EMERSON WAS GOING TOKILL his brother, hide the body and spend the rest of his life as his parents’ only son.Sure, they’d mourn for a while, but they’d get over it.
He could still feel the remnants of their kiss, Sophie’s lips against his, the way her body fit against his, her slender arms twined around his neck, her leg around his hips as he cupped her perfect ass with his hand. Gabe’s ringtone had been enough—just barely, but enough—to break through the spell she’d cast over him. Now that he’d stopped kissing her, all the reasons he shouldn’t have done it in the first place came crowding back in. Another reason to murder his cockblocking younger brother.
“What crawled up your ass and died?” asked Gabe.
More evidence that some things just needed doing. His parents would be fine. They’d still have him and his sisters.
“I presume there’s a reason for this call.”Beyond your death wish.
“I found something I think might be connected to the break-in at that store Sophie works at. I assumed you’d want to know. I can pass the information on to Andrews if you’d rather not be bothered.” Emerson could picture Gabe’s smug grin as he waited for his response.
“I’ll be right there.” Not bothering to wait for a reply, he pocketed the phone and drew in a slow, steadying breath before he turned to face Sophie. “I’m sorry. I crossed a line I shouldn’t have.”
Her expression moved from open and expectant to steel so fast it was as if someone had thrown a switch.
“Emerson Southerland, don’t you dare apologize to me. Not for doing something webothwanted. Something I have every intention of doing again.”
He had almost a foot and over fifty pounds on her but the look in her eyes had him shifting nervously in place.The woman was fierce.Head-to-head against her, he didn’t stand a chance, which was another reason to head downstairs immediately.
“I need to go. Gabe found out something about the break-in.” He didn’t bother to contradict her statement. He could repeatSophie is off-limitslike his own personal mantra, but as long as he was in the same room with her, he didn’t trust himself to keep his hands off her. Not when she wanted him to touch her.
Her expression clouded—the woman’s face was like a billboard, broadcasting everything she felt—and his chest tightened, knowing the reminder of the attack was the reason. A few words and the ease of their afternoon evaporated, and she was back to feeling threatened again. One more reason to get his ass back to work and figure out who was responsible.
“Of course. I understand.”
He saw her begin to curl in on herself, and he couldn’t stand it, couldn’t stand the idea of the bright, vibrant woman he’d held in his arms moments earlier being afraid.
“Hey,” he said. Reaching out, he cupped her face in a move that was sure to prove a colossal mistake.So much for holding boundaries and crossing lines.But he couldn’t stop himself if he wanted to. When he saw the way her eyes lit up, felt the way she softened at his touch, he knew without a doubt: he didn’t want to stop touching her. Not if he could give her any kind of comfort. “It’ll be okay. I’ll keep you safe.” She nodded, her skin soft and warm against his palm, and he let out the breath he’d been holding. “Lock the door behind me.”
He took a step away and turned to leave before he did something stupid. He couldn’t count on his brother saving him twice.
––––––––
EMERSON SPENT THE elevatorride to the Southerland Security offices shoving his feelings for Sophie into a box and running through account payables to crowd the taste and feel of her out of his brain. By the time he strode into Gabe’s office, he was mostly back in his right mind, but he wouldn’t place bets on how long it would last.
“That was fast,” Gabe said, spinning his chair away from the monitor in front of him. “With the way you bit my head off, I thought I might have interrupted something.” He waggled his eyebrows, looking more like a fourteen-year-old kid than a partner in a security firm. It was a good thing, clients found his pain in the ass younger brother charming.
“Fuck off.”
“Nice.” Gabe nodded his head, a knowing expression plastered on his smug face.
There was a reason fratricide was a thing.
“Show me what you found.” Emerson pulled up a chair next to his brother and turned his attention to the monitor.
“Remember that data breach at Seaton a couple of months ago? The way it seemed like the hacker was just screwing with us?”
“The Toy Barn guy? Of course.” It was one of the reasons Emerson had been paying such close attention to the pearl broker’s account. Someone had started poking at the company’s database without ever quite breaching the walls they’d put in place. They hadn’t exactly been hiding either. It was more like the hacker laid a trail of bread crumbs leading them through other servers, including a big toy store. Hence the nickname. “That guy’s work isn’t on the same level as the B&E at the jewelry store. What makes you think they’re linked?”
For as sophisticated as the cyberattacks had been, the robbery was just the opposite, almost clumsy in the way it was executed. The only thing they had in common was that neither had really been successful. Almost as if the perpetrator hadn’t really wanted to succeed. It was still a very thin thread between them and not nearly enough to build a connection.
“Have you ever heard of shell parties?”
“How about you get to the fucking point and tell me what you found?” The never-ending questions frayed the last scrap of patience he had left. Lack of blood flow to the brain and interrupted kissing seemed to have that effect on him. It probably made him a bad person, but it gave him a perverse sense of satisfaction to be able to direct his ire at his pain-in-the-ass brother.
“Fine. Shut up and listen then.” Gabe looked too damn happy with himself. “Shell parties started out as a multi-level marketing thing. Kind of like Tupperware parties. The guests paid twenty bucks or so for an oyster, which the host opened in front of them. The hustle was convincing the new pearl owner to spend upwards of two hundred dollars to turn their treasure into a piece of overpriced jewelry. The whole thing was limited in size and mostly harmless. Worst-case scenario, the client spent too much for a piece of jewelry. Something’s value is in what people will pay for it. As long as they’re happy, what does it matter?”
It was a simplistic view of the world in general and fraud specifically but not too far from the truth.
