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  When she’d announced her intention to join the FBI, her family hadn’t supported her decision, saying she was too pretty to take on a job like that.

  Her father, an old-school type with decidedly archaic beliefs, had been dismissive.

  That’s not the future for you. God blessed you with a beautiful face. Find a good man to take care of you. Treat you right.

  She hated saying that being considered beautiful was a burden because people tended to think she was being falsely modest, but it was true.

  The irony was that she’d fought to be seen as a good agent because of her skills, but the biggest case of her career thus far would hinge upon her ability to use her looks to her advantage.

  Time to put that pretty face to work for more than being someone’s trophy.

  No one was going to take this opportunity from her.

  Especially not Shaine Kelly.

  CHAPTER 2

  The plane touched down in Miami and they were immediately whisked away in a nondescript black SUV to the debriefing at a secure location.

  The small room, located in a government building disguised as an insurance office, was cramped with everyone inside.

  Introductions were brief and to the point, with Chief Hobbs doing the introducing via video call.

  “I’ll call your names, you raise your hands. This ain’t no tea party and there’s no time for a meet and greet. Miami police officers Richard York and Ben Rocha, DEA agents Marcus West and Poppy Jones, FBI special agents Shaine Kelly and Victoria Stapp, Miami DEA contact Rosa Ramirez.” Murmured greetings were exchanged and Hobbs continued, “From here out, Ramirez will be your primary on-scene superior. Ramirez will be in constant contact with me via videoconference. She will handle all immediate concerns regarding the investigation. Any questions?”

  No one ventured a comment and Hobbs took that as a cue to turn the meeting over to Rosa.

  “Thank you, Chief Hobbs,” Rosa began, a no-nonsense woman with slicked back dark hair pulled into a tight bun. “This is the biggest covert operation in recent history, and we’re anxious for a successful end to this El Escorpion character.”

  Rosa gestured to the packets on the table. “For the agents going undercover, you’ll find IDs, cash and backstories for your covers. Officers York and Rocha will be your only contacts inside the Miami PD for obvious reasons. We know there are cops on the take, but we haven’t figured out who. York and Rocha have been determined to be trustworthy.”

  “And who vetted them?” Shaine asked. When his life was on the line, he didn’t care about being nice.

  Rosa smiled. “Ahh, Special Agent Shaine Kelly. I’ve heard about you. Smart, fearless...a chameleon in the field.”

  “Guilty as charged,” Shaine said with a grin.

  But Rosa wasn’t finished. “Also known for having an issue with authority. Let’s be frank, Agent Kelly...the reason you’re here is that your ability to close cases outweighs your undesirable qualities. But make no mistake, eyes are on you, so watch yourself.”

  Shaine caught the tiny, infinitesimal twitch of Poppy’s lips and his own thinned, though he chose to remain quiet.

  So Rosa Ramirez wasn’t a fan.

  Great.

  Nothing like your direct superior looking for reasons to toss you out.

  Rosa moved on briskly. “The Scorpion has been a thorn in Miami’s side for years, but until now the product of choice was always the usual, heroin or meth. This new drug is lethal, cheap and moving quickly. It’s the new cash crop, and unless we put a stop to it here, it will spread. We could have an epidemic within months. That’s not going to happen. We’re counting on this team to bring The Scorpion to justice. Please open your packets.”

  Paper rustling was the only sound in the room as they quickly read through the details.

  Shaine and Poppy would pose as twentysomething college kids. Shaine would bartend at a popular upscale bar and strip club, Lit, while Poppy would be a dancer.

  A strip club? Poppy didn’t outwardly react, but he suspected her gut was churning. He knew Poppy didn’t have hang-ups about her body, but she wasn’t an exhibitionist, either.

  Poppy’s attention was focused on the paper in front of her, but the absent way she chewed her bottom lip told him her thoughts were elsewhere.

