Dangerous Kisses (Siren Publishing Classic) by Tonya Ramagos Page A

the need to taste again, to be devoured again.
    She pushed last night from her mind and started walking. “I hope I’m right, too.” She paused at the front door of the building, allowed him to open it for her, and stepped inside.
    The sense that she had just stepped into a morgue swept over her as she moved into the eerie silence of the empty lobby. On a normal day, the lobby would be filling with people in less than an hour. Employees would bustling about, making the last preparations for the nine o’clock opening time.
    Today isn’t a normal day.
    “Everyone must be at the tank.” Drake’s hand came to rest on the small of her back. Electric bolts zinged through her at the possessive touch, looping through her system and tying a knot of need in her pussy. He steered her toward the employee doors across the lobby and down the hall to the tank room.
    Megan heard voices as they walked inside and topped the stairs. She caught the tail end of a sentence that surprised her even as the hope she had been feeling grew stronger.
    “…after the mess is cleaned up, I want to reopen, as early as tomorrow if at all possible.”
    Megan stepped further into the tank room, her attention instantly landing on Bandon’s back where he stood talking with Cusack at the edge of the tank.
    Cusack’s gaze flicked her way, moved passed her, and filled with an immediate distain. “As it stands right now, I don’t see a reason why you can’t.” His focus moved to her again, but his words were obviously meant for Brandon.
    “You’re talking about reopening tomorrow?” Drake dropped his hand from her back and walked passed her, his steps nearly silent as he strode onto the metal grating around the tank.
    Brandon turned to look at him and nodded. “I want to and the sergeant here has just told me I can.” He sighed and rubbed the back of his neck. “I don’t want it to seem insensitive, our reopening so soon after Paul’s death, but frankly we can’t afford to be closed. We’re losing money every second there isn’t a customer in this place.”
    “The reports of Paul’s attack hit the news hard last night,” Megan commented, joining the men at the edge of the tank. “It was still on every channel this morning.” She had turned on the television while she quickly dressed before leaving her apartment. Every local news broadcast had highlighted the attack. “I’m surprised the parking lot out there isn’t full of people trying to get in.”
    “When it hits the news that they can, they will be,” Brandon predicted. “And I know this will sound tactless but, from a business standpoint, we need to take advantage of the publicity.” He turned toward Megan and took her hands in his. “This place was Paul’s heart and soul. We both know that. He died here last night, but he was doing what he loved most. I want to see that continue.”
    Megan smiled, comforted by his consoling words. “Then we will do what we can to see that it happens.” She pulled her hands from Brandon’s and moved closer to the edge of the tank. Deep below the slightly pink water, the tiger shark swam slowly around the circumference of the tank as if today were just another day.
    It was an accident. A horrible one that left no one at fault but the shark.
    Cusack had been half right on the phone last night. What happened to Paul had been a horrible accident, but no one had been left at fault, not even the shark. It didn’t know it had done anything wrong. It only knew Paul had somehow provoked it to attack, and it had reacted in its natural, instinctive way.
    “We’ll have to drain the tank first,” she said aloud to no one in particular. “It will be easier to capture the fish, rays, and the smaller sharks. We can work on moving the big boy to the holding tank while that’s happening.”
    “Terry and Mark are in the control room about to start on that now,” Brandon told her.
    “We might have to tranquilize the tiger shark,” Drake said,