He hadn’t expected for the woman to be mad at him.

“You wanted me to have sex with Damon,” Micah accused. “I don’t know how many times you practically begged me to just fuck him. What was that one particularly ridiculous thing you kept saying… ah, that’s right, you told me to ‘just board the beef bus already’.” Micah made sure to use finger quotations for that gem.

Impossibly, Tessa’s face grew redder. “That was before I knew he was a fucking mob boss,” she all but snarled at him. “Who knows how many crimes – deaths – he’s responsible for? And forgetting about the ill-advised tumble in the sheets for a moment, I can’t believe you’re actually wearing this around.” She grabbed Micah by the forearm attached to the wrist that wore the watch Damon had gotten him for Christmas.

Micah yanked his arm out of her grip. “He promised it wasn’t bugged. And it’s not like it’s a smart watch, so he couldn’t have downloaded any weird tracking apps on it.”

“Oh, you mean like that phone he gave you?” Tessa pointed out primly. “The one he practically admitted was a tracking device?”

Micah hunched his shoulders defensively. “He only did that because he was worried about me.”

“Yeah!” Tessa agreed loudly, a hysterical edge to her voice. She clearly didn’t care that they were in public, having stopped at an Olive Garden to eat after Micah had picked her and Jasper up from the airport. (Damon would have a fit if he knew; he despised Olive Garden.) “Because he thinks you’re a fucking prostitute, Micah. Not a goddamn cop – but you are. And I don’t care how much faith you have in him, there’s no telling how Damon will react when he finds out.” She took a deep breath in through her nose, as if attempting to calm herself. “I know there’s no way you’ve been wearing that to the precinct.”

“So what if I have been?”

Tessa slapped her fork down on the table, spaghetti and all. Sauce splattered on the tabletop. “Shit, Micah. Do you want him to find out?”

Of course not.

Except… maybe a tiny part of him did. He was tired of lying to Damon, and hiding such a big part of his life from him. He felt sick about it when he thought about it too long… so sue him if he no longer thought it would be the worst thing in the world if Damon discovered his real job.

When he didn’t immediately answer in the negative, Tessa had apparently had enough of his bullshit. “Jesus Christ, Micah, I know you’re not this fucking obtuse. I swear, it’s like he fucked the brain right out of your skull-”

“Hey!”