Chapter Thirty-Four

Harvard

The lawyer drove past my cabin and took me directly to the training facility, where Quinn waited by the front door. I recognized this for what it was. A handoff so I couldn’t escape.

Quinn’s face was as inscrutable as always. He held open the door. “Inside.”

We passed the computer lab, and memories assailed me. The way Sami felt, smelled. Her laughter.

Her betrayal.

But none of that mattered. She was a hostage now. A mission.

HORNET’s mission central, recently dubbed The Hive, sat behind several locked doors at the end of the hall on the first floor. It rivaled any war room I’d seen while with the CIA. Screens covered one wall, and a large gray table that could seat twenty stretched from one end of the room to the other. From The Hive, Gabe and Quinn had the ability to monitor any HORNET mission in the world.

Only a few of the seats were taken at the table—Lanie, Jesse, Jean-Luc, and Ian, all recently back from the mission in South America. Marcus was missing, but that wasn’t a surprise. His head hadn’t been screwed on right since his best friend, Danny, had died in Martinique over the summer, and he went AWOL after the mission in Nigeria.

Gabe sat at the head of the table, and Quinn took the empty seat beside him, leaving me standing awkwardly at the other end.

The silence stretched into eternity. Each second ticked by like a drum.

I finally couldn’t take it anymore. “We need to find Sami.”

“Yeah,” Gabe said after another tense beat of silence. “We’ll get to that, but first I need you to tell me what the fuck is going on. I never expected I’d be springing you from jail. Start talking.”

I had known this was coming, and still my skin crawled at the prospect of telling them everything. It was time to bring down all of my firewalls and finally let my team in. They were about to lose what little confidence they still had in me, and that knowledge churned like lava in my gut.

Where did you start when you were about to flay open your veins and publicly bleed out all the things you despised about yourself?

I started with the easiest: “My mother has been in town trying to pump me for more money. She was murdered yesterday, and because we were seen arguing, the cops want to pin it on me.”

Gabe gave a short nod. “I got that much. Who killed her? You know, don’t you?”

I sucked in a fortifying breath. “I’m not who you think I am. I never went to Harvard, and I haven’t always been Eric Physick. Before the CIA, I was Eric Smith, and I created a group online called Also Known As or A.K.A. In that world, I was known as Khaos.”

A murmur went through the room. Yeah, they had all heard of me. Everyone knew A.K.A. We were the stuff of legends.

I kept my gaze fastened on Gabe, unwilling to look at the rest of them. Especially unwilling to look at Jean-Luc. He was my closest friend, and I’d never told him any of this.

“It started as a joke between me and a friend—a way to vent our frustrations at the world through our computers—but it went viral and became more. By the time I was arrested, we’d caused millions of dollars in damage. I was set to go to prison for a long time, but the CIA decided they wanted me working for them. I got a Get Out of Jail Free card. Others didn’t.”

“And those others?” Quinn said with no inflection in his voice to hint at what he was thinking. “They didn’t take that well.”

“No.” I rubbed a hand over my face. “Right before Detective Roth arrested me, I received a video on my phone. It was of Sami, unconscious in the back of a van, with a threat that they planned to ruin me. The man who recorded the video is Adrian Weber, a former friend and my partner in forming A.K.A. I’m fairly certain he lured my mother here, because only he would know how miserable that woman can make my life. When I refused to let her manipulate me, he killed her to frame me instead. He wants to hurt me.”

“He’s Nomad,” Gabe stated more than asked.

“Yeah, I think so.”

“How long have you known?”

“I only figured it out this morning, but he’s been fucking with us ever since—” I stopped. Here came the hard part, the part I feared would mean a definite end to my career with HORNET. “Ever since Sami sabotaged our network.”

Nobody said anything for a half second.

“She. Did. What?” Quinn said through his teeth and slowly rose to his feet.

“She was part of A.K.A. and got swept up in the FBI’s raid. Adrian manipulated her into helping him.” I didn’t know why I was defending her. What she’d done was indefensible, but at the same time, she never would’ve done it if not for the bad choices I made all those years ago.

This whole shit show was my fault. My mess to fix. Sami was a victim. Not an innocent victim, but one all the same.

Quinn looked like he was about to stroke out. “She exposed us, exposed our families, when she knew we had Defion on our ass after Nigeria. My kids are here. My fiancée. Gabe’s pregnant wife. Jesse’s son.”

“And my parents.” Jesse threw out an arm, motioning in the general direction of his family’s ranch. “They’re right there, less than two miles through that field. Both of them in their seventies, and my father completely immobile. If Defion came here, what chance in hell do you think they’d have of survivin’?”

A rock of sorrow rose in my throat. “She made a mistake, but she realized it almost immediately and fixed it. As far as I can tell, Defion didn’t get in.”

“But your old pal Adrian did. Do you know for sure that Defion didn’t?”

