Chapter Text
Trevor never imagined when he started working for the FBI that he would one day be fitted for a wedding ring.
Sure, he knew he would be going undercover as part of his job as a special agent, and sure, he knew the statistics about how civilians more easily believed cover stories when there was more than one person involved, but as Trevor sat in a windowless room at Quantico, having a mousy-haired elderly woman sorting through ring sizes on a keychain to choose the correct one for him, it really began to sink in that this was happening.
He was going undercover.
With a wife.
Weird.
When the woman finally seemed satisfied that they’d found the correct size for his wedding band, she scurried out of the room, only for the door to immediately open again to reveal his friend and case officer, Ari Cantor.
“Ready to hear about your new life?” Ari said, sauntering in with a smirk that said he was enjoying this a little too much. He threw the manilla folder in his hands down on the table between them, such that Trevor had to reach unnaturally far to pick it up.
The first thing Trevor saw in the folder was a social security card, clipped to a brand new passport. Flipping open to the page with his picture, Trevor’s brow furrowed in confusion. “Trevor Woodstone? Why didn’t you change my first name?”
“The powers-that-be decided that since there’s a rush on this assignment, and they didn’t have enough time to properly prep you, they’d keep your first name, rather than run the risk of you not responding to an alias,” Ari offered, crossing his arms behind his head in a way that affected an air of casualness that didn’t quite suit the situation.
“I’ve been undercover before,” Trevor countered, a bit insulted at the idea that he wouldn’t be able to learn a new name when he’d successfully infiltrated a black-market exotic animal smuggling ring, which required six months of deep undercover work. If he could stick to his cover story and fool those criminals, why wouldn’t he be able to do it again?
Beneath the passport, there were several credit cards in his new name, a birth certificate, and marriage certificate, followed by a formal photo of his soon-to-be wife. Curly red hair, blue eyes, sharp bone structure, and a smile that looked positively deadly.
“She’s hot,” Trevor said, his eyes lingering just slightly too long on the slit in her evening gown. The photo must’ve been taken at a fancy party, since the dress was decidedly more formal than he’d expect an FBI agent to wear while on assignment. “Which branch of the FBI or CIA did they grab her from? Or is she a cop?”
“Does she look like a cop?” Ari said with a dismissive laugh. The sound grated on Trevor’s nerves as he tore his eyes from the woman’s photo to take in Ari’s smug expression. “She’s not CIA or FBI. She’s an... independent contractor.”
“Since when does the FBI contract out for stuff that’s within the United States?” Trevor frowned, flipping through a handful of photos, some of which had been photoshopped to include Trevor. These images would serve as pocket litter, to be kept in his new wallet, to add to the believability that they had lived a real life together. “I thought you said they were sending me to New York?”
“They are,” Ari sneered. “Keep up, bro.”
“You haven’t explained anything yet, bro,” Trevor argued back, waiting impatiently for Ari to brief him on the situation.
“Henrietta Atwood,” Ari began, gesturing to the contents of the folder that Trevor had spread out across the table. “Cover: Hetty Woodstone. She’s worked in espionage both at home and abroad for the last twenty-five years.”
“Why haven’t I heard of her before?” Trevor said, eyes drawn to a wedding photo. She sure did make a beautiful bride. Trevor wondered if the wedding picture was completely doctored, or if she’d actually been married at some point, and it was stolen from a real album.
“Why are you surprised?” Ari said, a malicious glint in his eye. “The best spies are the ones you’ve never heard of.”
“So, she’s a real pro?” Trevor said, picking up a grainy photo of Hetty with a gun strapped to her thigh, her left hand bunching up her skirt while her right hand reached for it. Her exposed leg was long and muscular, and the hint of black lingerie peeking out from beneath her skirt was enough to drive him mad.
That certainly wasn’t going in Mr. Woodstone’s wallet, since it was clearly surveillance footage of some sort of espionage mission. But it did get an enthusiastic reaction from Little T.
“In more ways than one.” Ari licked his lips lasciviously, which made Trevor’s stomach clench in disgust, even though he was not above ogling the photo, either.
