I looked around my monitor again for effect. “Agent Davies is saying I fucked my way to the top. Do you have any idea how hard it is to get the agents to take me seriously when I walk in here and get a promotion on day one?”

“It was day two actually. And Agent Davies did fuck her way to the top—well, to her top. She won’t likely be promoted any further.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Have you ever given her a raise?”

“Absolutely not.”

“Well, Davies might have, but technically, she’s right about me. It’s gnawing at me. I’m putting in extra hours, so I can make myself believe that I earned the spot.”

“Grow up, Liis.”

“You first, Thomas.”

I thought I heard him breathe out the tiniest hint of a laugh, but I didn’t acknowledge it. I simply allowed myself a smug smile from behind the safety of the lit screen between us.

Car horns and sirens could be heard coming from the street below. Out there, the world continued, unaware that we worked late and lived lonely lives to make sure they could go to bed with one less mob boss, one less sex ring, and one less serial killer on the loose. The hunt-and-capture was what I worked for every day—or that was what my function used to be. Now, I was tasked with keeping Thomas’s brother out of prison. At least, that was what it felt like.

My smug smile vanished.

“Tell me the truth,” I said against my hand.

“Yes, I’m hungry,” Thomas droned.

“That’s not it. What is your objective? Taking Benny down or keeping Travis out of prison?”

“One is entangled with the other.”

“Pick one.”

“I practically raised him.”

“That’s not an answer.”

Thomas took a deep breath and exhaled, his shoulders sagging as if the answer were weighing down on him. “I’d trade my life to save his. I would definitely walk away from this assignment. I’ve walked away before.”

“From the job?”

“No, and no, I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Understood,” I said. I didn’t want to talk about her either.

“You don’t want me to talk about it? Everyone else in this office is dying to know.”

I glared at him. “You just said you didn’t. There is something I want to know though.”

“What?” he asked, wary.

“Who is in the pictures on your desk?”

“What makes you think it’s a who? Maybe they’re pictures of cats.”

All emotion left my face. “You don’t have cats.”

“But I like cats.”

I leaned back, and I hit my desk, frustrated. “You don’t like cats.”

“You don’t know me that well.”

I hid behind my monitor again. “I know that you either have a miracle lint brush, or you don’t have cats.”

“I could still like cats.”