Chapter 17
ROGUE
Here's the thing about people who destroy a city and walk away clean.
They don't look back.
Why would they? Rothwell collapsed, the money was gone, the people who caused the problems were discredited or disappeared or just too broken to bother to do anything about it.
The developers who ran the corruption didn't flee in a panic—they left because they were done.
Finished. They took what they came for and went somewhere better and left behind a city full of people who couldn't afford to do the same.
Which means they weren't careful. Arrogant people never are. They didn't shred documents or burn files or cover their tracks with any particular thoroughness because they didn't think anyone was coming. Dead cities don't investigate themselves.
They were right about that. Until us.
Armen sent us back out first thing this morning with one of Fischer's addresses and a short brief: find the paper trail, photograph everything, don't touch what you don't need to.
The address is a commercial building on Hargrove Street in the old development corridor, eight stories, half the windows dark, currently managed by whatever property company picked up the building for a fraction of its value after the original owners walked away.
That's the other thing about abandoned paperwork. When a building changes hands in a collapsed city, nobody goes through the filing cabinets. The new management company doesn't know what's in them and doesn't care. They just inherited the furniture and other crap.
We're counting on that.
Vi is three steps behind me and slightly to my left, which is where I put her this morning and where she's stayed. I know she's there without looking. I've known where she is every second since we came through the gate, which is a thing I no longer bother hiding.
The building lobby has a directory by the door. It hasn't been updated in years. Whoever manages the building now didn't bother replacing the old listings. Which means what's on the board is a snapshot of who owned and operated here before everything fell apart.
Suite 304. Voss Property Group.
I stand in front of that directory for a moment longer than necessary.
Voss. I know that name. Not from Fischer's files, not from anything recent, but from several years ago, the week after Dad's shop burned down. That’s when my father told me the name of the company that wanted the spot his business occupied.
I wrote it on a piece of paper. Lost the paper.
Spent years trying to remember what it said.
Voss Property Group.
That’s them. The company that wanted my father's block. The same company that sent a man to pressure him. The same company that had his shop burned down three weeks later when he wouldn't sell.
And now, here they are, connected to Fischer's corruption network, their name still on the lobby directory of a building they owned in a city they helped destroy.
Waiting for my angry ass.
Sting goes to the unmanned security desk and starts going through the visitor log with the easy authority of a man who does this regularly. Armen takes the door. I stare at the directory.
Vi appears at my shoulder.
She doesn't say anything. She just reads the directory beside me, close enough that I'm aware of every inch of distance between us.
"You know that name," she says.
"I might."
She looks at me. I look at the directory. We stand there, a tension between us that's all ours. I know what she wants, and she knows I know.
"Later," I say in a low voice.
She snickers and nods, no further communication needed.
Suite 304 hangs open, the door ajar, the kind of space that hasn't been worth locking in a while. It consists of two rooms, a desk, filing cabinets along the wall, and a window overlooking the street.
Nobody has been here in a long time. The dust on the file cabinets is undisturbed, and the folders I find inside belong to whoever was here before, not whoever theoretically manages the building now.
If anyone manages it at all.
Sting goes straight to the cabinets. I go to the desk in the office and Vi follows me, taking up position at the window to watch the street below. I spend too long watching her before I make myself look at what's in front of me.
I find transaction records going back eight years, property transfer documents, and a paper trail connecting Voss Property Group to three of the shell companies from Fischer's files.
There it is in black and white, the same fake businesses, the same money moving through the same hands, all sitting undisturbed because the people who created it assumed no one would ever care to dig into their crimes.
They assumed wrong.
I photograph everything in twelve minutes, maybe fifteen. Vi is at the window keeping watch the whole time, and I do my job with all the focus I can muster.
The rest of my attention’s on her. On Voss. On my father's shop and years of being pissed off about something I might finally get to fix.
She turns around when I'm done.
"Got what we need?"
"Yeah."
The satisfaction hits me in a rush and when she crosses the room toward me, while I should move toward the door, I stay where I am.
My hand finds her jaw and I bring her mouth to mine. Her own hands land on the front of my jacket, and we stand in the middle of this office like we have all the time in the world.
We don't. She knows that. I know that. We kiss anyway.
When I pull back, she's looking up at me with dark eyes and slightly less composure than she walked in with.
"That was nice," she says.
"Nice? Just nice?"
She throws her head back and laughs.
I weave my hand into her hair and this time, our kiss goes longer and deeper. I press her back against the desk, and her thighs part so she can pull me closer.
But the door flies open and Sting stands there.
"Building security," he says, completely level. "Three minutes."
Vi straightens up, fixes her jacket, and walks to the door, completely composed.
At the door, she looks back at me.
"Later," she says.
That’s my girl.