  “The idea is to blend into the scene where Bliss is commonly found. The dealers are like sharks circling the chum. It’s your job to seek out the higher level dealers to get close to anyone who knows El Escorpion’s identity. Once we discover a name, phase two will start, which is why we need a male and a female undercover agent. You must be willing to do whatever it takes to get this information. Are you up to that challenge?”

  “Not a problem for me,” Shaine answered, looking pointedly at Poppy.

  “Nor is it for me,” Poppy replied coolly, adding, “Looks like all those dancing classes in my childhood are going to finally pay off.”

  “You’re sure about that?” Shaine asked, not buying her answer.

  “Why wouldn’t I be?” Poppy returned with a dispassionate expression. “Do you feel you can handle being a bartender?”

  “All right, all right, settle down. We’re all on the same team. Like I said, the bar is upscale, so it’s not going to be some seedy place with sticky tables. Full nudity is not required, though many of the girls finish with a topless number.”

  “Again, I’m fine with it,” Poppy assured Ramirez, dismissing Shaine’s comment.

  “Good.” Rosa seemed pleased. “You are dismissed to settle in. Tomorrow is your first day of work. Remember, you’re college kids looking for a good time. Leave your law enforcement persona behind. These people are pros. They can smell a cop from a mile away.”

  Shaine smirked. “Like I said...not my first rodeo. This is the fun part.”

  Rosa said, “Both Kelly and Jones will have separate cars, but a rental is outside to take you to the location where your cars will be assigned. It may seem as though these are extraneous precautions, but we can’t take the chance of an overlooked loophole.”

  He went to grab the keys to the rental car, but Poppy beat him to it.

  “I’ll drive,” Poppy said, snatching the keys. “Being a passenger makes me carsick.”

  Since when?

  The little liar.

  He always used to drive.

  But someone was proving a point.

  “Be my guest,” he said, following her out the door.

  Yeah, this was going to suck.

  Thanks a lot for ruining what could’ve been a cool undercover gig, Poppy Jones.

  * * *

  Having Shaine in the car was unnerving. Her plan had been to treat him like any other undercover agent.

  Dispassionate.

  Professional.

  But the humid air lifted the scent of his skin straight to her nose and she was awash with memories.

  Her breath caught.

  No. She wasn’t going to do that—no going backward.

  Do the job. Stay focused. Be chill.

  As it turned out, Shaine broke the unbearable silence first.

  “How’d you get this gig?” he asked.

  “The usual way. Working harder than everyone else. Harder than every other man in my way.”

  “Still the ballbuster. Glad to see some things never change.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong. I’ve changed plenty. I no longer care what small-minded people think of me.”

  “Whoa, right out the barrel, an insult. I was trying to make polite conversation.”

  “Right. You forget I know you, Shaine. You don’t do polite and you certainly don’t do idle conversation. Your question was a dig at me. A bit passive-aggressive for my taste, but you got your point across.”

  “Since you seem to know the inner workings of my mind, why don’t you enlighten me with what I was thinking when I passive-aggressively asked you a polite question,” he suggested, his tone laced with sarcasm. “Personally, I thought I was being nice to
a person who certainly didn’t deserve my niceness.”

  Why was she arguing with him? Two seconds into an enclosed space alone and they were ripping into each other. She was not about to let her personal feelings about Shaine ruin the biggest case of her life.

  “Just stop. We need to get into character. We are not Poppy Jones and Shaine Kelly, former lovers. We are two college kids without a care in the world, ready for a good time. Let’s keep to the script, shall we?”

  “And what if I don’t think you’re up for this part?”

  “Oh, that old argument again? Please, get some new material—that bit is tired.”

  “I’m not kidding around. You’re not ready to take on a case like this. You can’t even be around me without switching to bitch-mode. How are you supposed to pull off melting into someone else’s skin when you can’t even handle your own?”

