by Cara Adams
Nerida changed buses at a major bus interchange. She didn’t need to. She could easily have caught a bus from her apartment to only a block away from Bailey and Bond’s inner city office. However, traveling by a roundabout route was ingrained behavior now, so she climbed off her bus and went and stood in line for another bus. Not the one she planned to catch. But again, it was something she always did to see if anyone followed her.
Because it was quite early in the morning, a lot of people were heading to work, so the lines were long and the buses came frequently. Before the bus she’d lined up for arrived, she changed lines again, but she was certain no one was following her. No one ever had. Likely she was paranoid, but it was just how she acted.
At the attorney’s, she signed in at reception, citing Allegra Lee as her reference as she always did, and then made her way to the library. The lights were on and the computer booted up, but the librarian wasn’t there yet. Nerida guessed she’d gone for a coffee or to collect more files or something and settled herself in front of the computer, clicking on the LexisNexis icon. She was soon absorbed in her search. Ten minutes later she was smiling, the details she needed on the screen.
No one was allowed to take papers from the building without special permission, and Nerida had brought a thumb drive to save any information she needed. However, she did use the notebooks provided to make lists of things she wanted to search in the files, carefully shredding the pages she’d used before she left. Judging by the piles of paper in the shredder, everyone else did the same thing.
Nerida logged out of the database and picked up the notepad she was using.
The Compactus was a huge thing that filled three quarters of the room. It towered a long way above Nerida’s head, and users had to slide the shelves apart to find the references they required. This time the documents Nerida was looking for were in the second bay from the end. Even one shelf was heavy to move, despite being on sliding rollers, so Nerida had to push five shelves toward the middle of the room, one at a time, before she could get close to the files she wanted.
By the time she reached the section she wanted, there wasn’t a lot of space left. She’d underestimated how wide to open the first aisle. As each shelf was moved, it hadn’t closed tightly against the farther one, so every aisle she opened was narrower than the previous one. Nerida groaned. She could go back to the start and move every shelf another foot, or she could squeeze into the aisle she wanted.
“No contest.” Nerida inched sideways into the aisle she wanted and looked up and down the shelves for the correct file number. “If it’s on the top shelf, I’ll be out of luck. I’ll never fit a step stool in here to climb up.” But luck was smiling on her. It was on the bottom shelf, so she sat cross-legged on the floor, spread the file out on her lap, and began reading.
The library door opened, and Nerida heard footsteps. She looked up from the file she was studying, assuming it was the librarian and needing to tell her she was here so the woman didn’t accidently squash her by moving one of the Compactus shelves. A man was talking, so she waited for him to finish. She’d only heard one set of footsteps, so the person he was speaking to must still be in the hallway.
“Look, it’s not going to be all that easy. I’m only a junior here and—”
“—I know, I know, I owe you and I’ll do my best but you need to understand—”
“Will you just listen a minute? People don’t leave those kinds of things just lying around, you know? I said I’d try. I’ll look, but you need to see it from my side as well. I can’t—”
“All right, all right. I’m on it. I’ll start straight away.”
“Fuck you, Lillington-Hall.”
Nerida sat completely still. She knew her mouth was open with shock. At first she’d expected a second person to come into the library, and then she’d realized the man was talking into a cell phone and had presumably come into the library to answer his call in private. Which meant that he knew the librarian wasn’t here but didn’t know about her.
And then he’d said Lillington-Hall’s name. Nerida was dreadfully afraid he was Lillington-Hall’s spy here in Allegra’s own office.
Quickly she turned to a fresh page of the notebook and scribbled down his words as best she could remember them. She read her notes through twice, changed a word here and there, and was as sure as she could be that she’d gotten it, if not right, at least close. Lillington-Hall was forcing this man to look for some papers, which he wasn’t entitled to see, to give them to him. Nerida’s best guess was that they were papers Allegra was going to use in any case against Lillington-Hall.
