Celtic Dragons

by Dee Bridgnorth

  Everyone had a job to do, and Moira’s was to destroy the footage of Eamon’s transition before anyone saw it, but she couldn’t shake Grady, and any minute he was going to log into the computer system there and see Eamon transition into an enormous white dragon and demolish the contents of the vault. Moira had never been faced with a situation like this before, and even if she managed to somehow destroy the footage without Grady seeing it, there was still the state of the vault to explain. Although she wasn’t one to worry about what she couldn’t change, her palms were sweating and she felt like she couldn’t breathe as she watched Grady walk over to the surveillance system, sit down, and begin to tap away at the keyboard.

  “Wait!”

  The word came out of her mouth before she could stop it, and she had no idea what words would follow. Grady followed her directive though, his hands stilling on the keyboard as he looked at her over his shoulder, wariness in his gaze.

  “Wait for what, Moira?”

  “Just…” She was fumbling, grasping for any possible reason that he shouldn’t log into his own surveillance system and watch what had happened the night before. “Just wait. I …there’s something I need to tell you.”

  He turned around in the chair, leaning back and lacing his fingers together on his lap, every bit the composed businessman while she felt as though she was falling apart. “Okay. I’m listening.”

  Moira licked her lips, her mind working overtime. As she stared at him and the seconds ticked by, she had a sudden flash of memory from the day before. A look that he had given her. The spark when his hand had touched her arm. The chemistry that was so confusing and potent between them, despite the fact that they hadn’t gotten along well from the very beginning of their acquaintance. It all ran together in her thoughts, and she acted without stopping to think of the consequences.

  “I …can’t work with you anymore,” she blurted out. “It’s not professional.”

  His brow furrowed, and he looked like he had been expecting some sort of bombshell, but not that one. “What do you mean it’s not professional?”

  Again, Moira didn’t stop to question her instincts, willing to do whatever it took to keep him from learning her secret. “I mean that I’m attracted to you.” The words were out before she could stop them, but it was like she was above herself, watching it all unfold from an upper corner of the room. Surely she couldn’t have been the one who just said those words to Grady Princeton, the incredibly wealthy and drop-dead gorgeous CEO of the company that owned the building she was standing in.

  It wasn’t as though it was a lie. He was a gorgeous man with a kind of intensity that could draw in any woman. Of course she was attracted to him, even if it was probably in a twisted, unhealthy way. But to say it outright like that? Moira Brennan was hardly the type. She was always the one being chased, often running far faster than her pursuer could ever hope to. Never before in her life had she said something so vulnerable to a man, and she never would have had she not been desperate to distract Grady from the video he was about to look at.

  Immediately, Grady’s expression changed from one of wariness to one of interest. His eyes widened and his lips curved in a smile. He stood up from his chair and took a step toward her as their gazes met.

  The same power crackled between them that always had, but now it had shifted, growing more heated by the moment. Moira hadn’t stopped to plan what happened next, but even if she had, she could never have predicted the reaction her body was having to her own reckless words. Her heart was still hammering, but it wasn’t just out of fear now. It was because of the look on his face and what it made her want to do.

  “Say that one more time,” he said. “I want to make sure I heard you right.”

  Moira swallowed hard, clearing her throat. “Uh …I’m attracted to you. And …we can’t. I mean, we shouldn’t. Work together. So, I think that …you know, we’ll just …stop now and probably all of this was a mistake and we can just …you can go back to work and I …”

  Whatever words were going to spill out of her next got cut off as Grady, having moved closer and closer to her as she fumbled, leaned down and touched his lips to hers, stealing the breath right out of her.

  His mouth was warm on hers, his kiss insistent as his arms wrapped around her waist and pulled her against his hard, muscled body. Without her permission, her hands lifted to his shoulders, her fingers digging in the muscles that rippled there as he held her so close to him that her feet came off the ground. When his tongue swept against the seam of her lips, asking for entrance, she couldn’t help but grant it, shivering with pleasure as the kiss deepened, spinning out endlessly.

  She could never have planned it, and after the night she’d had, she shouldn’t have been remotely interested, but every part of her was responding to him. The words that had come flying out of her mouth to start all of this had been the furthest thing from premeditated, but they must have been some sort of Freudian slip. Until he’d begun kissing her, Moira had had no idea just how attracted she was to him, and now there was no hiding from the knowledge.

  “You’re every bit as delicious as I thought you would be,” he murmured against her mouth, coming up for air after endless minutes of intoxicating kisses.

  “You thought about that?” she asked, looking up at him and trying to get her bearings back.

  “I’ve thought about very little else since first laying eyes on you,” Grady said, smiling wryly. “I had no idea you were thinking the same thing. We’ve been dancing uncertainly around each other, and I couldn’t figure out why I kept getting the feeling that you were hiding something from me.” He kissed her again, grinning against her lips. “Now I’m beginning to understand.”