For a moment, I said nothing in response. He was right. I had no definitive way of knowing, so I went with my gut. “If Defion got into our system, we wouldn’t be having this conversation now. We’d all be dead. They wouldn’t have played a game of cat and mouse like Adrian has been. They would have attacked us with brute force and obliterated us before we even knew what hit us.”

Quinn made a sound, a sharp exhale, like the idea had physically hurt him. Maybe it had. With a toddler and a baby, he was the one here with the most to lose.

“He has a point,” Jean-Luc said, speaking up for the first time since I walked into the room. “In Nigeria, Defion set a local militia loose on innocent people at a hospital. They killed everyone to get what they wanted. Brute force is their way.”

Jesse smacked the table and stood. Lanie reached for his arm, but he turned away. His disgust was obvious. I didn’t blame him.

“We should end the trainin’ program,” Jesse said. “This is our second infiltration. The first got Danny killed. This one nearly killed one of the kids we’re supposed to be lookin’ after and put all of our families in danger. Obviously our screenin’ process wasn’t rigorous enough.”

“That’s on me,” I said. It hurt my perfectionist soul, but it was well past time I owned up to my mistakes. After all, my mistakes were what had brought us to this discussion in the first place.

“No,” Gabe said with a weary sigh. “That’s on all of us. We had you take on the work of five men and expected no complaints, no errors, no problems. You’re good, Eric, but eventually everyone crumbles under that kind of weight. We should’ve seen it coming. We should’ve offered you support to keep it from happening.”

I understood what he was saying, knew he wasn’t trying to tear me down, was trying to take some of the blame, but all I heard was: you weren’t good enough.

All I ever wanted out of life was to prove I was the best. That I was better than good enough.

Man, had I failed.

“Yes, Sami made a mistake,” I said. “But I’m just as much at fault here. I know it hurt everyone and nearly cost Will Campbell his life, but she doesn’t deserve to die for it. And Adrian will kill her if he thinks it will hurt me.” My voice cracked a little on the last few words, and the room fell to silence.

Everyone looked at Gabe. I held my breath. Now I knew how gladiators felt waiting for the thumbs-up or thumbs-down from Caesar.

Gabe slowly rose out of his seat. “All right. One problem at a time. How do we find them?”

Well, it wasn’t a death sentence. For now.

I moved around the table to the bank of computers that controlled the wall screens and brought up everything I had on Adrian. Including his mug shot. The sullen, pudgy teenager staring out from the screen was how I remembered Adrian. The troubled kid just looking for a place to belong in a world that didn’t want him. Sorrow snaked through my chest. I’d failed him. I’d failed Sami.

I didn’t know how to fix any of it, but I had to try.

“First, we need to find out everything we can about Adrian’s life after he went to prison. And we need to know who he’s connected with since getting out.”

“Like your ma?” Jesse asked. Temper spent, he sank back into his chair. “Do we know how they hooked up?”

I nodded. I didn’t know for sure how it happened, but I had a pretty good idea. “Mom’s last boyfriend went to prison for securities fraud. If I had to guess, it was the same one where Adrian was incarcerated. He recognized her and knew which buttons to push to get her help.” I released a slow breath. “Mom was not a complicated woman, and Adrian took advantage of that.”

“Having background intel is all well and good,” Quinn said tightly, “but we need to know his location now. Not where he was years ago.” Where Jesse’s temper was always a quick flash, Quinn’s was a slow burn. He was still pissed as hell, but he was too much of a professional to let it get in the way of the job. “How do we find him now?”

I turned back to the monitors. “The problem is he’s as good with computers as I am. I can’t get anywhere near him digitally. As soon as I do, he’ll know, and he’ll bolt. He wants to ruin me…” I trailed off as a memory twitched to life at the back of my mind.

Adrian and I had met in foster care after I had run away from home. I was only there long enough for my mother to be located. He was a permanent fixture, shuffled around the system since he was two years old. Everyone said there was something “off” about him, but I hadn’t cared. We bonded over computers, and he had protected me from the foster father who preferred fucking little boys rather than his wife. We’d hide in a hollowed-out space behind the wall of our room and dream about pulling off the hack of the century—the one that would make everyone stand up and take notice, the one that would make us rich enough to escape the hell that was both of our lives.

We had dubbed it our “Master Plan.”

Shortly after, my mother picked me up. I begged her to take Adrian with us. She’d said I was too much of a hassle, so why would she want another? We kept in touch, and neither of us spoke of the Master Plan or the bruises that often appeared on his body. By the time I was fifteen, I was making enough money with ransomware attacks to move out and keep my mom from going to the authorities by paying her. Adrian ran away from his newest foster family and moved into my apartment, and A.K.A. was born. And, there, when the FBI started closing in on us, he started talking about our Master Plan again.

