by Lexi Blake
Ian’s fingertips drummed along the top of the bar. He hopped up on the barstool and made himself comfortable. “I think they’re on to something here. Mr. Black gave me a look at his file on Wright. Wright is escalating. Black thinks he’s behind two arsons, one at a lumber yard and one that killed a couple of people at a real estate development office. He likes to hit corporate offices, especially ones in large cities. Unfortunately many of those are in high-rises. The last fire that he started affected a twenty-nine-story building. It caused millions of dollars in damage, and the locals called it faulty wiring. I don’t buy it, and neither does Black.”
“Then why hasn’t he called in the cops? This should be handled by the feds or Homeland Security.” Sean’s hands worked quickly on the chicken. It occurred to him, not for the first time, that he would really be happier in a restaurant somewhere. Fort Worth was a foodie town. It might be a really good place to open a little bistro.
Ian’s hand slapped against the bar. “Get your head in the game, Sean. What’s wrong with you? I’m talking about catching a killer, and you’re more interested in that chicken.” He leaned over and looked at the spices Sean had purchased. “What is Coco Van anyway?”
Sean quickly corrected the way his brother butchered the French pronunciation. “Forget it. It’s for Grace. Now what the hell are you really doing here?”
A cloud passed over Ian’s face. “How deep are you in with this woman?”
“He’s certainly sleeping with her.” Liam walked out of the bedroom. He was dressed all in black, from his T-shirt to the denims and boots on his feet. He flashed two empty condom wrappers at Sean and Ian with a smirk. “Only twice, lover boy?”
Sean washed his hands and pulled out the pot he would need. Grace’s kitchen was very well organized for a woman who rarely cooked. “Some of us like to talk to our lovers.”
“I thought you and Big Tag there just liked to tie them up.”
He wouldn’t argue with that. He’d gone to more than one store this afternoon, but he wasn’t about to tell Liam and Ian that he’d bought handcuffs, lubricant, and a vibrator while he was out. He settled for sarcasm. “Unlike Ian, I sometimes take the gag out and listen to what the lady has to say.”
That got Ian laughing. “I trained you poorly.”
Liam slammed the condom wrappers down on the counter. Sean was well aware that Liam viewed him as a little brother to be taunted on a regular basis. Normally, it didn’t bother Sean. “Still, I thought you were good for more than just twice. Guess it’s hard having to do an old lady.”
This time, it bothered him. It was an instinct. Sean’s fist came out and met Liam’s nose with a bone-crunching snap. Liam hit the floor. Sean calmly went back to his prep work.
“What the fuck was that for?”
Sean knew Liam had been thrown off guard. Liam’s Irish was up. “The” came out sounding like a slurred de and “that for” sounded like dat fer. Sean gave him back some of his own. “Dat, boyo, was fer talking dirty about a lady.”
Sean was happy with his accent. It mirrored Liam’s. If he said another word about Grace, Sean would be forced to do something else.
Liam was on his feet in an instant. His mouth hung open with shock rather than anger. “Damn me, Little Tag. Tell me you haven’t fallen for the girl. Sean, this ain’t a good idea.”
Sean shook it off and tried to act casual. “This was the plan from the beginning. I always planned on getting close to her. Now that I am close to her, I have to say that she’s an extraordinarily nice lady. I won’t let you talk about her like she’s one of your underaged hotties.”
Liam stared at him open mouthed and then looked to Ian. “Pull him out now. He’s compromised.”
Ian pointed to the condom wrappers. “Obviously. My brother’s virtue isn’t what I’m worried about. Did you plant the bugs?”
“Aye.” Liam seemed to hear himself and suddenly his accent was gone, replaced by the flat cadence of the Midwest. “Yes, sir. I have all her landlines bugged, and there are a few in strategic locations. If she makes contact with Wright here, we’ll know. By now, Adam should have bugged the office and her car. Also, we’ll know if Little Tag here breaks his record of fucking her two whole times.” He held his hands up in submission. “Pardon me. We’ll be able to hear their beautiful lovemaking.”