  Guilt tugged at Moira, because she was hiding so many things from him. The whole reason they were wrapped up in each other, kissing, was because she was trying to hide things from him. Granted, she was really, really enjoying it—far more than she should, in fact—but it wouldn’t be happening if she wasn’t trying to distract him. She knew she needed to stop them before it progressed any further. Surely he would be disoriented enough now that she could come up with some excuse to get him out of the room long enough for her to destroy the footage. They couldn’t let this get out of control—she wouldn’t let it.

  But she didn’t want to stop him as his lips traveled from her mouth, along her jaw, and down her neck. Every bit of her skin that his lips touched tingled with anticipation, and the simmering heat that had settled down low in her body promised so much pleasure to come. She couldn’t help the way her hands tangled in his hair and slid down his back, feeling the bulges of his muscled body as she explored.

  “Moira,” he groaned against her ear, his hand slipping down below her waist to grip the firm curve of her ass. “God, I want you so much.” His hips pressed against her, proving his words. “Feel that?” he whispered. “That’s all you. That’s what you do to me.”

  Heat flushed through her, creating a heavy pulse between her legs as she helplessly pressed back against him. Her breath was coming fast, and she had to press her face against his neck to stifle the groan that came from somewhere deep within her. “Grady …”

  “What, baby?” he said, both of his hands now gripping her ass as he guided them into a slow, sensual grind while he kissed her neck. “Tell me what you want.”

  She wanted to strip both of their clothes off and follow through on the need pulsing in her veins, and it would be so easy to tell him that. There was no doubt that he would happily follow through with her request, or that it would be immensely enjoyable for both of them. Moira was no prude, and she’d had her fair share of men, including one-night stands where it was just about physical need. She had no problem with that kind of arrangement, which was all this could ever be. But the circumstances meant that there was no way she could let that happen.

  She had to stop what she’d started before it was too late, and given that Grady’s hands were slipping beneath her shirt now, she h
ad very little time to put on the brakes.

  “Wait,” she said, once again not knowing what would come next.

  He stilled his hands, but didn’t pull away from her. “What’s wrong?”

  “I can’t,” she whispered, closing her eyes against the regret that was already flooding her. “It’s not right.”

  “Okay, you’re fired,” he said, kissing her ear. “Does that help? I’ll find someone else to investigate, and we won’t have any professional relationship to make things complicated.”

  Moira bit back a groan as his teeth skimmed her earlobe, sending chills over her skin. “It’s not that. I just …I can’t. I meant it when I said I was attracted to you, but I can’t. I just …do you think you could give me a minute in here? I need to compose myself.”

  As she spoke, she’d begun to ease back from him, and when she flicked her eyes upward, she could see the confusion and disappointment on his face.

  “Moira, what’s going on?”

  She shook her head, her heart still beating fast. “I need to think. I need a minute. I’m not sure what I’m doing.”

  “Did I do something wrong?”

  “No,” she said quickly, though she put several feet between them even as she reassured him. “Not at all. This is my issue. My problem. I …moved too fast. I don’t know why I said that. I should never have…it wasn’t professional. I’m just embarrassed, and I need to get my head back on straight.” Moira gave him a pleading look that was completely foreign to her. “Please?”

  He nodded, taking a step back from her. “Okay. I’m sorry. I thought we were on the same page.”

  She hated that he was feeling guilty when he’d done nothing except respond to her own words and actions. But she couldn’t afford to let the opportunity slip from her fingers, so she didn’t reassure him further but simply nodded. “I know. Me too. But we’re not, and I just need to catch my breath. I need to be alone for a minute.”

  “All right,” Grady said again, though he was clearly upset and uncertain. Even still, he walked toward the door. “I’ll, uh, be out there, then. You’re …okay?”

  “Fine,” Moira said, hoping he could see the apology in her expression. “I won’t be a minute.”

  Grady nodded again, then opened the door, glanced back at her, and left the room, closing the door behind him.

  Moira knew that she was never going to have this opportunity again and that any second it might be over. So she couldn’t afford any time to try to process what had just happened. Instead, she hurried over to the computer that Grady had logged into and began clicking on things furiously, trying to figure out the source of the footage. Her pulse was racing and her whole body was rigid with tension as icon after icon turned up dead ends.

  Just as she was beginning to fear that he would walk back in and catch her in the act, she clicked on something—she wasn’t sure what—that brought up the feed of the footage for the vault. From that screen she found the past recordings that updated every hour and she selected the last twenty-four hours before hitting the button to erase them. The relief that washed over her was so strong it almost left her weak, but she didn’t forget to then go to the computer’s internal storage area, find the recently deleted folder, and permanently delete the footage.

  As the files disappeared permanently, Moira fell back into the chair, her hand pressed to her heart. The Dragon Clan had been on the cusp of complete exposure, and it was only through fast thinking, luck, and happenstance that she’d been able to get rid of the evidence of Eamon’s transition. Under any other circumstances, they would have been completely screwed.

