Chapter 27
Awhole bottle of champagne landed on the bed. Thankfully, it was unopened, but Nala was compelled to jump off anyway.
“It’s a good thing we… good thing we didn’t drink anymore…” Robin sat in Nala’s place, holding out her arms as if she couldn’t protect her balance any other way. Lucian flopped near the pillows and jostled the whole damn thing. “Because I want this to be awesome.”
Nala stood near the wall, keeping her satchel close to her chest. “What are you guys doing here?” That was all Nala, not Nightingale – because Nightingale knew damn well what “group fun” meant. I can’t believe this. No wait, yes I can believe it.
“This bed is way more comfortable than the one we got,” Lucian revealed.
“That one is all squeaky. This one is nice and sturdy.”
He patted it to reiterate his point. “You’re a lucky woman, Lake.”
Lucian’s attempt to put his hand on Varen’s shoulder ended with him landing on his stomach in the middle of the bed.
I can smell the alcohol over here. How plastered are they?
Robin was obviously a lightweight. Lucian, on the other hand, either set a record for a guy his size or had nearly drunk Ravenwood out of his home.
“Hi.” Robin attempted to climb in Varen’s lap but was met with a firm hand against the shoulders. “Wow, you smell good, Mistress Varen. Doesn’t… doesn’t she smell good, Lucian?”
“Like roses.”
Nala briefly met Varen’s eyes from across the room. “Don’t you dare,” Varen said. “Don’t you dare leave me with these crazy people.”
“Um, I gotta go to the bathroom first,” Nala announced, shuffling toward the door. “Little girl business. You three go ahead and get started!”
She ducked out of the room before Varen noticed.
Uh-oh. Nala stood in the hallway, alone, looking back and forth for anyone who might be watching her in turn. She heard the occasional reveler somewhere in the hall. Luckily, none of them were Hawk or Ravenwood.
Varen had told her that the office was a few doors down. Well, she still had her satchel and the pin in her possession. There was no reason for her not to make a go of it, assuming she could find the office.
Look for a room closed all the way and with a normal-looking lock. If pressed, she could say she was looking for the bathroom around there. Nala started shuffling, trying to be quiet but also convinced that the echo of her heartbeat could be heard in Timbuktu.
She was reaching the end of the hall. Had she gone the wrong way and Varen meant the other direction?
As she thought that, she came upon the final door before another one marked RESTROOM on a gold plaque. No wonder Varen had found the office so easily. It was the only unmarked door closed all the way. It also had a lock prime for picking.
Nala forced herself against the wall. She looked behind her again, making sure the coast was clear before jamming her hairpin into the lock and jostling it about.
What the fuck was she doing? She had no idea how to break a lock!
All she knew came from the movies. Spies were able to put in hairpins, fingernails, pretty much anything and break into a room with nary a sweat broken in turn.
Except this was Nala. This was real life.
She couldn’t jam a hairpin into a lock and…
Something clicked. Nala turned the handle and watched the door miraculously open, admitting her without a second thought. Oh, shit!
She looked around again, convinced that at any moment the police would come storming down the hall and arrest her for breaking and entering. That was the kind of kinky shit she wasn’t into. She also doubted that Varen liked gruff handcuffs as opposed to her silky ropes.
When she was sure that nobody had seen her, Nala stepped in, keeping to the wall.
The lights were off, which was good for cloaking her – although any security cameras were probably night vision.
Regardless, Nala stayed close to the wall, pulling out her phone and using it as a light to see her way around the office.
It wasn’t that big. It was almost sparser than Varen’s downtown office.
This doesn’t look right… Had Varen gotten it wrong and this wasn’t Ravenwood’s main office at all?
Nala thought it was suspicious that such a place was so close to the happenings of a party.
Wouldn’t he keep that far out of the way from where anyone may be snooping around? Like her, for one.
What am I doing? Her phone and the light coming through the window picked up a few things, mostly furniture and decorations on the wall. Still-life paintings. Race dog photos. Old pictures from Ravenwood’s childhood.
Nala was about to turn and rummage through the desk when she came upon a series of recent photographs that piqued her interest.
Mostly because the first photo was of Robin and Lucian, embracing as they smiled for a candid photo.
Since Robin was wearing a glittery red mask, Nala had to assume that it was taken at an Aviary party.
Perhaps one hosted here in Ravenwood’s house.
