Chapter 33 Honestly, I already knew she was going to say something like that. And that's not exactly an everyday thing someone says to you. It's not as if her saying that is hyperbole or some off-the-cuff, my father will kill you if he catches you in my bedroom, kind of thing. Her father isn't a good man. For one, he has an undercover FBI agent on him. For another, he sent that undercover FBI agent here to try to scare me and get more information on my relationship with Liora. More than that, he's squeaky clean on the outside, and with minor digging, which doesn't add up. That's why Saturday night I did some major digging. I knew the risks of that when I moved her and Hazel in with me. I didn't exactly have a choice because Liora wasn't going to let me get her a place, and there was no way I was letting them stay in her apartment. Even if my lovely drug-dealing, woman-assaulting buddy will be going to prison for a long time, thanks to all the stuff I put on him. Regardless, I wouldn't have slept with her still living there. No, she needed to be with me. Hazel too. I study her. "Where is this coming from? Why now?" Her teeth snag her lip, and her eyes wobble. Someone got to her. She was threatened. "Did your father come to see you today or Agent Vega?" And why didn't I put this together sooner? Even though I didn't see or notice anyone, her father clearly knows I came up to Maine and blew through town. He knows I'm onto him. He has to. Hell, he might even know I asked about Liora in the coffee shop. That was insanely stupid of me. Mrs. Heather had already told me he comes through there a couple of days a week and that they talk. "My father never comes to see me." She blinks at me and tilts her head. "Agent Vega?" This is where things start to get tricky for me, but if I want her trust, I have to give her mine first. Besides, at this point, she pretty much already knows I hack. She just doesn't know the extent of it. "Wait. Before you answer that." She climbs off me, and that's not nearly as fun as her climbing on me. "Turn away," she commands as she tucks her dress between her thighs over her pussy to cover it. "You're kidding, right? I've seen every inch of you." "Goodie for you. I said turn away. I can't sit on you with my pussy rubbing your freaking pants and dick." I roll my eyes but close them, giving her this one. "This good enough for you?" "Only if you're not peeking." "I'm not." "Done. You can open them. Did you have to tear my panties? I don't have another pair here." I blink open my eyes and smile widely at her scowl. My little angel is so fucking hot when she's angry with me, but now isn't the time to get distracted. I crook a finger at her, and thankfully she comes back to me, but because she always has to be a touch defiant, she doesn't climb back on my lap. "Get over it. You're mine. My girlfriend, my lover, my roommate with benefits, my life. Mine." I pick her up and place her back on my lap where she belongs. "That wasn't some mid-thrust, your pussy and ass feel like magic talk. I've meant it every time I've said it." She shifts around to keep herself covered and then places her forearms on my shoulders so she can play with the strands of hair at the back of my neck. The fact that I not only know she's not wearing panties but also feel it is driving me crazy. My cock is already hard. It's a goddamn trigger reflex whenever she's near, but I force myself-and my dick-back in line. "Agent Vincent Vega⁠-" She snorts out a laugh. "You're kidding." "No. I think it was intentional on his part, actually. I think he wanted me to know it was a fake name and that he wasn't there as a real FBI agent. I think he wanted my skepticism. Anyway, he came to visit me right after you started working here. He was poking at me, at my past and my arrest in college." "Wait." She holds up her hand, stopping me. "What arrest?" Here's where this gets serious. "Angel, what I'm going to tell you is me putting my life in your hands. My freedom, more or less. I'm trusting you. Do you understand that? It's not something I do with hardly anyone." Not anymore. A shudder rolls through her, but she nods. "Yes. I understand." "You already know I'm a hacker. You figured that out, and most people can guess at it, but they have no real notion of it or what I do. You know about my closet, but Champagne's the only other one. Legit, everyone else thinks it's a closet and that I play drums and video games in there." Her eyes round. "Oh. I had no clue. About your closet, I mean. This... Vega person mentioned you used to hack things you shouldn't." I try not to grimace. "Cassian's death and subsequently leaving you fucked me up pretty good. I was... doing stupid