Joyful Engagement Read online

  “Jesus,” Tate said through gritted teeth. “Fuck. Yeah. God.”

  Roman moved first, sliding down the mattress until he was lying next to Scarlet. Tate withdrew, though he made no move to lie down. Instead, he watched as Scarlet twisted toward Roman, curling up against his chest, wrapping one of her legs over his, while he rested his hand on her bare hip.

  Once she was settled, Tate joined them, dropping down to the opposite side of Scarlet, laying his hand on top of Roman’s. The three of them remained there for a good ten minutes, none of them speaking, simply soaking up the pleasure of lying in each other’s arms.

  “I might need you guys to distract me again in an hour or so,” Scarlet said, laughing softly.

  Roman chuckled, realizing that for those few minutes, he hadn’t even heard the song. It had become white noise, drowned out by the peaceful thumping of his heart.

  Of course, now that she’d pointed it out…

  “Worst kid’s song ever,” Tate said disgustedly.

  “I don’t know about that,” Roman interjected. “That theme to ‘Lamb Chop’ was pretty bad too.”

  “Ugh.” Scarlet shuddered slightly. “The song that never ends. Yeah...that might have been worse.”

  Tate snorted. “Definitely would have been. So would a Christmas song. By this point, I’m sick of those too. If I hear “Rockin’ around the Christmas Tree” again before next December, I’ll lose my shit.”

  Tate stroked Roman’s hand, then tapped his fingers in time with the do do do do do do, reminding him of the rhythm they’d both found earlier.

  Roman chuckled. “At least they gave us a song that has a beat we can work with.”

  Chapter Six

  Selene perched on Luca’s knee as they both watched Oscar order them fake passports. They’d doctored the photos to give Selene a blonde bob haircut and Luca a blue Mohawk. They were going to have to actually do that to their hair so they’d match their new passport photos, before they could go on the run.

  Selene thought about her parents, her sister, her aunties, uncles...all the people she’d have to leave behind.

  She leaned her head against Luca’s, and he wrapped his arm around her waist.

  They were worth it, her men, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t mourn the people she’d leave behind.

  At least she’d been able to say goodbye to Roman.

  Roman’s comment was nagging at her like a fly buzzing too near her ear that she couldn’t swat away.

  “Shit, even if I get him all my bitcoin, he says it will take two days. We wouldn’t get these until after you two were already supposed to be in Boston.” Oscar scrubbed his hands over the top of his head. “Fuck it, we’ll make it work. I’ll tell him to get started, and then have them shipped to wherever we end up. We’ll have to find someplace—near an international airport—”

  “But if we wait, won’t they be looking for us, even with that, uh, hair?” Luca’s free hand came up to touch his temple.

  “We arrive late, get right on the plane. They won’t have time to capture us,” Oscar replied, sounding more confident than she felt about that plan.

  Luca hesitated, and then quietly said, “If they have us placed on a watch list, no matter how late we arrive, with facial recognition—”

  Oscar’s jaw clenched and Luca fell silent.

  “If you two want to go to Boston, if you don’t want to be with me—” Oscar didn’t bother to hide the heartbreak in his words.

  “Shut up. I’m thinking. Have your dramatic moment later.” Selene kicked Oscar’s thigh lightly with her heel.

  “Ouch, damn it, Selene. I was trying to be all open and emotional...”

  She hopped off of Luca’s lap and started to pace. They were in Oscar’s house, in his “office,” all of them clustered together in front of his main computer command center. There wasn’t a huge amount of room, and the guys—her guys—had to roll their chairs back and forth out of her way as she moved.

  “My cousin was trying to tell me something.”

  “He was trying to tell you to be fucking obedient to the Grand Master,” Oscar snapped.

  “No, it wasn’t just that. He suggested you come with us to Boston.” She tapped Oscar on his head as she went past. He responded by smacking her ass with an irritated grunt, but she could feel that some of his panic was fading.

