DRAGON SECURITY: Volume 2: The Complete 6 Books Series

by Glenna Sinclair

  “I will do whatever you ask of me,” I assured her.

  She smiled, touching my arm like a mother might do to comfort a child. And then she stepped back and gestured to the young woman who had been standing by silently from the moment she showed me into this office.

  There was a narrowing to the woman’s eyes as she studied me. She clearly didn’t think much of me. It didn’t concern me. I could charm any woman given enough time. And it looked like this woman and I would have plenty of time to spend together.

  She wasn’t bad to look at. She had dark hair that was cut almost severely, a short bob that my mother would have called a pageboy. I normally disliked short hair on a woman, but on her it seemed to accent her heart-shaped face and perky little nose, making her look a little less childish than she might have otherwise.

  She had big brown eyes with a lovely amount of fringe in those long lashes. Not a bit of makeup to mar what God offered her, but just fresh, clean skin that was milky and smooth, the kind of skin that my fingertips loved to dance over.

  And those hips … I loved my women slender and she was definitely that, her hips narrow, her breasts just the perfect handful … hmmm, my thoughts were suddenly going places they probably shouldn’t. Not under these circumstances. But it was better than where they’d been going before.

  We left a few moments later. She kept shooting me these uncomfortable glances, like she wasn’t sure exactly what it was she was getting herself into.

  Personally, I was relieved to get into her vehicle and have some time alone with my thoughts. She didn’t talk on the drive to wherever it was she was taking me. I stared out the window, my thoughts a whirlwind.

  It had all gone sideways three days ago. I should have gotten out of town then, should have headed anywhere but to that damn party! I should have warned her …

  “The spare bedroom is down that hall,” the woman said to me as she led the way through the front door of a narrow condominium near the university. “You can have a shower or whatever.”

  “Thanks.”

  “But I need to be with you when you take off those clothes.”

  That got through the haze of retrospection.

  “Excuse me?”

  She seemed a little embarrassed. “It’s something about chain of custody. The lawyer insisted on it.”

  “Should I strip right here, then?”

  I lifted the hem of my shirt. She blushed, turning her head to the side so she couldn’t see me. I laughed, amused by this level of prudishness in such a beautiful, clearly capable woman. She gestured toward the hall she’d mentioned before.

  “We’ll go in the bedroom.”

  “If you say so.”

  I led the way, turning when she instructed me to. It was a narrow hall with only two doors that opened off of it, one under the stairs that she said was a bathroom and one across from it that opened into a surprisingly large bedroom. I turned to face her once inside, once again amused by the blush that continued to burn on her cheeks.

  “Now?”

  She opened a plastic bag and held it open. “Just the shirt and the jeans. Put them in here.”

  “No problem.”

  I stripped the shirt over my head, making sure to touch her hand as I put it into the bag she was holding. She continued to look away, like I didn’t know she was sneaking little looks at me from moment to moment.

  I tugged at the waistband of the sweatpants I’d worn to bed last night, a surreal coming over me as I distinctly remembered climbing into bed … alone. How the hell had they gotten her into my bed without me realizing it?

  I was not a heavy sleeper. I was not the kind of guy who didn’t notice someone slipping in or out of bed beside him. I’d once woken in the middle of the night when my mother whispered my name from the next room. I did not sleep through anything.

  How had I not known someone was in my house? How had I not known death was lying right beside me?

  I stepped out of the pants, my thoughts so dark that I almost forgot that girl was watching me. I guess the change in my demeanor got her attention because she was no longer pretending not to look at me. She was staring right at me, a frown on her pretty face.

  “Where did you get that?”

  I had no idea what she was talking about.

  She stepped forward even as the pants fell into her bag, her fingers reaching for something low on my thigh. I was standing there in my boxers and this beautiful woman approached me with a bag full of my bloody clothing dangling from one hand.

  “What …?”

  She dropped to her knees in front of me and ran her fingers over something. Pain shot through my leg. I stepped back, pressing my legs into the side of the bed.

  “What are you doing?”

  “You have a cut on your leg here. Did you know that?”

  I shook my head, twisting my leg to see what she was talking about. There was congealed blood, but that was all I could see. She touched it again and pain flared through my body.

  “Stop doing that.”

  “I need to get a picture of this. Stay here.”

  She ran out of the room and came back an instant later with a Polaroid camera. She stood by the door and took a couple of pictures of me standing there in some sort of daze, dressed only in socks, shoes, and my boxers. Not a glamour shot. Then she moved closer and knelt again, taking photographs of something just far enough around the back of my leg that I couldn’t see it clearly.

  “That should do it,” she said, dropping the photographs into the bag with the clothes. She stood again. “You should wash it off really well in the shower. I’ll bandage it when you get out.”

  “What is it?”

  She shrugged. “It looks like a cut, but I’m not sure. There’s so much blood congealed on it … did you not feel it before?”

  “No. I guess I’ve been too wrapped up in what happened.”

  “I suppose.” She picked up the bag. “I’ve got some clothes for you in the trunk of my car. I’ll get them while you’re in the shower.”