Sean gave serious consideration to kicking his ass. It just wasn’t worth it. Liam’s head was too hard to knock sense into. “Is this really necessary?”
Ian inclined his head slightly, and Liam took it as his cue to leave. He disappeared out the back door. Sean was left alone with his brother. “It is. We need to monitor Grace Hawthorne as though she was a prime suspect. Sean, I’m worried about you. I think your girl is in this up to her neck.”
Sean rolled his eyes even though he knew he’d made the same argument to Adam just a couple of nights before. “Don’t be ridiculous. Grace isn’t some ecoterrorist. She’s a lovely widowed mother of two.”
There was a little pause that let Sean know Ian had something serious to say. Big brother knew how to leave him waiting. “She was arrested back in the mid-eighties.”
Sean’s head came up. “What are you talking about?”
Ian looked pleased to finally have his brother’s full attention. “The arrest was purged from the records because she was a minor, but Eve managed to dig up the files. She can find anything, you know. Grace Hawthorne, formerly Thornton, was arrested at a protest. She was charged with assaulting an officer. She was placed on parole and the charge purged from her record on her eighteenth birthday.
The knife in Sean’s hand fell to the side. There was nothing in Grace’s character that would lead him to believe she had a record. He would have bet his life on her being a perfectly law-abiding citizen. “What the hell was she doing assaulting a cop?”
Ian waved it off as though the reasons were inconsequential. It only mattered that she had been arrested. Sean knew that sometimes Ian saw the world in stark black and white, with absolutely no shades of gray. “Best I can tell she was trying to save a monkey or something. She tried to stop a van carrying primates to a lab that tested beauty supplies. She chained her liberal ass to the gate and refused to let the truck pass.”
Sean breathed a huge sigh of relief. That he could see. Grace had a strong instinct to protect anyone she thought weaker than herself. It was one of the things he admired about her. Hell, if he’d been there, he would have helped her. “If she hit a cop, then the cop deserved it.”
“Well, there might have been mention of some of the cops getting handsy with the female protesters.”
“See, he had it coming.”
“All right, I might give you that, but she’s deeply involved in a plot to keep the gas companies out of this area.”
“A plot? With who?” She hadn’t mentioned anything about this. Of course, they hadn’t spent an enormous amount of time talking. He’d been far too busy making her moan. That might be why it hadn’t come up.
“Her homeowner’s association. She’s been pushing everyone to refuse to sign their mineral rights away.”
The chicken was calling again. Ian was making a big deal out of nothing. Maybe his brother was missing his old black ops days. This was the real world, and not everyone had hidden motivations. “Well, call the cops, brother. She’s guilty of giving a shit. Maybe she doesn’t want a bunch of gas wells leaking natural gas into the air. You know those things are built as cheaply as possible. Give it up. You can’t call her an ecoterrorist because she cares about where she lives. Grace wouldn’t hurt a fly. Ninety-nine point nine percent of those greenies are the most non-violent people you’ll meet.”
“It’s the point one percent I’m interested in.” Ian’s blue eyes were hooded as he regarded Sean. It made Sean a bit nervous to be under that unblinking gaze. He felt like an insect being studied. The only question was whether Ian was about to push a pin through his abdomen and stick him in a box for collection. Sean stood silently, knowi
ng that whatever Ian was about to do, he wouldn’t be able to sway him. Ian always made up his own mind in the end. “If I pull you out, you’ll be right back here, won’t you?”
And he was almost always right. “Only after I hand in my notice. I’ll quit the firm, and I’ll stay with Grace. I don’t believe for a second that she’s involved in this, but if something is going on around her, she could be hurt. I have no intention of allowing that to happen.”
Ian’s shoulders slumped, a sure sign of defeat. From the day their father walked out on them when Sean was barely ten, Ian had led the way. On only one occasion had Sean even thought about going against Ian’s better judgment. Ian had wanted Sean to go into business after college rather than following him into the army. There had been times in Afghanistan that he’d wished he had listened to Ian. But now, he knew Sean would whole heartedly tell the brother he loved to go to hell, and all over a woman. Not just any woman, he thought in a burst of revelation—the woman. Grace was the one for him. Last night had proven it to Sean.
