“What the f**k?” I repeated, thinking he hadn’t heard me with his ear protectors on.
Then he looked at me.
Wow.
I didn’t have to know him very well to know he was seriously pissed.
“You hung up on me,” he said, voice smooth and quiet.
“Vance.”
“Don’t ever hang up on me.”
Most girls would probably hear the way he said those six words and nod meekly.
I wasn’t like most girls.
“You put a tracking device on my car,” I said in my defense.
“So?” he responded.
“And in my purse,” I went on.
“This is a problem because…?” he asked.
“This is a problem because…” I couldn’t think why it was a problem with his angry eyes on me. Then it came to me. “It’s intrusive,” I finished.
“It’s intrusive,” he repeated.
“Yes,” I clipped.
“Then you’ll probably not be happy to learn that your house is bugged. The living room and kitchen have cameras as do the front and back entrances.”
My mouth dropped open. “You’re joking,” I whispered.
“I put them in myself the first night I broke in. The only reason the windows don’t have them is because you have protective bars.”
Oh my God.
I was going to have to learn not to sleep so heavily. I didn’t know how to manage that but I’d have to try. I could not believe he wired my house while I was asleep.
God, he was f**king good.
I shrugged off my admiration and pulled back my anger. “You’re watching me?” I asked, narrowing my eyes.
“The Team’s watching you in the surveillance room at the office.”
Oh my God.
My mind flashed to the Sacred Girlfriend Ritual, complete with margaritas and makeup and discussion of popping cherries. Mace had been in the surveillance room last night. He’d picked up my call when Vance had gone after Sal. He’d probably watched and listened to the whole thing.
No doubt about it, I was moving to Nicaragua.
“God dammit,” I muttered under my breath and, embarrassment overwhelming me, I sagged against the wall.
Then my mind flashed to Vance and I on the couch and my head which was tilted down to stare at my boots shot up.
“Last night –” I started.
“They’re instructed to turn off the internal cameras when I’m with you,” Vance told me.
“What if they don’t?” I asked.
“They do.”
“What if they don’t?”
“They f**kin’ do. Jesus, Jules, that isn’t the point.”
“What is the point?”
He moved quick and got in my space.
I was really going to have to learn to be prepared for how quickly he moved.
He stared down at me, eyes still angry. “The point is, you stood me up and you hung up on me. That’s what we’re talkin’ about.”
“No, now we’re talking about you and your boys keeping tabs on me.”
“We’re protecting you.”
“I want them taken out, the cameras, the bugs, the tracking devices, all of it,” I demanded.
“That isn’t gonna happen.”
“I’ll take them out myself,” I told him.
“You wouldn’t find them.”
He was probably right.
“I’ll ask Frank to take them out,” I said.
Frank would find them, I was certain.
“Muñoz pulls them, I’ll put more in,” he shot back.
“God dammit Crowe.”
“Jules. The shit stays at your house so I can protect you. No discussion.”
That’s when I saw red and I snapped, “I hate it when you do that.”
“What?”
“Make these macho man declarations. It pisses me off.”
“If you weren’t so f**kin’ antagonistic, you’d realize it’s for your own damned good.”
Again, he was probably right.
Still.
My anger ebbed a bit, I frowned at him but this had no effect.
“We’ll take Indy home. Then we’re goin’ to dinner and we’re talkin’,” Vance said.
“No, I can’t. The Rock Chicks have decided to throw me a birthday party and we’re going to Brother’s to plan it.”
His eyes narrowed. “You wanna explain to me how you’re all of a sudden close with Indy and her gang?”
I shook my head, not because I didn’t want to explain it but because I couldn’t.
“I have no idea.” When he looked dubious I continued. “Honestly. I swear. I actually tried to get them to leave me alone but I thought Daisy was going to take me down in a bitch-slapping fight when I told her my life was none of her business. Have you seen that woman’s nails? I’m not gonna go there.”
He shook his head a few times. His hand came to the wall at my waist and he leaned into it and, therefore, leaned into me, getting way close.
“We got shit to discuss,” he said, his face an inch from mine.
“Yes. We do. Unfortunately I’m moving to Nicaragua after our meet with Darius so we won’t be able to do that,” I declared.
He stared at me a beat then slowly his anger disappeared and he grinned, just like he did last night as if I was downright adorable.
“What’ll Roam and Sniff do if you move to Nicaragua?” he asked.
With him no longer being angry, the smooth was still in his voice but it was an altogether different kind of smooth. This had an effect on me, an effect I ignored.
“I’ll take them with me,” I decided on the fly.
He moved in closer, his free hand coming to my hip, his eyes getting soft and sexy and I felt my belly flutter in a way I couldn’t ignore. “What’ll I do if you move to Nicaragua?”
Immediately I mouthed off. Do not ask me why but I was going with the Belly Flutter Defense.
“Find yourself a woman who can cook and doesn’t mind you ordering her around all the time, being bossy and dictatorial and macho and hyper-intense and actually likes it when you get all… whatever… and make her belly flutter.”
After I said that, my mouth snapped shut.
Damn.
I’d gotten carried away and went too far.
He finished moving in, pressing me back into the wall with his body. “I do that to you?” he asked, his voice silk.
Like he didn’t know.
“Back off, Crowe.”
His eyes dropped to my mouth and my heart started hammering in my chest.