Divide & Conquer (3 page)

He debated not even looking at the text; he wasn"t sure he wanted to encourage Ty to distract him from work. Then, after a moment, Zane shook himself. There was no reason to be so seriously uptight about this. He activated the phone to read the message.

The last 3 calls on my phone are for backup and pizza and sex. In
that order. Cant decide what that says about me.

Zane almost forgot to repress his smile. The night before Ty had called him to say he"d ordered pizza and that Zane should pick it up on his way over. They had intended to watch some football in front of Ty"s big-screen TV, but pointless playoff games not featuring any of Ty"s favored teams weren"t enough to hold Ty"s attention for long.

After the pizza was gone, they"d wound up in front of the TV all right, doing something entirely different than watching it.

Zane sniffed. He very purposefully did not shift in his chair as he set his phone down without answering or looking up at his partner.

Maybe he"d pick up dinner tonight too.

His phone almost immediately lit up again. Zane hadn"t even picked his pen back up. This time he glanced around the desks at their team members—none of them were paying him or Ty a bit of attention—before he poked at the phone to read the message.

You realize I have free texting plan right?

Obviously, ignoring Ty wasn"t going to work. But Zane pushed away the phone, determined to do his level best. Simply because the struggle would amuse Ty, if he were being honest with himself. And keeping Ty amused was good for the rest of humanity.

The phone lit up again, and when Zane"s eyes cut to look at Ty, his partner was leaning back in his chair, feet blatantly propped on his desk as he held his phone in his hands.

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Zane kept typing with one hand as he unobtrusively shifted his phone across the papers strewn in front of him so he could hit the button and read the message without drawing attention to it.

Pop quiz partner. How many letters in the government alphabet?

Biting his tongue, Zane tried to decide what the answer to that would be. It was fifty-fifty that it was a joke. He figured Ty was trying to break him now, to get him to react, maybe even to laugh. As he checked his peripheral vision, he could see Ty watching him, his head lowered just enough to make him look slightly predatory. Zane knew that look too well. Most people who didn"t know Ty were intimidated by the glint in his hazel eyes and the slightly malicious curve to his full lips. But Zane had come to learn that Ty only wore that look when he was enjoying himself. And it made his clean-shaven, heart-shaped face that much more handsome, which irked Zane to no end. Irked and aroused.

Just to egg him on, Zane ignored the message, went back to working on the reconciliation, and tried to build up the resolve it would take not to react to Ty"s next attempt to break his cool.

The phone lit up again, and this time Ty had returned his attention to his computer when Zane surreptitiously glanced at him. Zane wondered how the hell Ty typed so fast on the itty-bitty phone keypad.

He would have liked to have seen it, if it wouldn"t have spoiled their game.

He made them both wait five minutes through a discussion of assets with Alston before he hit the key to open the latest text message.

Answer: 19. ET went home on a UFO and the FBI went after him.

Zane blinked several times at the screen as he kept a straight face, though by all rights, that one did deserve a laugh. Who"d have known he"d be tapping into years of undercover experience to hide that he was playing text games in the office? He tapped his pen thoughtfully on the ledger as he stared at it blankly. He was certainly distracted now. He suspected Ty knew it. But they"d both continue to enjoy it if Zane tried not to admit it. He wouldn"t have dreamed of goofing off like this at work a year ago. Hell, six months ago. But Ty Grady had done his damnedest to yank the stick out of Zane"s ass….

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The little message icon in the corner of his phone"s display began to blink, indicating he had yet another message. He hadn"t even seen Ty move. Was it possible to schedule these texts ahead of time? That would take quite a bit of forethought, but it was just the kind of plot Ty would favor. Zane shifted around his stack of folders, took a drink of coffee, and checked the message.

You know you want to laugh.

Score one for Zane Garrett. He looked up slowly, face composed, raising one eyebrow.

Ty was watching him. He winked when Zane met his eyes, but he wasn"t fully smiling yet. He still wore that infuriating smirk. Instead of answering in any way, Zane sniffed and turned to his computer. That reaction would surely get another out of his partner. Besides, Zane was intrigued now to see what Ty would come up with that would be enough to get Zane to laugh despite his practiced control.

He didn"t have to wait long for Ty"s next attempt. His phone lit up, and Zane was able to catch a glimpse of Ty reaching out to set his own phone on the desk. Zane deliberately waited a couple of minutes before turning in his chair to change out files and check the message.

Did you hear about the guy downstairs who lost his left arm and
left leg in a wreck? Hes all right now.

Zane stared at the little screen really hard for a long moment before he was able to shake his head ever so slightly and turn away from the phone.

He slowly looked around at the rest of the team, wondering how none of them had caught on. Did they really pay so little attention? Or was it that they weren"t at all surprised to see Ty texting
someone
, and they just didn"t connect him with his partner? Zane knew Ty received about half a dozen text messages from various people on a normal day, but Ty rarely checked them or responded when he was working.

Zane deliberately shoved some files into his outbox and did not look in Ty"s direction. He turned his attention to a conversation between Clancy and Perrimore about calling a judge for a search warrant, but he was hyperaware of his partner.

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He heard Ty"s chair squeak as he moved. Ty"s chair always squeaked because he was so damn hard on the thing, always moving around and fidgeting. His chair stayed broken and noisy, just like his computer.

Zane"s phone lit up again, and he keyed it with his right hand while answering a question from Clancy.

When she turned away, he finally glanced down at the phone.

What do you call a monkey in a mine field? A baboom.

He had to admit: that one was funny. This time Zane had to close his eyes to keep his reaction under control. When he opened them, he deliberately turned his chin to look right at Ty in an open challenge.

