Nathan nodded. “That’s what Gideon said when I told him what I’d found. He’s running some hacks now, said he’ll report back as soon as he turns up any leads.”
As the Order’s longtime chief intelligence officer and resident genius, Gideon in D.C. hadn’t run field missions in many years, but the vampire was an absolute killer behind the keyboard.
“Gonna take a hell of a lot more than lawyers and corporate shields to keep Gideon from exposing Cass and whoever he’s hiding behind,” Rafe said. “There’s never been a database in existence that he couldn’t crack.”
Nathan agreed, but time spent waiting was time wasted. While Headquarters was hacking into Cass’s life from D.C., Nathan and his team needed to keep up the pressure locally.
“Tell Eli and Jax we’ll meet in fifteen for a review of tonight’s patrol. We may not know everything about Cassian Gray yet, but there’s one obvious constant in his life and that’s La Notte.” Nathan headed for the exit. “We need to start disrupting his business, rattle the hive, and see what it stirs up. And we start tonight.”
Jordana walked the exhibit floor at the museum, taking a slow measure of the entire collection and jotting notes on her tablet. Last night’s patron preview had been a means of thanking the various donors and community supporters, but it had also been a dry run for the exhibit in preparation for its public opening in just a few nights.
She perused the pieces and their placement, making minute adjustments to temperature and humidity settings, double-checking text cards and lighting levels for each of the displays.
Anything to keep her mind from straying to her unsettling encounter with Nathan earlier that morning.
He’d been crude and confrontational. Impolite and far too bold. He was terrifying, not because of his profession or his past but because of the way he seemed to see straight into her soul and lay her bare.
He was dangerous for so many reasons.
And yet she couldn’t stop thinking about the things he said to her. She couldn’t stop thinking about the way he made her feel. Her pulse quickened at the memory of being alone with Nathan in close quarters.
He hadn’t even touched her, yet her body had thrummed with the need to feel his hands on her.
Have you ever kissed Elliott Bentley-Squire the way you kissed me?
Nathan’s words came back to her in a heated rush, making the ache return again now. She tried to will it away, but it was already taking root deep inside her. In truth, it had never fully ebbed in all the hours since she’d seen Nathan at the mansion.
Has he ever made your cheeks flame just by looking at you, or made your pulse beat like a hammer in your veins because of the things you wish he’d do to you?
Jordana idly brought her free hand up to her lips, finding it all too easy to imagine it was Nathan’s mouth brushing against hers, not the tips of her suddenly trembling fingers. He had been right about that too—she didn’t regret kissing him. Not even after the things he said to her today.
Not even after the mortifying things she’d admitted to him about her relationship with Elliott and her lack of experience in general.
God, why had she told him that? What had possessed her to admit so much to him with so little provocation? Nathan knew more about her now than anyone besides her best friend. What more might she be willing to tell him—or willing to do—if she ever saw him again?
I’m the last kind of man you should want in your life … or in your bed.
She didn’t doubt that for a minute, yet her blood still throbbed in her veins, kindling the knot of heat that pulsed in her core. Her nape tingled beneath the loose chignon of her upswept hair, the pulse points in her neck echoing in her ears with each heavy beat of her heart. Warmth spread down her throat and across the tops of her br**sts, making her light silk blouse feel as hot and confining as a winter sweater.
“Hello? Earth to Jordana.” Carys’s voice broke into Jordana’s thoughts like a splash of cold water. “Did you hear a word I said?”
“Sorry,” Jordana blurted. “I was just finishing a note on this display.”
Carys cocked her head and narrowed her eyes slightly, as if she didn’t quite buy the excuse. “I’ve got the temps and humidity readings you asked for on the French tapestry displays.” She tapped her tablet screen and sent the data to Jordana’s device.
Jordana scanned the report and nodded her approval. “This looks good, Carys, thank you. I would like to see the lighting muted a bit on the Beauvais pastoral piece. I noticed last night that we were losing some of the more subtle colors of the weaving.”
“Okay,” Carys replied. “Are you still rethinking the placement of the Roman mosaics?”
Jordana glanced over to the display of ancient tiles encased in a multi-tiered tower of Plexiglas in the center of the exhibit. She considered for a moment, then gave a nod. “Yes, let’s have that switched with something else. Sleeping Endymion would be a better focal point for that section of the exhibit, don’t you think?”
Carys smiled. “Your favorite piece. Sure, I think it’s a great idea.”
They walked over to the clear case that housed the Italian sculpture that was more than three hundred years old. The terra cotta depiction of the mortal shepherd Endymion reposed in eternal slumber where he waited for his lover, the lunar goddess Selene, had enchanted Jordana from the moment she first saw it. Donated anonymously, the sculpture had been part of the museum’s permanent collection for at least two decades.