Chapter 22
TWENTY-TWO
Cormac drove straight to the Elite Security offices. He glanced at Lucy periodically, whose face was blanched and fists were clenched.
“You good?” he asked.
She nodded, then lied right to his face: “Yep.” A long sigh slipped through her lips. “So. Rhonda, huh.”
“Let’s talk about this when we get to the office,” he said, and he cranked the heat in the SUV. It was a nice day, but Lucy was trembling. He shouldn’t have brought her along, but as they crossed the town limits into Stirling, Lucy let out a long breath and said, “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For trusting me today.”
Cormac glanced at her for a moment. A shaft of sunlight carved out the soft lines of her face, making her dark hair shine with strands of gold. “You did great,” he said, which was the truth.
“The longer we spend together, the more capable I feel,” she admitted. “You’ve made me realize that I’ve been living my life way too small. I could do so much more.”
“You will,” Cormac replied, throat tight. “You’ll do that pitch and win a huge contract.”
Her smile was tight, but it was there. That was an improvement. A bit of color returned to her cheeks, and Lucy leaned her head on the headrest. “This has been the craziest experience of my life, but I feel like it’s forced me to realize some things about myself. I’ve been hiding. You helped me come out from under my rock.”
“If I had my way,” Cormac said, “I’d do that without any exploding vehicles and murderous stationery men.”
Lucy giggled, and Cormac’s shoulders relaxed in response. She’d be okay. He could breathe easier.
Once they got inside the offices, with the steel door barred and armed and all their personnel safe behind it, Cormac sat Lucy down in one of the chairs in Elton’s command center and told the other man what they’d discovered.
Sam drifted over and leaned against the doorjamb, grimacing. “I called her a nice lady,” he said, jaw hard. “I’m usually good at reading people.”
“Now I see why she was asking about you two,” Lucy said. Cormac glanced at her, not happy to see her wrapping her arms around her knees. She looked small and vulnerable. But she met his gaze and said, “She was fishing for information, and when I told her you were helping me lift heavy boxes, she obviously took it as a threat. She must have thought that I brought you there as part of my own criminal operation, as a show of force.”
“If she’s the broker for Phillips’s forgeries, they must be using the Wedding Expo as a distribution event,” Cormac said.
“Hiding in plain sight,” Elton added with a nod. “Makes sense. And it explains why you continuing to attend the Wedding Expo set them off.”
A knock on the security door made all their heads turn. “Open the door, McKenna,” a male voice barked—Ricky. The detective was here, and he obviously wasn’t happy.
Cormac stood, taking a moment to put a hand on Lucy’s shoulder as he walked by, and checked their internal cameras before unlocking the security door to let Ricky into their secure area.
The detective sneered at him. “You want to tell me why your vehicle was seen driving out to a certain hunting lodge?”
“You use our resources for your tech support, this is what you deal with, Detective.”
“Damn it, Cormac!” Ricky pinched the bridge of his nose. Behind him, Chrissie looked half-contrite, half-annoyed.
Cormac stepped aside to let the two of them in, closing the steel door behind them. He offered them coffee and grabbed one of the donuts from the box on the kitchen counter. He bit into it and met Lucy’s gaze from across the room. She smiled, and Cormac felt a little better.
Everyone gathered in the office kitchen with a hot drink and donut of their own.
“You need to back off,” Ricky told them, stern. “This is an official police investigation.”
“We were simply taking a walk in the forest, Detective.”
Rick glared at Cormac. “We’re on the same side here, Cormac. You get in our way, that might not be the case.”
Cormac gritted his teeth. He couldn’t help the bitterness that swept through him. It was all well and good for the detective to claim to be on his side now, but where was he twenty-five years ago? Where was he when his mother was sprawled across their foyer tiles, when he was bleeding from a cut on his temple? Where was the cavalry when they were needed?
“We put up a camera,” Lucy said, and all heads whirled toward her.
Cormac curled his hands into fists to stop himself from bundling her into his arms and carting her away. He watched the way she lifted her chin and squared her shoulders. She clearly hated having this much attention on her, but when she spoke, her voice was steady. “We saw a woman drive up and try to pay Aaron Phillips. If the camera was running, it probably caught the whole thing.”
Ricky looked like he was one frayed thread away from snapping, but he smoothed his hand over his mouth and swung his gaze to Cormac.
Lucy’s interjection had helped a bit of sense return to Cormac’s mind. She was right—they needed to cooperate with the police. He couldn’t go rogue. Not when the stakes were so high. He’d only get himself in trouble.
“Elton?” he asked.
The other man was in his den of electronics. “Got it,” came the reply, and everyone crowded in to watch the footage on the big screens.
Cormac put his hands on Lucy’s shoulders as they watched. Her muscles twitched and trembled as the scene played out on the screens, and he knew she was remembering the fear and adrenaline that had coursed through her body just an hour before. He needed to get her home.
Leaning into him, Lucy let her head rest on his arm. Something settled in Cormac’s chest. He stood behind her chair, his hands on her shoulders, and drew comfort from her closeness for the few minutes they spent watching the video, only loosening his hold when she straightened. His heart beat a little steadier, and his mind was clearer. Her presence had soothed him more than he’d anticipated.
