The Grifter
Chapter 10

Beck took a deep breath and used the exhale to curse. “Let me see if I’ve got this right,” he said, channeling his irritation into his stare. “I tell you I’ve got the deal of a f*****g lifetime and all I need are trustworthy people to move the product, and you give me those two.”

He gestured to the opposite end of the alley, where Ty and Cade stood with their backs to the bricks and well out of earshot, and Alfie’s smile slipped in the harsh gray daylight.

“What? They’re good for this,” he said, but Beck shook his head.

“They’re bangers,” Beck argued. “I said no gangs.”

“Okay, okay, okay.” At least Alfie had the f*****g brains not to argue. Beck really hadn’t wanted to kill him this early in the game. It would probably wreck Thanksgiving, his aunt bawling all over the place. “Ty’s maybe involved with the A Park Phantoms from time to time, but he’s good for this. I run with him. And Cade’s alright. Has a buyer or two at Remington University that’ll be real good for this. Word will spread.”

And now, they were getting somewhere. Still… “A buyer or two isn’t going to be enough. We need someone else. Someone with real connections who can move some serious weight.”

“Rome wasn’t built in a day, man.” Alfie tried for a smile, but it died on his lips when Beck met his eyes. “I’m looking, okay? I’ve got a couple of possibilities.”

But the way his voice shifted made it a lie, and in an instant, Beck was in Alfie’s personal space, breathing the motherfvcker’s shocked exhale.

“Do you remember what you told me, when I said I wanted to come up here to expand?”

“Y-yeah,” Alfie stammered, his fidget a telltale sign he was coming down, hard. “I told you I was in.”

“You told me you were good for this,” Beck corrected. “You said you had it covered.” He stepped even closer, enough to see Alfie’s pupils dilate and his chest begin to rise and fall more rapidly, the power of that fear rushing through him more hotly than anything he could snort, smoke, or shoot. “You said I could trust you to get this done.”

Alfie’s smile came out as a plea. “Aw, come on. You can. Give me this weekend. I’ll hook you right up, man.”

“Be careful with your promises,” Beck warned, notching his voice to its most deadly setting. “I will be running background checks on whoever you bring to the table. If they don’t check out, they won’t be the only ones who pay for it. And if either of these two falls out of line, or this gang affiliation thing comes back to bite me”—he nodded toward Ty and Cade—“I’m holding you responsible, and it will hurt. Do you understand?”

For the first time in his life, Alfie looked serious. Scared.

Just the way Beck liked him.

“Yeah. Yes. We’re all good,” Alfie said quietly.

“Make sure that we are. You have until the end of the weekend to bring me someone I can use. If you don’t, we’re going to have a conversation you won’t enjoy.”

And without a second thought or a shred of remorse, he turned and walked away.

Well,if there was one win to come out of all this undercover work, it was that Frankie was now a complete pro at false eyelashes. She fluttered a look—the fourth one this week through her undercover getup—at herself in the mirror in her rental apartment. Sliding into Frankie Burton’s persona had become easier the more she’d done it. Not that some parts were difficult; after all, Burton had no shortage of bravado, and Frankie brought her own to the table on a near-constant basis. Faking the rest wasn’t so bad.

True, every time she and Shawn had made a buy off Alfie this week she’d felt more than slightly nauseous, and definitely true, every time the crap weasel spoke to her br3asts instead of her face, she wanted to pop him in the chin.

But being Frankie Burton was a means to an end, and what’s more, it was working. With every buy, Alfie grew more and more comfortable with them. He’d introduced her and Shawn to Ty and Cade. Hell, he’d even sought them out a few nights ago, coming over to their booth at the club and offering up party favors as he’d tried to flirt with Frankie, to no avail.

Shawn Pritchard was one overprotective dude. And despite the fact that she knew better, Shawn’s arm around her felt far better than it should.

“Girl, stop.” Frankie met her own eyes in the bathroom mirror. This thing with Shawn was a job. An act. Yes, they’d had a few more conversations this week in their down time at the club. Yes, he still read historical non-fiction and the occasional thriller in his free time. Yes, he worked out far more than any mere mortal should. Yes, he still ate his pizza cold, which was not entirely human as far as Frankie was concerned. But they still navigated around the land mines of her stabbing and their past.

Shawn was an iceberg. Not melting any time soon. She needed to gather up her hormones, toss them in a lake, and get on with it.

With one last look at herself in the mirror, Frankie grabbed her purse and headed for the door. She and Shawn had their routine down cold, and by the time she got to the precinct, he was already there, panic button in hand.

“Hey.” He popped the panic button onto his watch, his movements smooth and efficient. Tonight’s outfit was a black on black ensemble that made her belly flip. He’d rolled his shirt sleeves—snug to begin with—halfway up his forearms to reveal the ink snaking down to both wrists. The muscles beneath didn’t surrender to his tattoos. No. No hiding for them. Instead, they stood out, flexing and releasing with each movement, and okay, yeah. The tiny little scrap of panties Frankie had managed to get beneath her body-hugging dress were pretty much on fire.

“You okay?” Shawn asked, his dark blue gaze snapping with enough concern to bring her back to reality.

“Yep.” Work. Work. Focus on work. “How do you feel about giving Alfie a nudge tonight?”