  They still might be, given that Moira had no idea how she was going to explain to Grady that the footage she’d been looking for had somehow been erased. Her actions had been in no way subtle, and he would never believe that their heated kisses hadn’t been exactly what they were—a distraction tactic. They had been more than that, but she was the only one who would ever be able to know that for sure, and she wasn’t even certain that she wanted to know it.

  Now that her task was complete, Moira did take a moment to compose herself, but she didn’t forget the need to get herself out of the situation as quickly as possible. Grady would have no evidence now of what they were and why Moira had acted as she did, but he would absolutely know that there was something she was keeping from him. They wouldn’t be able to work together any longer, and it was in Moira’s best interest to never interact with him again.

  There was a surprising amount of regret connected to that realization, but Moira was a practical woman, and there was nothing she could do to change it. All she could do was get herself out of here as quickly as possible, and she was standing to do that exact thing when the door opened again, revealing Grady standing there.

  Immediately, his eyes went to the computer, and though the screen was blank and innocuous, Moira could feel that he knew that she had tampered with something. When he looked at her, his eyes held such a deep betrayal that it shook her to her core, and all she could do was stare back at him for a moment.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, when she finally regained her voice.

  Then, without waiting for his reply, she ran past him and into the staircase, zipping down the seventeen floors of stairs at a speed that, if observed by anyone, would clearly betray her as supernatural. It was a risk she took, desperate to get out of the building, into the fresh air, and back to some semblance of control in her life.

  Grady Princeton had gotten under her skin, inside her mind, and almost into her body. His case had almost ruined the status quo of her life, and the impact he had on her was more confusing than pleasurable. Yet, as she hurried away from his building, intent on doing whatever it took to never see or speak to him again, all Moira could feel was sadness that she hadn’t gotten to figure out what it was between them that was so intense.

  She wasn’t even sure she liked Grady, but she knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that she would miss him.

  Chapter Twelve

  Grady

  Although Grady had been involved in any number of intense business deals and relationships that had gone sour, he had never been motivated by revenge. There had been plenty of opportunity, given that creating your own consulting business from scratch, growing it into a multi-million-dollar consulting empire, and working with clients from a wide range of backgrounds and situations created almost unending conflict. But he’d never been inspired to take down a former business contact before, despite having the means to do so.

  This time it was different. What had happened with Moira had pushed Grady past anger into a dark place where he was determined to get his own back. If he stayed still for too long and really thought about it, he began to suspect that it was hurt driving him to get back at her, but he didn’t like that thought and so he hadn’t stayed still for more than a few minutes in the past two weeks. During the day he was either working, running, lifting weights, or obsessing over his plan to get back at Moira, and at night he kept his eyes open until the last possible moment, lying down in bed only when he was confident that he had no choice but to immediately fall into a restless sleep.

  The first step in his plan was taking longer than he’d like, but there was little he could do about that. It revolved around the footage that Moira had deleted when he had been foolish enough to leave her in the surveillance room by herself. He had brought her to that room, skeptical and determined to watch her like a hawk. But when she had suddenly announced her desire for him, all logical thought had flown out the window and his body had taken over. His attraction to her had been so strong that it affected everything, and he would gladly have laid her down on the floor in that very room, two weeks ago, and given them both what they had wanted.

  Or, at least, what he had thought they both wanted, before he realized that everything that had taken place between them during those few moments had all been a ploy to disarm him enough to get him to leave her alone in the surveillance room.

  What bo
thered him the most was how easily he had fallen for it. Moira must be laughing at him somewhere, knowing that she had played him for a fool. He cringed now when he remembered how obviously eager he had been to take her up on her presumed offer of intimacy. When he had kissed her, he had been so certain that he had felt her returning his desire in equal measure, but then she had stopped everything, he had left her alone, and minutes later she had run out of the room, disappearing without explanation, the footage in question erased not just from the program but from the whole computer.

  It had only taken him a few days of stewing to decide that he was going to do whatever it took to restore the footage she had deleted and see just what it was that had been so important that was she was willing to go through all she had to keep him from seeing it.

  He had to know that, and then once he did, he was going after her and the agency she worked for, and he wasn’t going to stop until their reputations were destroyed. After all, they deserved it, given the fact that Moira had clearly taken advantage of him …even if he didn’t know exactly how or why. Yet.

  One of the things that bothered him most was that he just didn’t understand why she had done what she had done. It was too much to imagine that she was behind the thefts and that it had either been coincidence or complex orchestration that led him to choose her agency for the outside investigation. He had spent many an hour poring over the possibility that Harrison and Moira were somehow connected, and that Harrison’s suggestion to bring in a third party had somehow been laced with the underlying message to choose Connolly Security.

  It made no sense at all, and neither did it seem possible that he had somehow stumbled upon the person taking advantage of his vault.

  He just didn’t see how Moira could have been connected to the thefts, and if she wasn’t, then what was it that she was hiding? What had she done in that vault that she’d been so desperate to hide? Granted, she had left the vault an absolute disaster, with shelves overturned, gold bars scattered over the floor, display cases broken, and scratches all over the floor. Something had clearly happened down there that night, but he didn’t know what and he didn’t know why.