Midnight Captive by Elle Kennedy Page B

at her. He knew he’d been a dick to her before, but he couldn’t help it. Being around her was torture. Knowing he could never have her, knowing the only way she’d ever view him with anything other than hostility was if he pretended to be another man . . . it was bloody torture.
    “And you need to take that with you?” She gestured to the phone in his hand.
    “Yup.”
    “Wow. You really don’t trust me to monitor the phone in case Rabbit makes contact?”
    “It’s not about trust,” he muttered.
    Her nostrils flared. “Then what is it about?”
    “Me. My job. Mine, Bailey, not yours. And when I set up this trade, I’ll find a way to leave you behind,” he said bluntly.
    She smiled. “That’ll be hard to do, considering I’m not leaving your side.”
    “’S’that so? Does that mean you’re joining me in the shower, then?” Arching a brow, he unsnapped the button of his khakis.
    Her eyes widened, and there was no missing the tiny spark of heat that ignited in them.
    “Come on, luv. If you wash my back, I promise to wash yours.”
    Whatever desire he’d thought he’d glimpsed reverted right back to anger. “Sorry, not interested,” she said coolly.
    “Sure you aren’t,” he mocked.
    Sean marched into the loo and shut the door behind him, too tired and pissed to concentrate on anything other than dunking his head under the spray in the tiled shower stall. He closed his eyes and let the hot water wash away all the evidence of this day from hell. No, a week of hell. He’d felt powerless and on edge ever since he’d left Morgan’s team.
    He didn’t want this. Any of it. He didn’t care about the Irish Dagger or their messed-up ideology. Let the bloody British have Northern Ireland. He didn’t give a shit.
    Family was the only thing that mattered to him. His parents were dead, which meant Ollie was all he had. And he owed it to his brother to handle this Rabbit bullshit.
    Fuck, he owed his twin a helluva lot more than Ollie even knew. He’d betrayed his brother when he’d slept with Bailey, and the guilt had been gnawing at him for a whole year. Sean had never kept secrets from his twin until that night, and he didn’t intend to keep this one forever. He would tell Ollie what he’d done. One of these days he really would come clean about it.
    But the thought of Ollie being disappointed in him, or worse, not forgiving him . . . it tore his insides up.
    The water muffled his anguished groan, and he forced himself to push away the guilt. He stepped out of the shower and dried off, then wrapped a towel around his waist and headed for the door. He wasn’t concerned about walking around the loft half-naked. Bailey had made it more than clear that she wasn’t interested in jumping his bones.
    His phone beeped the second he stepped out of the loo, and his shoulders stiffened when he glanced at the message.
    Bailey immediately shot off the couch. “Is that Rabbit? What did he say?”
    Without a word, Sean tossed her the phone. A crease appeared in her forehead as she skimmed the message. He was so tempted to smooth it out with his fingers . . . his tongue . . . and the mere thought of putting his hands or mouth anywhere near her made his cock thicken beneath his towel.
    “What does this mean?” Frowning, she read the text aloud. “‘Hot tonight. Might turn up the A/C. Hopefully it’ll cool down by tomorrow.’”
    Sean sighed. “It means he won’t meet until tomorrow night. He wants to give it twenty-four hours for the heat to die down, in case the Garda is on my trail.”
    “Fine. When and where will this meeting be?” she demanded.
    “I guess we’ll find out when he texts back tomorrow.”
    “So, what, we just wait around for a whole day?”
    “Pretty much, yeah.” Sean was nowhere near as frustrated as she was. If anything, he felt relief. Oliver would remain safe, at least for the next twenty-four hours.
    He strode to the closet on the other side of the loft, while