“Absolutely not,” I smirked.
“You always take my breath away when you smile,” he said, and his compliment threw me off guard. My face heated almost immediately, and his smile grew even bigger.
“You could never hide that from me, little girl.” I cocked my head in confusion.
“Hide what?”
“Whenever I give you a compliment that you don’t expect, you blush so very prettily for me,” he explained, and I could have sworn it made me flush even more.
I needed to change the subject before the throbbing in my pussy swept over the rest of me. If things kept going like this, I would beg him to fuck me right here.
“Why go this way? Wouldn’t it just have been easier to leave through the front door?”
“Leaving this way is safer,” he clarified. “There are no cameras in the back of the building, and I was careful to guide you through the building so that you weren’t seen. To the Fixer, it will be as though you disappeared without a trace. Right now, she probably thinks you’re safely with Salvador, tasting wine and enjoying his company in the privacy of his ostentatious study.”
“She’s probably back in the hotel suite, waiting for me to return. But she may not expect me to come back tonight,” I added.
“You said her name was Janet. Did she ever give you a last name?”
“No,” I answered.
“That’s fine. I’ll be able to capture her face through the multitude of cameras I’ve installed in that hotel,” he replied.
“You’ve installed?”
He already knew what hotel I was staying at. That shouldn’t have surprised me, but it did.
“I’ve known where you were since you stepped into my hotel, little girl. It was simply a matter of time until you were alone so that I could take you back,” he answered.
I didn’t know what to say.
“I started running her face through my facial recognition software a few days ago once I realized that she was with you. I didn’t like that she never left your side. I especially didn’t like the way she was looking at you like you were something beneath her,” he scowled. “Now that I have a first name, it will speed up the process a great deal.”
“Is that how you found me?” I asked.
“I have access to a great many resources, little girl. I modified the facial recognition software that I wrote myself and called in a great many favors to lift the restrictions that had limited me before. It was simply a matter of time until I found you again.”
His fingers curled around mine. I thought I had known this man, but I didn’t. There was so much more to him than I could have ever guessed. I reached for him, wanting to feel my hands against him. My fingertips brushed against the collar of his shirt, just playing with the hair on his chest and that comforted me.
“Who are you?” I asked. I wanted to know more. I wanted to know the real him.
“A long time ago, I worked for a special unit in the FBI focused on domestic crime. Through my work, I made a great number of connections that afforded me a great deal of power. I wrote programs that innovated the way we found and took down criminals and that also granted me a quite a bit of capital,” he began.
How had I missed that? I swallowed my questions, wanting him to continue more than I wanted to ask them.
“Your face popped up on a number of inquiries through our data mining systems. You were spotted with a number of wealthy men. Although you have no social media to speak of, your face still pops up all over the place in wedding pictures on the internet. It was trackable, at least temporarily. In order to learn more, we started following the financial accounts of the men you showed interest in and began to notice a pattern,” he explained.
My blood ran cold.
“How long have you known?”
“Since well before you ever set your sights on me, little girl,” he answered. A tiny squeak escaped me.
“I have no idea how I could have missed something like this,” I gasped. “I mean, you’re FBI. How could even the family’s connections have missed this? They’ve killed people for lesser mistakes.” I couldn’t hide the horror in my voice.
“I used to be FBI,” he said, and I lifted my eyes to meet his.
“What do you mean by that?”
“The task force I was a part of was working on exposing the ring of people around you that allowed you to do what you do. At first, we just watched you and were convinced that it was just you on your own. As you moved around the country, though, we soon realized that it was impossible to accomplish what you’ve done all by yourself. There were pictures that we tracked down of you in wedding dresses walking down the aisle that would disappear soon after they were taken. Every time you assumed a new identity, the paperwork trail was pristine. Whoever created those names for you created a life that went with it, not just a social security number and a driver’s license. It was astounding. It was a real operation that took a lot of planning and a lot of time,” he explained, and he said it like there was a part of him that was proud of me for it.
I remained quiet. I wanted to hear what he had to say.
“I volunteered to go undercover and see your process firsthand. On paper, you were a job. Once I met you in person though, you were something else entirely,” he said softly.
“What do you mean?”
“From the time I first laid eyes on you, little girl, I decided that you were mine,” he replied.
“How could you say that when you knew what I was doing the whole time? When you knew I was nothing more than a criminal?”
“I’ve studied you for a long time. You’re very good at what you do, little girl, but
