42. Lucy

I turnedto see Liam watching me with sleepy eyes and I knew he was thinking the same thing I was. "Do you happen to own any guns?"

He smiled like I was being cute. "Maybe."

Cas narrowed his eyes and pinned me with a look. "Why?"

"I think you should start going around armed. Just in case." I studied Liam's dark red eyes and wondered if he'd be able to handle this part of my job. "I need to go to the café and I need access to the server room at Valor Enterprises without making people question what I was doing there and why."

Liam kissed my temple, way calmer than I thought he'd be about this. "Looks like I need to give my omega a tour of Valor Enterprises, don't I?"

"Tomorrow's Saturday. We could go then," Cas suggested as he reached for my mouse. "There will be fewer people around. Is there something specific you need?"

"Well, I'd rather go tonight," I admitted. "Whatever data is being sent off site goes out at three in the morning. It would be faster to get set up before that happens, rather than doing it tomorrow and having to wait another day for the results."

"So impatient," Liam chastised. "I thought you wanted to go through that list of locations."

I sighed and pushed his face away, needing some space. "I do, but this is important. I can't restore missing data without tipping off whoever erased it, but I can set up a program to monitor where it's going. If that information is saved to my drive instead of sent to me externally, I should be able to keep whoever it is from finding out what I'm doing."

Cas started going through the same files I had, his mouth a hard line. "But it's not guaranteed they won't see it. They could find the drive, or have a program set up to alert them of unusual activity."

"Yeah, they could, but if I set up an admin account on the authentication server, I can reroute those alerts. They wouldn't know unless they physically inspected all the servers and I plan to remove the program after a week. I'll have what I need by then."

Cas grabbed my chair and turned it so Liam and I were facing him, caging us in when he set his hands on my armrests and leaned in.

His black hair fell into his eyes and I found myself staring for way too long. I didn't think I'd ever get over just how bright his blue eyes were…or how dangerous and predatory they always looked.

"And what if this person comes down to the server room while you're in there?" he demanded. "What if they're the one who killed Gideon?"

"I'm not going unarmed." I made a face, wondering if he thought I was really that stupid. "If they try to stop me or hurt me, they're hiding something and we'd have a legitimate reason to hold them for questioning."

"You're not the police." Cas leaned in closer and I held my breath. "You can't legally hold someone for questioning. That's called kidnapping."

Frankie snorted and then covered her mouth when Cas glared at her.

"You would know, wouldn't you?" I pushed his arms off my chair and scooted back so I'd have some room. "It's not my job to worry about that, Cas. All I've been hired to do is deliver the information I find. What Valor decides to do with that information is none of my business."

I stood and turned around to glare at Liam. "If I suddenly had to defend myself, would you want me to hand whoever it is over to the police, or to you?"

Liam's smile was playful and teasing, reminding me of that very first day. "Obviously you should hand them over to me, but it's not like you'll be going into that server room alone."

Instinct told me to get the fuck out of the way when Liam turned that playful smile on Cas and I leaned back so I wouldn't be in his direct line of sight.

"It's our job to keep her safe," Liam reminded him, his voice so soft I shivered. "If she needs to get into the server room, she's going to get in to that fucking server room. Lucy's job is to find answers even when it's dangerous, and it's our job to make sure she can do hers safely."

Cas didn't growl in frustration, but I could feel the emotion through the bond, pulsing like a heartbeat. "There's no guarantee she'll be safe in this situation even if we go with her. She could get hurt."

Liam stood from his chair and I leaned so far back I was practically climbing on top of my desk. This was not an argument I wanted to get in the middle of.

"We promised that her job didn't matter," Liam snarled. "Don't you dare break that promise now, only a day after you bonded her."

My chest ached and I swallowed hard.

Hearing that he didn't care about my job was one thing, but getting to see the truth for myself? It made me more emotional than I thought it would.

I'd made the right choice and Liam was proving that to me all over again.

