Dirty Trick Read online

  With his jaw hanging open, Corbin tentatively grabbed his briefs, jeans, and shirt. Clearly he wasn’t the kind of man who was used to being rushed out. I had a feeling that he was the one who usually rushed girls out.

  “Um, no, that’s not what I was thinking. I just…” Corbin slipped into his jeans.

  He looked so damn sexy.

  But I knew this was for the best.

  He was visibly flustered that I was kicking him out, and not doting over him like most girls probably did. I ushered him toward the door and opened it. He hopped on one foot and tried to put his shoe on quickly.

  “Goodbye!” I said. I gave his body a light push, and didn’t kiss him goodbye.

  “Alright then. Bye Alexa,” his low voice reverberated through the hallway outside.

  I had to be realistic. What future could we have? What was I going to do, get married to some sexy bad boy I met at a Tijuana club and had a one-night stand with? To whom I didn’t even give my real name?

  I mean, this was fun, but I worked for the DEA, and something about Corbin screamed shady. Besides, I needed to at least grab a couple of winks of sleep.

  3

  Corbin

  4 weeks later - San Diego, California

  Five. Six. Seven. Eight.

  “Ahhh,” I grunted as I heaved the weights over my chest. They clinked as I dropped them back onto the rack, and I sat up, feeling the burn run through my arms.

  I took a couple of deep breaths and stared outside into the sunlight. For the two years I spent in prison, lifting weights became a kind of mediation for me. Now that I was out and readjusting, I enjoyed my time in my brother’s garage weight room even more.

  My phone buzzed on the ground and I picked it up.

  Three messages, from Lucy, Lacy, and Laura.

  One morning selfie in lingerie from the front, one from the back, and one sans clothing.

  Well good morning ladies.

  It had been like this ever since I got out of jail a month or so ago. Take Lucy’s message that went along with her quite attractive selfie:

  Lucy: Hey Corbin I heard you’re back in San Diego, when can you come over?

  Lacy: Hi Corbin! Thinking of you now that you’re out :)

  Or just the more direct:

  Laura: cum over please

  Yeah, I know. This is not the average guy’s text feed. You’d think I was their dick for hire or something. Apparently there is a vast shortage of real men in the southern California area who understand how to give a girl multiple orgasms, so now that I’m back, these girls are ready for the rainy season.

  I thought about responding to them, but instead I set my phone back on the ground and pounded out another set of of chest on the bench press.

  My mind drifted as I pounded out a few extra reps. The truth was I had a mental block in place these days when it came to women.

  And the cause of my trouble, was, of course, a woman.

  Her name was Alexa, and she ghosted me.

  Not even just a standard “oh maybe we’ll hang out sometime, maybe not” type of passive aggressive ghost.

  After the hottest night of sex in my life, she ghosted the fuck out of me. She told me to get out, and she apparently never intended on seeing me again.

  I searched high and low for all the Alexa’s in San Diego. I even used some of my shady drug connections to look for her.

  You’d think in the age of social media, finding someone would be simple.

  But this one was good at covering her tracks, apparently.

  This was bullshit, and she was eating away at me.

  Who has the fuck of their life with someone, and then tells the other person to leave?

  Okay okay, I might have done that a few times. But I was at least gentlemanly about it.

  Fine, I’m a total hypocrite, I admit it. But fuck this.

  I’m the one who does the kicking out. Not the girl. Me.

  After my workout I showered off and threw some music on my brother’s stereo, sat at the kitchen island and had some breakfast. As I was shoveling the last of a delicious omelette into my mouth, I got a text that had nothing to do with a girl. It was my least favorite DEA agent, Ned Ronin.

  Ned: What the fuck Corbin. Seriously? You went to Mexico without telling me??

  My heart sank just a tad at hearing that. I thought since four weeks had passed, I was in the clear.

