Dragon Discovering Read online

  Claire sat down.

  She didn’t know how, exactly, she knew it, but in that moment she knew with everything in her that she could trust Seth. He kept his hand on hers, his warm palm never moving as she raised her eyes to look at Councilor Morgan.

  “Okay. I understand.”

  Councilor Morgan, along with all of the other Councilors, looked immensely relieved.

  “Thank you, Claire. Trust me, this isn’t an easy situation for any of us. But we do appreciate you and all the hard work you have put into being a productive citizen in Torch Lake.”

  Claire nodded numbly as the Councilors stood to leave. They all patted her on the arm or squeezed her shoulders, and it took all of her energy to raise her eyes and politely nod at them. After they had left, Claire sat there, not moving for several long moments. Seth kept his hand over hers. She liked the way it felt, warm and strong, but she felt confused, too. If he believed in her, and he wanted to help her, then why would he have told her to let the Councilors go with barely more than one attempt at a protest?

  As if he could hear her questions, Seth tilted his head to look at her.

  “I’ve worked pretty closely with the Councilors for some time now, and I’ve gotten a good feel for how they work. I was worried that this might happen. They’re good people, and good leaders, but they all have a little bit of a stubborn streak.”

  Claire turned her head to meet Seth’s eyes. The intensity she saw there made her stomach do a funny little flip-flop, and she forced herself to hold his gaze when it would have been easier to look away. She wasn’t sure what this cocktail of emotions she was feeling right now meant. All she knew was that she never wanted Seth to move his hand away from hers. Having him there helped her feel grounded in a week that had otherwise been complete chaos. Seth gave her a sweet, encouraging smile, and then continued.

  “The Councilors tend to get their minds set on one thing, and stick to their decision on it. Sometimes, that can be a good thing. You don’t want leaders who are changing paths with every gust of wind, after all. But it can be a bad thing, too, like it is in this situation. Sometimes they stick so stubbornly to their decisions that they refuse to give new and opposing evidence a fair chance.”

  “So I’m just supposed to give up and let them be stubborn?”

  Seth laughed. “Not exactly. You should let them be stubborn, but that doesn’t mean you’re giving up. You’re going to look for whoever caused this explosion. And I’m going to help you.”

  Claire frowned. “But how are we going to look for the person who did this on our own? We don’t exactly have the resources we would need for a manhunt.”

  “Where there’s a will, there’s a way.”

  “Care to be more specific about that ‘way’?”

  Seth winked at her. “Sure. Video surveillance.”

  “Um, maybe a little more specific? I’m still not following you.”

  Seth sat up straight with a broad smile on his face. “As a high-level employee at the Dragon Utilization Department, and a dragon shifter, I have access to the security cameras from all of the government buildings. I think we should review footage from every building for the time surrounding the explosion. If it’s true that they were trying to distract the town so that it would be focused on the television station and not on a building they were getting into, we might find some security footage of them causing trouble or breaking in to some other building.”

  “But wouldn’t someone have seen the footage already? Surely the security guards would have checked the security footage for each building.”

  “I don’t think so. No one was watching security cameras closely because they were watching the explosion. And if no alarms were tripped or nothing was obviously stolen, the guards probably wouldn’t bother to go back and look though the few minutes they missed.”

  Claire felt her heart starting to race with excitement. “Maybe you’re right. And if we find something, then the High Council will have to believe us.”

  Seth shrugged. “Depends on what we find. We might need to do some more searching after getting some clues from the video footage. But, in any case, it’s going to be more than what the High Council is doing now.”

  “Which is nothing,” Claire said bitterly.

  “Exactly. So, are you in?”

  “I’m in,” Claire said, doing her best to sound confident even though her hands were shaking. She wasn’t sure where the shaking was coming from. Perhaps from the fact that she was excited to have a way to at least try to track down the man responsible for the explosion. Perhaps from her worry that the High Council wouldn’t like it if they knew that she and Seth were going to attempt to find someone despite the experts calling the whole situation an accident. Or maybe, just maybe, from the little thrill that went through her body every time she thought about spending time with Seth. Reviewing that footage would likely take hours, and she would need to spend all of those hours with Seth, sitting in a small room. The idea of being so close to him for so long held great appeal for Claire.

  Seth was still smiling over at her, and Claire’s stomach was doing a series of rapid-fire flip-flops. She couldn’t think straight around him, and it took all of her concentration to make a coherent question.

  “When will we start?” she asked, hoping that her voice didn’t sound as shaky as she felt.

  “Tomorrow morning. I’ll need a little time to get all of the footage together. I’ll get copies of all the computer files, and then we can watch it in my office. I have a pretty large screen for my work computer, so I’ll just play them on there. Hopefully it won’t take too long to come across something, but you never know. We might have to sit there for a while.”

  Claire nodded. Under normal circumstances, she would have balked at the idea of having to sit still in a tiny office. But knowing that she’d be sitting there with Seth made it all seem bearable. In fact, she was almost looking forward to it.