  Poppy’s cheeks heated with embarrassment. Swallowing the bile that’d risen in her throat, she said stiffly, “I didn’t expect you to be on this case. It’s just taken me a minute to adjust. I worked my ass off to get on to this detail and nothing is going to keep me from closing it. Not even you. So if that means I have to pretend that there’s no history between us, I’ll find a way to do it.”

  “You sure you can?”

  This time she had the wherewithal to send him a withering glance. “Yes,” she answered. “I’ve managed to put you in my past before, I can do it again.”

  “Good,” Shaine said. “Maybe that’ll keep you from getting shot this time.”

  “Now who can’t let go of the past?” she retorted, freshly irritated even though she knew she needed to put a cap on it. “I’m not the only agent who’s been shot in the line of duty.”

  “No. But you were the only one I was in love with,” Shaine said.

  “That was a long time ago.”

  “Yeah, it was.”

  “So don’t bring it up again. I’m a better agent today than I was then. Leave it at that.”

  Shaine accepted her answer with a short nod and did, indeed, leave it, which was surprising. To her memory, Shaine rarely let anyone else have the final word—on that topic.

  Only because he had another bone to pick.

  “You really think you can pull off being a stripper?” he asked.

  “And why is that so hard to believe?”

  “Because you’re more modest than most. You wore a one-piece to the beach.”

  “I also wore a hat. Skin cancer is no joke. It had nothing to do with my comfort level. If the ozone layer wasn’t an issue, I’d run around naked if I could.”

  “Oh, c’mon, who are you trying to convince? Me or yourself? This is dangerous, Poppy.”

  His condescension scraped against her nerves. “It kills you that I’m on this team, not because of my qualifications, but because of our history. If anyone can’t let go of the past, it’s you,” Poppy said.

  “Honey, I let go a long time ago,” he disagreed. “I just don’t feel like dying because you don’t know what you’re doing. There’s an art to going deep cover and I don’t think you have what it takes.”

  Poppy resisted the urge to snap back. He was baiting her purposefully.

  What an ass.

  “Well, thankfully, you’re not in charge and it wasn’t your call. I’m here... Get used to it.”

  Shaine shook his head as if he wasn’t going to waste more time arguing and she was glad. She didn’t know how much longer she could keep her cool and the last thing she wanted to do was give Shaine any kind of valid reason to have her tossed from the case.

  They arrived at the apartment fourplex, a gray building with nothing charming or exciting about it, and walked around to the back where the two apartments they were to occupy were situated.

  From a defensive standpoint, the place was deceptively secure, which was why it was owned by the Miami DEA office as the newest safe house used for informants needing a place to hide before their testimony.

  There were also hidden cameras in the narrow alleyway that fed into the four apartments so no one could sneak up on anyone inside.

  No more words were exchanged as they each disappeared into their apartments.

  Poppy set her suitcase down and took a minute to compose herself.

  Damn it.

  Around Shaine she devolved into someone she swore she’d never be.

  Surveying her new living environment, she saw it’d already been decorated to reflect the tastes of someone much younger, which was the part she was playing.

  Shabby chic, repurposed furniture, a thrift-store sofa and a few picture frames featuring people she didn’t know were placed here and there.

  This operation was costing a pretty penny.

  Everyone expected results.

  “So failure isn’t an option,” she murmured to herself as a reminder. “Time to get your game face on.”

  Suddenly a door, which she’d assumed was a closet, opened and Shaine walked in.

  “What the hell?” she exclaimed, not expecting Shaine to walk into her living room.

  “Adjoining rooms,” he explained, surprised himself.

  “Is there a lock?” she asked. The last thing she wanted was Shaine Kelly traipsing through her living room as if he had the right.

  “Looks similar to a hotel room door.” He showed her how to lock it and then exited again. The sound of him locking the door from his side made her exhale. Had she actually been holding her breath?

  Okay, so it made sense to have an adjoining room, for safety purposes if the DEA was housing someone who needed protection, but she could take care of herself.

