CHAPTER ONE

       Owen

      I KNOW IT’S going to make me seem like a cruel bastard, but there isn’t much in this world that pleases me more than getting the drop on someone. The element of surprise is my catnip. I love the moment my target realises they’ve been duped. Maybe it’s because nobody ever expected a thing from me.

      Who actually thinks the class clown will amount to something? No one.

      So yeah, I like it when the tables are turned. Especially when my target comes in a five-foot-two-inch package filled to the brim with bristling indignation.

      “No.” Miss Indignation shakes her head, a frizzy brown ponytail slapping her ears like she’s a puppy shaking off the water from an unwanted bath. “Can’t we pretend to be brother and sister?”

      “I’m not sure which part of this meeting you misinterpreted as a negotiation, Anderson.” My old boss, Gary Smythe, raises a bushy silver eyebrow. “This is your first assignment as a detective. I thought you’d be champing at the bit.”

      Hannah Anderson, now known as Detective Senior Constable Anderson, straightens her shoulders. “Yes, sir, and I’m very grateful for the opportunity—”

      “Then I suggest you quit shaking your head like you’re trying to dislodge something.”

      I snort and stifle the noise with a cough. Neither one of them buys it. We’re sitting in a meeting room at the Victoria Police headquarters. It feels strange to be back. I’d never planned on returning to Australia, let alone to my old job. But that’s life, right? The second you think you’ve got your shit together, fate punches you in the nuts.

      “Yes, sir.” Hannah looks like she’s about to erupt. She clutches her coffee cup in a way that tells me she’s trying to mentally crush my skull.

      Nice try, Anderson.

      “Not exactly the warm welcome I was hoping for,” I chime in, returning her fiery glare with a cocky grin. If there’s one thing that makes Anderson blow her stack, it’s people who take life less seriously than she does.

      Spoiler alert: that’s literally everyone.

      “Shut up, Fletcher.” Gary takes a sip of his cappuccino. He’s drinking out of a mug that says “I like big busts and I cannot lie” with a picture of a pair of handcuffs beneath it. A white line of milk foam caps his Ned Flanders–style moustache. “If you want someone to fawn over you, then pay your grandmother a visit.”

      “Will do, sir.”

      Anderson rolls her eyes. If it’s not completely obvious at this point, she kind of hates me. Well, hate might be a strong word although she has said it before. It’s a weird kind of hate. The kind that feels prickly and cold but is really a front for a gooey centre of white-hot attraction. Yeah, she has the hots for me and she hates herself for it.

      So I’m scoring another point in the bastard category, but that pleases me very much.

      “We’re going undercover,” I say, leaning forward against the table and not even trying to hide my glee. “As man and wife.”

      I swear she somehow manages to tell me to go fuck myself with her eyes. “Right.”

      “We thought we’d put this to bed before you left.” Gary frowns.

      He told me the pertinent details before I submitted my leave at Cobalt & Dane, the security company I work for in New York City. A folder with everything required for this undercover gig—ID for my new identity, keys and an access card for the apartment I’m going to call home for the next month, and surveillance info that’s been collected to date—is already in my backpack.

      This is an evidence-gathering mission, in the hopes of convincing the higher-ups to put together a task force. And I’m going to enjoy the heck out of being cooped up with Anderson.

      “So did I, Boss.” The name comes out of habit. Gary Smythe will always be “Boss” to me.

      We’d cracked the old case before I left for New York. But organised crime is a tricky beast. You think you’ve cut off the snake’s head and suddenly it grows back. If there’s one thing I’ve learned over the years, it’s that greed is unrelenting.

      “It looks like one of the relatives took over the family business,” Gary continues. “We suspect they’re running the operation out of an apartment complex in South Melbourne. We’ve secured an apartment for you. You’ll move in on Monday morning and make friends