21. The MacTavish Threat #2
I gesture for her to go ahead, moving to examine another section of her evidence board while she speaks in hushed tones.
"Viki, I can't right now... Yes, I know she has the appointment... Can't you take her?... Fine, fine. I'll figure it out." She ends the call with a frustrated sigh. "Sorry about that. Family stuff."
"Everything all right?"
"My mother has a doctor's appointment. My sister had to take Charlie to some school thing." She checks her watch. "I might need to cut this short to drive her."
"I can have a car sent," I offer.
"Thanks, but she won't go without family. Armenian stubbornness." She smiles wryly. "I can pick this up later tonight."
Something possessive and unexpected rises in me at the thought of her leaving. "Or you could come to my suite afterward.” I cough. “To continue working, of course.”
Her eyebrow lifts. "To continue working?"
"Among other things, perhaps."
A slow smile spreads across her face. "How very CEO of you. Efficient multitasking."
"I prefer to think of it as smart resource allocation."
"Well, when you put it that way, how could a girl refuse?" She begins gathering her notes. "I should be done by seven."
"I'll text you the address."
"I still have it from last time."
The casual reminder of our previous encounter sends heat through me. "Right."
She hesitates, half-packed bag in hand. "Callum, about Richard..."
"We'll discuss it later. Once we have conclusive evidence."
She licks her lips and blinks, before nodding. "Okay. Later."
After she leaves, I remain in the conference room, studying the elaborate web of connections she's mapped out.
The evidence pointing to Richard's involvement is becoming harder to ignore, yet I still feel that inexplicable reluctance to pursue it fully.
Why am I still protecting him?
After everything he's done—the embezzlement, the betrayal, the apparent sabotage—why does the thought of taking definitive action against my brother still feel so wrong?
I don't have an answer.
Not one I'm willing to examine too closely, anyway.
* * *
The hotel suite door closes behind us with a soft click at 10:23 PM.
Karina's mother's appointment had run long, and further research had kept us both at the office well past nightfall.
By the time we finally made it to my suite, fatigue had settled over both of us—though not enough to dampen the electricity that crackles whenever we're alone together.
"Find anything new?" I ask, taking her coat.
"Nothing conclusive yet." She kicks off her shoes with a sigh. "But I've narrowed down the source locations for the most explicit posts. Three originated from Reykjavik, but the rest came from Seattle—specifically, from a coffee shop Richard frequents. Used to frequent," she corrects herself.
"Interesting. That suggests he might have a local accomplice."
"Or he set up automated posting before leaving for Iceland." She runs a hand through her hair, loosening it from its professional style. "Either way, we're getting closer."
I move to the bar. "Drink?"
"Please. Whatever's strongest."
I pour us each a finger of single malt, the amber liquid catching the low light as I hand her a glass.
Our fingers brush during the exchange, a momentary contact that somehow feels more intimate than it should.
"To progress," I offer, raising my glass.
"To finally getting some answers," she counters, clinking her tumbler against mine.
We drink in the air-conditioned silence, the day's tensions gradually easing as the whisky works its magic.
Karina wanders to the window, looking out at Seattle's glittering skyline.
"It's beautiful at night," she comments absently. "All the sharp edges get blurred."
I move to join her, standing close enough to feel her warmth without quite touching. "A convenient illusion."
"Sometimes illusions are necessary," she says quietly. "They make difficult truths easier to bear."
The comment strikes closer to home than she likely intended. "Like the illusion that family loyalty means something?"
She turns to face me. "Is that what's bothering you? That Richard betrayed your loyalty?"
"Among other things."
"He didn't just betray you, Callum. He betrayed the company. All the employees who depend on it. The clients who trust it." Her voice remains gentle despite the hard truth in her words. "And now he's actively trying to sabotage the MacTavish acquisition."
"If the evidence proves conclusive," I hedge, still clinging to that last thread of doubt.
"Why is it so hard for you to accept his guilt?" The question holds no judgment, only genuine curiosity. "After everything he's done—even to me personally—why do you still want to believe the best of him?"
I stare into my whisky, searching for an answer I'm not sure I have. "I don't know."
"I think you do." She steps closer, until I can smell the subtle citrus scent of her perfume. "I think you protect Richard because it's what you've always done. Because at some point, it became who you are rather than what you do."