Ty"s feet were still propped up, and he was leaning one arm against his desk, fingers strategically covering his mouth as he shook silently. He was watching Zane, and his hand couldn"t cover the smile lines around his sparking eyes or the slight dimples that formed when he laughed.

Damn, Ty Grady was a fine-looking man. Even more so when he was relaxed and smiling.

Zane didn"t feel the urge to laugh anymore. Instead, he found his thoughts slightly more erotic, thinking about the man sitting several feet away and just exactly how fine-looking he was, both in and out of that suit. Zane pulled himself toward his desk in the rolling chair, just to get his lap under cover. Then he offered Ty an angelic smile.

Ty shook his head and bit his lip to stop his silent laughter, though the dimples were still there as he grinned. Zane stared after him for a few moments, thinking about just how amazing it was when Ty smiled or laughed and his eyes lit up and the hard shell melted away from him.

Ty waved his hand at Zane in apparent surrender as he turned his chair to face his own desk again, still shaking his head and laughing.

Zane doubted that was the end of it and expected another text message within a few minutes, but Special Agent Scott Alston chose that moment to stand up.

“Time to meet with McCoy,” he said to Ty and Perrimore.

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“Have a good time, guys,” Clancy teased as she sipped at her melting smoothie.

Ty stood with a decent amount of grumbling and fanfare, making a show of gathering his files and his suit coat and getting his gun out of its drawer to slide it into his holster. Zane tidied a file, set it aside, and opened another as he watched Ty discreetly. “Say hello for me,” he said smugly. He knew that the only thing worse than paperwork, in Ty"s opinion, was a multi-departmental meeting where he was expected to sit still.

“Don"t break anything playing solitaire,” Ty shot back as the three of them headed toward the elevators.

Zane let the smile pull at his lips as he tapped his fingers on his phone and watched Ty walk away.

TY HAD his eyes closed and massaged the bridge of his nose as he leaned his elbow on the arm of his chair, slumping slightly. He was listening. Quite attentively, to his everlasting chagrin. But he could listen with his eyes closed.

He was pretty sure he, Alston, and Perrimore had all been summoned to this meeting by mistake anyway. So far they"d been over the escalating violence in the city, in particular a nasty case of arson in which a second explosion had been rigged with the express purpose of injuring or killing firefighters. Everyone was up in arms about it, including Ty. There would be a memorial for the slain heroes next week.

But while escalating violence could possibly be in Ty"s job description, arson certainly wasn"t.

Next they hit on a bank robbery that had “professional job”

written all over it. They"d caught a break publicity-wise with that one, since it had happened on the same day as the arson tragedy and hadn"t received much press yet. What"s-His-Name from Financial Crimes was told to look for similar robberies in neighboring states over the weekend. Something that organized had probably been run before somewhere and would surely be run again. Soon.

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Weekend assignments. Awesome.

And bank robberies weren"t Ty"s job either.

Then the agenda moved on to the negative image the FBI was being painted with of late and several avenues the PR people had come up with to nip it in the bud.

None of which had much of anything to do with Ty, so he still wasn"t exactly sure why he was supposed to be here at all.

“So,” Special Agent in Charge Dan McCoy was saying, “we"re going to give them what they want so they"ll get off our backs for a while. And Grady, the next time you and your partner want to blow something up, at least pretend you"re sorry afterward, got it?”

“Yes, sir,” Ty said as he opened his eyes and shifted to a slightly less outwardly miserable position. He wasn"t sorry, though. That fax machine had deserved what it got. And Zane had laughed his ass off.

There were only thirty minutes left in the work day, and then he was free to go do cartwheels in the parking lot. He glanced at Alston, who was asking another question, and then Ty"s pants pocket vibrated.

He actually jerked in his seat before he could stop himself, quickly leaning forward to place his elbows on the table and cover the reaction.

“Something to add?” McCoy asked.

“Nothing constructive,” Ty admitted with an innocent smile.

McCoy rolled his eyes and nodded. As he continued outlining the plan to make the Bureau more “fan-friendly,” Ty leaned back again and pulled his phone out of his pocket slowly. He kept it under the table as he slid it open and pressed the button that would open the text message he"d received. Ty was almost surprised to see that it was from Zane and not one of the usual suspects.

Baby seal walks into a club.

He pressed his lips together tightly and looked up at McCoy as he tapped out his response to Zane"s weak opening gambit.

You shouldnt club baby seals. Bastard.

16 | Madeleine Urban & Abigail Roux

It wasn"t a minute before the phone vibrated in his hand again. He quickly set it to silent so no one would hear the vibrations, and then he glanced down at it to read the new message.

Energizer bunny arrested. Charged with battery.

Ty"s lips twitched as he tapped out a quick response.

Is he being held in a duracell?

He returned his attention to McCoy just in time. McCoy slid a file across the table toward him, and Ty opened it as he massaged his left temple.

It was a proposal that outlined a plan to pull as many government and municipal service organizations as possible into a softball league and then open up the games to the public. Ty huffed in amusement.

“Think you could get the ball rolling on that if it"s the plan we go with?” McCoy asked.

Ty nodded slowly and then looked up at McCoy. “I know a guy who knows a guy,” he drawled with an easy smile.

“I thought you might,” McCoy said, sounding pleased with himself.

That was why Ty was here, then, because he"d played on the Bureau team ever since he"d been transferred to Baltimore and knew just about everyone. That had to be it, because everyone knew Ty didn"t give a shit about public opinion and had nothing to do with bank robberies or fires.

McCoy moved on to the Financial Crimes dude who still didn"t have a name but had a whole hell of a lot of opinions, and Ty surreptitiously checked the phone again. The message icon blinked at him, and he flipped the phone open to read it.