  Poppy grabbed her suitcase and went to the bedroom, finding more shabby chic, girly stuff—stuff for someone who was stuck between wanting to be an adult and still wanting to be a kid.

  But she supposed that was pretty much what some college girls felt like.

  Not that she had.

  She’d been more than happy to leave behind all that crap.

  Opening her closet she saw clothes already chosen to match her cover story.

  Poppy lifted a skimpy shirt from the rack and frowned at how barely there it was.

  Sure, she could pull it off, but it’d been a long time since she’d purposefully worn something so revealing.

  Shaine’s earlier comment about the one-piece bathing suit came back to poke at her. Okay, so she preferred tailored suits to string bikinis and microminis. Sue me.

  Poppy liked to leave something to the imagination, but there was no hiding the goods in these outfits.

  “Good Lord,” Poppy murmured in faint distress as she pulled a tiny dress from the closet. A tight, formfitting number with a cutout where her cleavage would show, she wondered how she was supposed to wear a bra with this thing.

  Or underwear for that matter.

  Even a damn panty line would show.

  Oh, well.

  Her new motto was, “When in Miami...do as the party girls do.”

  Time to make some friends.

  CHAPTER 3

  Rosa Ramirez was Miami born and bred and she’d made it her business to clean up her beautiful city.

  When the opportunity came around to take down El Escorpion, she didn’t hesitate, but in truth, this operation had been a long time coming.

  And she wasn’t blind to the fact that if a certain senator’s daughter hadn’t gotten herself doped up on Bliss and put on life support from her last party, taking down that piece of shit drug dealer wouldn’t have gotten so much attention.

  But Rosa never looked a gift horse in the mouth.

  The operation was in play and she was going to see it succeed.

  But she had a bad feeling in her gut about some of the people involved.

  Mainly Agent Kelly and DEA agent Jones.

  Now, she hated to think one of her own might be dirty, but El Escorpion had a long reach and a deep pocket.

  Times are hard, people slip.

  All it takes is once.

  O
ne agreement to look the other way for a handful of cash and you were hooked.

  Cash was a persuasive bargaining tool.

  Rosa had seen too many good agents get caught up in bad shit because the allure of quick cash was too hard to ignore.

  She poured herself two fingers of scotch and nursed it while reading the personnel files of both Kelly and Jones.

  Both were exceptionally nice to look at—something Rosa hadn’t been graced with—not that it mattered to her.

  Rosa was the job and the job was her.

  And she was good with that.

  But even Rosa had to admit Shaine Kelly had that enigmatic quality of a bad boy wearing a badge, with a devil-may-care attitude that instantly drew women like a flower bathed in pollen drew bees.

  Dark, wavy hair, deep blue eyes—shit, this guy was sex on a stick.

  Rosa flicked away Kelly’s file and picked up Jones’s.

  White-blond hair like a fairy-tale princess, long, lean body and cornflower blue eyes. California prom queen material.

  It should be a cosmic law that if graced with physical perfection, they couldn’t also be smart and well accomplished.

  Hell, bitter much?

  Rosa sighed at her own thoughts, ready to call it a night when something in Jones’s file caught her eye.

  Shot on the job.

  Now, that’s interesting. Rosa sat a little straighter.

  Bullet to the chest; missed the heart by inches.

  “You’ve got a guardian angel, kid,” Rosa murmured before sipping her scotch.

  Savoring the burn in her throat, she leaned back in her chair to read the details of the operation that’d gotten Jones shot.

  First undercover gig with the FBI.

  Rough start.

  Then she left the FBI to work for the DEA in Los Angeles.

  Rosa double-checked which FBI office she worked for—Washington.

  Same as Kelly.

  Coincidence?

  True, the FBI headquarters was huge. It was possible to work in the same office and never know every employee there.

  But two highly skilled undercover agents?

  What were the odds of that?

  Rosa didn’t believe in coincidences.

  Her hunch had been that Jones and Kelly were hiding something.