Her insight is uncomfortably accurate, stirring something deep and unexamined within me.
I set down my glass, needing both hands free for what comes next.
"Perhaps," I concede, reaching for her. "But tonight, I don't want to talk about Richard."
She allows herself to be drawn closer. "What do you want to talk about?"
"Nothing at all."
The kiss begins tentatively, a delicate exploration that quickly deepens into something hungrier.
Unlike our previous encounters—my measured restraint in the hotel suite, the stolen moment in my study—this feels like surrender.
To what, I'm not entirely sure.
Her hands make quick work of my tie, then move to the buttons of my shirt with equal efficiency.
Mine find the zipper of her dress, easing it down her back in a slow, deliberate motion that makes her shiver against me.
"We shouldn't be doing this," she murmurs, even as she helps me shrug off my shirt.
"Absolutely not," I agree, fingers tracing the curve of her spine. "Terrible idea."
“Abominable.”
“Abhorrent, even.”
We continue this litany of reasons to stop while systematically removing each other's clothing, the contradiction between words and actions almost comical if it weren't so charged with desire.
When she's finally laid beneath me on the king-sized bed, I take a moment just to look at her.
The warm olive skin, the soft curves, the unexpectedly delicate tattoos—one on her hip matching the tiny one at her wrist—that I hadn't noticed during our previous encounters.
"What is this?" I trace the small design with my fingertip—a pomegranate in simple, elegant lines. “I never did ask the first time I saw this on the inside of your wrist.”
"Armenian symbol of life and rebirth.” She watches my face. "A reminder that surviving hard times means coming back stronger."
I lower my head to press my lips against the marking. "And have you? Come back stronger?"
"Usually." Her voice catches as my mouth begins to move lower. "Not always gracefully, but yes."
"Grace is overrated." I taste the salt of her skin, savoring each gasp and sigh as I map her body with lips and tongue. "Survival is what matters."
Conversation ceases after that, replaced by more primal forms of communication.
I learn her through touch—the sensitive spot just below her collarbone, the way she arches when I kiss the inside of her wrist, the breathy sound she makes when my fingers finally find her center.
She's equally attentive, discovering with apparent delight that the right pressure at the nape of my neck makes me growl, that biting gently at my hipbone elicits a stream of Scottish curses, that when her hand wraps around my stiffening cock, my accent thickens to near unintelligibility.
What we embark on next isn’t careful. It’s not slow.
It’s a goddamn collision.
Teeth. Tongues. Hands that can’t get enough.
“Fucking Christ, Karina," I rasp against her mouth. "You drive me fucking insane."
She whimpers when my hands dive under her bra, yanking the thin fabric over her head without ceremony, baring her breasts to the cool air and my greedy mouth.
“Callum—” Her fingers tug at my belt, fumbling with the buckle, needy, desperate.
“Patience, sweetheart.” I drag my teeth over the peak of one nipple, loving the way her body arches helplessly into my mouth. “Gonna take my time ruining you.”
She shudders violently, the sound she makes somewhere between a whimper and a plea.
I peel her dress down her legs and toss it aside, leaving her in nothing but thin black panties — already fucking soaked.
"Look at you," I growl, running two fingers along the wet seam. "You’re dripping for me. Been thinking about my cock all night, haven’t you?"
"Yes," she gasps shamelessly, rocking into my hand.
I shove the panties aside and sink two fingers inside her, groaning at the tight, hot clutch of her.
"Fuck, you're perfect. So fucking tight. So ready for me."
She keens when my thumb circles her clit, her body already riding the edge.
"Not yet," I murmur, withdrawing my fingers slowly, dragging her slickness up to spread over her clit again. "You’re gonna come all over my cock, Karina. Not my fingers. Not this time."
Retrieving a condom from the side drawer, I can barely stop my hands from shaking. I kneel, ripping the condom wrapper open with my teeth, rolling it over my length with one hand as I watch her watching me — cheeks flushed, chest heaving, pupils blown wide with need.
“You want this?” I rasp, pumping my cock once, hard and fast, so she can see exactly what’s about to fill her.
“God, yes, Callum—please.”
“Beg prettier, sweetheart.” I drag the thick head of my cock through her wetness, teasing her entrance without pushing inside. "I want to hear you beg like you fucking mean it."
