“Well, you’re in it now.”
“Yeah, but why was it so secretive?” she asked.
“You really want to know?” he asked.
“Yes.”
Fergus pulled his laptop from his backpack and plugged it into a cable laying on his desk. He clicked a few buttons and then waved toward it for her to come take a look. She bent down over his shoulder and watched the monitor for a moment, gasping.
“This entire place is under surveillance? Why?”
“Do you really need to ask? It’s a necessity in my business.”
“Your house in Boston, is it all teched out like this too?”
“Aye.”
“Even the bedrooms?”
“Aye.”
“Bathrooms?”
“Aye.”
“Wait. Is it recorded to file? Is it saved?”
“It is,” he said, waiting for her to arrive at the unavoidable conclusion.
“Oh, my God! So, when you brought me here before, you had me on camera wherever I went. In the spare room. In the bathroom.”
“I did.”
“You perv!” she said, slapping him playfully on the shoulder.
“It wasn’t meant to be pervy. It’s just a precaution. What gets recorded on there is not within my control.”
She stood looking at him for a moment, squinting at him.
“You saw me walking around naked in my room, didn’t you? Did you sit in here and watch me?”
“The night you came here, while you were sleeping, I watched you and I got so turned on that I jacked off.”
“You sick, sick puppy!” she said, but she was still smiling.
He was surprised. For all that they’d shared together past their experiences here, he knew she was pretty open-minded, but he’d honestly thought she’d take the fact that he’d watched her when she was his captive with a bit more offense. Instead, she seemed to be a little turned on.
“Did you keep all the videos of us here?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“They were evidence that conflicts with the stories we told to explain your absence and that of Ciaron and his men.”
She paused at this, but then looked at him again.
“I’ve never asked, but what did you do with the bodies?”
“You don’t need to know that.”
“I know, but I want to know.”
“I don’t know. We have a cleaner. He takes care of things like that. He came up and disposed of the bodies and followed up on your cleaning of the house. For what it’s worth, my brother was wrong. The cleaner said you did a fairly decent job of clearing the scene, for an amateur.”
“Good to know. If my job as a corporate accountant falls through, then I’ll have a chance at a second career.”
“Either that or money laundering. You’d be damned good at that.”
“I’ll pass,” she told him, glancing back at the screen and then at his bed. “Want to make a new sex tape?”
“I thought you’d never ask,” he laughed, standing up and following her to the bed.CHAPTER THIRTYEimear
For the second time in her life, Eimear found herself in a bridal shop picking out a wedding dress. This time, Bronagh was almost as excited as she was. She hadn’t cared much for Ciaron and had admitted that she liked him far less than she’d let on about once he was out of their lives. She adored Fergus, though. He could be gruff and demanding sometimes, but he was good to Eimear, and she loved him in a way that she had never loved Ciaron. That alone was enough to make Bronagh happy. Despite Eimear not knowing it herself, Bronagh had always sensed she was in some way unhappy.
“You aren’t going to run away from this wedding, are you?” she asked.
“Not in a million years,” Eimear replied.
She hated lying to her sister, but she couldn’t exactly tell her who and what Fergus was. Likewise, she couldn’t tell her that he was part of a family of shifters or even that shifters exist, though she was bursting to do so most of the time. She definitely couldn’t tell her the truth about why she’d gone missing right before her wedding and what really happened to Ciaron. As far as her sister was concerned, he had moved to an office overseas to put everything with Eimear behind him.
“I don’t like that one,” Bronagh told her, leaning back and sipping her champagne like she was royalty.
“Yeah, I don’t think I do either. It’s way too busy.”
“What is it that you find too busy about it?” the salesclerk asked.
“Everything,” Eimear told her. “I look like one of those fluffy cats rich people put on their laps for photos.”
“You really do,” Bronagh added.
“Okay. Let’s get you out of that one and I’ll bring out a new rack of assorted styles, some more minimalist ones.”
“Thank you,” Eimear replied.
“Could you bring more champagne, as well,” Bronagh purred.
“Aren’t you the little diva?” Eimear told her.
“What? The hospital doesn’t pay me enough to afford an apartment of my own, much less good champagne.”
“Yeah, but just think about when you get done with your residency and are a cardiac surgeon. You can have champagne for breakfast every day.”