  “Perhaps he was told to say that, to make it easier for the Grand Master to control you. They must know about...about us.” Luca smiled, and there was something in the expression that told her there were times he still wasn’t completely sure this thing between the three of them was real. Growing up in a cult full of religious freaks had really done a number on him.

  “She knows. And she’s pissed at me. That’s why she’s trying to rip my fucking heart out of my fucking chest,” Oscar snarled.

  “I agree. There is an aspect of punishment here,” Selene said, “but I don’t think she’d do this…take apart three people who have been through so much together.”

  Luca frowned. “But you said the trinities are formed for a reason—intellectual, social, scientific.”

  “Because together those three people can do something, change something, in a significant way,” she countered. “And the three of us, we’re good together. We already proved that we are effective agents of change.”

  “You mean chaos,” Oscar said with a snort.

  “We’re dangerous together,” Luca said softly. “Perhaps too dangerous.”

  “If it were just about being dangerous, she’d keep the two of you together and I’d be left out,” Selene said. “I’m the most dangerous of the three of us.”

  Oscar was a data-mining specialist who could find almost anyone or anything with a computer. Luca built bombs.

  And only an idiot would think they were more dangerous than the nuclear physicist.

  Her men weren’t idiots, so they nodded in agreement.

  Selene brushed a strand of hair away from her eyes. “I think...I think that Roman was trying to tell me that there is more going on here. Maybe the letters are a cover and she needs us for a mission.”

  “Or maybe she’s going to marry you two off to some fucker I’ll have to murder.” Oscar folded his arms.

  “Maybe she needs someone to think that because she secretly needs us to work together, but the only way to think that would be if she creates a—”

  Oscar rolled his eyes. “Okay, well now you’re just turning this into the plot of a bad romantic suspense novel—secret societies, arranged marriages, super villains...”

  Selene didn’t even acknowledge his comment, continuing to spin her conspiracy theory. “—she creates a rift that someone can exploit...maybe someone will try to kill you, Oscar.”

  “Why do you sound so excited at that possibility?” Oscar reached out and grabbed her, pulling her onto his lap. But under the faux outrage was amusement.

  Luca cleared his throat. “Why don’t we try to figure out who the woman is? Scarlet is her name, I think. She’s the one who doesn’t seem to fit here.”

  As one, she and Oscar turned to Luca.

  “Huh,” Oscar said.

  “Oh,” she added.

  Luca’s lips twitched.

  Less than five minutes later, Oscar had found her, using no more than a first name and a photo he pulled from his surveillance system. Scarlet Hall. She was a high-level conference and event planner. The kind of events where world-changing tech were announced, the DOD showed off new weapons, and Hollywood announced the lineup of upcoming movies.

  They scrolled through pictures of her, usually in black wearing a discreet headset, standing beside world leaders, tech titans, and Hollywood stars.

  “An event planner…” Selene sucked in a breath. “Oscar, what did she take from your parents’ house?”

  They’d seen when they watched the security feed that Scarlet had had something in her hand when she’d emerged from the farmhouse, but that hadn’t been worth thinking about when thei
r priority had been going on the run to escape the long arm of the Trinity Masters.

  “Fuck. We’re idiots,” Oscar grumbled, rising quickly.

  Luca stood as well. “I have the car keys to their rental.”

  Together, they bolted out of Oscar’s house. It was the middle of the night, and not quite pitch black, thanks to the stars, but dark enough that Selene nearly tripped over a pile of copper wire. Langston had shit everywhere in the yard.

  They rounded the corner of the front house and skidded to a stop at the car. Luca hit the button, the doors unlocked, and they each took a different one, yanking them open.

  It was Oscar who found the framed pictures of his parents and grandparents in the back seat. “Look at this. She’s going to go after my parents and...well, my grandparents are dead, but…”

  “There’s a knife also.” Luca held up the cake cutter. “Uh, a very pretty knife.”

  Selene started to curse.

