Page 33 of Playing Dirty

Sawyer was already sliding out of the booth. “Yousit.I’llgo.”

I watched him cross the street like he was on a grocery run and not about to confirm the worst-case scenario. He vanished through the automatic doors.

And I sat.

Fuming. Pacing.

If he came back with a loaf of bread and no intel, I might’ve thrown it at his head.

Because I already knew the answer.

I just didn’t want to be right.

Sawyer came out five minutes later, casual as hell, a plastic grocery bag swinging from his hand.

He didn’t speak until he reached the truck and got in. “It’s him.”

I didn’t move.

“They both work there,” he continued, voice low. “She works in the deli. He’s the damn regional manager.”

He reached into the bag and pulled out a pack of gum, tossed it in the console. “Picture of him is on the wall by the breakroom bulletin board. Suit and tie. Big smile. Frontier Markets Inc. under his name.”

“And her?” I asked, already knowing.

“Wedding ring. Left hand. Didn’t look new.”

I looked down at the bag of junk he brought out—gum, candy bars, two weird off-brand sodas—and hated how normal it all felt.

The truth had never tasted so fake.

My stomach twisted. Not with just anger this time, but something else. Something sharper.

Desire.

Not for revenge. Not even for justice. But to be the one Callie turned to when it all crumbled. To be the one she leaned into—angry, aching, undone. To be the one shetrusted.

Hopefully… the one she let fall apart in the dark with.

The pieces were there now, and I held the match.

We waited until full dark before making our move.

Sawyer laid the plan out like we were storming a compound, not slipping through a half-collapsed barn across from a cheater’s white picket dream life.

“We park at the Stop & Go, half a mile down,” he said, tucking the trail cam into a small duffel. “No lights, no chatter, low and fast. In and out in ten minutes.”

“You want me to roll through the ditch, too?” I muttered. “Or just army-crawl the last hundred yards?”

He didn’t even crack a smile. “Only if you trip and draw attention. Which, given your track record... might be wise.”

We left the truck in the back corner of the convenience store lot, cut across a shallow drainage culvert, and hiked the rest on foot. The night was quiet except for our footfalls and Sawyer’s steady breathing beside me.

The barn loomed up like a ghost—same broken fencing, same sagging beams. It looked even more forgotten under moonlight.

Sawyer moved with purpose, guiding us around the edge, ducking under the fallen tree limb like he’d done it a dozen times. I followed, a little less gracefully, catching my boot on a root and nearly eating dirt.

When it came time to mount the cam, I pulled out the zip ties and fumbled them twice.