“It’ll be a cakewalk,” he’d said. “Easier even than sending ransomware to some company or another. They’re completely unprepared, and we’ll be long gone before they even know it was an attack. And once they know, they’re not gonna look for two teenagers. They’re gonna look at North Korea or Iran. We can’t lose.”

Holy fuck. He was going to do it, and he was going to frame me.

“Harvard?” The name brought me back from my memories. Going by Gabe’s sharp tone, he’d said it a bunch of times already.

“Stop fucking calling me that,” I snapped, my nerves frayed. “I’m more Khaos than I ever was Harvard.”

“What?”

“Never mind.” I shook my head to clear it and turned to face the team. “I know Adrian’s plan. He’s gonna ransom the U.S. power grid.”

The room exploded with noise. Even Ian, who had so far remained silent, sat up straight and said, “What the fuck?” Ian’s dog, Tank, got in on the action, too, barking sharply.

Gabe held up a hand, and it took a moment, but everyone quieted down. He stared at me with eyes as intense as laser beams. “Is that possible? Can he do it?”

“More than possible.” I wanted to fidget under the scrutiny, but I held my ground. “He can do it because I taught him how.”

“Jesus,” someone at the table said.

Gabe shook his head slowly. “We’re gonna talk about this later, kid. But right now…” He turned to Quinn. “Contact all the proper authorities—”

“No!” I protested. “By the time they get here—”

Gabe stopped me with a raised hand. “We’re not handing this off to anyone. Sami is one of us. Getting her out is our responsibility. Your responsibility.”

I swallowed hard and nodded. This whole clusterfuck was my responsibility. I started it, so now I had to end it. “I’ll fix this.”

“I know you will. What do you need?”

I looked up at the monitors around me, then back at Gabe and the team. I met Jean-Luc’s gaze, and, for the first time since the shit hit the fan, a smile tugged at my lips. “Call of Duty.”

Jean-Luc grinned, and, like that, whatever had been broken between us started putting itself back together. “Yeah, mon ami. Call of Duty.”

It was a long-running joke dating back to our very first mission with HORNET. He’d asked me how I knew military tactics, since I’d only been an analyst in the CIA. I’d responded that everything I knew I’d learned from the video game.

But nobody else got the reference, so I explained, “We can’t out-hack Adrian. He’s as good as I am, and he’s already steps ahead of us. But we do have an advantage he doesn’t have. Combat training. Everything Adrian knows is from Call of Duty.”

Gabe and Quinn were both already nodding before I’d finished speaking.

“We give him a real-life taste of the video game,” Quinn said, and one corner of his lips ticked up in a smile. “I really want to be there for this one.”

Jesse made a sound of protest. “You’re not—”

“I know, I know.” He waved a hand dismissively. “I’m not physically fit for active duty. And Mara would kill me. But, man, it’d almost be worth it to see this asshole’s face when you kick in his door.”

“First we have to figure out where his door is,” Lanie pointed out.

“Nearby,” I said. “You can count on that. He’d want to be close to see me go down.” When I got a bunch of confused looks, I added, “He’s planning on framing me for this. I’m sure he’s already laid the digital breadcrumbs thick enough that even the most inept computer guy at the NSA can find them. I have some ideas—”

My phone signaled, and I dove my hand into my pocket for it. Everyone who would message me was in this room—except Sami. A satellite map popped up with a little blue dot in the middle. “Oh, you brilliant woman.” I held up the phone so everyone could see the map. “She sent us her location.”

“How do you know it’s Sami?” Jesse asked. “And even if it is her, it could still be a trap. We can’t trust her.”

I looked at the phone’s screen, and my heart squeezed. Jesse was right. “I don’t know for sure, but even if it’s a trap, Adrian’s not going to give me a fake location. He wants me there to witness his brilliance, and he thinks I’ll show up alone. He’s never understood the concept of a team.”

Nobody said anything for a moment. I had to wonder if they were thinking the same about me. I hadn’t understood what it meant to be part of a team, either. Not really. I’d always been alone with my electronics and, even after joining HORNET, had kept myself separate. Had used my computer like a shield.

Jesus.

And I wondered why they always left me behind? You can’t trust someone you don’t know, and I never let them get to know me.

Gabe rubbed a big hand around the back of his neck. “Where are they?”

I released a silent breath and brought up a satellite image of the map Sami had sent. “It’s a power substation.”

One of the guys let loose with a long, impressive stream of profanities.

“No, wait.” I held up a hand and zoomed in to get a better view of our target. “This works in our favor.”

“What, you have a plan?” Jesse asked.

“I have twelve percent of a plan.”

Everyone stared at me. Nobody got the Guardians of the Galaxy reference. Sami would have. I shook my head and pointed at the bunker. “Our plan is shock and awe, and this dumbass holed up in a concrete building with no windows and only one exit.”