There were others. Every couple, including one of Maggie and Jay looking more stoic than usual, hung on the wall wearing sexy outfits and the masks of The Aviary. Little printouts beneath each photo held their names. Not the submissives’ real names, of course, but their code names as plain as day.
What intrigued Nala the most, however, were the older photos of couples no longer in the club.
There were only three of them. One called “Lewis and Bluejay” featured a man with tan skin and an Asian woman.
Another of two redheads was called “Othello and Sparrow.”
The last photo was missing, but the tag remained.
“Xan and Crow.”
Whoever Crow was, it certainly wasn’t Hawk, and she must have once been Ravenwood’s partner in the Aviary.
Nala hurried to punch these names into her notes before moving on.
There was one last space on the wall for a new couple.
No doubt Ravenwood would soon ask for Varen and Nala’s photo to hang on his wall of deviants.
Nala focused on the desk behind her. It was all but empty, with only an office chair and a comfortable pad for writing longhand on.
An ink well was filled, and plenty of pens were stuffed together into a simple box.
There wasn’t even a computer to snoop on.
Nala put on her gloves, however, and started opening any drawer that didn’t have a pesky combination lock on it.
Most of them were empty, aside from some candies and extra-legal pads that had hardly any scribbles on them. Nala grumbled, dropping her satchel and hurrying to pick it up again.
She was about to give up and get out of there when she found a few printout papers in the bottom drawer.
At first, they weren’t anything out of the ordinary – a few business receipts from a week ago that Ravenwood probably had yet to file with his other receipts.
Nala wished there was something incriminating, but the best she found toward the top was one receipt for chauffeur services around Portland.
Dinner receipts. Tech receipts. Even his phone receipt. Nothing was out of the ordinary. Not until Nala unearthed one piece of paper that had two familiar names on it.
RE: Othello and Sparrow.
Funds transfer status is confirmed. $5,000,000 has been cleared from primary account ending in x679 and deposited into an account ending in x4535. Awaiting further orders. Please advise. New target location: Hamburg, Germany.
RE: RE: Othello and Sparrow.
Hold off for now. Hopefully they will keep quiet. We don’t need an unnecessary mess. Keep an eye on their private activities for the next two years and report anything that may be defamatory to BCP.
Nala didn’t understand any of this, but it sounded shady as fuck, so she snapped a picture with her phone and hurried to close the door.
Now she had to get out and hope nobody saw her coming out of the office. She pressed her ear to the door, listening for footsteps or voices in the hall. When she was confident that everything was clear, Nala slowly opened the door and stared into the lights of the hallway.
When she didn’t see anyone, she opened the door wide enough to let her slip through and was sure to close it behind her. She kept close to the wall…
…And walked right into Xan Ravenwood as he emerged from her and Varen’s room.
“Nightingale!” he greeted, almost relieved. “I was asking Varen where you were since I noticed she was all alone in there.”
Nala’s heart beat so furiously that she worried it would pop out of her chest. “I, uh, was in the bathroom.” She pointed behind her.
“That’s what Varen said. Hope everything is fine.”
“Yeah. Things are fine.”
He continued to stare at her as if attempting to peer into her soul and read the lies painted upon it. I haven’t done anything, I swear! That was the message she broadcasted from her brain, hoping someone as shrewd as Xan could pick up on it.
“Do take care, dear Nightingale. Please excuse me. I must tend to something.”
She let him pass, bowing her head so she wouldn’t have to look at him. Don’t go in your office. Don’t go in… Sure enough, Ravenwood pulled a key out of his pockets and opened the office door before going inside.
Nala hurried into her assigned room, relieved to find Varen alone. Bedraggled, but alone.
“Well?” she snapped. “Did you get anything? Because things have been peachy in here.”
Nala slowly sat down on the edge of the bed, her eyes never leaving that testy countenance. I probably should not find that hot. Nala shouldn’t find a lot of things hot, yet here she was, already thinking about sex.
“You go first. What happened with Robin and Lucian?”
“Oh, that. After they both – yes, both – tried to rope me into a threesome for you to return to, I managed to fend them off and said that you and I hadn’t really discussed such things yet. They told me to have the chat with you right now so they would know if we would be game next time.
Then I think they went back to their room to screw around.”
“Oh.”
“Yes, Nala, oh. Because then no one other than Xan Ravenwood peeked in to try and watch us in the act. Did not end well for him because I was all alone, trying to regather my bearings after what had happened. I told him that you were in the bathroom. So?”