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“Well?” he said.

“Ask them about the General,” she whispered, keeping her voice low enough so no one would hear her. “Let’s see what reaction you get. I’m thinking I should search the chatty one alone. Less people around will help me concentrate more.”

Roman nodded. “Okay. We’ll take him to the bathroom then.” Dinah agreed and they both turned to face the room again. Roman walked slowly up to the guy, the shotgun held casually at his side. “Tell me,” he said. “Who is the General?”

“Shit,” someone whispered close to where she stood. Dinah grinned. The guy’s eyes widened only a fraction but she caught it. They glanced over to her. She couldn’t help herself after his smug little smirk before, she winked at him and watched as he clenched his teeth. Oh yes, she thought triumphantly, they definitely have something.

He was a
she.
Pete was still trying to wrap his head around that realization as he tried to keep up with the developments happening in the room. Poor Glenn was dead behind the bar and Pete wanted to make sure no one else followed. He had to put this to bed – now. The council was going to have his head.

He thought about Garrett in the washroom. When they all stood they had purposely hidden him so he could make an escape. Pete had discreetly passed him the cell, knowing he’d know what to do with it. Hopefully by now the General would know what was happening and not come here.

When Weapon X had approached him and he was able to get a closer look, he knew his suspicions were correct. How was it that he’d never noticed before? How did no one else notice? He looked around and realized that everyone else was looking down and away. So that’s how, he decided. If no one looked closely enough, they wouldn’t be able to see all the slight differences that gave her away. Well Pete noticed. He looked her over again as her attention turned to his brother and friends. There was no mistaking it.

First of all, she was tiny. Way too tiny to be a guy. But despite that, she still had curves that no man could have. The slight flare of her hips, the curve of her thighs. She wasn’t exceptionally endowed in the chest, but he could see the telltale curves there too. Weapon X was a woman. Huh, who would have thought? He almost wanted to laugh. He watched her eyes, those eyes that had caught him the second he made contact. A blue that was a shade he’d never seen before. He always thought Bridge had nice eyes, but this girl’s were amazing.

He watched as they narrowed and he wanted to shout for joy as he read the confusion and frustration in them. He couldn’t help the grin on his face when she finally looked back at him. Perhaps they’d get out of this unscathed. He was feeling pretty confident up until Roman asked him about the General. They were in deep shit.

“General?” he said, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. “No idea what you’re referring to, mate. Isn’t that a military term?”

Roman Adamson was not impressed. Pete hated the guy and would give anything to get him in a one-on-one fight. He’d tear the bastard to shreds.

“It is. I do wonder, though, which military you are referring to? Certainly not mine.”

Pete shrugged indifferently. “No idea. We’re all just having a pint after a hard day’s work, like us lower folk do. There ain’t no rebels here.”

Roman leaned in close. It took every ounce of will power not to slam his fist into that smug face. “Well you’ll excuse me if I don’t believe you. My colleague will have to confirm that statement.”

Pete raised his eyebrows, crossing his arms over his chest. The whole bar was so silent you could almost hear the dust settling. The two of them stared down each other before Roman stepped back.

“Bring him to the bathroom. I want the rest of you out here with weapons ready. No one is to leave or move. Got it?”

Two soldiers stepped forward, each grabbing one of his arms.

“Don’t fight,” Trent whispered. Pete rolled his eyes. Like he was going to. He might be impulsive and reckless sometimes, but he certainly didn’t have a death wish. They ushered him into the washroom to find Garrett there taking a piss.

“Get out,” one of them ordered.

Pete wanted to laugh at the expression on his brother’s face. If he didn’t know any better he would have believed the scared look there, but his brother was a little shit who didn’t scare easily. He mumbled incoherently and scurried out quickly. Pete breathed a sigh of relief that they hadn’t thought to search him first. If he was smart, that cell would be tucked inside his boot where no one would think to look.

The two soldiers pushed him inside and left without a word. A second later Roman and Weapon X walked in. The door slammed shut behind them.

“Let’s try this again,” Roman started. “Who or what is the General?”

Pete splayed his hands in front of him. “I already told you, mate. I’ve got no idea.”

Roman stepped forward but stopped when the girl put her hand on his arm. He looked back at her, eyebrows furrowed in question. She moved so her back was to Pete, her head close to Roman’s. Pete couldn’t hear what she said, but whatever it was, Roman didn’t like it. His jaw worked as he stared down at her like he wanted to argue. Resigned, he nodded once before looking back at Pete.

“Any trouble and I’ll be back in a second, and you,
mate,
will be dead. Understand? X, keep your gun ready.”

Pete just looked at him, unmoving. Weapon X reached for one of her pistols holstered beneath her arm, clicking off the safety loudly in the small space. Then Ludwig’s second in command turned sharply and left, leaving the two of them alone. Pete watched her back as she seemed to take a moment to collect herself. Then she turned to face him with those eyes. He opened his mouth to speak, but stopped as she held up a hand.

“Don’t,” she said. Her voice was soft and musical. Completely at odds with her appearance, and reputation. “If you tell anyone what you know,” she continued, “you’ll die. Do you understand me? If not by my hand, by another’s. This isn’t a game. There are consequences for those who know too much, and I really don’t think you’d like them.”

Pete laughed. “I get it,” he said. “Just tell me, how do you do it? I’ve never heard one rumour about you being a girl.”