  She realized she was falling for Seth, and normally that realization would have made her run in the other direction. She didn’t date clients, and she’d met him as a client. Besides, he was a dragon shifter. What could a simple wizard like her offer to a mighty dragon shifter? Claire thought she was reasonably good-looking, and she had her life together for the most part—she had a good job, a nice house, and a good group of friends. She had hobbies and interests outside of work, too. She liked to think of herself as a well-rounded person, but that didn’t mean she had enough to attract a dragon like Seth.

  He had obviously seen something in her, though. He kept his hand over hers as he continued to outline his plans for watching the video footage. Claire had a hard time paying attention to every word. Her head was spinning as she nodded at him. And then she giggled, despite herself.

  Maybe it wasn’t such a bad thing that the High Council hadn’t trusted her. After all, their refusal to help her meant she was now going to get to spend a great deal of alone time with Seth. She could hardly complain about that. By the time Seth finally withdrew his hand and stood to leave, Claire was counting down the hours until she would get to spend hours with him.

  Bring on the boring surveillance. Claire had a feeling it wasn’t going to be all that boring after all.

  Chapter Eight

  Reviewing security footage with Claire around turned out to be a lot more difficult than Seth would have thought. How was he supposed to pay attention to boring, grainy, black-and-white videos when a beautiful wizard was sitting right here in his office, live and in full color?

  He could have sworn that just looking at her made his heart beat faster. He should have known this was going to happen. He’d been drawn to her from the moment he met her, so it was no surprise that being alone with her in his office had sparked all kinds of feelings. The chemistry between them filled the air with a thick, passionate tension.

  Seth was enjoying himself more than he cared to admit, although he was beginning to worry about how much footage he had missed while laughing and tal
king with Claire. He might have to rewatch several of these videos just to make sure he hadn’t overlooked something while laughing with Claire. Oh well, if that was the case, it just meant he’d have more time to spend with the beautiful woman who was quickly capturing his heart.

  “So what brought you to Torch Lake, then?” Seth asked. Claire had been telling him about how she had trained as a makeup artist and then moved to Roseston, a wizard city best known for housing a large number of celebrity wizards.

  Claire shrugged. “I didn’t like the pace of life in Roseston too much. Don’t get me wrong—I’m grateful for the opportunities I had there. I learned a lot. And after the War, it was a nice place to be. People there were determined to move on and not let the devastation of the battles define them. I admire that spirit, especially when so many other clans just gave up and acted like life itself was too much of a chore after all the devastation. Roseston kept things upbeat and festive all the time, and the constant stream of special events meant good business for a makeup artist. I never lacked for work. But the celebrities were rude, and their managers were often ruder. I wanted a place to work where I would still have a lot of opportunities, but I wouldn’t have to be constantly treated like crap. And I wanted to live in a city where people are positive.”

  “Well Torch Lake isn’t perfect, but there is a lot of positivity here, that’s for sure.”

  Claire nodded. “It’s been a great experience for me. My boss over at Torch Lake Today can be a bit demanding at times, but he’s fair. He compliments me when I do a good job, and he’s always generous with yearly bonuses. Plus, I still get to work with celebrities quite a bit, and they tend to be a lot nicer to me when getting ready for a television appearance than they were back in Roseston when I did their makeup for all kinds of events like award shows or even birthday parties.”

  Seth blinked. “People get makeup professionally done just for a birthday party?”

  Claire laughed. “Yes. Celebrities do. They want to always look their best.”

  Seth shook his head and turned his attention back to the video screen, which he had once again been neglecting to watch. “I think I’m good with my non-makeup best.”

  Claire started to say something else, but Seth held up his hand to stop her as he saw a flash of movement on the screen. They were watching footage from one of the secure rooms in the Dragon Recovery Bureau, and it looked like someone was sneaking in. Seth felt his heart start to race. Maybe this was it. They were only a few hours into their little footage watching party. Was it possible they had already found something?

  The figure sneaking into the room was definitely acting suspicious. He looked around as though making sure no one was there, creeping slowly into the room. Then he turned around and gestured behind him, beckoning someone to come in and follow him. Seth held his breath as he watched. This had to be it. Some group of Dark Warriors had snuck into the Dragon Recovery room to steal something. But what?

  The second figure to appear on the screen was shorter than the first, and curvy. A woman. Seth watched as she also looked around, seeming to check if anyone else was there. Finally, she looked at the man and nodded, satisfied that they were alone. Seth bounced his knee up and down, anxiously watching to see what they would take.

  But a moment later, instead of looking for documents to take from the room, the man and woman ran into each other’s arms. They started making out, fast and furious, apparently unaware of the fact that they were in full view of a security camera. Seth watched for a moment, openmouthed, and then he burst out laughing.

  “Oh man, how lucky are those two? Normally security would have been on their ass in a heartbeat, telling them to get a room—a room that wasn’t a secure area of the Dragon Recovery Bureau.”

  Claire was laughing, too. “Yeah. Luckily for them, security was too busy watching the explosions at the Torch Lake Today building to notice their little makeout session.”

