Nick glared at Eva. “Are you serious? You want me to go with Sharon on an assignment to Rio?”

Eva put her hand on her belly. “I can’t go on assignments like this, and I need Sharon to take my place. She needs you to provide backup and handle the surveillance equipment.”

The last thing Nick wanted was to go to Rio. Things were going great with Ruth. She was thriving because of the great sex they were having, and Nick had never felt as happy and as content as he did now.

Heck, he was planning to propose.

So yeah, he was young, but he was no fool. He and Ruth had a good thing going, and he didn’t want to chance losing it. Not that marriage provided any guarantees, but it was a legal commitment that made it a little harder to walk away.

It was like a business contract. Any of the parties could break it at any time, but it provided a stronger pledge than a handshake, and there were consequences to violating the terms of the agreement. If he had his way, he would put a ring on Ruth’s finger as soon as he could.

He had to wiggle out of this trip somehow. “Sharon is not ready, and I don’t want to go.”

Eva rolled her eyes. “When my biggest and best-paying client is asking me to do this for him, I’m not going to say no because my employee has a new girlfriend he doesn't want to leave behind.”

“But you can still go. The pregnant belly is a better disguise than all the prosthetics you usually put on. Who is going to suspect a pregnant woman of spying on them?”

Eva waved a dismissive hand and wobbled over to the couch. Putting a hand behind her, she lowered herself slowly to the seat. “Look at me. I can barely move. And what if I go into early labor?”

He eyed her huge belly. She really looked like she was going to pop any day now. “Are you sure you don’t have twins in there?”

She shook her head. “Although it feels like that. Just one very active boy who likes to kick and punch his mommy from the inside.” She rubbed her belly lovingly.

“Come on, Nick, man up,” Bhathian walked into the living room with two beers, and handed one to Nick.

“As if I have a choice.” He took the beer and popped the cap.

“It’s going to be fun.” Sharon opened her mouth for the first time since Eva had dropped that bomb on them.

The thing was, she didn’t sound sure at all. Eva had been training her for months to take her place, and Sharon had even gone on a few simple assignments already, but this was a big one, and if they screwed it up their agency would lose one of its best clients.

“Does Robert know?” Nick took a swig of his beer.

Sharon shook her head. “Eva told me about it right before she told you. I didn’t have a chance to talk to him yet.”

“He’s not going to like it.”

Sharon’s boyfriend was the silent type, but he was very protective of her. He was going to flip out. Not that Nick could blame him. If Ruth had told him she was going on a potentially dangerous mission, he would have flipped as well. In fact, he would have probably asked for a vacation and gone with her to make sure nothing happened to her.

“I bet Robert would want to come with you.”

Sharon grimaced. “I’m sure he would, but I doubt he can get time off from work.”

Bhathian sat next to Eva on the couch and wrapped his arm around her shoulders. “Since we became a couple, Eva has gone on missions many times. I won’t lie to you and say that it was easy to let her go when I knew she would be facing danger. But that’s her job, and I didn’t want to make her life more difficult by giving her a hard time about it. I learned to live with it, and so will Robert and Ruth.”

Sharon groaned. “I know Robert is going to be miserable without me. And I’m going to be miserable without him, but I’m really looking forward to the opportunity to prove that I can do it. My first big solo mission.”

Resigned, Nick plopped down on the armchair and took a big gulp from his beer. “So, who are we going to be spying on?”