  Corbin: That was four weeks ago. I needed a little escape

  Ned: Get the fuck over here right now, you’re in deep shit. We’re going to have to do the interview after all

  Corbin: See you soon :)

  Ned: smh

  I sighed. Ned was a dick, but I couldn’t hate him too much since he was the one who got me out of prison early.

  Now, instead of Corbin Young, drug dealer extraordinaire, I had to become Corbin Young, undercover agent extraordinaire.

  For eighteen years off my sentence, I was willing to do what they asked of me. No fucking way was I going to spend the majority of my life in that shithole known as Folsom Prison.

  Today, all I had to do was pass an interview with a lie detecting expert to assure them I wouldn’t go back to the dark side.

  Piece of fucking cake.

  I jumped on my motorcycle and headed over to the headquarters.

  Stopping at a red light in the downtown area. I thought I saw a girl who looked like Alexa. Except this girl was blonde, not a dark-haired brunette.

  Apparently I was hallucinating. I’d get a grip soon, though.

  My mind trailed off again as I thought about that night in Tijuana several weeks ago.

  Maybe I shouldn’t be so ungrateful about the whole deal. I mean shit, it was my second night out of prison and I went home with the hottest girl in the bar. Her dark hair and lightly tanned skin killed me, just killed me. And damn, those eyes. I was getting hard again just thinking about her.

  Hearing Alexa’s moans with her body beneath me reminded me that I was, after two years locked up, a free fucking man.

  Emphasis on the fucking.

  Still. She didn’t even let me stick around for a round two. Now that’s heartbreak—never getting to feel her flesh on my lips again.

  The light turned green. Let it go, man. It’s not like you were going to try to hang out with her. You just wanted a hot piece of ass to bang on your second night out of prison.

  I had to chuckle at the fact that I didn’t even know Alexa’s last name, and here I was still thinking about her four weeks later.

  It wasn’t about neediness. Hell, I could get another girl in about three seconds flat. So it wasn’t about lack of options.

  What the hell was it about Alexa that made me still think about her?

  Damned if I knew for sure. Maybe I just liked how dirty she was.

  4

  Corbin

  I poured myself a generous cup of coffee in Ned’s office at the DEA’s headquarters.

  I recoiled just slightly at the heat of the brown liquid, still accustomed to the cold coffee they had served us in prison. “Ned, do you have any cream?”

  Ned stared back at me like I had just said the sun was green.

  “Cream? You’re worried about cream right now? Jesus fucking Christ, Corbin. Jesus H. It’s right on the side of the microwave. Jesus.” Ned paced around his room with his hands behind his back, too worked up to sit behind his large oak monstrosity of a desk.

  “Ah. There it is,” I peeked behind the microwave. “You even have those little vanilla flavored cream packets! Hazelnut too! I love these things. Let me tell you Ned, the coffee in prison—I’ll be damned if sometimes they just didn’t take a little dirt and throw it in the water and heat it up until it was luke-cold. And definitely no cream. Shit no. But sometimes we’d steal a packet or two of butter and make our own…Hey, you look really worked up, buddy. Are you okay?”

  Beads of sweat rolled from the corners of Ned’s receding brown hairline as he paced back and forth. He had undone the top but
ton of his ironed white shirt and loosened the knot of his tie. His sleeves were rolled up, exposing his hairy forearms as if he had been at the office working through the night on some ball-buster of a problem.

  “Corbin, do I look fucking okay to you?” Ned yelled, ceasing his back-and-forth pacing for a moment.

  “No, you don’t look okay at all. You look stressed. Do you want a cup of coffee? I made extra.” I nodded toward the Mr. Coffee and winked at Ned.

  “Un-goddamn-believable, Corbin. I get a report from border patrol that says you came over the Mexico/United States border on the second night after your release! After I explicitly told you to stay out of trouble. And you’re yapping on about how much you love little cream packets in your coffee? You just love those cream packets! Is this true or are my sources wrong?”

  Ned put his hands on his hips like an angry parent whose kid was in the principal’s office.