“What do you mean?”
“It’s true that most of her work is unknown or confidential,” Ari began, leaning forward conspiratorially. “But what the FBI and CIA do know, is that she has a history of honey trapping. To great success.”
Trevor didn’t like the salacious look in Ari’s eye. She was just doing her job; it felt wrong to talk about her like she was somehow lesser for using that method to obtain information. He’d done plenty of not-so-kosher things while undercover, including eating a rare tiger so as not to raise suspicion by refusing.
(No one had to know he threw it all up afterwards.)
Trevor’s eyes traced her enigmatic face, wondering what kind of secrets it held. “Was she trained by the Russians to be a Swallow?”
Ari scoffed. “You think we’d collaborate with a KGB agent?”
“No,” Trevor said slowly, trying to hide the frustration in his tone and failing. Ari could be infuriating, sometimes. “But I thought the US government doesn’t authorize sex-pionage missions?”
“We don’t,” Ari confirmed, though he looked over his shoulder as he did, as if he suspected someone else was listening to their conversation. No doubt, they were. “But that doesn’t mean we can’t hire someone who has a history of it. If you do successfully infiltrate the Farnsby’s human-trafficking operation, we want someone who can…you know…seal the deal, so to speak. Only the inner circle of the Farnsby’s ring know about what really goes on within the walls of that mansion.”
Trevor’s mouth went dry. “Nobody said anything about actually joining the ring. I thought we were just supposed to gather intelligence—like how they’re getting these people across state lines, and in and out of the country, without detection?”
“You want us to send someone else?” Ari threatened. “I’m sure I can find another man who would be up to the task. It’s not like we’re asking you to sleep with anyone; you just have to help her get close enough that if the opportunity arises, you can look the other way, and hopefully we get enough information to potentially take them out. Don’t you want those scumbags to be caught? I thought you said you were tired of riding a desk?”
Trevor ran his fingers over his freshly-shaven jaw. He was tired of working behind the scenes. He didn’t spend two years working his ass off in field training, and then six months undercover, just to be relegated to a desk job for the past year. And when it came down to it, he wasn’t actually opposed to sex work; he was just worried that one or both of them could be put in an extremely dangerous position if things got out of hand.
Human traffickers weren’t exactly known for being nice to undercover agents, should they be discovered. But that was a risk Trevor took with any mission, so there was no turning back now. Either he took the job, and accepted the risk, or he would be relegated to office work for the rest of his career.
“Fine. I’ll do it.”
Ari smiled. “I thought that’d be your answer. I mean, damn, just look at your ‘wife.’ I wouldn’t mind getting paid to play house with her.”
Ari reached for the sexy surveillance photo, but Trevor moved it out of his reach, gathering up all the pictures of his “wife” and placing them beneath his new birth certificate, out of view. “Is there anything else I need to know about the mission, before they ship me off to Ulster County?”
Ari looked annoyed at having all the photos hidden away, but begrudgingly shifted back into doing his job. “Trevor Woodstone works in finance. We thought since you studied it at Penn, you’d be able to make casual conversation about it. Your wife is independently wealthy; she inherited a fortune when her parents died that goes back to the Gilded Age. She was married once before, with one son from a previous marriage who’s an adult now. You met at an estate sale in the Hamptons seven years ago, and got married five years ago. No kids of your own; we didn’t want to risk any additional children being on the Farnsby’s radar.”
Trevor pulled out a photo of their targets. Mr. and Mrs. Farnsby were a couple in their late 60’s, and looked normal enough, but Trevor knew better than anyone that looks could be deceiving.
“They look pretty harmless, right?” Ari said, running a hand through his hair. “But don’t let the ‘retired grandparents who play pickleball and bake cookies’ act fool you; they’ve trafficked over two hundred people—mostly women and girls—in and out of the country. And that’s just the ones we know about.”
