Dangerous Designs

Dangerous Designs

Dangerous Desires

Book Five

An Alpha Billionaire Romance

By Kira Matthison

- Catriona -

My hands were shaking so hard that the papers slipped away and onto the floor. I could hear a whimpering sound and knew it was me, trying desperately to keep the terror and betrayal at bay. It couldn’t be. Dominick couldn’t have done this. It wasn’t him, wasn’t him, wasn’t him—

Only it was, wasn’t it? His filing cabinet, his apartment…his signature.

I didn’t have any memory of going back to the bedroom for my phone, but I must have, because I was on my knees again on the floor, taking careful pictures of each form. Dates and signatures. I kept everything in focus. Why was I taking pictures? Was I going to turn him in?

I couldn’t think about that right now. When I was done, I rested the phone in my lap and stared at the papers spread out around me. They had been organized by date, and I set the phone carefully to one side to put the forms back in order and slip them into the filing cabinet. I let the drawer slide closed on its own and resisted the urge to lean my forehead against the cool metal. The longer I stayed here, the more chance Dominick would come back, or a cleaning lady would come, or—

Fear moved me when nothing else would. I half-stumbled my way back into the bedroom and managed to get my clothes on clumsily. I couldn’t seem to tuck my blouse into my skirt, my hair was a mess, my makeup was gone. The shoes felt awkward on my feet; I had turned into a college girl, uncertain in her work outfits. When I caught sight of myself in the mirror, even my habitual self-hatred, all the little whispers about my chubbiness, couldn’t dent the pulse of fear and the low ache of Dominick’s betrayal.

I stopped in the hallway, coat over my arm.

Betrayal? I wanted to laugh. Dominick hadn’t betrayed me. Dominick had never pretended he was anything other than what he was. Dominick hardly cared enough about me to betray me. I wondered if he was going to have me killed when he figured out it was me who had turned him in. Probably. He’d killed Kelly, hadn’t he?

The hallway spun, and I reached out to steady myself. I was still there, trying desperately to stay upright, when the door to the apartment opened and the driver poked his head inside. What he thought to see me like that, I didn’t know, but he was gentle as he led me downstairs, and I leaned on his arm gratefully. He was being nice, far nicer than I deserved, and shame wormed deep inside me—this man clearly thought I was overcome with fear for Dominick. He didn’t know how low I was. How untrustworthy.

When the car finally drew to a halt outside my house and the driver helped me out of the back seat, I was with it enough to murmur a thank you. He didn’t pull away until I’d managed to get into the building, and it was only in the elevator that I slumped back against the wall, hands over my eyes. A sob escaped me, a little sound like a child might make, and I clenched one hand until the nails drove into my skin.

The hallway was blessedly empty; I didn’t think I could have dealt with Nate right around now. I took a long shower in my own bathroom, brushed my hair out until it gleamed, and then sat down at the table, wrapped up in a bathrobe, and opened my laptop.

I was careful, methodical. I was always careful and methodical—that’s what got me the job at the newspaper. That’s what got Edward’s attention. That was what was going to make my career, if it didn’t get me killed. I read and requeried the search engines, bringing up papers we’d all skimmed over while we were first investigating Ellison Corp. This time, I read them more carefully. It was difficult to find these types of laws and articles, and more difficult to understand them, but I made my way through one term at a time, and the picture came into chilling focus.

We don’t need more clients,
I remembered Emma telling me. They had all the contracts they needed at Ellison Corp. And I was beginning to think they had only one client.

We shouldn’t have missed this in our first reading, but somehow, we all had. We’d been so eager to track down Ellison Corp’s secrets and expose them to the world, that no one had bothered to wonder whether it was all legal. No one had noticed the few little sentences in the laws that changed everything.

I pressed a hand over my mouth as I reread the words, but they didn’t change. Their meaning didn’t change. And there was no hiding now. We were in over our heads, and I needed to tell the rest of them.