  Oscar and Luca shared a glance and then closed the car doors and came to stand beside her. Selene slid her hands into her hair, made fists, and let loose with one long string of four-letter words.

  “What?” Oscar demanded. “Why are you freaking out?”

  “Impressive cursing,” Luca murmured.

  “We tasered them,” she groaned. “Shit, shit, shit.”

  “Because they were going to—”

  “Take us to our surprise wedding.”

  “Yes, we know that, that’s the fucking problem, Selene. You and Luca are getting married.”

  “Shut the fuck up and listen,” she snapped. “Do you have a wedding Pinterest board? No? Then you need to stop talking.”

  “What is Pinterest?” Luca asked.

  “Those aren’t just pictures of your parents and grandparents. It’s pictures of them on their wedding day. You display those at the reception. That’s not a knife, it’s a cake cutter.”

  Oscar’s eyes had gone wide with shock and maybe a little bit of hope. Then he shook his head. Stubborn idiot. “No, Scarlet isn’t a wedding planner.”

  “No, but she could plan a wedding, easy.”

  “I didn’t get a letter.”

  “Forget the damn letters. Why would the wedding planner need a picture of your parents and grandparents if you weren’t one of the grooms?”

  Oscar shook his head. “If she’s going to marry you to Walt…”

  “I thought your brother wasn’t a member?” Luca asked.

  Selene punched Oscar in the shoulder. “Put that stuff back in the car. Luca, come on, we have some damage control to do.”

  “Selene, we should run.” Oscar’s voice was low, urgent.

  Selene sighed and touched his face. “Do you trust me?”

  “Yes. You, Luca, my brothers, Sylvie. That’s it.”

  “Then tomorrow morning, you’re going to be on that plane with us. I need you to trust me on this. Our lives depend on it.”

  Oscar nodded, leaning his head into her hand, his eyes closed.

  After a moment, Luca cleared his throat. “Perhaps we should hurry to end their torture. If we think they are not the enemy...”

  “Fuck it. Fine.” Oscar’s tone was resigned.

  The minute they opened the door to Walt’s house, they heard it. The song. The floor shook with it, the walls vibrated.

  Baby shark...

  “How do you apologize for mistakenly torturing someone?” Luca asked.

  Selene searched for an answer, but the song...Jesus. That song.

  “Some sins can’t be forgiven,” Oscar said ominously.

  Chapter Seven

  Tate put a glass of orange juice on the small table in front of Scarlet, but she didn’t move. Her attention was glued on her tablet. Apparently half a day away from her devices meant she was now behind schedule with regards to prep for the wedding.

  It had been the middle of the night when the music had turned off, and Tate hadn’t actually been asleep. The cessation of noise was a blessed relief and shocked him into full wakefulness. He’d been ready to take action—the priority to get them out of that room no matter the cost.

  But hours had passed, with nothing happening. Until, near dawn, Oscar’s voice had crackled over the speaker. Tate and Oscar’s dark-of-night negotiation—Tate yelling the responses through the door—had led directly to their current situation.

  Tate picked up the small juice glass and went back to the galley, asking the private jet’s stewardess for a straw. Now equipped, he went back to Scarlet, held the glass in front of her, and stuck the straw in her mouth. She drank without looking away from her tablet.

  “No champagne?” she murmured. “I need a drink. A real drink.”

  Roman, seated across the aisle from her on a couch rather than in one of the business-class-size airline seats, chuckled.

  “Laugh it up,” she muttered. “I’m so far behind that when we get there...” She glanced up and raised her eyebrows.

  Tate frowned at the threatening tone in her voice. What the hell did that mean?

  Before he could ask, the curtain separating the front and back sections of the cabin was pushed aside. A very relaxed-looking Selene, wearing a robe, emerged.

  The opportunity to ask her what she was working on and what she needed was gone. Now that the soon-to-be newlyweds were done with their pampering, they couldn’t speak freely.

  “That was amazing,” she hummed.