Nausea bubbled in Trevor’s stomach, imagining the terrible fate that awaited the Farnsby victims. He’d be only too happy to take down a ring that had caused so much suffering to innocent people. How they could live with themselves, knowing how many people’s lives they ruined, was beyond him.
“Having second thoughts?” Ari asked, seeing the green tinge to Trevor’s face. “If you’re gonna pussy out at the first sign of girls being mistreated, I need to know that now so I can—”
“I’m not a pussy for having a heart,” Trevor snapped. “I won’t have any problem handling this case. Don’t worry about me—T-Money doesn’t back down from a challenge. Let’s take these bastards down.”
Hetty was fairly certain her best friend-turned-handler had gone positively mad.
"No. Absolutely not."
"Hetty, at least give me time to explain—"
"No! You promised I'd never have to go undercover as married again!" Hetty pointed an accusing finger at him as she paced around the nondescript hotel room, while Isaac hastily laid out a plethora of documents and photos on the desk.
"I know what I said, but these are special circumstances. They need you—"
Hetty held up her hand to stop him there. "They do not need me. They need a prostitute with a gun and half a brain. You know I refuse to do that work anymore.”
"No one is expecting you to have…relations with any of the traffickers—"
"That's exactly what they're expecting,” Hetty replied, heat rising in her pale face. “Don’t play the blushing ingénue with me, Isaac. It doesn’t suit you.”
Isaac frowned, his pinched expression making him appear older than his years. "The FBI insists they just want information. How you go about getting that information is entirely up to you. Not to mention, the FBI doesn't authorize sex work missions."
"That's why they want me—to do their dirty work for them so their noses stay clean—and the answer is no." Hetty huffed, turned on her heel, and marched towards the door, unwilling to listen to Isaac’s absurd proposal for a second longer.
"Not even for a million-dollar contract?" Isaac said, his tone unreadable, even for an expert in body language and communication, like Hetty.
Hetty stopped in her tracks, with one hand on the door handle. "What?"
Isaac finished spreading out all the materials on the desk and turned to face her. "They're offering you more money than they've ever offered an agent for doing work within the United States. You've been saying you wanted to retire; this would be your ticket out of the profession for good. I thought that was what you wanted?"
Hetty bit her lip, conflicted. On the one hand, she hated Isaac for going back on his word and putting her in this situation to begin with, but on the other, he was right—more than anything, she wanted to retire—as much as a person like her ever could retire.
She’d certainly made enough enemies in high and low places to have to be looking over her shoulder for the rest of her life.
"If—and that is a big 'if'—I were to accept the job, who would be playing my husband?"
"Trevor Lefkowitz,” Isaac reached for a photo and held it up for her inspection as she took a few steps away from the door to get a better look. “He's an FBI agent who specializes in organized crime."
"He looks young,” and handsome, an unwelcome voice inside her head added as she snatched the photo from Isaac’s hand. “Has he ever gone undercover like this before?"
"Once. A year ago, he successfully infiltrated an exotic-animal smuggling ring. Saved a number of endangered species from being sold on the black market and put the culprits away for good."
Hetty studied the photo, eyes tracing the sharp line of the young man’s jaw. "Is there anything I should know about him that's not in the file the FBI provided?"
Isaac understood what she was really asking without having to ask.
"During his college years, he was known to over-indulge with alcohol and party drugs. Cocaine, ecstasy, amphetamines—uppers, mostly. But the recreational drug use never impacted his work, as far as I can tell, and he's been mostly sober since finishing that undercover op,” Isaac said, reaching to pick up another photo. This one was a candid that showed Trevor with a beautiful woman on his arm who was almost certainly a model or actress. “He's also known as a bit of Lothario; he's been seen with a number of different women over the years, and has never had a long-term relationship. But there are no HR complaints on his file, and the FBI thoroughly vetted his professionalism and conduct before assigning him to this case with you, at my request."
Hetty's mouth went dry at the idea that Isaac may have tipped off the FBI to the confidential mission that still haunted her nightmares by being so protective of her. "You didn't have to do that."