  I watched her go before twisting to try to see the wound again, but I couldn’t see anything. I was a little unnerved by the whole thing. How could I not be aware that I was injured?

  I crossed the hall to the bathroom and caught sight of myself in the mirror. No wonder that girl continued to suggest I take a shower. I looked as though I’d been in a fight. My face was smeared with blood. There was blood matted in my hair, across my chest, on my arms. It was drying and flaking off my legs, my neck, my wrists. I looked as though I’d taken a bath in it.

  I shivered. This was a woman’s blood, the blood of a woman who had died in my bed.

  I showered slowly, standing under the hot water with a sense of grief clutching at what was left of my heart. I thought I knew what I was doing. Come to America, live the American dream everyone always talked about. But even Americans no longer knew what their dreams are.

  I thought my work was all that mattered. And then I thought getting involved with these people, doing this thing, would make me feel as though my existence mattered. Not anymore. All it’d done was muddy the water and make everything seem twisted and turned upside down.

  This woman’s death was on me. I had to make this right.

  Chapter 3

  Amelia

  I walked around the living room picking up discarded plates of food, old magazines, and forgotten clothing. I wasn’t expecting to have a guest in my house today and would have refused if it weren’t for the fact that it was Hayden who asked.

  This was my space. This was my home. I had worked long and hard to earn this place, to move out on my own and have space. I hated that he asked me to give that up, even temporarily.

  I could hear the shower running in the guest bath. I couldn’t help but wonder about the wound on the man’s leg. How could he have not known it was there?

  I was piling some dirty clothes on top of the washer when my phone rang. I tugged it out, my heart skipping a beat when I saw Ha
yden’s name and face.

  “Did you collect his clothes?” he asked without so much as responding to my greeting.

  “I did. You can come get them whenever you’re ready.”

  “I’m on my way now with the lawyer.”

  There was finality in his voice like he was ready to end the call. I wanted to hold onto him for a second longer, even if it was just a conversation over the phone. Catching Hayden’s attention, even briefly, was like catching a rare butterfly in a net.

  “He’s got this thing on his leg.”

  “Thing?” he asked, clearly distracted.

  “I think maybe he was cut. Or burned.”

  “So?”

  “He didn’t know it was there. I’m … I wonder why not?”

  “You think he might have been drugged?”

  I hadn’t thought about it, actually, but it didn’t seem like a far-fetched idea.

  “Maybe we should have his blood tested before it’s all out of his system.”

  “Maybe. Good catch, Amelia.”

  I smiled, searching for a response before I realized the line had gone dead. He’d hung up.

  “Are you always that obvious?”

  I spun around to find McGregor, nothing but a towel around his waist, standing in the kitchen behind me.

  “Excuse me?”

  “You clearly have a thing for your boss.”

  “What makes you think that?”

  “The little girl lilt to your voice when you speak to him.” He smiled slyly. “And the dozen or so photographs of him stuck to your refrigerator.”

  My heart skipped a beat as I realized I’d forgotten about those pictures. They were all candid photos I’d had printed off my phone, pics I’d taken at the office when I was sure he wasn’t watching. If he’d gotten here and seen those …

  I dashed across the room and began snatching them off the refrigerator door.

  “How long have you been crushing on him?”

  “None of your business.”

  “Clearly it’s been a while. I’d guess six months or more?”

  It was closer to three years—three out of the four years I’d worked for Dragon—but I wasn’t about to give this stranger that sort of knowledge to hang over me.

  I took the photos and slipped them into a drawer, glancing around the room to make sure there was nothing else embarrassing hanging around.

  “Do you mind looking at this thing? Feels like it might need a bandage or something.”

  I’d forgotten the cut on his leg. I turned to find him facing away from me, the towel lifted slightly. Now that the blood had been washed away, it was clear that it was a burn of some sort. Curious, I moved closer, touching the inflamed skin on either side of the mark. It was swollen and crazy irritated, like it was older than just a few hours. And there seemed to be some sort of shape to it, like he’d backed up against a branding iron or something.

  “You don’t remember this happening?”

  “No.”

  “And it didn’t hurt before?”

  “I was preoccupied.”

  I got up and retrieved the first aid kit I kept in the pantry. He stood still, not making any sound as I coated the injury with ointment and covered it with a bandage, but I knew it was hurting him because the muscles in his legs stayed tense the whole time.

  It’d been a while since I’d been this close to a naked man. I found myself allowing my fingers to linger against his flesh, even if it was just the back of his leg. But it was an impressive leg, a leg that was very masculine in the shape of the muscles and the power that seemed to vibrate through them. And his ass … he was a good looking guy. And, at this moment, he was vulnerable enough to make me feel as though he might actually be approachable.

  But then he moved his foot, a clear indication of impatience.

  “Done,” I said, regaining my feet and putting the first aid equipment away.

  “Thank you.”

  He limped a little as he headed toward the guest room.

  “Do you think you could have been drugged?” I asked.

  He turned back, the towel’s flap opening just enough to give me a quick peek of dark hair and a heavy bulge.

  “I don’t know when it would have happened. I felt fine when I went to bed.”

  “But you didn’t wake when the woman was placed in your bed or when she was murdered.”

