“I’m concerned about Evangeline. She’s an innocent bystander in all of this.”
Warren gripped Sin’s shoulder and offered a fatherly smile. “Then focus your energies on keeping you both safe.”
“I’ve got this.”
“And that’s what worries me, son.” He hugged him and smiled warmly at Evangeline. “Good meeting you. Perhaps Sin will bring you by under better circumstances.” And with that, he left.
Sin’s smile was tainted by sadness. “I’m sorry to have put you through this, especially on Christmas.”
She curled her hand around his arm. “Let’s get out of here.”
“Where to?” he asked.
“To pick up your bike and then to your office.”
“We’re working?”
“Damn straight. We need to find the person who torched your club.”
“You must be exhausted. Don’t you think you should go home and get some—”
“Absolutely not. Sleep is overrated.”
When they pulled up to Uninhibited, Sin let out a sigh. All that was left was the foundation, the brick front and the lounge. All three floors on the backside of the club were a smoldering heap. Sin got out of her vehicle and surveyed the charred remains.
Evangeline joined him. “This could have been so much worse.” She hugged herself, but she couldn’t stop trembling. “Oh, God, this could have ended badly.”
He stared at the burned building. “We’re booked solid on New Year’s Eve. So many people would have died if the club had been torched that night.” His voice was whisper quiet, but when he regarded her, determination shone from his eyes. “Iwillfind him, and he’ll wish he never did this to us.”
As she followed him back to his office, she couldn’t take her eyes off him. Sinclair Develin on a Ducati was the best eye candy. An already scorching hot man morphed into a full-blown Adonis on that machine. The only thing missing was her, on the back, holding on to him like he was hers.
Though she wouldn’t confess her true feelings, she was worried. Worried for his safety. Based on that text, someone wanted him dead. Someone who had seen them go into the club and hoped they wouldn’t make it out alive. A shiver skirted through her and she turned up the heat.
They parked in his private lot and headed upstairs to Develin & Associates. She brewed a high-octane pot of coffee while he made a few calls. Assuming he was calling some of the club employees, she gave him space, but he found her in the break room.
“She’s with me now,” he said into his phone. “I’m making Evangeline’s case my top priority, so I need you to make the club fire yours.” While listening, he poured himself coffee and topped hers off. “No, you don’t need to come in now.” He ended the call and hung up. Then, he shifted his attention to her. “Our evening should have gone in a completely different direction.”
God, she’d missed his voice. Like thunder rumbling in a spring rainstorm. Deep, dark, and so damn sexy. “It should have,” she replied before she could check herself. “But we can’t go there.”
“No, we can’t.”
Her heart dipped. Squaring her shoulders, she squelched her emerging disappointment. “I appreciate that you’re making me—my case—top priority. I would return the favor and isolate that burner number, if access to the Bureau’s databases hadn’t been ripped away from me.”
Power shone from his eyes. “I can get you in.” He gestured for her to join him and they carried their mugs toward his office.
“How is that possible? We have a dedicated team who scans our systems to ensure no one hacks in.”
“You’ll be accessing the database as me,” he said as he entered his office.
“Is there anything youdon’thave access to?”
“You.”
Heat blazed across her skin and her heart skipped a beat. That one powerful word had her tamping down on a desire to pull him into her arms and smother him with endless kisses.
With a gleam in his eyes, he held her gaze an extra beat before extracting a laptop from his credenza. Then, he pulled out a chair at the conference table. “Please.”
She eased down and he sat beside her. Their clothes, their skin and their hair all smelled of smoke, but it was the embers theycouldn’tsee that continued burning brightly. The fire that had never been extinguished threatened to flare into white-hot flames.
