Dev’s gaze returned to the screen. “I’m going to find Evan and have a chat with him about our issues.”
A few clicks and a zoomed-in live feed of the bar popped up mid-screen. “Looks like he’s enjoying a bourbon,” Leland said. Evan Strickland, of Strickland Security Systems, was one of their two-dozen charter members.
Dev liked keeping business within the membership. Emily handled the catering. A domme owned a commercial cleaning company. Another member operated a fleet of charter planes under an exclusive contract with Devlin & Associates.
He stood, smoothing a hand over the front of his shirt, and headed for the door. “Expect a service technician within the hour.”
When the door closed, Leland sat alone again. For a few minutes, he focused where he should—on the feeds, the movement, the patterns.
He checked the patio, the lounge inside, the rear hall with the private rooms, and the main play space. But he wasn’t looking for trouble. He searched every frame that might hold a flash of blonde he already knew wouldn’t be there.
He swore and wasn’t quiet about it. Even when alone, when he had a job to do, Julia was a distraction. He forced his attention to the monitors.
***
Leland didn’t wait for the technician. After his relief arrived, he stepped out of the control room, flashlight in hand. He took the side stairs down to the parking lot and moved through the trees to the perimeter fence. His eyes worked ahead of him—scanning the tree line, the shadows, sightlines, and exits. The same scan he’d done a thousand times, muscle memory and instinct layered together until it required almost no conscious thought. Except tonight, his focus centered more on tech than usual.
He reached the first marker and paused, checking the small, recessed sensor at the base of the post. It was intact; the casing clean, the seal unbroken. He moved on.
The fence line stretched along the sides and front of the property, partially obscured by dense landscaping designed as much for privacy as for aesthetics. Boone had passed throughrecently. His tracks remained faintly visible in the dew-damp ground.
Routine sweep. No deviation. Leland checked it anyway. His hand brushed the fence, not to steady himself but to feel it—tension, vibration, anything out of place.
At the river, he stopped. It was a natural barrier, but not an unguarded one. There were cameras and motion sensors there too, as well as on the dock. He looked toward the house. From here, warm light spilled from the upper two floors, the patio and playground hidden beyond the hedges. It was a controlled environment. Carefully designed and closely monitored.
His looked toward the trees beyond the fence. Dark and still, aside from the movement of birds in the branches. Watching it too long was a good way to imagine things, and Leland didn’t deal in imagination. He dealt in predictability, in evidence, and right now, he had neither.
Leland continued the circuit. At the dock, familiar boats sat in their slips, the same as every Wednesday and Saturday—club night at Devil’s Pointe. The mooring ropes appeared tight; the vessels, mostly cabin cruisers, bobbed gently with the current. The weather was calm, nothing out of the ordinary.
He scanned the waterline and beyond it. All clear. He crouched briefly, checking the lower camera housing mounted near the dock’s edge. It showed no signs of interference. No loosened screws. No scoring.
He straightened slowly.
In all likelihood, it was a glitch in the system. A delay in processing. Something either Callan or the system tech would isolate and patch before morning.
Leland cut along the hedges toward the house. The entrance to the labyrinth loomed ahead, the arbor casting a deeper shadow across the path. He slowed without meaning to and stood for a moment, listening. The distant music barely reachedthrough the hedges, replaced by the closer, quieter sounds of movement, hushed voices, the occasional laugh, and the faint trickle of water at its center.
He didn’t go in. There were too many memories. The kind that led to thoughts he couldn’t afford. Of a future that wasn’t for him.
He mentally reset and stepped away. He’d found no disturbance. No forced entry. Nothing that justified escalation. He made a last pass along the side of the house before heading back toward the security office.
At the top of the stairs, he paused, one hand resting briefly against the frame. The grounds were secure. The systems were running. Everything checked out.
Yet, a nagging sense of unease remained. Whether it stemmed from system glitches or the blonde occupying too much space in his head, he wasn’t entirely sure.
Chapter 5
Julia kicked her shoes off the moment she stepped inside, her feet aching from being on them all day. She crossed the living room and dropped onto the couch, propping her sore feet on the coffee table with a sigh.
Only now did she notice the quiet.
The night ahead loomed long and empty. She reached for the remote and flipped through her streaming services, finding nothing that held her interest. After a few minutes, she switched the TV off and opened her laptop, telling herself she’d get ahead on next week’s work.
An hour later, she’d answered two emails, reread the same invoice three times, and spent far too much time thinking about a man who had never promised her anything.
Not so many weeks ago, she would have been getting ready for club night. Now, she was sitting alone in an apartment that suddenly felt too large.
Wednesday and Saturday nights used to have a rhythm to them. A reason to get dressed up. Somewhere to be. People expecting to see her.
