Night Moves (5 page)

“Me, too,” she whispered.

Exhaling slowly, he gradually withdrew from her body. Regan opened a desk drawer and grabbed a box of tissues. Her face heated as she handed some to Brian to dispose of the condom then proceeded to clean herself.

He put a finger under her chin and tilted it up. “No embarrassment. Not with each other. Not ever, for anything. Okay?”

“O-okay.”

When they had finished rearranging their clothing, Brian pulled out his cell phone and punched in a number. “Me,” he said. “Did you get photos of the footprints outside her house? Yeah. Uh huh. Anything on the information I left you about the text messages? Okay.

I hear you. Whoever’s doing the alarm system at her house, have him set up a caller ID on the phone. Regan can call the phone company to connect it. And fit her up with a better answering machine. And one more thing. I want special sentry duty tonight. Okay. Later.”

Regan was full of questions. “Okay, give. Did they find anything? About anything?

What about the text message?”

Brian held up a hand. “One thing at a time. Our geek partner checked the SIM card from your phone. The text message came from a throwaway so nothing there.”

“Damn.” She nibbled at a fingernail. She’d been hoping they could trace it back to someone. “What about the footprints?”

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30

“Looks like a man’s size eleven. They measured the impression and figure whoever it is has to be a pretty skinny guy. The footprint wasn’t too deep. How tall is this Greg character and how much does he weigh?”

Again the mention of Greg’s name made her feel sick. “He’s just under six feet but not more than one-seventy, I’d say.”

Brian gave her a hard look. “I wouldn‘t have guessed you went for twigs.”

“He has a certain…appeal.” Why was she even defending him? “But I’m telling you, I don’t think it’s Greg.”

He took her elbow. “Let’s go hunt him up and we’ll find out. I can tell in five seconds if he’s lying.”

But they got nothing out of Greg except defiance and anger. Dejected, Regan led Brian back to her office. “I have to appear in court this afternoon then go over the depositions Lisa Jensen took for me.”

“And I’ll be right beside you. There are good people at the agency working on this. I’m not letting you out of my sight.”

If anyone was curious about the tall, fierce-looking man sitting behind Regan in the courtroom, they were either too polite or too intimidated to say anything. At last, the day was over, and she went to pack up her briefcase. The first thing she noticed was the missing files.

“Something wrong?” Brian asked.

“The depositions I wanted to read and the case files. I left everything here on my desk.

Now they’re gone.” She buzzed the intercom. “Sharon, can you come in for a minute?”

“I’m just on my way out,” Sharon said, entering the office. “Can this wait?”

“I can’t find the files that I left here. The depositions and everything else.”

“I never saw them,” Sharon said defensively, smoothing her hand over her straight blonde hair. “You must have misplaced them.”

“I never misplace a file,” Regan snapped.

“You did last week.”

Was it her imagination or was Sharon enjoying her discomfort and worry? Last week, two files she was working on had gone missing. She’d found them two days later stuck NIGHT MOVES

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31

between two file cabinets, with no idea how they’d gotten there. It still rankled, because she was meticulous about her work.

“What happened last week?” Brian demanded.

When she told him, he didn’t comment, but his lips thinned to a hard line.

“I’m sure they’ll show up like the last ones did,” Sharon said, looking at her watch.

“And I hate to leave you like this, but I have a date waiting.”

Regan waved a hand at her. “All right. Go, go.” She picked up the phone and punched in three numbers. “Lisa? It’s Regan. Just checking, but you did leave those depositions on my desk, right? Uh huh. Uh huh. Okay, thanks.” She looked at Brian. “She swears she left them on my desk.”

She began picking up everything on her desk and the table next to it, checking each piece of paper. A knock at the door interrupted her.

“I’ll get it.” Brian opened the door, blocking entrance with his body. “Can we help you?”

A head of tousled dark curls peeked around the lean body. “Regan? Do I need a password?”

“Lisa. Thank goodness.” Regan dropped the papers in her hand. “It’s okay, Brian. This is Lisa Jensen. She’s the one who took the depositions for me.”

Lisa looked back at Brian. “Oh, my. Is this one yours? No wonder you’ve been off your feed.”

