Free Single Lady Spy 01 - The End of Me by Tara Brown Page B

desperately emotional.
    He shook his head, "No, it was the truth. You're a special woman. You deserve a special man."
    His words were making me uncomfortable. I glanced over at the bottle we were drinking from, to see how much was missing, and realized there was an empty bottle next to it. He got drunk before meeting me and was hitting on me.
    That was special. I would bet he was even using his best lines on me.
    I wondered if all the spies had experiences like that, or if I was just that lucky? The word spy made my palms sweat.
    "Getting back to the reasons you are anxious. I haven’t taken anything from you, Ms. Evans." He sipped the flute.
    I cocked an eyebrow, "Call me Evie please, and yes, you have. You have everything of mine frozen."
    He pointed at me with the hand holding the drink, "Ah, but that’s not the same thing, is it? You have something of mine and I'm going to have everything of yours, until I get it back." The way he said everything, and lifted one corner of his mouth, made me cringe inwardly.
    My chest rose and fell faster, as I processed all his words and the comfort with which he spoke them. Could he force me to give him everything? Coop had told me to say yes to it all. Surely, he didn’t mean everything.
    He put a hand out and waved me off, "We can negotiate what everything is later. For now, I want to give you what I like to refer to as my test run."
    I swallowed the champagne in my mouth. It felt as if it curdled in my throat.
    He grinned leaning forward and slid a white envelope across the table to me, "I will let you peruse this, whilst I attend to something in the other room." He said whilst like a foreigner and left the room.
    I gulped back my drink and placed the flute down. The white envelope felt weird when I picked it up, like Mission Impossible combined with True Lies. I watched too much TV, while glorifying my ‘good old days’ in CI.
    I opened it and looked inside—a room key for the Bellagio and a picture of a man with a chubby face and huge lips. He was in his sixties maybe and greasy looking. He was wearing a white suit in the picture.
    "Ew," I whispered and examined the white suit. Beyond Don Johnson, no one ever rocked that bad boy.
    There was nothing else in the envelope. I tapped my fingers against it and processed the whole thing.
    It could be a hit…please God, no.
    It could be a trace, please God, yes.
    It could be stealing something, please God, let it be the trace.
    I frowned and looked back at the room, he had walked into. I stood up, placing the envelope down and walked to the other room where the lights were off and the curtains drawn.
    "Mr. Servario?" I spoke softly. My mommy/spy/widow senses told me to run. When I turned to, it was too late. He had been behind the door and closed it as I turned around.
    In the dim lights coming from the alarm clock, I could see the serious look on his face.
    "I understand you were once in Intelligence," he spoke softly, taking a step towards me.
    I swallowed and took one back, "I barely finished training," I lied.
    He smiled, "Let’s not lie to each other, Ms. Evans."
    My fingers balled into fists as I whispered, "I told you, call me Evie," and took another step back.
    He reached for my hand, "I think you were good at your job. You were good at it, and your quitting to be a mother was a tragedy."
    Ouch. Maybe, he too would throw up the maternity leave quotation marks and my week would be complete.
    My legs backed into something. I hadn’t looked around the room. I didn’t know where I was—rookie mistake.
    He stepped too close to me, pressing our chests together, and towered over me. "I need you to do something for me, Evie," he whispered my name. It sounded deliciously frightening on his lips. He bent this face close to mine. So close, I could smell the champagne coming off his breath, as he whispered again, "I need you to kill the man in that picture."
    My stomach dropped.
    I shook my head, "I've never had to kill anyone. That