It wasn’t illegal, it turned out…if you were doing research for the government.

***

“Jesus,” Edward whispered, a few minutes later. He was staring at the pictures on my phone, his face screwed up.

I felt a wash of pride, a feeling that had become entirely alien to me. Somewhere in the sneaking around and the lying and my own dangerous game, I’d forgotten what pushed me to start this. In Edward’s revulsion, I had my reminder: we started this because Ellison Corp was doing something unjust, something that trampled over the rights of human beings. We were doing this because no matter how dangerous it was to expose them, what they were doing was wrong—and we wanted to stand up and show the world the truth.

Something kindled in my chest and I let out a deep, slow breath. We could do this. I could do this. I managed a smile when he looked up at me.

“Do we have something to smile about?” He frowned at me, gesturing at the pictures, at the phone, at his computer.

“It’s okay,” I told him. “I’m not afraid.”

“You should be.” His voice was flat.

“It’s more important now for us to tell the truth than it was before.” I shook my head, trying to find the right words. “You should…put something in writing. Tell me to stop doing what I’m doing. You need to be able to deny this later, all of you. You have a family, Ed.”

“Cat—your parents, your—”

“I don’t have a husband or kids.” I talked over him. “My parents…will be okay.”

“Cat, listen to me, you have no idea what this will do to them. You don’t understand what it means to have the government come after you. Ellison Corp was dangerous on its own, but I want you to understand that this is worse—you don’t have what it takes to get away from the Secret Service. And don’t think they won’t send someone. They will.”

“It’s okay,” I said simply. I lifted one shoulder. “No, Ed, listen to me—you think I don’t know what I’m doing. But what’s the point of not showing this to the world?”

“You get to
live.
”

“For what?” I leaned forward. “So I can do more journalism and uncover more secrets I won’t tell? What’s the point of living if you don’t stand up for what’s right? People need to
know.
”

He sank his head into his hand and rubbed at his forehead. He sighed, and when he looked up, I saw the weary acceptance in his face.

“You’re not doing this alone.”

“Ed—”

“No. I’m drawing a line. You’re going to go in there today and quit, and then you’re going to come back here and we are going to work out a plan. There’s got to be someone we can find, someone high up, who will break this story for you. Don’t tell me no. If you care about the truth, then you’ll let it come from someone who can’t get dragged through the mud. Because they’re going to find out everything about you, Cat. And do you honestly think they won’t find something that discredits you?”

I froze. It was there, in his gaze. He knew everything. Fury kindled in my chest.

“Nate told you.”

He hesitated. “Yes.”

“Listen, I—”

“I’m not interested in hearing about it.” He cut me off with a gesture. “I believe you. I still believe you. But no one else will. Do you hear me, Cat?
No one else will.
So we need to figure out how to break this story. Come back here when you’ve quit at Ellison Corp and we’ll work it out.”

***

I was nearly out the door when I saw the car pulled up outside, and I stopped so suddenly that someone ran directly into my back. I felt hot coffee drench my back and the other person swore.

“Sorry.” I turned around and pushed my way back into the building, panic rising, as they called after me about my ruined blouse. I didn’t care about the blouse. I cared about Dominick, leaning against the limo with his hands in his pockets and his blue eyes fixed on the building.

Dominick, who must have known I came here. Dominick, who’d had me watched.

He was going to kill me.

I should have gone back to Edward’s office. We could have called the police, waited it out, done literally
anything
less stupid than what I did. Because in my panic, I pushed my way out the back entrance, into the alleyway that ran out to the side street. In the alley, in the silence, I leaned against the wall and struggled to calm the racing of my heart.

I didn’t have to struggle long, though. Whoever it was moved without a sound, and there was a flash of pain on the back of my head. I had a sense of falling, and consciousness was gone before I found out whether I’d hit the pavement or not.