"It's not about the fucking job," Cas snarled right back, taking a step closer to get into Liam's face. "It's about making smarter, safer choices. She doesn't have to go down there herself. I can do whatever needs to be done. No one would think twice about me being down there."

Cas turned on me then, grabbing my face and pressing his forehead to mine. It happened so fast I couldn't do a single thing to stop him. "Just fucking ask me. Let me help you."

I need you to need me.

"I want to do it myself," I whispered, hating how much of his fear I could feel through the bond. "You can help me, but you can't do my job for me."

"Why, Lucy? Why put yourself in the spotlight when I know that's the last thing you want?" Cas took a deep breath and closed his eyes. "You make me crazy. I don't understand why you're doing this when you don't have to. You don't need to tell the world you're bonded to us before you're ready, just to gain access to servers I already have access to."

Oh.

So it really wasn't about the job.

"I mean…does it matter? They're all going to find out anyway." I wrapped my arms around his neck and breathed him in, smelling nothing but the orange soap he and Liam used thanks to his scent blockers. "If we do it like this, we can use it to do something fun and get away with it. We can control the moment people realize you and Liam finally bonded an omega and eventually…they'll learn I was the one who helped solve Gideon's case along with my adopted sister, Frankie. Don't you think that'll make our lives easier?"

Cas took another deep breath and opened his eyes, some of the fear easing as he studied me. "What do you mean by ‘something fun?'"

"She loves playing secret agent," Frankie muttered as she pretended to focus very hard on her monitor.

"Just like when we played the famous archeologist and her pretty little errand boy, huh?" Liam yanked one of Cas's hands away from my face so he could kiss my cheek. "Are you going to dress up too?"

Cas covered Liam's whole fucking face with his hand and pushed him away, wrapping an arm around my waist at the same time to pull me up. He held me so high I had to look down at him and those blue eyes were full of so much emotion I didn't even blink so I wouldn't have to miss a single second of this.

His aura was always so fucking intense but it didn't scare me even when he manhandled me like this. Cas was still getting used to the bond and this new dynamic between the three of us, but I don't think he realized just how fucking weird I was until right this moment.

The look in his eyes shifted. I could feel a trickle of amusement from him and I knew I'd won.

"We really need to talk about your definition of fun." Cas sighed and set me gently on the floor. "Fine. If that's what you want, you and Liam can go play psychopaths in the server room together while I play bodyguard."

"Oh, are you going to wear the outfit and everything?" Liam grabbed Cas by the shirt and yanked him away from me, their bodies slamming into each other.

"You mean the shit I wear every day I'm not in the office?" Cas grabbed Liam by the throat and physically moved him out of his way. "Sure, I'll wear the ‘outfit'."

The way he was holding Liam was definitely making me feel a way.

Frankie jumped up from her desk. "I'm gonna go change!" She ran off before Cas could glare at her and slammed her bedroom door closed.

Cas narrowed his eyes but didn't say anything. Then he released Liam and I had to pinch myself to make sure this wasn't a dream.

These two were my alphas. My very attractive alphas who looked like gods when they stood next to each other.

Liam shone like the sun, even when we were kids. It was the most memorable thing about him. He could make the shittiest day bearable when he smiled at me like this – like the sun breaking through the clouds on a rainy day.

I was nearly blinded by his beauty on a regular basis and he was far too brilliant to be anything other than an incarnation of the sun god himself – Apollo, not Adonis. Cas though…he was a dark god of war – my very own Ares.

Liam slipped his finger in Cas's belt loop and tugged him closer. The way Cas eyed Liam from head to toe made me clench my thighs together. I didn't know how much more of this I could watch without exploding.

Cas leaned down and kissed Liam's neck, right where he still had the mark of my teeth over his scent glands. "Don't distract Lucy."

Youare the one distracting me.

Those blue eyes caught me glaring at him and I could see the flash of hunger – feel it through the bond. A silent promise that he would deliver if I was a good girl.

Jesus. What had I gotten myself into?