Page 32 of Remote Access

“Innocent? They steal. They could have gone for help at any time.”

“Could they?” He pointed toward the living room. “He had that boy’s mother under threat. And I have a feeling once we figure out who all these kids are, we’re going to run across a few dead ones. Lane hasn’t told me everything, but he’s terrified of the man, that much is plain. If he weren’t, he wouldn’t be trying to find one thing and return it. He’d be doing everything he could to get revenge. I think he’s protecting at least one other person, too.”

“How the hell can you sleep with him if you can’t trust him?”

“I didn’t say I didn’t trust him. I just know there’s more going on here than I’ve found so far.”

“I sure hope you know what you’re doing.”

What he was doing?

Falling in love with a thief—that’s what he was doing.

* * *

“Metropolis!” Gareth said loudly into the silence of the room.

Lane was busy fighting several feelings. Dismay and a faint unease at being in a room full of policemen, for sure. His natural inclination was not to trust any of them. Hell, who was he kidding? He wanted to hightail it out of here so badly, his skin was crawling.

Except…he couldn’t leave Quincy. Not yet. Somewhere along the way, he’d started not only trusting the man but caring for him as well. And it wasn’t only from the fantastic sex they had—there was a core of strength and goodness in Quincy that he was drawn to.

His other feeling was intense sleepiness from a full belly. The lasagna hadn’t been the best, but it had been surprisingly good for a frozen meal. And he felt safe in this small cabin for the first time in days. Hell, in years. He glanced around at the men, taking in the good-looking big guy who was obviously closest to Quincy and his more intense friend. That guy made him a little more nervous than the other two and it had nothing to do with the fact he was still a cop. No, it was the way he carried himself, like he was a barely latched pin on a hand grenade.

“Nope, sorry. It’s not a poster,” Gareth continued as he stretched out his legs. He’d piled papers on the coffee table next to him and had a few spread out around him on the wood floor.

Lane frowned. “But it saysMetropolis? What is it?”

“Press book. And it’s not in the TAD stack.”

They’d continued adding to the TAD pile of papers and with all four of them going through the boxes, things had moved fast. But it had been hours and his eyes were starting to cross. Lane uncurled slowly from where he sat on the corner of the couch and walked to take the paper. “This has to be it. Someone willing to pay the kind of money he did for that poster would want anything he could get from the movie.” He looked up at Quincy. “It’s in Maine.”

“How convenient,” Quincy murmured. He looked at the others. “Lane took the poster from that very same state. Plus, remember what we found off those shipping labels?”

Isaac and Gareth were both nodding. Guess they all knew about Hayrick’s place there.

Lane stared at the name of the person who had the press book, something nagging the back of his mind. “Do you get Wi-Fi here?” He asked Gareth.

Gareth held up his phone. “I never set up Internet here.”

Lane glanced at the game systems cluttering the table in front of the massive television, causing Quincy to laugh.

“He doesn’t play live—we play each other.”

“I should have picked up a phone, but I really need a computer for what I need to look up. If I’m remembering correctly, this place is really close to the one where I got the poster.” He looked at Quincy. “It could be like that other story I told you. When someone in a family didn’t like that someone else inherited something. Shit. I could have righted this a long time ago.”

“Hey.” Quincy stood and came around the coffee table, which was a smoothed out hunk of tree trunk. He put his hands on Lane’s shoulders. “You had your mom to worry about, remember?”

Lane could tell he regretted the words the instant he said them because he grimaced.

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to make you think of her.”

Everyone in the room was silent then and Lane opened his mouth to explain, but he didn’t know these people and his mother wasn’t someone he could talk about. Not then. So he merely nodded and patted Quincy’s hand. The man shocked him when he picked up his fingers and kissed them. Right in front of his friends. He stared up at the ex-cop and wished with everything he had that he didn’t have to disappear after all this. But he’d made a life for Lane Becker—one he still had every intention of living.

Gareth cleared his throat. “I don’t know about you guys, but I could use a break. How about a little 007, Holt?”

Quincy kissed Lane’s fingers again, then turned to groan at Gareth. “Really? You feel like getting your ass spanked tonight?”

“From the sparks in this room, I’m pretty sure my ass isn’t the one in danger.” Gareth winked at Lane.

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