“Please, Callum—need you. Need you inside me, now, please?—"
It shatters me.
I drive into her with a single, brutal thrust, burying myself to the hilt.
"Fuck—" I choke out, my forehead dropping to hers as her body clamps down around me. "Jesus, Karina—you’re gonna fucking kill me."
She sobs against my mouth, her nails digging into my back, her legs locking around my hips.
I stay still, panting harshly against her throat, letting her body adjust — or maybe giving myself a prayer of not coming the second I move.
But she doesn't want slow.
She bucks up, trying to force more friction, more sensation.
"Move," she begs, voice cracked and desperate. "Fuck me, Callum. Hard."
I snap.
Gripping her hips brutally, I pull almost all the way out, then slam back in.
She cries out, back arching, eyes rolling back, and I do it again.
And again.
The bed frame slams against the wall with every punishing thrust.
"You feel that?" I grunt into her ear, fucking her harder, faster, rawer. "Feel how fucking good you squeeze me? Like you were made for me."
"Yes," she sobs, clawing at my back, gasping for breath between shattered moans.
"You’re mine when you come," I snarl, teeth scraping her jaw. "Say it."
"I'm yours," she whimpers, body trembling violently under mine. "Callum—I'm yours."
I reach down, rub her clit in tight brutal circles, and she shatters — sobbing my name, clamping down so tight on my cock I see fucking stars.
"That's it, sweetheart. Fucking soak my cock."
I barely manage three more thrusts before the pleasure detonates, ripping through me like a goddamn freight train.
I spill into the condom with a guttural growl, holding her so tightly against me it’s a wonder she can breathe.
We collapse together, a tangle of limbs, sweat, and stuttering breath.
The room is spinning. My heart pounds so hard it feels like it’s trying to crack through my ribs.
Slowly, achingly, I pull out and knot the condom, tossing it into the trash with shaking hands before gathering her back into my arms.
Karina is boneless against me, her skin flushed, her eyes hazy.
And yet — when she lifts her face to mine, when she presses her lips to my throat in a lingering, tender kiss — it’s not just sex humming between us.
It’s something bigger.
Something that fucking terrifies me.
"You're dangerous," I whisper, kissing her forehead.
"You’re worse," she murmurs against my chest.
I pull the sheets around us, trapping her against me like a selfish bastard who has no intention of letting go.
Because if that was a mistake…
It’s one I want to make over and over again.
For several minutes, we simply breathe together, the enormity of what just happened settling around us like a physical presence.
Eventually, she rolls to face me, tracing idle patterns on my chest with her fingertip.
"This changes things," she says quietly.
"Yes."
"Connor's party is in ten days."
"I'm aware."
"We should probably try to be professional until then."
I can't help but laugh. "We've been trying that approach for weeks. How's it working so far?"
She props herself up on one elbow to look at me, her expression serious despite her tousled hair and swollen lips. "What happens after the acquisition? When you go back to Scotland?"
The question hits harder than expected.
I haven't allowed myself to consider what comes after—too focused on the immediate challenges of MacTavish and the viral campaign.
"I don't know," I admit. "I hadn't thought that far ahead."
“I—Of course. This is just..."
"Karina." I cup her face gently. "That wasn't dismissal. It was honesty. I genuinely haven't considered what comes next because I've been too preoccupied with the present. With you."
"Oh." Her expression softens.
"But we will figure it out," I promise. "After Connor's party. After the acquisition. We'll figure out what this is."
She settles back against my chest, silent for so long I think she might have fallen asleep.
Then, so quietly I almost miss it, she whispers:
"I think I might be falling for you."
The words send a jolt through me—equal parts terror and exhilaration.
Before I can respond, her breathing deepens, exhaustion finally claiming her.
I lie awake much longer, her confession echoing in my mind.
The irony doesn't escape me—that after years of carefully controlled isolation, I've allowed myself to become entangled with my brother's ex, of all people.
The very woman he betrayed, now in my arms.
What does that say about me? About my supposed loyalty to family?
The questions circle without resolution as Seattle's lights blink beyond the window.
Eventually, I give up on answers and simply hold her closer, allowing myself this temporary respite from the complications that await us in the morning.
Because one truth is becoming increasingly difficult to deny…
Whatever is happening between us matters more than I'm prepared to admit—even to myself.