You finally did it, accomplishing every girl's dream: You found a way to monetize your most annoying qualities.
You stretch out in bed and William snuggles a little tighter into your side, huffing a happy little puppy sigh. You're sore all over from clearing out your garage and getting things ready for company and just generally having a mania-fueled spring cleaning the day before. Victor was around all day, changing locks and putting up cameras and unloading dozens of those big plastic storage cases. You never saw the insides, but you canimagine. Shiny, beautiful rows of guns, all snug in their perfect foam cutouts. Magazines and grenades and explosives and ammunition and night vision. Swoon.
You offered the basement for his gear, but he takes two bedrooms instead, one for gear and one, the spare bedroom he's visited once before, to sleep. You assume he's capable of sleeping and isn't some kind of Edward Cullen on steroids who just hangs over your bed and broods his existence all night, but for some reason the idea of him actually letting his guard down enough to sleep is difficult to imagine.
William decided it's time to get up and does his little paw tappy swim over to your head, dragging his belly across the blankets with a furiously wagging tail.
"Good morning, baby. Did you have a good sleep?"
You hold him down for rapid-fire kisses and that turns into a bitey wrestling match, and finally you force yourself to get up. You're across the bedroom and just about to go downstairs when you realize you actually have to get dressed now that there's a man in your house. You don't necessarily want to put on pants, but it just reminds you of how exciting your life is about to be so you don't mind too much. Somehow it will be worse when Victor is gone and you can go downstairs in just a cami and underwear.
Shorts come first and then a bra, and hoodie because the house is still cold from the frigid temps you like at night. Victor's door is closed when you pass and you vaguely wonder if he's a night person or a morning person, but that question seems to be answered when you hear movement in the kitchen on your way downstairs.
"Morning, pup."
William has blasted through all of his own speed records, clomping downstairs and making himself as wiggly as possible against the side of Victor's leg.
"Outside, potty first," you order, eyes flicking briefly to Victor and then looking away as fast as possible because he definitely didn't get dressed before coming down. He's fucking shirtless, in your kitchen, wearing dark gray sweatpants that sit distractingly low on his hips.
"Good morning," you say, feeling the need to acknowledge him verbally since you can't bring yourself to actually look in his direction.
"Morning, sunshine. You want any eggs?"
"Umm, no thank you."
You busy yourself doing piddly little things in the corner of the kitchen farthest away from him, and finally annoy yourself enough that you give up. You can't just hide from him all day, in your own house. Best to pretend you're normal, totally-never-fucked-each-other roommates who just happen to be in the same room at the same time, and one of them just happens to be shirtless.
"Do you want a coffee?" You ask casually on your way to get milk from the fridge.
And it's only because you're studying him so closely in your peripheral vision that you see his head snap up and his spatula stop pushing the eggs around the pan.
"What?" You demand, forgetting to avert your eyes.
His gaze is fastened to your chest, and you look down, suddenly panicked that you actually did forget to put on a bra. But everything is contained and in place, and it's just your hoodie staring back at you, looking completely normal.
"Sure," he says slowly, like he's thinking about something else. "Sure, I'll take a coffee. Two shots if you can."
"Okay." You quickly turn around to get milk because he's still staring at you with a weird intensity and you're not really sure what you're supposed to do.
"So," you say offhandedly when you're scooping espresso and he's finally turned back to his eggs, "What are we doing today?"
"Well first I'm giving you that." You turn your head and catch the tail end of his gesture over to the counter, and it's the first time you notice the little white box there.
Your heart does a little flip because he's giving you something, and that means you'll have some proof of him even when he's gone, and that is… a bad sign. Simply emotional suicide that your thoughts even go there. You aren't ready to get hurt again, you won't allow those feelings to form.
Inside the box is absolutely as advertised on top: a brand new iPhone, complete with screen protector and a nondescript case.
"It's already set up with my contact information," Victor says, coming to stand by your elbow. "Passcode is 'baby.'"
You give a little huff and punch it in. "Can I change it?"
He leans against the counter, taking his time getting all comfy and making you wait, and you can hear the amusement in his voice when he replies, "Of course you can. But isn't it just so convenient to remember?"
You really should be more angry at the absolute audacity, but imagining Victor hunched over this little phone, programming "b a b y" with his enormous pointer finger is so funny that you have to fight your smile.
"No social media apps on this device," he instructs, "and especially no Whatsapp or TikTok, they're not secure. This is the only phone you take when we travel, and on jobs. You can text your friends, call your mom, I don't give a fuck, just leave your other phone at home so you can't be traced."
"Alright," you agree.
"You use this phone when you contact me, no exceptions. If you call me and I don't answer, you wait for me to call you. You do not call me twice, unless you're in an emergency. You call me twice and I'm going to assume you're laying on the floor somewhere bleeding out."
"Oh my god," you mutter.
"When you text me, you refer to me as Victor, never Creed. If you call me Creed that means you're under duress. Someone has you and is forcing you to type out the text. Understand?"
"Holy shit. Is that really going to happen?"
"No," he answers quickly, "Zero percent chance."
"Then why have these rules?"
He gives you the most pandering little smile and looks you right in the eye and says, "Because you like this shit."
But there's something about the specificity of his rules that makes you think it's slightly higher than a zero percent chance, and you commit them to memory regardless.
You pull up Messages and quickly write something to the one contact you have, labeled VC:
Where is your shirt?