  Except this wasn’t a school, and what I did with my personal time sure as hell wasn’t any of Ned’s business as far as I was concerned, even if it involved bending their “rules.”

  As long as the DEA needed me to take down Luis Reyes, the most prolific drug dealer of all time, they wouldn’t do shit to me, as long as I played ball and got the job done.

  And I was a master at getting shit done, be it playing for the dark side or the good side.

  I concentrated on putting the third and final cream packet into my coffee while I stood next to the microwave, giving him some time to cool off. I wasn’t sure why Ned had such an ax to grind with me when I was basically the heart and soul of this whole goddamn operation.

  “Answer me, Corbin. Is this true?” he repeated.

  Slowly, I turned around and took a step toward him, holding his gaze.

  “It’s true,” I nodded. “I do love cream in my coffee, and these little packets are phenomenal. Ohh, don’t get me started about hazelnut flavor. Everyone sees me and thinks tattooed, shady looking guy like that? He’s definitely a black coffee guy. But I love cream for my hangover coffee. Isn’t it funny how sometimes you don’t know what you’ve got until it’s taken away? Now that I’m a free man, I’ll even have a latte once in a while or if it’s hot I’ll have an icy cold—”

  “Goddamnit!” Ned pounded his desk with both fists, cutting me off.

  “Holy shit. Wow! You think this is funny. Just one big joke about cream in your fucking coffee. Do I look like I’m goddamn laughing? This is the DEA, Corbin! Your early release is contingent on your cooperation. I’m your superior and I’m asking you a question: Did you or did you not roll past border patrol four weeks ago? And some of the reports I gathered from sources in the field are even telling me you went home with some prostitute?” Ned paused and looked at his watch, “—for the love of God Corbin, that wasn’t even forty-eight hours after your release! If I can’t trust you to--”

  “Whoa, whoa whoa! That’s totally unfair, Ned. Honestly, I’m offended,” I said, cutting him off.

  Ned took a deep breath and relaxed his shoulders. “Phew. Thank God. So you’re saying my sources are wrong. That you didn’t break the rules and go across the border to sleep with a prostitute?”

  “No, that’s pretty much right. Everything except she wasn’t just some prostitute, Ned! Honestly I thought we had a pretty good connection for one night. And damn, if you woulda seen how gorgeous she was you’d have brought her home yourself. Beautiful dark brown hair, banging body. And this cream-coffee colored skin. It was so soft I actually felt bad that she had to deal with my beard. And I don’t usually feel bad, Ned. About almost anything.” I took a pull of my coffee and made an audible slurping noise. “Oohh. That’s the perfect temperature. Finally. And the perfect amount of hazelnut cream.”

  I nodded a little, truly content.

  “It’s the little things in life,” I winked. “Am I right? You’ve got to appreciate them.”

  Ned looked at me blankly, jaw open, disbelieving of my dripping sarcasm. His eyes widened like they were about to blow right out of his head. Clearly he was used to his agents obeying his every order without question. He brought his hand to his forehead and massaged it with his thumb and forefinger.

  “We’re out here trying to catch Luis Reyes,” he began, his voice sounding dejected, “the biggest drug dealer of modern times—and my fucking double agent is more concerned about getting his rocks off than taking this seriously. I swear to God.”

  “Hey Ned, buck up, pal,” I walked over to him and put my hand on his shoulder. He looked like he needed some serious comforting, and not just about the mission. “I’m just trying to fit in, okay? If I’m going to go undercover, I figure I better stick with my old habits in the outside world so I don’t arouse any suspicion. Me having a one-night stand with a girl isn’t suspicious. You know what is suspicious? If I get out of prison and I stop partying like I used to. I just need you to trust me, okay? I’m staying in character. It’s all an act.” I grinned.

  He had to know I was right.

  Ned leaned back on his solid oak desk and folded his arms.

  “That’s exactly the problem Corbin. I don’t know if I can trust you. Is this really an act? Or are you just unreliable and unpredictable? I was already skeptical. And after the shit you pulled going across the border, I have my doubts.”