The spy hadn’t wanted to work for Lillington-Hall but was being blackmailed into it. The next question was, should she go and find Allegra immediately, or should she continue her work here first? If she went right away, the man might see her, whereas right now, she was hidden. But if she didn’t go, he might find Allegra’s files before Nerida warned her. Fucking hell. What a dilemma. What was she to do?
Chapter Five
Nerida slid her cell phone out of her jeans and texted Allegra.
Spy in your workplace looking for your files.
That would have to do for the moment. She’d just have to hope Allegra wasn’t already at court with unprotected files here somewhere. She dragged her mind back to her own searches. It was even more important now that she found the information she was looking for and gave it to Allegra. It was also important she cover her own tracks. She’d been paranoid before, but if Lillington-Hall knew she’d overheard that conversation, she’d really be in trouble.
Nerida finished reading the file, noting down the case number and the protagonists. The most interesting part of it was that the man under suspicion had gone on to work at the company that had employed Lacey. His name was John Jones. That was several years ago, and his name was a very ordinary one. Likely there were hundreds, if not thousands, of them in Ohio. However, even more interesting was that Lacey’s boss, the one she thought might have taken the money, and the one who did employ Lillington-Hall as his attorney, was named JJ.
Once again Nerida pulled her cell phone out of her pocket and sent a text, this time to her sister.
What is JJ’s full name?
Nerida put the file away in its correct place and closed the Compactus, moving several more shelves so the gap was not where she’d been. Then she sat at the computer typing her notes onto her thumb drive and shredded all the notes she’d made, tearing them into even smaller fragments after they went through the shredder, and tipping them into different places in the trash box, lifting up handfuls of shredded papers to disperse her trash among all the rest.
Her phone rang, and it was Lacey. “I already thought of that. His name’s John Johnson, and I searched him on your computer days ago, but nothing came up.”
“I might try him here as well. How did he spell it? With a t and an e, as in Johnstone or Johnson.”
“Plain Johnson. Thanks, Nerida. You’re a wonderful sister.”
“I love you, too.”
This time when the door opened, it was the librarian. “Did you find what you needed? I’m sorry I wasn’t here. I was caught up in a meeting.”
“I’m fine, thank you. I’m just about to start a search now. I’m so rude. I don’t even know your name.”
The librarian smiled. “I know. I’m usually hidden behind all the paperwork. I’m Amy.”
“Thanks, Amy.”
“If you need any help just holler.”
Aware she hadn’t been entirely truthful, Nerida started searching for John Jones. Before long she found out he’d been implicated in several borderline illegal activities, although never convicted of anything. His attorney in each case had been Lillington-Hall. Evidently the man was a decent attorney. Either that or the prosecutor hadn’t been much good.
As Lacey had told her, John Johnson was clean with no record, but when she looked for his birth certificate and school records, there weren’t any. There were plenty of
John Johnsons aged fifty and older, a few in their forties, but none at all in their mid thirties, and Lacey hold told her the man was about five years older than herself, which made him about thirty-three. That was truly interesting. Nerida was more and more convinced John Jones had reinvented himself as John Johnson. Calling himself JJ would have paved the way, as people who knew him casually would have thought they’d forgotten or misheard his name if they said Jones and were corrected to Johnson.
Damn. She really needed to see Allegra soon.
Nerida forced herself to clear her mind and concentrate on the work she’d originally come here to do for the next few hours. She was feeling very hungry, and considering finishing for the day, when her cell vibrated in her pocket. It was Allegra at last.
Can you meet me for lunch at the chicken shop in the mall? I’ll be there in half an hour.
The mall was only half a dozen blocks away. She could walk there easily in that time, so she told Allegra yes, finished saving her information onto her thumb drive, and logged out of the various websites she’d opened.
“Thank you, Amy. I’ll see you again sometime.”
