We follow the path around a corner, skirting a small garden where the scent of eucalyptus hangs in the air. Ahead, a covered patio leads to the back entrance.
“You think it’s still wired?” Chris asks, nodding toward the door.
“Less than the front. Cameras, but no audio in the residential half.”
He raises an eyebrow. “You know a lot about the security setup.”
“I helped design it.”
We approach the back entrance cautiously. The patio is lit by soft landscape lighting, creating pools of warm illumination against the darkness.
“We should just knock,” I say.
Chris hesitates, his eyes tracking along the roofline. “Give me a minute to check for blind spots.”
“Seriously?”
“Force of habit.”
He moves toward a cluster of ornamental grasses, crouching behind one large plume of pampas grass to examine something I can’t see from where I’m standing. The moonlight catches his profile, highlighting the tense set of his jaw.
“I don’t think this is necessary—” I start.
The impact comes from nowhere—a solid mass hitting me from behind, driving me face-first into the grass with enough force to knock the wind from my lungs. My arms are wrenched behind me, a knee pressing into my back, pinning me to the ground.
Chris grunts in surprise, followed by the unmistakable sound of a body hitting the earth.
The zip ties bite into my wrists as rough hands secure them tight. My face pressed into damp grass, I manage to turn my head just enough to meet Chris’s eyes across the patio. He’s pinned similarly, a man in dark clothing efficiently binding his hands.
Chris’s expression shifts from surprise to resignation, then to something almost like amusement. My own lips twitch despite the circumstances.
Of course Nina has a security team. I helped vet them myself. And of course we look like intruders because that’s exactly what we are.
We lie there, bound and silent, two idiots who should have just knocked.
25
Nina
Someone’s in my backyard.
I set my book aside and slip out of bed, pulse hammering in my throat. The motion sensors trip as I reach the kitchen, flooding my patio with light beyond the windows. A muffled grunt carries through the glass—then another—and adrenaline sharpens everything to crystalline clarity.
My hand finds the panic button on the kitchen island without conscious thought, but I don’t press it yet. Through the window, I catch a flash of movement near the ornamental grasses—dark shapes against darker shadows, too coordinated to be random intruders.
Then I hear a familiar voice, low and resigned: “Of course she has a security team.”
Chris.
I flip the interior light switch, then throw open the back door.
The scene that greets me would be comical if my heart wasn’t trying to punch through my sternum. Two men sprawled face-down in my yard, zip-tied at the wrists, with Lucia and Darius crouched over them like they’ve just bagged prize catches.
Wyatt’s face is turned toward me, his lower lip is split, swollen and dark against his pale skin. Chris lies a few feet away, dirt smudged across his jaw where blood has dried from what looks like a scrape. Both of them look resigned rather than surprised, like this is exactly what they expected to happen.
My stomach clenches. Did Lucia and Darius hurt them?
I’m not shocked they’re here. The way I fled tonight, the conversation we didn’t finish, everything hanging between us. What surprises me is that they came together, given how Wyatt looked ready to throttle Chris when I left. And naturally they were stupid enough to try sneaking around instead of just knocking on my door like normal human beings.