"I did," Isaac insisted, his eyes fierce. "I'm not letting you be married to the likes of Elias again. It wouldn’t matter how much money they offered—you matter so much more to me.”
Against her will, tears pricked behind Hetty’s eyes at this uncharacteristically sentimental declaration, but she quickly squashed that involuntary response by digging her nails into her palms. The pain distracted the emotional center of her brain and the sensation behind her eyes almost immediately dissipated with it.
Hetty still wasn't sure the risk was worth it. She couldn't stay awake at all hours—at some point, she'd have to go to sleep—and she didn't like the idea of being alone in a house with an agent she neither knew nor trusted when she did. Before the mission with Elias, she never would have questioned her ability to take care of herself in that situation, but she could not possibly have anticipated that the slimy bastard would drug her when they were meant to be working together, on the same side, to collect intelligence.
Taking care of herself had been impossible when she couldn’t even move.
Hetty immediately shoved that thought and the memories associated with it as far down as they could possibly go. "Will we have any back up or support agents?"
Isaac pulled on the lapels of his suit jacket. "To be determined. The FBI debated giving one of you a sibling who lives nearby, or a close friend, so that another agent would be able to come and go as they please through the house, but there was some concern that this would draw suspicion. The less people involved, the better, so that if things go sideways, fewer federal agents are implicated. Which is one of the reasons they wanted you—you aren’t affiliated with any US government agency.”
"How likely are things to go sideways?"
Isaac grimaced. "Difficult to say. It depends on how convincing the two of you are as a married couple. I think getting close to the targets will be the easiest part. The Farnsbys are known swingers, and essentially have an open door where that is concerned. The hard part will be figuring out how they're getting all these other people in and out of the country. I imagine that isn't something they share with the casual couple joining them on the first Wednesday of every month at their swinger parties."
“So, they want us to go undercover as swingers?” Hetty said, her eyes nearly bugging out of her head. “How exactly does that line up with the FBI’s strict no-sex policy?”
Isaac sighed, rubbing a frustrated hand across his forehead. “You would have to ask them. But they’ve promised me that you will have complete control over the tactics you use to get information. If you’d rather collect intelligence on the Farnsbys through dinner parties and pickleball instead, be my guest.”
Hetty raised an amused eyebrow. “Do I look like someone who knows how to play pickleball?”
A teasing smile lit up Isaac’s face—the first glimpse of levity since the conversation started. “You don’t want me to answer that question.”
“Oh, hush.”
Three days after being briefed, Trevor arrived at his new “home,” and almost had to pinch himself to make sure he wasn’t dreaming as he looked out upon Woodstone Mansion. He’d been shown photos of it before leaving Virginia, but the pictures didn’t do it justice at all. After seven hours of driving, he would’ve been happy to arrive at a one-bedroom apartment, let alone a mansion.
“If anyone asks, I’m your frat bro, and I’m here to help you move in,” Ari said as he hauled a suitcase out of the trunk of Trevor’s rented Lamborghini. When he found out he was getting issued such a fancy car to keep up their cover of being wealthy elites, he was beside himself with excitement.
“You are my frat bro,” Trevor responded, recalling all the times they got wasted together at Penn. “So that won’t be a problem.”
Trevor grabbed the suitcase full of clothes as Ari lifted a heavy briefcase—concealing multiple government-issued weapons Trevor had trained on before going undercover the first time—out of the trunk with a grunt.
“Let’s go inside. Your little wifey should already be in there, ready to welcome you home,” Ari said, wiggling his eyebrows.
Trevor punched his friend’s shoulder with the hand that wasn’t hauling a suitcase behind him. “Don’t call her that. I bet she has a body count higher than the both of us combined.”
“Oh, I never doubted that,” Ari said, his voice dripping with innuendo.
“Shut up, bro,” Trevor spat as they got closer to the door, not wanting the woman herself to hear Ari disrespecting her.
“Relax, bro,” Ari replied, but immediately became deadly serious as he stopped Trevor from raising his hand to ring the doorbell with freakishly-fast reflexes. “What the fuck are you doing? This is your house.”