Nerida walked briskly west for two blocks before heading north, which was the direction she needed to go in. When she turned east, she was as sure as she could be that no one followed her, but when she arrived at the mall, she continued to backtrack on herself until she was certain she was alone. She always was, but she couldn’t shake her paranoia, and it was growing worse with today’s discoveries.
Allegra was sitting at the very back corner of the chicken shop, a tall, muscular woman with salt-blonde hair beside her. Thinking she was still busy, Nerida was about to sit alone at a different table, when Allegra waved her to join them.
“Tegan Carter, Nerida Veldman,” she introduced them.
“Hi,” said Tegan, smiling.
“Sit down with us, Nerida. Tegan is working on this case as well.”
Nerida slid onto the bench. The voice she’d heard in the library was clearly male, but she wondered where Tegan fit into the picture.
“What did you learn today?” Allegra asked, and Nerida realized if she was in a recess from court, likely she wouldn’t have much time so she’d better get to the point. She quickly explained what she’d heard, and Allegra’s eyes darkened, and she frowned.
“Great sweating armpits, if it’s not one thing, it’s something else. Now we’re going to have to run another check on every male junior in the building.”
“I can do some of that while I’m waiting for you to get out of meetings,” said Tegan.
“Are you a security guard, Tegan?” Nerida asked.
It was Allegra who answered. “Cam and Hammer worry about me. Tegan was the easiest solution for all of us. Although solving the case would be an even better solution.”
“About that. John Jones and John Johnson could potentially be the same person.”
“Can you keep following that up? Let me know if you need extra resources.”
Tegan handed her a business card. “If you feel threatened at any time, call that number. It’s a twenty-four-hour hotline, and one of Harry’s staff will come immediately to protect you. Don’t delay or worry about calling us unnecessarily. I don’t trust these people at all.”
Yeah. Nerida didn’t trust them either. She stared at the business card. Harry Harrison Security.
* * * *
Finding someone willing to exchange shifts with him on the Saturday had only been the first hurdle Gavan had to leap in order to be with Nerida. He’d known many people would already have plans for the weekend, and he was willing to offer to cover two of someone else’s shifts if everyone said no at first.
But even after he’d managed to sweet-talk Ogden into swapping shifts with him, that was just the start. How the fuck was he supposed to design a dungeon scene for a woman who kept her life as private as Nerida did? Even after three dates, he knew very little about her. He didn’t even know where she lived or what kind of a car she drove. Hell, he didn’t even know if she had a car or a home. She could be sleeping under a bridge and washing in the river for all the information he had to the contrary.
Dammit, why wouldn’t she tell them about herself? Didn’t she trust them at all? And that upset him more than anything else. The fact that she mightn’t trust him and Taj. He knew all about discretion and privacy. For fuck’s sake he was a fucking werewolf shape-shifter. There were still plenty of people who thought a werewolf would bite them one night under a full moon and they’d go crazy and furry. Never mind that becoming a werewolf was a matter of genetics. Be born with the gene from a parent and you were a shifter. No gene, no shifter, no matter how many times someone was bitten.
Then there was the tiny little detail that he not only worked in a BDSM club but that he was a Dom by lifestyle choice. Some people didn’t like that at all. They thought sex should be dealt with in silence behind closed doors and that all clubs like The Dom’s Dungeon should be shut down by the government immediately.
So yeah. He was all on board with privacy and discretion. But right now, there was no possibility of a genuine, ongoing relationship unless she was prepared to tell them at least some things about herself. In turn, that meant him and Taj opening up with her. And Gavan wasn’t ready yet to tell her he was a werewolf. Talk about a fucking Catch 22.
He even spent half an hour chewing over the idea that she might be a shape-shifter of some kind herself, but he finally decided she wasn’t. When he was in close proximity with another shape-shifter, such as in bed, he always knew they were the same as him. But he had no sense of otherness with Nerida at all. No, her determination to be private was for some other reason. And that scared the shit out of him. What if her family was the mob? Or even worse, if she was in witness protection hiding from the mob? Already he knew he’d hate anything to happen to her, even something really minor. No. There was only one solution. In the dungeon tonight, he had to prevail upon her to tell Taj and him more about herself.