shit. Careless shit. I wanted to burn the world, and in some ways, I started to. I won't go into the details of it, but I hacked something pretty major and got busted for it." She shakes her head. "I don't remember hearing about that, and that's something that would have traveled to Lavender Lake." "My father made sure my name never hit the papers and that it was kept silent. The bust was reported, but it simply stated that MIT students were involved in an underground hacking ring in competition with Caltech. That's it. The FBI and the NSA didn't want it broadcast either." "The NSA? Jesus, Vander." "Anyway, my arrest was expunged along with any record of it. Vega knew about it. There's only one guy at the FBI who likes to fuck with me, and he's the one who arrested me. He also hasn't bothered me in years. I'm positive I'm still on a watch list, but no one really minds me because I've kept myself outwardly clean and I'm insanely careful." "But this Vega guy knew about it when he shouldn't." I nod. "Yes. Because he's actually an undercover FBI agent." "So he showed up here as a fake FBI agent when he's actually a real one because my father sent him to scare and intimidate you," she states, working it through. "But he's also working for my father as one of his hired men." "He's undercover. Your father is involved in a lot of criminal activity, and it seems he has triggered the FBI with it to the point where they sent someone undercover into his operations. Probably because they don't have enough evidence to arrest your father or indict him. I think your father sent him to get a feel for how things are between us, and in doing so, Vega tried to get a sense of me and what I can do." "Does my father know about your past?" "Maybe. Possibly. Probably. I don't know. But if he does, it means he was watching me very closely back then. There's no other way. I don't know for sure." But I've found some of that. Files on me in hidden, encrypted folders. It wasn't easy to get access to his systems. It actually took a lot of work and rooting around and a backway entrance, but I got in. I just haven't had the time to really dig through everything yet since that all happened in the wee hours of Saturday morning after having Liora. She swallows, absorbing that. "And this guy was here asking about me?" "Also, yes." "Why didn't you tell me?" "I knew you were keeping things from me, and honestly, I had to protect my ass too. I didn't know your angle. I still don't other than you're afraid of your father and he's doing some crooked shit." She scrubs her hands up and down her face and leans back against the table. "Vander..." "You can tell me anything. You're safe with me. I swear it." My forehead drops to her chest. "God, Liora." I press a kiss to her left breast, over her heart, before I cup her face, and our foreheads meet. "I'd die for you. I'd kill for you. I'm every bit as obsessed with you as you said. Please tell me. I can help. I swear I can. You just have to trust me." Her fingers drag through my hair, but she's trembling so badly, I'm shocked she's not vibrating the table with it. "Cassian didn't fall, and he didn't jump. My father had one of his men kill him. They pushed him, and he fell four stories." I freeze, everything inside me seizing up. Hell, I'm not even breathing. "My father paid off the medical examiner to corroborate that, and after he filed his report claiming Cass was drunk and fell, he had him killed too so there were no loose ends." I fall back against my seat, staring at her as if I've never seen her before. Her face is streaked with tears and fear, but she's calm, and it shocks me because I'm anything but. It's as if I'm being sawed in half and my insides are being ripped from me. Cassian was murdered. By his father. There are no words to describe that. It's unfathomable. It's horrifying. It's gutting. "If you had been there when you were supposed to be, he would have killed you too. And part of me always thought that's what he wanted. Now I'm nearly positive it is." "I... I was there. I saw the men, and at the time I thought they were police officers. One put me in the back of a car and drove me into town and left me. I was so fucked up by seeing Cass on the ground that I never thought about the details of it. Until Saturday morning, when I went back to the site where he died. I realized then that there was no way the police could have gotten there that fast. It was the men who killed him." "Yes. And you were lucky they didn't kill you too. In fact, I'm shocked they didn't." "I had my phone in my hand," I murmur. "I was calling my dad. I think by that point, if they had killed me, it would have been too suspicious." "Maybe. My