“Right, right,” Trevor said, embarrassed to have slipped up already. He needed to pull himself together.
Shaking off his blunder, Trevor opened the heavy wooden door as he said, “Honey, I’m home!”
“Seriously?” Ari said, his tone unamused as he entered the empty foyer.
“What? You never want to sneak up on a spy,” Trevor said, shrugging.
“I would advise you not to refer to your wife as a spy when you don’t know who may overhear,” came a commanding voice from the staircase.
Trevor turned to see a man in his thirties standing on the landing, wearing a blue suit and a sour expression.
“That’s Isaac Higgintoot, Hetty’s handler,” Ari offered, gesturing with his free hand. “Ex-military captain and combat veteran.”
“For the purposes of this assignment and maintaining cover even when we’re alone, you should refer to me as your brother-in-law,” Isaac stated with a no-nonsense, clipped tone that spoke to his military history, his eyes narrowing as he looked between the two of them.
“Right, of course,” Trevor replied quickly, letting go of his suitcase so he could offer his hand for Isaac to shake. “I’m Trevor. Nice to meet you.”
“We’ve already met,” Isaac said, ignoring Trevor’s outstretched hand as he traversed to the bottom of the staircase and marched past them both. “I attended your wedding to my sister, after all.”
Trevor lowered his hand, understanding why Isaac was a stickler for maintaining appearances, but it was still a bit much. “Right. Of course.”
“Hetty’s upstairs, unpacking,” Isaac offered as he walked away. “I’m headed to the kitchen to put on the kettle. Tea, anyone?”
“No, thank you,” Trevor said, while Ari made a juvenile gagging noise by way of answering. The only kind of tea either of them drank was the iced, sugary, pre-packaged kind.
“Hope she isn’t as uptight as him,” Ari said, throwing his thumb over his shoulder in the direction of the kitchen. “Military types never know how to relax.”
“You know, I think I’ve got it from here,” Trevor said, reaching to take the briefcase from Ari. “Why don’t you head out?”
“Trying to get rid of me, bro?” Ari observed, but handed over the briefcase without further protest. “I don’t blame you for wanting some alone-time to get familiar with the house. I bet the wife will be happy to give you a tour, starting in the bedroom.”
With that, Ari slapped Trevor encouragingly on the back, and made his way out.
“How charming,” came a sardonic voice from above. Trevor’s head turned to look, his face flushing as he realized Hetty had no doubt heard Ari’s unprofessional remarks.
“I’m sorry about him—”
Hetty held up her hand to stop him, making Trevor’s mouth snap shut mid-sentence. As she descended the staircase, Trevor couldn’t help his eyes from wandering down her body, taking in her simple white blouse and gray sweatpants with interest as she almost seemed to glide down the stairs, like royalty. Her grace was at odds with the casualness of her outfit, though Trevor assumed the reason she was dressed so comfortably was because she had been at the house in time to meet the move-in truck, and had spent the day unpacking while he’d been sitting in a car. Her curly red hair was piled on top of her head in a bun, with a few stray curls framing the sides of her face.
Even in sweatpants, there was no denying she was beautiful.
No wonder so many men had fallen under her spell.
“Let me make one thing clear from the start,” Hetty said, coming to a stop on the last step, which had the effect of forcing Trevor to look up to meet her gaze. She held up the back of her left hand in front of his face, presenting her fake wedding band and engagement ring to him. “I may be playing the part of your devoted wife in public, but in private, there will be no ‘tours’ of the bedroom. If you enter my room without permission, I will castrate you before you even get both feet inside the door. Is that clear?”
Trevor swallowed nervously, quite certain from the murderous glint in her eyes that this was not an empty threat. “Crystal.”
“Good,” Hetty replied, flashing him a predatory smile that went straight to his groin. “I’m glad we understand one another.”
With that, Hetty patted him patronizingly on the cheek, before strutting past him.
Trevor took a moment to recover himself before deciding he should follow her into the kitchen, rather than try to figure out which room upstairs was meant to be his. For all he knew, she had already booby-trapped her own room, to ensure he never step foot in it without consequences.