Which at least gave him some ideas for what games they could play and what scenarios he should plan.
By the time his cell phone beeped to warn him it was ten to seven, he’d checked all the toys in the top drawer in his allocated dungeon three times, and it was almost a relief to lock the door and walk upstairs into the Stage Lounge. Taj was sitting at the same table by the dance floor where they’d met her the previous time. The difference was that this time there was only a carafe of ice water and three glasses on the table. No other beverages. Evidently Taj was making it crystal clear he planned to be in the dungeon tonight. Well, that suited Gavan as well.
Quickly he told Taj the type of activities he planned, keeping his head angled to watch the doorway as well as Taj. But Taj was smiling and nodding.
“I agree with everything you’ve said. If she has a reason to be wary of us, we need to know what that is. She seemed perfectly okay meeting here in the dungeon, but maybe she’s not one hundred percent happy with the idea of BDSM. I hope it’s not just us, but that really doesn’t matter. Until she tells us what her problem is, we can’t solve it.”
And then she was there, in the entryway, her gaze scanning the room. Gavan grinned at the sight of her, still in jeans but with a loose, fringed denim jacket over them instead of a shirt or sweater. She wasn’t carrying a purse. He’d never seen her with a purse. It was interesting that she didn’t seem to need to bring the mountain of things with her that so many women wouldn’t leave home without.
His smile broadened as she smiled back at them both, and he heaved a sigh of relief. She’d not only come, but she was pleased to see them. He’d just about tied himself in knots wondering if she hadn’t been sure about returning for another date with them, yet here she was. Well, tonight he’d keep asking her to talk to them until he received some answers. She didn’t need to tell them every tiny detail of her life, but he had to know she genuinely wanted to be with them. He couldn’t continue in limbo as he’d been up until now.
&
nbsp; Taj jumped up to hold out a chair for her, and her green eyes sparkled with pleasure.
“Thanks, Taj. You managed to change your shift okay, Gavan? Or did you have tonight off work anyway?” she asked.
“Ogden exchanged shifts with me. What about you? Do you work Saturdays? I don’t think I’ve met a researcher before.”
“It’s like a lot of jobs. When it’s busy, I work extra hours. How about you, Taj? Do you have to work weekends?”
“Like you said. When it’s busy we do. But you haven’t told us what you actually do. What does a researcher do?”
“Most people would consider it very boring. I look up files or online articles and then write a report.”
Gavan had a feeling her work was more complicated than that. “How do you know where to look things up, or what to look up? Are you like a librarian?”
She laughed. “No, my degree is in English, not library science. The Internet makes everything so much easier these days. Key word searching is much faster than having to look up a library catalogue.”
“Hey, I can remember those old card catalogues. Rows of drawers with tiny cards in them, and everything was filed by hand. I was still in elementary school, and some days the struggle with the drawers and the cards to find the book I needed was all too hard. It was much easier just to copy a page out of an encyclopedia,” said Taj.
“One of the libraries at the college I went to had kept a row of the old catalogue cabinets for us to see. Like a historical exhibit. Some of the cards were hand-written and almost impossible to read. It was amazing that anyone ever found anything they were looking for.”
That was the kind of opening he’d been waiting for. “What about you, Nerida? What are you looking for in your life?”
She went completely still, and the sparkle left her eyes. For a moment Gavan thought likely he’d ruined their evening. But then she brushed his comment away. “Oh, the same as everyone else. Happiness. Fulfillment.”
Which told him nothing, once again. But she was looking for something, and it was either her search, or the reason for her search, that was making her wary. She was a researcher. It was her job to look for information. Had her job gotten her into something dangerous? Was her life threatened? Was that why she was so secretive? Dammit. I will find out.