Chance and Zara stood at the front of the room talking softly about "segments," which he could only assume meant her music.
Dez had taken up residence in the back corner. She had an entire array of tech around her, from her laptop to her tablet and phone. The woman was using all of it somehow. Jason, however, had a few more tools. He'd set up two monitors. One was filled with tracking programs authorized by the FBI. The other was good old-fashioned web searches. That was when a rhythmical thumping began to grow louder. Jason paused, but so did everyone else. The keystrokes fell silent. The mouse clicks stopped. That made another noise easier to hear. It was definitely a woman, and her moans matched the drumming sound coming from the other side of the suite.
Jason snorted out a laugh, almost ashamed of himself for being amused. But that only made Braden chuckle and Jeff tittered beside him. The thumping sound was clearly Logan and Riley celebrating their marriage. Rather violently, it seemed. And loudly.
Zara kinda pointed at the wall. "Do I need to..."
"No," Dez told her. "It's their suite, and their wedding night. Pretty sure none of us are shocked that those two fuck hard."
"She fucks as hard as she fights," Jason mumbled under his breath.
"What?" Chance asked from the front of the room.
Jason just looked at him. "That was what everyone asked her at her first few events. If she fucked as hard as she fought. Everyone but the man who managed to get a ring on her finger. Just seems ironic somehow."
Dez chuckled. "She's something else, I'll give her that."
"Yeah, she is," Jason agreed. "She's kinda my inspiration."
"Mine too," Dez said. "It's like she's untouchable."
"She's pretending," Chance told them, touching Zara's back to guide her with him to some empty chairs closer to the middle of the room. "Riley Andrews has learned that it's easier to bite first and apologize later. Kinda like someone else I know."
"I'm not that bad," Dez told him.
"So you say," he teased. "Dez, the only difference between you and Riley is that she's loud and you're not. She barks before she bites. You just lash out. That's not a bad thing, either."
"What about me?" Zara asked. "Since you seem to be reading everyone."
Chance turned to her with a smile and let his eyes run across her. "You appreciate the little things. All the fucking little things. You're the kind of woman who's moved more by a smile than an expensive gift. You also aren't going to put up with crap, but you won't make anyone feel bad about it either. I have a feeling you're a bit stubborn, though."
"Very," Jason assured him.
Chance laughed. "Which works for you, because you manipulate. You notice all the details and then use them without even thinking about it. That's why you like Riley so much. She shines brightly, not afraid to have all eyes on her, but you can't do that. In order to feel useful, you have to make sure that you're never seen."
"You're good," Jason told him. "Should've been a profiler."
"I kinda am," Chance pointed out. "I spent my entire life learning how to read people and manipulate the things they didn't even know about themselves. It's why I'm so good at running Deviant."
"And here I thought it was because you're really a geek at heart," Braden teased.
"That too," Chance admitted with a laugh.
Jeff just reached over and clasped Braden's shoulder. "Man, I'm falling asleep at the keys. You good?"
"I'm fine," Braden assured him. "Thanks for the distraction. Go crash."
Jeff stood. "Night, guys. Find something good for us to use tomorrow."
They all muttered their good nights, and then Jason turned to Zara. "You still going or need to lie down?"
She dipped her head and lifted a brow. "Jason, don't you dare try to make me useless now that I'm pregnant."
"Think of this more as me being concerned." But he lifted his hands, admitting defeat. "You can stay up all night if you want. I just hoped you didn't feel like you had to."
She shook her head. "I can get coffee like Amy does, right? And while I can't hack shit, I can do research if anyone needs it."
Which made Jason remember something. He turned to look at Dez. "I'm getting user logins on the KoG site still. People hitting it, but now that it's shut down, I get an IP but nothing to compare it to."
"Think we can put the login page back up?"