“All right, I’ll leave you in, but watch your back,” Ian conceded. “Eve’s profile of Patrick Wright is frightening.”
It was good to get back to the case. Eve St. James had been one of the best profilers the FBI had ever trained. Now she worked for Ian. If she was scared, Sean wanted to hear about it. “Care to enlighten me?”
“It’s all in the report I sent you, if you could be bothered to read your e-mail. I’ll give you the gist. He’s highly intelligent and willing to kill, though he will wait if the time isn’t right. He isn’t governed by passion. He was almost certainly abused as a child, probably by his father. He has large chunks of time in his adult life that are unaccounted for. Eve thinks he was either underground or perhaps working off the grid when he needed cash. She’s a bit confused by some of his history, but she’s absolutely sure that he’s cold-blooded and utterly ruthless.”
“I’ll buy that.”
“Furthermore, he’s quiet and serious. He doesn’t play games or have any real wish to be caught. He has no grand desire for acknowledgment. He probably has donned masks and costumes on more than one occasion and might have plastic surgery if he thought it would help him elude the authorities. That part really scares Eve. Most of the time, these killers are caught because deep down they want to be.”
Sean nodded. He promised himself he would read the profile later tonight, but first he wanted to know one more thing. He knew exactly how Ian ran these ops and just what he would have Eve do. There would be a profile on everyone involved. “And what did Eve have to say about Grace?”
Ian’s mouth flat-lined. “She says Grace is completely harmless unless someone she loves is in danger. Then she would be a tiger. She says Grace is the kind of woman who gives her full loyalty to a person and then it is very difficult to sway her. Grace is the kind of person who loves fully and well. Eve very much liked your Grace.”
His Grace. He liked the sound of that. “I think Eve’s summed Grace up nicely, so what’s the problem?”
“Eve’s been wrong before.”
Eve had been very, very wrong before, and it had cost two FBI agents their lives. It had been the reason she left the Bureau and finally joined McKay/Taggart where her ex-husband Alexander McKay worked.
“She’s not wrong this time. Trust me, Ian, it’s going to be all right.” Sean turned to get a corkscrew for the wine. When he turned back, Ian had vanished.
Sean shook his head. He would never be able to match Ian’s skill, and he was long past wanting to try. He had his own talents. He put the sauce on and then set the chicken to cooking. This particular dish took a long time to properly simmer. It would only be fully flavorful if given the right amount of time to cook. It was a little like a relationship.
But Sean didn’t have time. Ian wanted this done, and fast.
If Sean was going to keep Grace at the end of this, he would need to bind her to him, and quickly.
Sean set the heat to low on the stove and picked up his keys. It was time to move the heat up with Grace. Sean thought he knew just how to make her boil.
Chapter Eight
Grace slid into her office chair, perfectly content with the afternoon’s excursion. Jake and Adam had been total sweethearts, helping her find three skirts, two blouses, and a dress that showed off her assets to perfection. They had found some swanky boutiques she hadn’t known existed. It was good to get a male opinion. Adam had been sweet enough to go into the dressing room with her and help her in and out of the cocktail dresses she’d tried on. He’d missed his calling. Adam should have been a stylist instead of an account rep.
“Tomorrow we could do lingerie.” Adam sat down on the edge of her desk. “I know there must be a store around here that sells Agent Provocateur.”
“Or La Perla.” Jake set down her bags. They had driven around in Jake’s Jeep. Grace had decided he was the more butch of the two. He tended to take the lead. Rather like Sean.
“I’m not sure about that.”
The way she’d read it, the Dom usually liked to pick out lingerie. Sean was in charge in the bedroom. She wasn’t sure he would like another man picking out her undies, even if that man had zero interest in seeing her in them.