  “No.”

  “Do you think someone could have slipped a sedative into your drink or something?”

  He shrugged. “Anything’s possible.”

  He turned again, disappearing down the hall. I watched him go, trying not to admire the way he walked, the masculine line of his back, the heaviness of those thighs. It was difficult not to find his movements arousing. I almost felt like I was back in high school, watching the quarterback of the football team walk down the hallway, knowing I’d never have a chance in catching his attention.

  You’re not good enough, a voice whispered in the back of my head.

  But the author of tat voice was long gone. I didn’t have to listen to it anymore.

  I went back to the kitchen to finish cleaning up. By the time I was done, Hayden was knocking on the front door.

  It was strange having him in my house.

  “This is Jennifer Wallace,” Hayden said, barely gesturing toward a tall, overweight woman who followed him into the living room. “She’s a criminal law lawyer who’s graciously agreed to take this case.”

  “You have his clothing?” the woman asked in a deep, husky voice.

  “I do.” I grabbed the bag and held it out to her. “There are some Polaroids in there, too, of him after he took off the clothes and of a burn on his lower leg.”

  “Did you take pictures before he undressed?”

  I shook my head. “Didn’t occur to me until I saw the burn.”

  She frowned. “Pictures before he took off the clothes would have been a bigger help.” She dropped the bag onto my couch and flopped down beside it, her eyes moving quickly over my belongings like she was my mother making judgements about the way I kept house.

  “Where is he?” Hayden asked.

  “Getting dressed.”

  Even as I said the words, Mr. McGregor came into the room dressed in a pair of jeans that were slightly too big in the waist and too short in the legs, as well as a sweatshirt with a local Houston high school team’s mascot on the front, the Horned Toads. Man probably didn’t even know what a horny toad was.

  “Mr. McGregor,” Hayden said, turning to greet him, “this is Jennifer Wallace. She’s the lawyer we’ve contacted on your behalf.”

  “Ms. Wallace,” he said politely.

  “Just Wallace,” the woman barked at him, ignoring all offers at a handshake. “Can you please tell me how you happened to wake up with a dead woman in your bed?”

  McGregor didn’t seem fazed at all by the woman’s bluntness. He took a seat and politely went through the story again, not once annoyed by her continued request for more information. She badgered him, asking a million questions that didn’t, at first, seem to make a great deal of sense. But eventually I began to see what she was doing.

  She was assuming he was lying and she was pushing him, trying to get him to slip up. But he didn’t, at least not as far as I could tell.

  “Okay,” she finally said, playing with her cellphone as she’d been doing almost the entire time. “We’ll need to get blood samples, urine sample, and more pictures. We need to document everything that we can in order not only to satisfy the police in their investigation, but to begin building our defense.”

  “When do you think they’ll come to arrest me?” McGregor asked.

  “Well, we’ll do our best to put them off as long as possible. But if I were you I’d be prepared to be arrested within the next week or so.”

  He inclined his head. “Do you think they’ll find evidence that will keep them from arresting me?”

  “Doubtful.” She set the cellphone down and leaned close
to him. “They have a dead woman in your bed, a woman whose body shows signs of sexual activity. They have a knife on your bedside table with your fingerprints on it. And they have a house that shows no sign of breaking or entering, nor evidence that someone other than you and that woman were in your house last night.”

  She touched his knee lightly. “To be perfectly honest, if I were a cop I would be knocking down that door right now, arresting you.”

  McGregor nodded, but I saw something cross in his eyes, something very much like fear. He honestly didn’t believe he did this. For some reason, that surprised me.

  A parade of people came and went from my house over the next couple of hours. I stepped into the kitchen to get out of the way, feeling like an unwanted guest in my own house. Hayden wandered into the room after a while, moving around it like he’d never been in a kitchen before.

  “Sorry about all this,” he said. “I know it can’t be easy having all this happen in your own house.”

  “It’s all right.”

  “It’s not all right. Dragon will compensate you for the use of your house.”

  I didn’t want him to think that was all that mattered to me. But I didn’t know how to say anything else without sounding ungrateful, either.

  “We’ve got Vincent headed over to McGregor’s place to see if he can slip in around the cops’ forensics people.”

  Vincent Caplin was the head of our investigative division at Dragon. He was an operative once, back when the firm was still fairly new. I’d heard that he once took on a case that no one else could figure out and managed to unearth a stalker who was making threats against a pornographic movie producer. But I’d also heard that he’d married a porn star, so I wasn’t entirely sure any of it was true.

  If anyone could prove McGregor innocent in all this, it would be Vincent.

  “You might have him check the bathroom of McGregor’s master bedroom,” I said, giving voice to an idea that had been nibbling at the edge of my thoughts all afternoon.

  “Why?”

  “If he was drugged …” I glanced toward the living room where a professional photographer was taking close ups of the burn on the back of McGregor’s thigh. “He says that he felt fine when he went to bed last night, but he didn’t feel that burn on his leg until the first time I touched it. I think maybe he was drugged, and the drug was delivered either just before he went to bed or after. Any other way and he would have been aware of it.”