Leaving his things at the bottom of the staircase, Trevor made his way towards the kitchen, trying not to think about how turned on her threats had made him. He couldn’t help it if he was attracted to powerful, beautiful, terrifying women.
He was only human, after all.
“His case officer is a boar,” Hetty said, having a seat at the kitchen table as Isaac made a show of taking a sip from her teacup in front of her before handing it over. She tried to ignore the way the reminder of what Elias had done made her insides squirm, even as she was grateful to know with certainty the tea was safe to drink. “He’s going to be a problem.”
“I’ll tell the feds to straighten him out,” Isaac replied, before taking his own seat. “What do you think of your new husband?”
“Too soon to say,” Hetty responded, blowing on her tea to cool it down, “especially considering he’s standing in the doorway.”
Trevor didn’t know how she could’ve possibly been tipped off to his presence, with her back to the door and the care he’d taken to move as quietly as possible, but then again, she was an accomplished intelligence officer. It stood to reason she would have heightened senses.
“Sorry, I just didn’t want to wander around upstairs without one of you to show me which room is already taken.”
“Rooms, plural,” Isaac said, his commanding voice bordering on impolite. “I’ll be staying here this weekend to ‘help with the move.’”
“There’s really no need for that,” Hetty insisted, her pale face suddenly tinged with pink, which peaked Trevor’s interest.
“There’s every need,” Isaac replied, eyeing Trevor suspiciously before returning his gaze to Hetty. “I want to establish a presence at the mansion from the start, so no one will think it odd that I’m hanging around. My sister and I are very close, you see.”
Trevor looked between Hetty and Isaac, certain he was missing something as Hetty frowned at her handler, while tension grew in the silence between them.
“That’s cool with me,” Trevor offered, never one to let an uncomfortable silence linger as he pulled out a chair to take a seat across from Hetty. “No harm in having an extra agent around.”
This answer seemed to please Hetty, if the slight upturn of her lips was any indication.
“The Farnsbys always greet new neighbors with some form of baked good,” Isaac said, shifting into case officer mode. “We should expect them to call on you some time tomorrow.”
Trevor rubbed his hands together. “Gotta practice my smitten husband look before then.”
With a smirk and a wink in Hetty’s direction, he closed his eyes and took a deep breath, before reopening them and sending her what could only be described as puppy-dog eyes.
Crumpling up a napkin, Hetty threw it at Trevor’s head to stop his gazing, and she was mildly impressed when Trevor snatched it out of the air with cat-like reflexes before it ever had the chance to hit him.
“What? Don’t like my head-over-heels-in-love look?” Trevor laughed, throwing the crumpled ball up in the air before catching it again with the same hand.
“You looked more like a kicked puppy. If that was supposed to be your smitten face, I shudder to think how you’ll look at me when we’re dealing with swingers and sex-traffickers.”
That sobered him up fast.
“Right,” Trevor replied, putting the napkin down on the table with a sigh. “I’ll follow your lead. If you want me to act more aloof, I can try that.”
Hetty took a moment to consider this. “You don’t have to be aloof. The cover story is that we are still very much in love, even after seven years together. Just don’t overdo it. A young man being a bit too interested in his older wife might raise suspicion.”
Trevor frowned, not liking the way she put herself down. “As far as I’m concerned, Trevor Woodstone is a lucky guy who landed a wife way out of his league, so if it’s all the same to you, I think he should still be very much interested.”
Hetty looked momentarily startled by this declaration, but covered it up quickly by taking a sip of her tea. Trevor’s eyes followed the motion, and remained unmistakably fixed on her lips before Isaac cleared his throat.
“Right. Well, my body is currently on London time, so I believe I will be ‘hitting the hay,’ as they say, early tonight. Why don’t I take this opportunity to show you to your room, Trevor?”
Not waiting for a response, Isaac was already out of the room by the time Trevor registered the command to follow him.
“Uhhh, yeah, sure,” Trevor said, scrambling out of his seat. “Talk to you later, Hetty.”