“I want an ID on that woman,” the detective said to the officer beside him. “Call the Expo organizers and get whatever details you can. We’re going to that cabin at first light,” he said, then turned to Elton. “That camera going to record all night?”
“Yep. I can set up alerts if there’s any movement or sound.”
“Do it,” Rick said, then turned to Cormac. “I know you’re not going to stay away,” he said, “so I’m going to make you an offer. You can ride along. We hire you as a consultant officially. But I’m in charge.”
Cormac bristled until Lucy glanced up from her seat to meet his gaze. Then he dipped his chin. “Understood.”
“Good. We have less than twenty-four hours, folks. We have work to do.”
Lucy let out a sigh when she stepped into Cormac’s fortress. He dropped her at home on his way to the police station, promising to check in on her later. Lucy wasn’t going to ride along in the morning; she had her pitch to finish and rehearse.
After the excitement of the last few days, it was strange to sit down at her computer to work. Graphic design was so quiet, so solitary—but it was also calming. Lucy’s body relaxed bit by bit as her mind slowed down, focusing on typography and composition. She opened the pitch deck she’d started to create earlier in the week and edited the slides as the world fell away.
This was what she was good at, and everything that had happened since the Expo had only served to prove to her that she could reach for more. She could think bigger. She could accomplish any goal she set her mind to.
Yes, she’d crashed and burned in her sales career. She’d let her brain take her on a long and painful death spiral.
That wasn’t going to happen again.
Lucy was stronger now—and she had Cormac at her back.
Princess Snowball lay curled at Lucy’s feet for the hours she worked, occasionally following a shaft of sunlight on its journey across the living room floor, only to come back and wind her way around Lucy’s legs. The cat’s presence was comforting, and it reminded Lucy of Cormac. His complexity, his depth of feeling, the way he kept himself apart from most people. Lucy glanced down at the cat, then bent over to stroke Snowball’s soft, dark fur. Really, Cormac was just an oversized cat in human form. He even purred when she stroked him, just like this.
By the time the locks on the front door turned, Lucy realized it was dark out. She’d worked for hours, not even getting up to eat or use the bathroom once. Her pitch deck was complete, and her samples were ready. She’d run through the presentation a dozen times already, and she’d do another dozen practice runs tomorrow, before she met with Belinda and her team.
Cormac appeared in the foyer, features drawn, exhaustion and stress written in every line of his body. Lucy closed her laptop and went to him. As soon as her arms wrapped around his neck, Cormac let out a shuddering sigh and pulled her close.
They stood like that for long moments, inhaling the scent of each other, drawing comfort from the touch. This was where she belonged.
Cormac pulled away and slid his hand over her jaw. “When this is over,” he said, “I’m taking you out to a nice restaurant.”
“No exploding cars?”
Cormac sighed. “No, Lucy. No exploding cars. No fights. Nobody trying to hurt you. I want us to try this—for real. You and me.”
Lucy melted. She understood exactly what Cormac was trying to say: that what existed between them wasn’t only developing due to the high stress of their situation. There was more between them than some sort of lust born out of stress and necessity. He wanted the date nights, the mundane, the normal.
And Lucy wanted it too. The only difference was, she didn’t need a dinner date to prove that they belonged together. She already knew it was a done deal.
“I’m not letting you go after this,” she warned him. “I hope you know that.”
Cormac’s lips curled into a smile. Some of the tension that had dragged his shoulders down melted off him. “That’s good, because I happen to share that opinion. I’ve chosen you now, Lucy, and I’m not going to let you go.”
“You and me,” Lucy said.
“You and me.”
“Forever,” she added, because that’s how she felt. There was no one else like Cormac. No one who drew her out of her shell, who built her up, who showed her that she was capable of so much more than she’d thought.
His thumb swept across her cheek, and he dipped his head to hers. A moment before their lips touched, Cormac whispered, “Forever.”
He kissed her hard, wrapping one arm around her back and letting the other tunnel into her hair. Lucy was surrounded by him, wrapped up in him, and there was nowhere else she wanted to be. In the way he gripped her tight, she could feel how worried he was about what the next day would bring.
Lucy was worried too, but she also felt calm. What existed between them was true. It was forever. The certainty of it settled over her, undeniable.
She pulled away and slipped her hand into Cormac’s, leading him to the bedroom. They fell into bed and into each other’s arms. Clothing disappeared in a blink, and Lucy wrapped herself around the man she’d fallen for.
In the fading evening light, he looked at her with dark-blue eyes, a vow written in his gaze. His body was carved by the shadows in the room, propped above her as she ran her hands over the hardness of his shoulders and arms.
Two and a half weeks ago, she’d stood before him, trembling like a fawn, asking him for help. She hadn’t known what kind of man he was—the goodness, the depth, the care.
He lowered his body onto hers and kissed her like he was promising her the world. She kissed him back and sighed, complete.
They used their bodies to speak the truth to each other. With every touch, every kiss, every taste, Lucy showed Cormac that she wanted all of him, and she felt it when he returned the sentiment. She ran her lips along his neck and gasped as they moved together, knowing that tomorrow, everything would change.
Tomorrow, she’d face her fears and make her pitch. Cormac would face the villain in her life and bring him to justice. Things would be different after.
But tonight, they had each other, and that was enough.