“I have not been off my feed. I wish people would quit saying that. I just can’t find a couple of file folders.”

“I swear I put them right on top of your desk.” She skittered around Brian, pushing her curls away from her face. “I know you need them for tomorrow. I’d hate to think they’ve gotten lost.”

Regan gritted her teeth. “They are
not
lost. I don’t lose important files.”

“Oh, honey.” Lisa’s voice turned sympathetic. “I know you’re just the best around here, but you have been a touch distracted lately.”

“For God’s sake,” Regan huffed. “I’m fine.”

“Do you want me to take those court appearances for you tomorrow? You look real disturbed about something.”

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Lisa’s Texas drawl was beginning to grate on Regan’s nerves. “No. Thank you. I’ll find the depositions, and I’ll be in court. Thanks again for your help.” She made her tone as dismissive as possible.

“Okay, then.” Lisa all but fluttered her eyelashes at Brian. “Maybe tall, dark and handsome here can help you.” She looked back at Regan. “Unless he’s not yours. In which case, I’d like first dibs.”

“Good
night
, Lisa.”

“Okay, okay. I can take a hint. Can’t blame a girl for trying, though.” Like Sharon, she managed to brush against Brian’s body as she left.

“Are all the women in your office this predatory?” Brian asked.

“I guess.” Regan unclipped her hair and shoved her fingers through it. “I guess I’ll just keep looking.”

“No you won’t,” Brian told her. “We’ll lock the office so no one can get in or out, and you can start looking again in the morning. I’m going to hook up the new alarm system to your car and alert the guard that we’re leaving your car here overnight. I think that’ll work best. Then we’re going to pick up some dinner and go back to your house. Your day is done, counsellor.”

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A panel truck with a logo on the side that said Electric Man was parked in her driveway. Regan looked at Brian as he parked next to it and raised an eyebrow.

“Nobody questions an electrician,” he explained. He opened her garage door with the opener he’d taken from her car, drove in and parked. “Come on. I’ll introduce you to everyone.”

“It must be a big crowd,” she said. “You bought enough Chinese food for an army.”

“Trust me,” he chuckled. “These guys eat like animals.”

Four people were in her kitchen. The three men were all as tall, lean and muscular as Brian, two of them as dark, one a golden blond. The fourth was a woman, slender with red-gold hair in a long braid tossed over her shoulder. Brian looked surprised to see her.

“Hey, Sierra.” He nodded at the dark man standing with his arm around her shoulders.

“Sorry if we delayed you guys heading back to Maine.”

She grinned and went to give him a kiss on the cheek. “You know nothing’s hanging fire up there right now.” She gave him a look Regan had trouble defining. “And Luke thought I might be of some help here.”

“Always glad of some assistance, darlin’.” He grinned, set the large bags on the table and gave her a hug.

Regan, feeling like a third wheel, cleared her throat. “I take it you’re all from the agency?”

The woman smiled and held out her hand. “Please forgive us for being so rude.

Especially Brian, who is sorely lacking in manners.”

Brian grunted.

“I’m Sierra Spencer, Brian’s sister-in-law.” She nodded at the man sprawled at the kitchen table. “My husband, Luke. Also not known for his manners.”

Luke rose in a lithe, graceful movement, and held out his hand. “I apologise for the Spencer family. Nice to meet you, Miss Matthews. Sorry it isn’t under better circumstances.”

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“Regan, please. Thank you all for doing this. It’s been a…trying experience, to say the least.”

The other two men introduce themselves as Grey Montgomery and Michael Dancer.

Sierra began taking the food from the bags while Regan took out plates, utensils and glasses.

Brian had purchased two twelve-packs of soft drinks.

“Nothing alcoholic on the job,” he’d told Regan.

Curiosity piqued her when she saw Brian whisper in Sierra’s ear and the two of them moved into the next room, but she said nothing. If the woman’s husband didn’t mind, why should she? Still, she wondered what they couldn’t discuss in front of the others.

When they were all seated around the table with full plates, Brian looked at each one individually. “Okay. Reports, please.”

