Page 146 of Played By Design

I break the kiss, breathing hard. “Take me home, mate.”

Kain’s mouth curves against mine. “Anything you want, Bunny.”

EPILOGUE

KAIN

The tires crunch as Luca pulls the car to a stop and kills the engine.

“Here we are,” Rowan says.

Ash pops open the door on his side and climbs out. Saint scoots across the bench seat and straightens from the vehicle, one hand braced on the roof of the sedan as he takes in the building.

Luca slides out from behind the wheel, and Rowan and I follow.

Gravel shifts under my boots, and cold air cuts through my jacket, despite the season edging toward spring.

The squat brown-brick building sits on a side street in Ashford Heights, the chipped mortar between the bricks out of place in the more affluent part of the city.

Rowan circles the front of the car, his breath fogging in the air as he scans the building’s front, the windows, the roofline, and the narrow alley to the left, where a fire escape climbs the wall in rusted segments.

Saint moves to the alley mouth, pauses, and looks up. He studies the fire escape from ground to roof, then to the dumpster shoved against the brick. One hand rests at his hip, close to where he keeps his knife.

“Clear,” he says, quiet enough not to carry.

Luca moves up beside me, a half-step behind my left shoulder.

“The IP finally resolved to this building,” I say. “Last ping was three months ago. Right after the house attack.”

Three months of following threads into dead ends, all to put an address to the people who tried to sell the Vartanians’ stolen data.

And it all led here.

Ash approaches the door first because that’s what he’s here to do. Locks are his territory. He has it open before we even reach the porch, the showoff.

Rowan strokes a hand over his mate’s hair, and Ash falls back to stay with the car. I push the door open an inch and stop. The hinge protests with a whine that sets my teeth on edge.

“Easy,” Rowan says from behind me.

I push it wider. The door swings inward on hinges that haven’t seen oil in a decade, each degree of movement accompanied by a groan that carries down the empty hallway beyond.

The space inside is dark, and it takes a second for my eyes to adjust.

Dust hangs in the air and coats my tongue, old and metallic.

Saint moves past me into the hallway without a sound. Rowan follows, his broad shoulders almost brushing the doorframe. Luca brings up the rear, pulling the door closed behind us with a click too final for my liking.

We move through the downstairs, clearing empty rooms one by one.

On the second floor, we find the server racks still bolted to the floor, the industrial metal frames the kind that cost more than most people’s cars.

Empty now. Gutted.

I curse under my breath. It was a slim chance they’d still be here, but I’d hoped they’d at least leave something behind that would point us toward the assholes who’ve been causing us so much trouble.

I move down the row, boots kicking up dust with each step. The hardwood is scarred, worn smooth in the pathways between the racks where someone walked a thousand times.

Rectangular outlines mark where equipment sat for years, the floor still showing signs of an old polish beneath a fine layer of undisturbed dust, like negative space carved into the floor.