, you know that,” he replied. “Bugs are good. They’ve been in place without detection for years now.”

Curt’s voice dipped. “Different kind of sweep, Nick. Whoever did it located all of them like he was goin’ right to them. We got nothin’ from that warehouse since noon yesterday.”

That itch crept back.

“Like he was goin’ right to them?” Nick asked.

“Took him an hour to sweep our shit clean,” Curt told him.

“Anything heard before that?” Nick asked.

“Georgia giving the order. She didn’t say a name. We got no clue if the guy who pulled them is on the Shade crew or if he’s freelance. But he didn’t fuck around.”

Nick and his man held each other’s eyes.

This was not good.

It meant a leak.

There was no leak in Nick’s crew but shit happened. New allegiances were bought or coerced. He’d have to expend the effort to make certain that was true.

Knight’s crew was tight. No way in fuck any of Knight’s men would share what Nick had told his brother. But it wouldn’t get that far. There was no reason for Knight to share that information with any of his crew, and until there was, he just wouldn’t do it.

The only other person who knew he was on this job and knew how he did that kind of job, which meant knowing the kind of equipment Nick used and being able to make an educated guess where it might be placed, was Turner.

Twice while Nick had been working that situation with Hettie for the Feds, Nick’s position as a CI had been compromised.

The first nearly got him dead. Hawk Delgado, with the help of Sylvie and Tucker Creed, had intervened, working another job and in doing so, forcing the bust of a small-time player in the larger operation Turner’s team was targeting. Nick had gotten away and Turner and his crew had scrambled and covered Nick.

The second almost had the same ending, with Hettie getting dead and the operation never coming to fruition due the players backing off because of Federal heat.

Nick would stake his life that Turner wouldn’t fuck him.

That didn’t mean someone on his crew wasn’t playing both sides.

Obviously, in both incidences, questions had been asked. How Nick had been made. How Nick and Hettie got put in the position that had ended Hettie’s life.

Internal investigation, everyone came up clean.

Nick had never liked that, but taking that on was not his mission.

Getting his shit together, sorting his life, settling in with Livvie and finishing the job he started with Hettie and vengeance for the early end of her life was.