You look up with a grin of anticipation, and watch his eyes narrow suspiciously before he slow-blinks in annoyance when his phone dings in his pocket. It's got to be eating him up inside, wanting to know what you wrote but also not wanting to give you the satisfaction of looking when you're behaving like this, and that only tugs your smile even wider. Obviously he doesn't look, because he's a consummate professional with deep reservoirs of self control, and he just walks away to grab a plate from a cupboard like he already knows where you keep them.
While you drink your coffee he explains the new door locks and how to access the cameras from your new phone, and where to find the pistol he got for you.
"What happened to 'zero percent chance?'"
"Do you know how to shoot?" He asks in an offhand way, completely ignoring your question.
"Of course."
"Can you hit a target at twenty yards?"
Fucker. "Um, probably not."
"I'll take you to a range sometime. Not today, because we're leaving this afternoon."
"Leaving?" You repeat blankly.
"Got a job."
Your heart starts pounding and you look over at William excitedly, like he's your fellow stowaway. "Where?"
Victor leans back a little in his chair. "Similar weather to here. You'll figure it out when we get there. Pack for a week."
"Why can't you just tell me now?" you hedge.
"Don't trust you yet."
Oh. So it's like that. "What do you think I'm gonna do, call the local police?"
"No," he answers calmly, "but you're completely inexperienced and I'm trying to reduce as many risk factors as I can while you settle in."
In other words, he's worried he can't predict all the mistakes you'll make and your leash is going to be microscopic for a while. Which is fair, you guess, though relatively humiliating. But you understand the stakes are higher in this game than any you've ever played, so you just say, "Okay," and head upstairs to start packing.
You aren't sure what to expect when you begin your road trip with your new boss. The choice of a Honda CR-V is confusing at first until you're on the road and realize that though the window tint was a little darker than it should be, your vehicle is perfectly common and ordinary, and not one will look at you twice.
William starts out in his crate, but it only takes about half an hour of pitiful, barely audible whines until Victor pulls over with a, "For fuck's sake," and lets him loose in the back seat. Then it's all sunshine and wiggles and occasional sneaky licks to the side of your neck. Victor is getting the same treatment and pretending to be annoyed by it.
"Switch your clothes at every location if possible," Victor tells you, continuing this crash course on surveillance. "Jackets and sunglasses are the easiest changes. Hair up one location, hair down the next. He stops to eat lunch, you're someone who's frightened of all eye contact. He walks down the sidewalk, you're someone who keeps your chin up and looking at everything. Body language is just as recognizable as clothing."
"I only packed for a week."
"And you'll only do surveillance for a day. All I need is for you to follow him long enough to get a photo of who he's meeting with."
You stare down at the face on your phone screen, memorizing the impression of his features. Face only, because you won't know his name until the day of, per Victor's tiny leash.
"I'll be in touch frequently, and you can quickly change in the car between locations. Use your peripheral vision as much as possible, but don't ignore your human nature. If he yells at a waiter and everyone else is looking at him, you look too."
To be honest, you're trying not to freak out at this point. You're fairly sure you will forget everything in the heat of the moment, and imposter syndrome is really starting to take hold, but Victor is somehow convinced you will be 'a natural,' so you keep your doubts to yourself. After all, it's only following an unknown, probably dangerous man to a meetup with another unknown, probably dangerous man. Only the one specific job description you have, that you've never even practiced before, and will have to execute flawlessly to have any hope of success. Easy peasy, right? Yeah, there's no possible reason to be so stressed that Victor keeps eyeing you and telling you to relax. Everything will be fine.
It's not until that night, when you're tucked into a queen sized hotel bed with William, that Victor deigns to reply to your text:
VC: I run hot
You roll your eyes and type out a reply:
Highly unlikely. I've seen the way you dress in the summer.
VC: Yeah and I'm fuckin miserable
Prove it. What's your thermostat set to?
And then you get nothing. He replied so instantly before this that it's strange when that message goes several minutes unanswered. You know he's in the next room over, probably also in bed, with nothing better to do than reply to your stupid texts, but he doesn't. It gets you reading it over and over, wondering if what you said was too personal, or too flirty or something. God, he's your boss now. You have to force yourself to maintain some level of professionalism when you talk to him.
Thoroughly annoyed at yourself, you backpedal with a simple, appropriate text:
Goodnight Victor.
That goes unanswered too, and you lay there, picturing Victor in his room and what he could be doing. How weird is it that you kind of miss him? You wish you were over there, peering at the number on his thermostat and noting which shows he watches on TV. You've been inside his house, and it's still not enough, there's still endless more that you want to see. The way he brushes his teeth, which guns he carries and how he straps them on, how he looks reading a book or just lying in bed or… texting you.
Finally your phone dings.
VC: Get some sleep. You'll do just fine tomorrow
You put down your phone, and softy from behind your back come little piggy snores.
It was an outrageous oversight that you didn't anticipate this. At the time, you'd thought you were hurt enough to bury those feelings forever, after the hellish month of no contact he put you through. But here you are, fucking itching to swipe your keycard on his door and glue yourself to him for the rest of the night. All those anguished resolutions suddenly mean nothing when he's so close by and giving you attention and making you feel important.
You aren't sure if it's a stroke of luck or simply an act of mercy that he isn't flirting in earnest, because you know exactly where you would end up: right back in that bathtub, crying your heart out again when he leaves.