Trevor could feel her eyes on his back as they followed him out the door.
Isaac showed Trevor to a spacious room with a nice, big bed and a couch in front of a flat screen tv.
“Nice,” Trevor said, setting down his bags. “You sure Hetty doesn’t want the room with the tv? I think I read in the file that there’s only one in this house. Great Aunt Sophie wasn’t much of an ‘electronics’ person, or something.”
“Quite sure,” Isaac said, closing the door behind him with a decisive click.
“Uh, oh,” Trevor said, sensing he was about to get a talking-to. “Did I do something wrong already? You’ve gotta cut me some slack, man. I was just sitting in a car for seven hours—”
“Stop talking,” Isaac said, sweeping the room for bugs with an odd-looking device before putting it away and coming to a stop in front of Trevor. “I’ve already checked every room in the house, but you can never be too careful.”
“Totally,” Trevor replied, eyeing Isaac uncertainly. His energy was off, but Trevor couldn't put his finger on why it would be.
“I just wanted to have a little chat—alone,” Isaac said, tucking his fingers around the lapels of his suit jacket.
“Are you gonna give me the shovel talk?” Trevor teased, flopping down on the couch to make himself comfortable. “You know you don’t have to do that, considering this is a fake marriage.”
“I don’t have a shovel,” Isaac said casually, producing a gun seemingly out of nowhere.
The hair on Trevor’s neck immediately stood up, prompting him to reach for his own weapon, but he’d hardly moved his hand when Isaac moved closer, making it clear he’d be shot dead before he even managed to put a finger on his own gun.
“What the hell, man?”
“I just want one thing to be clear,” Isaac said, aiming the gun straight at Trevor’s heart. “You so much as hold Hetty’s hand without permission, I kill you. You double cross her, I kill you. You try to force her to have sex with you, or the Farnsbys, or any of their friends, I cut off your testicles one at a time, and then kill you. It would be only too believable that a young special agent got in over his head with human traffickers and wound up on the wrong side of a gun. Understood?”
“Don’t you think Hetty ought to have first dibs on cutting off my balls in that scenario?” Trevor tried to put as much bravado into his voice as he could while having a gun trained on him. “Pretty sure a trained assassin can take care of herself.”
“Oh, she can,” Isaac confirmed, though Trevor detected a flicker of…something in his eyes that made him uneasy. “But I just wanted you to know that if she doesn’t kill you, I will.”
“Copy that, Captain,” Trevor said, saluting to try to lighten the moment, but Isaac’s expression only darkened.
“In this house, I’m not a captain,” Isaac said, his tone dangerous.
“What do you want me to call you, then? Bro?” Trevor countered, enjoying the way Isaac’s face twisted in disgust.
“Isaac will do,” he said as he lowered his weapon. “Isaac Woodstone. We may be brothers by marriage here, but we are not ‘bros.’ Save that for your silly little fraternity friends.”
Trevor didn’t bother asking how Isaac knew about his frat at Penn. He imagined Isaac knew everything about him, down to the date of his circumcision.
“I assume you don’t want me to tell Hetty you pulled a gun on me unprovoked?” Trevor ventured as Isaac turned on his heel and walked towards the door. “Or my case officer, for that matter.”
“You can tell them whatever you like,” Isaac said, pausing with his hand on the doorknob. “But I think we can both agree that we will have better success taking down the Farnsbys if we have clear expectations and work as a team.”
Trevor raised an amused eyebrow. He’d never been threatened by a member of his own team before. Rather than scare him away, however, it only made him more determined to pull this operation off without a hitch. And he couldn’t blame Isaac for not inherently trusting him; he wouldn’t trust himself, in Isaac’s place.
“You really care about her, don’t you?” Trevor mused, wondering how a military veteran came to be the handler of an international spy. “Are you two…you know…together? I won’t try to steal your girl. That’s not the kind of guy I am. I’m just here to do my job.”
The only response Isaac gave was a bewildered look, before he wrenched open the door, and was gone.