Shawn tilted his head, clearly interested. “What’d you have in mind?”

“Well, he clearly trusts us, at this point. At least, enough to do a little business. But trust alone isn’t going to get us where we need to be. We need to give him an opportunity to cut us in. Otherwise, who knows how long we’ll be stuck making low-level buys off of him.”

“Fair enough,” Shawn said. “But it’s not like we can pop off with, ‘hey, heard you’re recruiting for a super-secret drug ring led by your homicidal maniac cousin, do us a favor and give us a piece of the action’.”

Frankie rolled her eyes, even as she chuffed out a laugh. “Give me a little credit, would you? My plan is better than that.”

“Okay, let’s hear it, then.”

“I think we should lead Alfie by his d**k.”

Ha, that got him. “You…what?” Shawn stuttered, but Frankie didn’t blink, nor did she hesitate.

“Alfie’s predictable, and he’s also impulsive. He hasn’t made any move to hide the fact that he thinks I’m attractive. I say we use all of that against him.”

She outlined her plan methodically, step by step. Shawn’s face revealed nothing as he listened, then more nothing after she finished, and finally, Frankie had to say, “Well?”

“It’s pretty brilliant. But it’s also pretty ballsy.”

“Of course it’s pretty ballsy. That’s the point,” she said. “But we need progress. We can’t nail Beck if we never get in with him. And we can’t get in with him unless Alfie recruits us. Which we have to make him think was his idea so it’s not super obvious.”

“Appealing to his ego is a good angle to take. God knows he’d fall for it.” Shawn thought about it for a beat. Then, “You’ll have to play it just right, though. It won’t be easy.”

In another situation, she might be offended. But she had far less undercover experience than he did, and she couldn’t be pissed at him for shooting it straight. “Yeah, but I have good backup. Between the two of us, we can do this.”

Heading toward the pickup, Frankie gave up a few more ideas. She and Shawn pieced together some tactics, and by the time they pulled up in front of the club, their plan was a smart, solid thing.

It would work. All they needed was to kick it into motion.

The deep, thumping bass of the soundtrack pulsed in Frankie’s veins, mixing with her adrenaline as she scanned the club’s interior. The shadows had become increasingly familiar, the layout—escape routes, obstacles, hiding spots—all long-since memorized. She realized with a pang that Alfie was nowhere to be seen, nor were Ty, Cade, or Leo, despite the fact that the night was well underway. Now that she and Shawn finally had a plan to proceed, Frankie wanted to use it, and she bit back frustration as she looked around the club again, just in case she’d missed something.

The sight of three women snorting coke in a nearby booth sent another jangle of nervous energy through her, and ugh, she needed to breathe or move or something.

Shawn’s hand found the small of her back, and he guided her in a wide arc around the women. “Your usual?” he murmured into her ear, his eyes on the bar, but not even the low, steady notes of his voice were quite enough to smooth out her jitters.

“Actually, why don’t we dance?”

Shawn’s eyes widened by a fraction that only Frankie was close enough to see in the low light, and she leaned toward him to keep their conversation just as private. “Alfie’s not here yet, and I have a little too much energy to sit still and wait.”

He nodded, his chin brushing by her cheek. “Understood.”

Changing their course as flawlessly as if it had been his original intent, Shawn led her to the dance floor. He wrapped an arm around her rib cage, and Frankie channeled her focus into the contact. Using the slow, rhythmic beat of the music as her guide, she channeled her breath to keep her pulse in check. Shawn’s body was firm against hers, not dominating or overpowering, just steady. Present. There. The comfort of his palm against her back, his chin pressed softly at her temple, made her body loosen.

Which Shawn must’ve felt, because after another minute, he asked, “Better?”

Frankie didn’t shift out of his hold as she nodded against his shoulder. “Sorry. I know you’re not really a dancing kind of guy.”

His head tipped slightly in concession. “No. But I get it. The job’s not always easy.”

She laughed, although, God, it felt far from happy. “With how well you do it, you could’ve fooled me.”

“You’re very good at what you do,” Shawn said with enough conviction that Frankie knew he meant it.

“The job, yes,” she said. “Staying emotionally detached from things, not so much. I’m not really wired that way.” Frankie melted a little more against his body before admitting, “I suppose I’m a little envious of the way you stay so focused.”

“I do have feelings, you know.” He placed the words just above her ear, but funny, they arrowed directly to her belly.

“Jury’s out, Iceman,” she joked, but Shawn pulled back, just enough to pin her with a glittering stare.

“No. I’m human, just like you. And, like you, I feel things.”

Her breath caught hard in her chest, turning her voice husky as she asked, “Like what?”

“I get edgy, too.” His muscles flexed just slightly beneath her fingers in proof of the nervous energy he’d banked so well. “Sometimes, I get pissed. Like when I think about what happened to your friend.”

“Val,” Frankie breathed, her heart twisting.

Shawn nodded. “And, since you brought it up, I suppose I’m a little envious, too.”

It took a beat, then another before Frankie realized—“Of me?”

“You’re an open book,” he said quietly. “Sometimes, I wonder…”

He paused, and Frankie’s pulse raced faster, her breath escaping on a gasp as he said, “I wonder if I hurt you by holding everything in.”