father knew we were together. The... man he had visit me today said as much. But then you broke up with me and left and never came back, and he lost interest." "He didn't lose interest, Angel. He just watched from afar and didn't act because he didn't need to. Until you started working for me." She nods. "Yes." I pick her up and place her back on the table as I shoot out of the chair. I kick one as I pass it, sending it careening into the wall with a loud bang. My fingers rake through my hair as I pace, thinking this through. Fuck. Fuck! This is just... in-fucking-sane. "Vander." She says my name softly but resolutely, and I already know I'm not going to like what she has to say next. "Hazel and I are going to move out today." "No." "Yes." I round on her and march back until I have her face in my hands. "You're not moving out. You're not going anywhere." "If I don't, he won't only kill you, he'll kill Hazel. And me, but he'll kill Hazel before that. I know his secrets. I overheard him discussing Cassian's and the medical examiner's deaths as well as some other things one night. He caught me and told me that if I left, he wouldn't kill my mother or me. But if I ever talked or ever came back home, he would, and he'd make it hurt. So I left. But his threat remains, and now that I have Hazel, it's grown. I can't risk you too." She hiccups out a sob. "Please, Vander, I'm trying to be strong and brave, but I can't risk you, and I can't risk Hazel. He knows you're a hacker. He knows we were together in the past. He knows you were in Maine." "Angel, Vega is a real FBI agent. He's undercover, and he's working for your father. As far as I can tell, he's only been there three months. That's not exactly long enough to build a case, if that's even what he's doing. But it means the FBI is onto your father. I don't know the full extent of his crimes, but they go far beyond killing Cass and a medical examiner. Cass had to know something and was going to talk. He had to know Cass asked me to meet him there. Why else would your father kill him?" "So the man who waited for me outside the hospital today on my father's behalf, loaded with threats, is actually an undercover FBI agent?" S~ᴇaʀᴄh the (F)indNƟvᴇl.ɴet website on Gøøglᴇ to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality. I nod. "Yes." "You're positive?" "Yes. It wasn't easy to find. I have facial recognition software here that I designed, and it led me down an empty path until I thought everything through and realized he knew about my arrest, and only the FBI knew the reason behind it. They've hidden it well, and if I didn't still have a back channel into the FBI, I'd never have found him. I've also started getting into your father's sys⁠-" "No." My brows pinch. "No?" "You'll get caught. He'll figure it out somehow, or the FBI will." "I've already hacked the FBI. I've been in their system for more than eight years. Even when they arrested me, they never found the computer I had everything on because it was at Stone's, and with that, I never removed the worm. I have them in all government agencies. I just don't touch them unless I need them." She shakes her head violently. "Don't tell me that! They'll catch you. You'll go to prison." I run my fingers along the lines of her face. "Baby, this is what I do. I'm not bragging or being full of myself. I'm one of the best in the world." "But you got caught⁠-" "I trusted the wrong people. I got arrogant and stupid, and I didn't have a ton of fucks to give at that point. It wasn't the hacking that got me caught. It was the people I told. It's not like that now unless you turn me in." "I'd never." My chest inflates like a hot air balloon at the vehemence in her tone and expression. "I have everything to lose and therefore won't risk it." "But they know. They're already onto you." "Do you trust me?" She nibbles on her lip, and I want to bite it for her hesitation. "Goddammit, Liora. Do. You. Trust. Me?" "Yes. I trust you. But⁠-" "No buts. We'll continue as we have been. You'll start looking at apartments to make it clear our arrangement is as we say it is. You're not fucking moving out, though. We won't be together in public." Again. Shit, I took her and Hazel out for dinner Saturday night, and we looked like a family. Even the waitress said we were such an adorable family. Fuck! "We'll come and go separately. I will have security on you and Hazel at all times. That's nonnegotiable," I quickly add when I can see her argument starting to come. "You'll never see them or know they're there, and if anyone from the outside is watching, they won't know they're there either. Life will continue on. But I will get your father, and I will take him down."