Page 48 of Stolen Temptation

Kiara blinks up at me, her eyes wide. She glances at the floor, chewing her bottom lip, and then, slowly, she returns her gaze to mine. “Books.”

“What kind of books?”

“Children’s books.Charlotte’s Web.Where the Wild Things Are.”

Her shoulders droop again, like she really is sad to be left alone.

“I’ll have a few titles sent up.” The words are out before I can think them over, but fuck it. I hate seeing her all mopey.

She rears back, eyes wide and stunned. “You will?” Her hands clasp together in front of her. “Thank you,” she breathes.

I try not to frown. She’s acting like I promised her a check for a million dollars, not a couple of dusty old books. “It’s no problem.”

The guard ends the exchange by closing the door between us.

Why do I feel unsatisfied?

It takes everything in me to peel myself away from her doorway and head down the hall and up two flights of stairs to the war room, where Finn’s waiting for me.

Somehow, it takes even more effort to keep myself from pulling up the estate’s internal security cam system to check on her.

What the hell is up with me right now? I really need to get a grip.

To distract myself, I text Harper and Riley about getting some books sent up to our honored guest, drop my phone in my pocket, and pull the doors to the war room open. Finn’s perched at the central table, eyes pouring over a map of the boroughs.

Red pins mark all the places where we’ve lost men in skirmishes and shoot-outs with the De Lucas and their sympathizers.

There are more pins now than there were the last time I was here.

The weight of that on Finn’s shoulders…I can see it the moment I enter the room. When I walk in, he glances up with a dark expression.

I stride toward him until we’re side by side.

“So? Did you find out who she is?”

“Not exactly, but I did learn what she does for the De Lucas.”

Finn grunts at me to continue, so I keep talking. By the time I finish, he’s got the same questions I do.

“So she’s the one who’s been generating the Libertas paintings that the De Lucas have been making millions off of on the black market.”

“Yep.”

Finn folds his arms as he processes this information. “Well, that does explain why a bunch of bastards with no taste have made a fortune in selling art.”

“I don’t know why we didn’t think of it sooner.” I grab my phone and toggle my way onto the secure server where I’ve been saving classified information about the De Lucas. “Money laundering. Shady deals. The black market.”

“They got into the business as smugglers.”

“And then decided to branch out.” I nod. He’s starting to get it.

“Perfect for scumbags like them to enrich themselves millions of times over…” Finn pushes out a breath. “Fuck, Rory, you may have really found it this time. The missing piece.”

The way he saysfound it this timebrings to memory all the failures of my past in one bitter bite of acid reflux.

I set my jaw but don’t say anything.

Finn draws back, startling me.