“You know we couldn’t do anything with the text message,” Luke reminded him. “But Michael,” he nodded at the blond, “took the list of possible suspects and using his computer magic is checking to see who might have bought disposable phones in the city in the last month.”

“But how can you find that out?” Regan asked. “Don’t you need sales slips or something?”

“As long as they didn’t pay cash, which is a possibility,” Michael said, “you’d be surprised at what we can find out. Something, by the way, I don’t think you, as a prosecutor, want to look at too closely.”

Privately, Regan agreed with them. She’d hired The Sentinels because they got the job done, whatever it took. She didn’t need to know the details or all the ways they might be skirting the law.

“I’ve got the profiles on your four top suspects,” Grey said. “The folders are on the counter. You can look at them after we eat, but I don’t think you’ll find much there.”

“Not even Greg Sampson?” Brian asked.

“I told, you,” Regan said. “I really don’t think Greg would do something like this.”

“The new system’s in place,” Luke told him. “Once it’s turned on, if anyone trips a sensor, they’ll think a brass band is standing next to them.”

“Good. All good. And we’re set for tonight?”

They all nodded.

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“Tonight the system will be off,” Michael told him.

“What’s happening tonight? Why will the alarm be off after you went to so much trouble to install it?” Regan felt as if she was missing something here. “And what’s Sierra’s role?” She smiled at the other woman. “Not that it isn’t nice to have you here.”

“We’re going to do some outside guard duty,” Brian told her. “Sierra’s going to keep you company for a while. Maybe have some girl talk with you.”

Her jaw dropped. “Girl talk?” She wasn’t even sure she knew how.

“Why don’t you let me take care of that?” Sierra said, beginning to clear the plates from the table. “You and Regan need some private time before it gets dark.”

“Okay, what’s this all about?” They were in her bedroom with the door locked, Regan’s hands clenched into fists, her emotions a mix of irritation and anxiety. Brian’s warm hands smoothed her shoulders, his body so close to hers she could feel the heat radiating from it.

“And don’t think you can distract me with sex,” she told him.

“Not even a little bit?” he teased, brushing his lips against hers.

Regan tried to push him away, but when she opened her hands and pressed them against his chest, her mind began to wander. God help her. One touch and this man had her reduced to nothing but a puddle of hormones, all running a marathon through her body. The sexual chemistry between them was so incendiary it almost frightened her. No other man had ever called to her senses this way, possessed her so completely, drove her need for him higher even as he satisfied her again and again.

What was happening to her? Sex in her office. Sex with a house full of people below.

And no more ability to stop this than to stop a speeding freight train.

What is happening to me?

Brian licked at her lips, tracing the outline with his tongue, his hands moving from her shoulders to her back and down to cup the cheeks of her ass.

“Jesus, Regan. I feel like a stallion after a mare in heat with you. I can’t be around you for five minutes without wanting to get you naked and fuck you every way possible. What the hell are you doing to me?”

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“What are you doing to
me
?” she asked.

“Not nearly enough.”

He pressed his lips to hers again. Unable to resist, she opened her mouth to let his tongue in and danced her own with it. Just that quickly, moisture soaked her panties, and her nipples sprang to life.

With a desperate effort she pulled her mouth away from his, gasping for air.

“Wait, wait, wait.” She tried to make some space between them. “What about everyone downstairs? They’ll know exactly what we’re doing up here.”

Brian’s eyes burned into hers with a hunger that fuelled a fire within her. “Nobody pays attention to what we’re doing. We’ll just be very quiet. I want this, Regan. I want
you
.

Anytime. Any place. And you want me, too. Admit it.”

She would have if she could find her power of speech. His mouth was all over her, kissing her cheeks, her eyelids, the column of her neck, her breasts, stealing her breath and heating her blood.

“Brian. I can’t think when you do this. Take a minute and tell me what’s happening.”

He loosened his hold on her, but only slightly. “You’re right. You need to be in the loop.

It’s just that I want to spend every minute fucking you every way possible.” He backed her up and sat her on the edge of the bed then stepped away. “There. That’s better. At least, I can think.” He ran his fingers through his hair. “Okay. That footprint indicates that whoever this is doesn’t mind coming around your house. And with today’s message, we have a feeling whoever it is will try something tonight.”