“That’s because those who know, who shouldn’t know, are disposed of. It would be smart of you to remember that.”

“Noted,” he replied dryly.

She narrowed her gaze at him, silent for a moment before saying, “tell me how you’re doing it.”

“Doing what?” he asked.

She took a step closer, the hand holding the gun twitching at her side. “You know what,” she said. “Tell me how you’re doing it.”

He didn’t think about his next move, he just did it. Overthinking these things sometimes complicated it, so instead he acted on impulse. One second they were glaring at each other, and the next he had her pinned to the ground beneath him, her gun skidding across the floor. His hand instantly moved to cover her mouth as he used his bodyweight to restrain her. There was no way someone as small as she was could over power him.

“You’re not so big and bad when you don’t have your little ability, are you?” he said in her ear. He pulled back, her eyes burning into him with rage. “How easily the infamous Weapon X is taken down, and there’s no one here to save
her
.” He reached down with his other hand, quickly robbing her of the rest of her weapons. “No more blowing off people’s heads today.”

She struggled under him, but he just pushed her harder into the tile floor. He slid the guns to the far wall, well out of reach. “That’s better,” he said. He looked down at her furious, blue eyes and chuckled. Lifting his chest up a bit, he looked her over until he saw what he wanted. With one fast move, he ripped her hood off. She sucked in air, but his hand was covering her mouth again before she could get out a scream.

Bloody hell. She was beautiful.

He’d seen a lot of pretty girls in his life. Bridgette was often called beautiful by all the boys, and even Danielle was attractive. But this girl…she was quite possibly the most gorgeous girl he’d ever seen. Long, black hair fanned out around her head. Her skin was smooth, pale porcelain. Dark lashes framed those eyes set beneath perfectly arched brows. Pete realized he was staring at her like an idiot, mouth open and everything, as she seethed beneath him.

“I’m going to let my hand up so we can have a chat, and
you
are not going to scream. Deal?”

Her eyes narrowed to slits. For some reason that made him chuckle which seemed to only make her more angry.

“It’s the only way you’re going to get me to talk, so you don’t have much choice. I could kill you right now if I wanted to.” Not that he would, damn him. Part of him rationalized that it was because he’d be dead himself before he even made it out of this room. The other part knew it was for a lot more selfish reasons. Killing her would be like destroying a fine piece of art. He just couldn’t bring himself to do it. “Are you going to be a good girl?” He could have sworn she growled. He chuckled again, he couldn’t help it. This girl was all sorts of entertaining to him. Slowly he removed his hand and almost wanted to groan when he got his first look of her soft, plump lips. God must hate him, he decided.

“We both know you wouldn’t make it out of here alive if you killed me,” she said.

“Who says I care if I don’t?” he countered. Her lips pressed together angrily. “Now, tell me how you knew about the meeting tonight.”

“Tell me how you’re blocking me,” she shot back.

He shook his head. “I’m not going to do that, we both know that.”

“Everyone out there has a wall up. How?”

He rolled his eyes. “You’re wasting your time…” he tilted his head. “What’s your name?”

She opened her mouth then closed it again, as if rethinking her response. “Dinah,” she answered.

“Dinah,” he repeated. She cocked one eyebrow as if to say ‘what of it?’. He smiled at her feistiness. “Okay,
Dinah
, I want to know how you knew about the meeting.”

She looked away for a second, deciding. When she looked back his heart actually jumped. Not good, he thought. He could not have those sorts of reactions to her. Other parts of him were jumping to life as well just from lying on top of her, and that was
really
not good.

“Some old man was brought in,” she said. “I don’t know his name. He had the same sort of wall as the rest of you, but I was able to break it down enough to get that information.”

“What did he look like?”

She shrugged awkwardly. “I don’t remember.”

“Did you kill him?” For some reason he really wanted her to say no.

“No.”

He actually let out a sigh of relief. Why did it even matter?

“I don’t normally kill unless I have to,” she said. He stared at her, surprised by her honesty. “I don’t know why I told you that,” she admitted.

“Cause you don’t want me to think you’re a monster?” he suggested.

“I don’t give a shit
what
you think of me.” He fought the urge to smile again. His little spitting kitten. Whoa, whoa whoa. Not
his.
Why the hell did he just think that? It was time to wrap this up.

“I need you to get you and your men out of here, without anyone else dying. Think you can manage that?”

“What am I supposed to tell Roman?”

“I don’t know, I’ll leave that up to you. But make sure it’s good enough to convince him it’s time to leave.”

She bit her lip, drawing his attention there. Unwanted desire built in his stomach that he quickly pushed away. “Fine. What about you?”

“What about me?”

“Are you going to tell anyone about me? Not only do you know I’m a girl, but you’ve seen my face. That’s very dangerous information.”

“For now, I’ll keep it to myself. Can’t make any long term promises.”

“Fine. Neither can I.”

He looked into her eyes, knowing that she could bring a shit storm down on all of them if she wanted. “Fine.”

Something very weird had just happened to her, and it wasn’t that she had been taken off guard. To be honest, even though she was trained, she was still a lot smaller than most opponents. Without being able to hear the other person’s moves, she was pretty much SOL. The fact that he got the best of her wasn’t really all that surprising. She was more shocked she hadn’t considered that possibility before she asked Roman to leave.