Sean. She couldn’t get her mind off Sean. She couldn’t stop thinking about the fact that her big, strong Viking was at her place puttering around in the kitchen, cooking dinner. He would be there when she got home. For the first time in over a year, since her youngest had fled the nest, she didn’t feel a small sense of dread at the thought of heading home. It wouldn’t be empty. She could drive up and not be assaulted by a darkened house with its dreary silence and obnoxiously neat rooms. The neatness bothered her. It proved the house wasn’t really lived in anymore. For the last year, she’d merely existed there.
Grace hoped Sean was just the tiniest bit messy.
“Come on, Grace,” Adam cajoled, pulling her from her thoughts. He leaned in and gave her a sexy little wink. “You would look awfully pretty in a corset. I would pick an emerald green full corset with a matching thong. You could wear those amazing Jimmy Choos we saw.”
Grace snorted. Oh, she would love the Jimmy Choos, if she could drop three grand on a pair of shoes. She wasn’t so sure about the corset. Sean seemed to prefer her naked. She knew that was the way she preferred him. Grace thought about the scars on his back. She wanted to run her hands along them and ask the story of each one. She knew he’d seen combat. She wondered if he still dreamed about the day he got those scars. She would kiss them, running her lips along each one, learning their touch and taste. Each scar was a part of him. She wanted to know them all, to commit them to her memory.
“So, happy hour tonight?” Jake was looking at the clock.
Grace followed his line of sight. It was a little after two. Three whole hours before she would see Sean. God, she was acting like a lovesick teen. Before she knew it, she would be setting up a Facebook page just so she could say Grace Hawthorne is “in a relationship.” Her boys would love that.
“She’s not going to happy hour. She’s rushing somewhere to see that big bruiser she’s screwing six ways to Sunday.” Adam’s elegantly arched eyebrow dared her to say otherwise.
She wasn’t going to lie. She might be discreet with someone else, but she’d gotten close to these guys over the last several weeks. They had become her confidants. “He’s not a bruiser. He’s my Viking.”
Adam laughed long and hard. It was a husky sound that did strange things to her insides. Now that she was having sex again, she had it on the brain constantly. Sometimes, when Adam and Jake looked at her today, she almost thought they were sizing her up, and not in a purely aesthetic way. She was crazy, of course. Sean Johansson was turning her brain to sexual mush. Adam pulled her out of her chair and wrapped his arms around her in a friendly hug, though his hands were awfully close to her backside. He was all muscle under his designer suit, and he smelled clean and crisp. She could appreciate Adam Miles, but she longed
for Sean.
“A Viking? I love the analogy, sweetheart. Tell me something. Did he plunder your goodies last night?”
“He’s going to plunder yours if you don’t watch it.” Jake was shaking his head at his boyfriend’s antics. It struck Grace that they seemed intensely bonded for two people who had only gotten together a couple of weeks ago. She had noticed it earlier. They had a whole silent subtext going on between them as though they communicated on a different level.
Before she had a chance to reply, Matt’s door opened. He stuck his head out. His eyes were red, and he looked like he hadn’t slept in a day or two. “Grace, if you’re back from lunch, I’d like to talk to you.”
Grace said goodbye to her friends and walked into Matt’s office. He wore his weariness like a wrinkled suit. Though she had pulled back from him in the last week, she still felt a tug at her heart when she looked at him. For years he’d been her friend, and now he seemed a little lost. Grace didn’t think for one second that Matt’s offer the other night had been serious. He was just that guy who never noticed something until someone else had it. The minute Sean was gone, Matt would go back to taking her for granted and being her friendly boss. It was the way Grace preferred it, but for now there was a tension to their every encounter. “What’s wrong?”
He shook his head as though to purge himself of thoughts. “Nothing’s wrong. As a matter of fact, it looks like we’re going to get a big contract. I think I finally nailed down the Bryson Building’s janitorial services.”
“Seriously?” Grace let herself smile. Matt had been fighting for that contract for months. “That’s good news.”
She was happy for Matt, though she wouldn’t have done any business at all with that particular building. It was one of the biggest buildings in downtown Fort Worth, and it housed the largest natural gas development company in Texas. Grace knew the building well. She’d dropped off a signed petition there not three weeks before.