- Dominick -

I waited longer than I should have, my hands clenched in my pockets, my eyes fixed on the revolving door that led out of the newspaper building. She worked here once, I told myself. She’d gone to have coffee with a former colleague. Maybe someone had had a baby and she was signing a card or—

I knew the truth. There was no point in denying it. She had gone to the newspapers. What was she going to tell them? Some lurid story about me and Kelly? She was going to twist my words and say that I’d admitted to killing her.

I got back into the car and closed the door carefully. I did not slam doors. I did not rage. I had learned, long ago, not to be that man. And no matter what Catriona said, no matter what she did, I was not going to let her get in the way.

“Where to, sir?”

“The office. Thank you.” I sat back in my seat and drummed my fingers against the handrest.

I needed to put her out of my mind. I would know what she wanted soon enough, and—

The images in my head were unwanted, but I could not stop them: her last night, bent over my bed, taking me deep with that toy in her ass. Her moaning for me on the floor of this limo. Her locking her ankles behind my back as I thrust deep. She was always so wet for me, so damned wet and desperate for each thrust, and I lost myself in that perfect body every time. I leaned my head back and gritted my teeth, clenching my hands. She was nothing but a body. Nothing but a liar like the rest of them. She’d just been good enough to fool me.

Something in me whispered that she was more, and I refused to listen. Catriona was nothing to me now.

***

“Jack.
Jack.
” I slammed my hand down on the desk, and the voice coming from the speakerphone broke off at last. “Thank you. This is not a crisis.”

“Do you understand what’s going to happen if they go through your apartment?” I’d finally made him angry. For years, Jack had slunk around like a whipped dog, cowed enough by my father and Sebastian that he kept his suggestions quiet and his objections silent. Now, at last, he was trying to be the father figure. “They’re going to find everything. Fuck, Dominick, what possessed you to keep documents—”

“You know exactly what.” I cut him off brutally. My voice was low and ugly, and it stopped him in his tracks. Good; Jack needed to learn. “Let’s level with one another, Jack, huh?”

There was a ringing silence, and I knew he was staring at the phone in horror. Who else might be on the other end of the line, listening? Russell Hayes? Sebastian? Where did Jack’s loyalties lie? We’d hit this point earlier than I thought. There was no point in berating myself over it; I would simply have to rectify the problem. I chose my words carefully now.

“We both know Sebastian didn’t want to leave. Don’t we, Jack?”

There was a pause. “Dominick—”

“Don’t we. Jack.”

“Yes.”

“We both know he wants me dead. Don’t we.”

This time there was a longer pause, and I almost thought I heard grief in his voice. “Yes.”

“Good. And we know that the board would sell their own grandmothers if it got them a sliver of what I have. Don’t we.”

“…Yes.” He didn’t want to say it, but he knew. It was nothing personal; they would have done it to my father, to Sebastian.

“So you know I can’t trust them with everything that happens in this company. You know—you
know
—Russell Hayes brought Sebastian back. It’s starting, Jack. I did what I had to do.”

I wished I could take back that last sentence; it betrayed too much. But he only sighed heavily.

“I know, kid. I know.”

I gave a weary look at the phone. Kid. “So?”

“So I’ll stall them. But goddammit, Dominick, get that stuff out of your apartment, do you hear me? We don’t have much time.”

“I know.” I ended the call and sighed, staring at the phone. I could do with another crisis, I thought. Something to keep my mind of—

“Ma’am?” Sarah’s voice.

“I need to see Dominick.”

My blood ran cold and I straightened as Catriona opened the door to my office. She looked terrible. It wasn’t the makeup or the hair—though I realized I hadn’t ever seen her when she wasn’t done up. It was something in her eyes. Something haunted. She shut the door behind her and I waited. My fingers twitched. What was this? An ultimatum?

When she spoke, however, the ground dropped out from under me.

“Who did you send for human testing?”

I stared at her wordlessly, and she swallowed hard. A single tear made a streak down the side of her face and she clenched her hands.

“Who did you send?” she repeated. “Who did you send for human testing last March?”