Lost and Found (Masters & Mercenaries: The Forgotten #2)(111)

It was the most animation he’d seen on her in half an hour. This could get embarrassing, but if it made Becca smile, he would suffer through it. “Not exactly.”

“Not at all is what he means,” Robert replied with something akin to glee. “He wasn’t supposed to get close to you. I was.”

“Really?” Her nose wrinkled up. “No offense, but you’re not my type. I mean you’re attractive and all, but I don’t know that I would have responded to you.”

A deep sense of satisfaction welled inside him. Robert turned women’s heads wherever they went, but he wasn’t Becca’s type. Owen was. “She likes a bit of the bad boy in there. And she loves this accent of mine.”

Becca glared his way. “I think I’ll stay away from bad boys from now on since I got taken by one.”

Before Owen could reply, Robert was chuckling. “I wasn’t going to seduce you. I was going to befriend you, and trust me, you would have wanted to befriend me. I had plans. I bought board games and everything. A couple of rounds of Ticket to Ride, some wine and a nice dinner, and you would have been eating out of the palm of my hand. You would have been thrilled to befriend the new couple in the building. Of course we would have bonded over talking about my surly husband there. He wasn’t going to talk much.”

She finally glanced his way. “You and Robert were going in as a couple? You didn’t mention that to me. When did that change? Did Ezra order it? Speaking of couples, why were Ezra and Ariel posing as a married couple when it’s obvious she’s involved with Robert?”

“I wouldn’t say involved,” Ariel began.

“Because I looked better with Owen than Ezra. I was the obvious choice, and no one consulted me about the whole married to Ezra thing,” Robert continued as if Ariel hadn’t said a thing. “I would have gone with sister.”

Ari snorted. “Seriously, you think I look like lily-white Ezra’s sister? And how would you explain the accent?” She shook her head, but there was a smile on her lips. “He’s insane.”

“He was also staring at the two of you like he was going to rip Ezra’s head off that night at dinner.” It was way better to talk about Robert’s flaws than his own. He noticed Becca had moved closer to him. He wanted to reach out and get a hand on her, but he wasn’t about to push his luck. “You two should be damn glad I got her out of there early because I think she would have figured out something was wrong if you’d spent the entire dinner glaring at Ezra every time he touched his wife.”

“Everyone at that dinner was in on it.” Becca sat back, her hands in her lap again. “The whole thing was done to trick me.”

“The whole thing was done so I could get a feel for who you are as a person,” Ariel corrected quietly. “I really am a psychologist. I wanted to spend time with you so I could evaluate whether or not I thought you were capable of working with McDonald on a project like Tabula Rasa. You have to understand that it was important to know who you were personally. All of these men’s lives depend on who you are. On paper, I would have said no, but getting to know someone in person is important. I didn’t get the chance because Owen hustled you out. And no one changed up the assignments. Owen did that because he couldn’t keep his hands off you, and he knew it the minute you stepped on that lift. He could easily have given you his cover and that would have been the end of it. But he didn’t because he’d been thinking about you since the moment he saw a picture of you.”

He wouldn’t have put it so baldly, but the words seem to have an effect on Becca. She’d turned to him and there was a softness to her expression.

Was this what Ezra had been talking about when he’d mentioned Case and Mia? Had he been talking about letting himself be vulnerable? It wasn’t something he wanted to do, but she’d been made to feel that way and he’d had a hand in it.

“We had two pictures of you,” he began. “One was the picture you use on all your foundation informational materials. You look very professional.”

“And the other?”

He couldn’t help but smile. “You’re wearing spandex and your smile is so bright you reminded me of the sun. I think something about that picture brushed against those memories you say are trapped inside me because after I saw it, I could remember what it felt like to be in the waves with the sun on my face. I think that picture opened up a place inside me I didn’t know I had.”

“You didn’t tell me you were getting flashes,” Robert said.

“Not the point, dear,” Ari said and they went quiet for a moment.

“Captain Neuro. It’s stupid but I have fun with it,” Becca said after a long moment. “Had fun with it. I liked being around the kids. I liked showing the girls they could be doctors and talking about science with the classes.”

“I don’t think it’s stupid. I think you found a way to get them to think about science,” he replied, hating the inches between them. It felt like miles.

“Yeah, well, it’s gone now, and I won’t be allowed to do it again. The funny thing was I didn’t start it until I came here to Canada. I set up the charity years ago, but I didn’t know what I wanted to do with it. After I left Kronberg, I came back to the States and that was when my marriage fell apart. I was having terrible dreams about…about what happened in Germany. I had them for a long time afterward. I thought I was a coward for running out the way I did. I guess you could say I was compensating and didn’t even realize it.”