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“Don’t get yourself into a tizzy,” Bess said.
Zara turned her head to glance at Bess’ image and read the time in the corner. “It’s after midnight. Hold on.”
Shoving herself along the desk in the wheeled chair, she tapped the farthest keyboard to bring the CI cameras up. She didn’t get much from them. There was no direct video link inside the building, though she had various external views. Glancing up at the monitor bank, she watched one screen change, but instead of bringing up a picture, it was a blank, black space.
Intrigued, she frowned. “Hmm,” Zara hummed.
Removing the CI image from the display, she tried to locate the hidden embedded code on the faulty black screen to bring the feed onto the monitor in front of her.
“What is it?” Bess asked. The video link was still active on the first screen while Zara worked on the third of the trio of screens at the security workstation.
“One of the cameras is out,” Zara muttered.
“Someone will be getting their ass handed to them,” Bess said on a laugh. “Who’s responsibility was the check this morning?”
They’d been drinking last night, so it was possible that whoever it was had been too hung over to do it properly. Zara thought for a moment, and she figured it out just as she input the embedded code and the data log popped up. Marrying all of the information together, she sat up straight, slowly. Bess had to see something in her expression, because she became serious.
“What is it? Zara? What is it?”
“Brodie was on security check this morning,” she whispered.
“It’s not like him to be absent-minded.”
“No, it’s not,” Zara said.
“Which camera is faulty?”
Distant, she tried to temper her distress. “It’s not faulty,” she said. “The data log shows it was manually overridden and disabled from here.”
“I’ve never known any of the boys to do that. The cameras are placed where they are because the locations they monitor are vital.”
“I know,” Zara said, unable to find her volume switch.
“So, what is that camera watching?”
“My apartment.”
Bess didn’t have anything to say to that and neither did Zara. Why would Brodie want his ex to have privacy that he wasn’t interested in his current girlfriend having? He didn’t apologize for monitoring her apartment, when it was Zara’s permanent residence.
“I’m sure he has his reasons for—” Blinking her disbelieving eyes at Bess, Zara quieted the sheepish woman. “What are you going to do?”
She wanted to go over to her apartment and find out if the reason Brodie had been so long with Cuckoo was because he’d taken her home. But a dramatic confrontation would just embarrass them all. Zara had to trust her boyfriend. She was too aware of his commitment to the mission and to the Kindred to doubt his professional loyalty. If Raven had to get close to Cuckoo under false pretenses of romantic interest then Zara might have to just live with that.
He’d done it to her, that was how they’d become involved in the first place. The process worked, and he’d been honest about sleeping with women for information in the past. But if that was what he was doing, she’d have to lay ground rules, the first of which being he had to be honest with her about it.
When the door opened, she spun in the chair to see who was coming in, hoping it was Brodie returning to base. It wasn’t. Tuck was storming toward the security desk so fast that she leaped out of the seat, knowing he’d need it.
With a blank, intent stare, he swung himself into the seat and began to type faster than she’d seen a person type. “What is it?” she asked, putting a hand on the back of his chair to look at the screen just in front of the keyboard, but he didn’t answer her. He just kept on typing.
She glanced at Bess, who was frowning. “I’ll let you get back to work,” Bess said and blew her a kiss.
“Take care,” Zara said, managing a smile before the woman left the screen.
Without slowing in what he was doing, Tuck reached to the keyboard on the right and tapped the code to kill the audio feed she and Bess had been using. “We have something,” he said to her after a few more swipes.
“Is it Brodie?” she asked, panicked that something could have gone wrong while he was away from the manor.
“Nope,” Tuck said and reached to the left keyboard to bring up a still on the monitor in front of it.