  I rubbed my short beard with a hand. Two years in prison and a lifetime of crime hadn’t exactly turned me into an ego-assuager who would grovel before his superiors. Especially given the dire straits the DEA was in to make a deal with a guy like me in the first place. They’d been trying to catch Reyes for nearly a decade.

  “So what are you going to do? Put me in jail and find another ex-con who has years of experience working with the Reyes gang? Who spent a year in the same cellblock with one of the Reyes cousins? Get real. I’m all you’ve got.”

  “Maybe. But I’m going to take the necessary precautions,” Ned cleared his throat, “Which is why I’m bringing one of the DEA’s top psychological evaluation specialists to interview you. If you’re lying—we’ll find out. And we will put you back in prison if you’re not on our side. She’ll be here shortly to deal with you. Dr. Napleton is no bullshit, Corbin. So head out, get some lunch, whatever, and make sure you’re back here later.”

  I took a large gulp of my coffee and swallowed. “She. A girl, huh?”

  “Yes Corbin, a girl.”

  I sat back down and smiled as I held on to my coffee mug. “Alright, I’ll do your little interrogation thingy.”

  Who knew? Maybe she’d be cute.

  5

  Eva

  My heels clicked on the white tile as I made my way to my boss’s office.

  For the past month or so, I’d felt like a changed person, and I couldn’t put my finger exactly on what made me feel so empowered.

  Okay, maybe I could.

  Maybe it was the satisfaction I felt the night I kicked the most gorgeous man I’d ever met out of my room.

  And all this after I’d spent the night pretending I was another version of me:

  Alexa.

  After that experience, something just clicked for me about how I’d been letting people push me around at the office.

  Instead of retreating into my shell when confrontation became uncomfortable, like I’d done in the past, instead I channelled my inner alter-ego.

  I asked myself, What would Alexa do?

  Sure, in some ways it was a silly mental trick I played on myself.

  But it worked. I liked being Alexa.

  Alexa was powerful.

  Alexa was dominant. She took what she wanted.

  She was sexual--but on her own terms. She didn’t tolerate the come-ons of imbeciles.

  Alexa even had blonde hair--I’d dyed it blonde the Monday after I got back from Tijuana.

  “Hello Eva,” one of the young agents said as he passed me in the hallway.

  “Gabriel,” I said with a curt nod and a businesslike smirk.

  I had to smile a little at si
lly thoughts going on inside my own head, and it was definitely giving me the competitive advantage at work.

  Today, I had even donned my blue and white pinstripe power suit, my go-to wardrobe choice when I wanted to feel like a boss. It made me look intimidating at best and downright bitchy at worst.

  I paused for a moment to look at the plaque on the door before I walked inside.

  Ned Ronin: DEA Head of Operations.

  Like he was some kind of big deal. He’d been in charge of catching Luis Reyes for years, and hadn’t even come as close as getting a video of him.

  I opened the door without knocking. Ned sat behind his giant desk, clacking away on his laptop, totally engrossed. I didn’t think he heard or saw me, which was impressive considering how loud my heels were. I walked up and slammed my palms on his desk.

  “Ned,” I began. “You’re transferring me to the field. I’m done being your psychological evaluation specialist. I’ve put in my time. And I want the promotion.”

  He stopped typing and looked at me with an indifferent gaze.

  “We’ve had this conversation before. We still need you in your current role. In the office. Analysis is your strong suit.”

  Ned turned back to his computer and started typing again.

  “No. Listen to me,” I put my hands on my hips and continued. “I’ve been requesting to work in the field since I first started working here under you—over two years ago. Six years counting all the Ph.D. work I did for the department. You’re underutilizing me and you know it! I’m a psychological profiling expert, I speak fluent Spanish, and I’ve gotten the highest possible score in all of the field tests. Which box don’t I check to get into the field and work some actual drug busts?”