  Seth shrugged, wiping tears of laughter from his eyes. “Don’t worry. I’m sure they’ll try it again, since they got away with it this time. Next time they go into their little private room they’ll probably get a nice visit from security.”

  Seth leaned forward and started fast-forwarding through the footage of the two making out. Sped up, the two black-and-white figures looked especially funny. Eventually, they took their clothes off and fully consummated their relationship right there in front of the camera. Seth looked away, laughing again. “I feel like I’m intruding into someone’s bedroom.”

  Claire was laughing, too, but her face was slightly red with embarrassment. “Oh, god. How awful. But how can they have no idea that they’re on camera? It’s a room full of secure documents, for crying out loud.”

  “Some people don’t think, I guess.”

  By the time Seth had finished skipping through the couple’s little lovemaking session, the video footage of this room had gone far beyond the time of the explosion. He closed it out and went to search for the next room on the list. He and Claire had been methodically going through footage for every government security camera, from forty-five minutes before to forty-five minutes after the time of the explosion. Seth figured that gave them a wide enough window that they would definitely see anyone who had tried to sneak into any of these rooms while the city was distracted.

  He’d been playing the videos at double speed, but they still took forever to get through. At this rate, he and Claire would be sitting in his office doing nothing but watching these videos for the next two weeks. Not that he minded spending time with Claire, but he wasn’t sure how he was going to manage to screen all this footage and get his regular work done, too. Thankfully things were slow right now, but still. He’d have to make sure he carved out some time to do some things for his real job, or people were going to start complaining.

  Of course, the best case scenario would be that he and Claire got lucky, and that one of the first videos they watched would just happen to be the one they needed. He’d thought for a moment that this had been the case several minutes ago, when he first saw the man at the Dragon Recovery Bureau come on the screen. Seth chuckled. That had been the most amusing false alarm ever.

  He found the next file and hit play, then glanced at the clock on his computer and groaned. It was eleven-thirty, which meant the day wasn’t even half over yet. After this video was done they could go get lunch, but then there would be several more hours of boring footage.

  “Here goes our next thrilling flick,” Seth said. “I’m sure it will keep us on the edge of our seats.”

  The security footage showed another secure room at the Dragon Recovery Bureau. It looked similar to the first one, but this time no secret lovers appeared on stage. Seth’s eyes glazed over as he watched the grainy image of the room. The only thing on the screen that moved was the little counter on the bottom of the screen. The numbers changed rapidly, showing the passage of time.

  As they went further and further past the time that the explosion had happened, Seth knew that it became less and less likely that this room was going to have the security footage they were looking for. He forced himself to pay attention, anyway, until the video finally ended. He glanced at the clock again. It was after twelve now. He wasn’t actually all that hungry, but he wouldn’t mind a break from all this monotony.

  “Lunch?” he asked Claire.

  She shrugged. “I could eat, but I’m not starving. What if we try to get through one more and then go grab something?”

  Seth nodded. He didn’t want to watch another video right now, but the more they did now the shorter their afternoon would be. He’d told himself he was shutting down the video watching operation at five o’clock, no matter what. “Alright. Here we go.”

  He hit play on the next video. This one was from the Bureau of Magical Artifacts. Seth didn’t think they would find much on here, since the rooms in the Bureau had actual guards in front of most of the doors. Still, he wanted to be thorough in his search, so they would watch these video
s, too.

  This video showed a room full of artifacts that seemed to not be organized at all. There were piles everywhere of rings, wands, wizards’ hats, pots, magic balls, and all sorts of other things that Seth didn’t recognize.

  “Jeez. Looks like they need to hire a few people to organize that,” Claire said, leaning forward to try to get a better look.

  “I think this is the intake room,” Seth said. “I’ve never seen it before, but I’ve heard some of the Bureau of Magical Artifacts employees talk about how messy it is. They weren’t kidding.”

  “Yeah. We had some rooms like this at the television station. Granted it wasn’t anything as valuable as magical artifacts. But, wow, some of the rooms with props and stuff were just ridiculous. I don’t know how anyone would have ever been able to find anything they needed in there. I never understood why they didn’t just send a few people up there for an afternoon to take care of it. I guess it doesn’t matter now. That room is in ruins just like the rest of the building.”

  Seth hated how sad Claire sounded. He reached over and patted her shoulder. “Don’t worry. They’ll rebuild it.”

  When his hand made contact with her body, though, it was hard to think about anything other than how beautiful she was. As she looked over at him, the air between them seemed to fill with electricity. He wanted nothing more in that moment than to lean in and kiss her. They had chemistry, there was no denying that. But he wasn’t sure how she felt about him, and it didn’t seem like a good idea to make things awkward between them when they had a week or more left of watching video footage together.

  He withdrew his hand and looked back at the computer screen, trying not to think about how attracted he felt to the woman sitting next to him. They were sitting so close that he could smell her perfume, a soft floral scent. Seth had figured the best way for them both to watch the footage was to borrow an extra desk chair so that there would be two desk chairs behind his desk, side-by-side. This arrangement did make sense for watching the footage, but it had the unintended side effect of keeping Claire too close for Seth to ignore his feelings.