  Luca, wearing a matching robe, came out behind her. He leaned down and kissed Selene’s cheek. She led Luca to the couch, taking a seat beside her cousin.

  “Enjoying yourself?” Roman asked mildly.

  “I would like to apologize once again,” Luca said.

  “I maintain that you should have just told us,” Selene said, but she glanced guiltily at Roman and Scarlet. Tate met her eyes and folded his arms, feet spread. It usually intimidated people, but she merely shrugged at him.

  “Told you what?” Roman asked with a brow arched.

  Selene had figured it out, but Scarlet, Roman, and Tate hadn’t confirmed anything.

  “I still think we should have run for it,” Oscar called from the back of the plane. Everyone—with the exception of Scarlet who was still tapping away at the tablet a million miles a minute—leaned into the aisle to look back at where he lay on a massage table, cucumber slices over his eyes as the masseuse worked his shoulders.

  Selene had combined Scarlet’s thievery with Roman’s misspoken words, and come to the correct conclusion. That had been part of last night’s discussion/negotiation. If Tate had been willing to disobey orders and confirm what Selene had figured out—that Oscar was their third, and that they were going to Boston to be married—Tate and his partners could have been out of that room a lot sooner.

  His partners. He liked thinking of Scarlet and Roman like that.

  His attraction to them was off the charts. That went without question. What surprised him wasn’t the physical pull though. It was all the emotions churning inside.

  The three of them should feel like relative strangers. After all, they’d only met a couple of weeks ago, but then, when he thought about everything that had happened in that short time, perhaps it made sense. Tate had seen it happen in the service—surviving something together was a bonding experience.

  Just prior to Christmas, they’d spent several days in planning meetings for this surprise wedding, the three of them staying in the same hotel in Boston during that time. After their meetings at Trinity Masters’ headquarters, they’d often caught a cab back to the hotel before heading out to share dinner together.

  Dinners with Roman and Scarlet weren’t the eat-and-run variety. Instead, they were marathon meals, as the three of them sat around the table talking about anything and everything over appetizers and wine, then the main course, followed by dessert and coffee.

  From the first day he met them, he felt like they were old friends. They’d certainly fallen into that pattern of jumping into any conversation as if there was some ye
ars’ long association that brought with it familiarity and comfort.

  And that closeness had only grown after yesterday, complete with stun guns, Baby Shark torture, and the hottest sex of his life.

  “Why didn’t Oscar get a letter?” Selene asked, posing the question casually, as if it wasn’t the first, second, or even fiftieth time she’d asked it.

  Roman sighed and stood, patting the top of his cousin’s head, and he gave the same response he had each other time she asked. “I don’t know.”

  “I…we…are very sorry about attacking you,” Luca said...again. He was the most genuinely apologetic, and currently Tate’s favorite of the three. Not that the competition was stiff.

  Tate was grateful the Grand Master had chosen to place Selene and Oscar in the same trinity because he wasn’t certain anyone else—with the exception of Luca, the bomber with a conscience—could have survived a lifetime with them.

  “Apology accepted, Luca.” Tate uncrossed his arms and then slid into the seat across from Scarlet to get out of the way of the attendant, who brought around a tray of champagne and small bowls of fruit. He wondered if she’d heard Scarlet’s complaint about plain orange juice.

  Tate scooted over so Roman could sit beside him. They could have asked Scarlet to move over one seat, but one glance at the scattering of paper she had both on the other seat and the table in front of it made it clear asking her to do so would be a bad idea.

  Everyone drank their champagne and munched on fruit. By the time Tate had finished his second bowl—he was missing Andre’s cooking because Andre and his other roommates would have known a little bowl of fruit was not enough calories to qualify as even a snack—Oscar, looking well-oiled and a little ridiculous in a heavy terry cloth robe which only came down to his knees, ambled in to sit on the couch.

  “You’re welcome to get massages, facials, or manicures,” Scarlet said, without looking up.

  Tate glanced at Roman, who raised a brow.