Excerpt from Bad Girl Dilemma by Zara Cox
Chapter One
Dahlia
Not gonna lie, this is my favourite part.
Okay, maybe not my absolute favourite.
But watching pollsters on my heavily encrypted social media app lose their minds always gives me a buzz.
I watch two contenders battle it out until it hits the 85% mark, then the fickle public, as they always do, rally behind one.
Tonight’s clear winner hits 92% and I grin.
Obsidian Corp it is.
I don’t use the actual entity names beforehand of course because that would stupid. Obsidian is only known as DDD to my pollsters.
Lying on my stomach in bed, legs tangled in my sheets, chin propped on one hand, I wait for the stragglers to get on board. I like to get as close to 100% as I can.
There’s a delayed gratification to that, a sizzling in my veins that comes with righteous sinning that’s a high I like to skate as long as possible. Forget drugs, it comes as close to sex as I can get.
So while the disgruntled few whose initial picks didn’t make the cut make up their minds, I swipe lazily across the screen.
The poll numbers spike in real time. Thousands of anonymous voices, weighing in on who deserves a taste of my justice.
My fingers hover over the voting breakdown.
Each name on the list makes my blood boil.
? A billionaire hedge fund vampire who crashed a housing market for sport.
? A pharmaceutical exec who jacked insulin prices mid-pandemic and is still at it.
? A prince with offshore accounts full of human trafficking money.
? DDD, founder of “O” Corp, crypto king, rumoured sadist, silent investor in all the above.
The comments under his name are extra spicy.
"That DDD guy gives me the creeps."
"Didn’t he blackmail a journalist into disappearing?"
“Such a shame he’s fuck-hot. Or is it??!”
“Do him and I’ll tattoo your name on my ass."
I chuckle. My followers are feral, and I love them for it.
I’m no saint. I’ve never claimed to be. But there’s something delicious about righteous vengeance dressed in latex and filtered through a voice modulator.
I steal. I expose. I redistribute. I livestream it all.
And if I get a little thrill watching corrupt assholes rage and lose their minds as they promise to hunt me down and “insert extremely unimaginative punishment of choice here”—also, dream on, fuckers—? Bonus .
When I hit 96%, I flip onto my back, flick out of the poll and swipe to another app. Just to…peek. I may be putting the proverbial cart before the horse but I’m already dreaming up ways to reward myself once I’m done notching another win under my belt.
The Club app opens in full dark mode, purring like a secret lover.
It was a joke at first—signing up. A little curiosity, a little mischief. I never expected to keep it. But somehow, logging on after a job has become a ritual, although tonight I’m doing it before not after. Which, if I believed in superstition, I would be fucked. But I don’t so…
I don’t talk much on the app. Just… watch. Explore. I’ve interacted a couple of times, but mostly I’ve created dirty little fantasies in my head I secretly hope will come true.
Dominants, subs, contracts, scenes.
Intimacy without strings.
Pain twisted into pleasure.
There’s something almost reverent about it. Like control isn’t something you seize—but something you surrender.
Maybe after this job, I’ll finally do what I’ve been too chicken to do so far and…indulge. Dip my toe in the water, so to speak. I don’t know how far I’ll get because all that surrendering sounds copasetic in theory but yeah…I’m not the surrendering type.
Maybe a clean, anonymous hookup. No feelings. Just breathless, beautiful pain. A reward for a job well done. I scan a few profiles, half-distracted. A masked man with a wicked mouth. That Dom with blood-red leather gloves. The one I keep returning to over and over.
My pulse flutters. I take a note of his name.
SinMadeFlesh. Meh, not exactly original but whatever.
Maybe I’ll message him. Later.
I shut down the app and return to the poll.
98%. That’s as good as I’m going to get.
I roll off the bed, energy spiking as the prospect of vengeance.
Showtime.
###
My gear is already laid out: matte black cargo pants, tight turtleneck, harness strapped with micro-tools, soundless boots. My gloves are fingerprint-resistant, and my mask—sleek and mirrored—covers half my face, voice modulator built into the jawline.
I secure my ponytail, zip everything up, and look at myself in the mirror.
No one would guess I’m twenty-two. That I’m very partial to cereal for dinner and cry during Pixar shorts. That I once built a server farm in my mom’s garage to DDOS a revenge porn site.
All they see is Spectre—digital thief, vigilante brat, chaos in motion.
Not Dahlia Wynn, cyber security expert and programmer.
I tap the go-live button. “Spectre, online.”
My voice comes out distorted, laced with static and steel. The screen flashes green. My viewers spike fast.
"Yessss she’s back."
"This one’s gonna be juicy, I can feel it."
"Who’s tonight’s victim, Spectre?"
“You voted. I listened. It’s Triple D,” I purr. “Let’s rob the devil.”
###
The building looms like a monolith, all obsidian glass and silent menace like it’s owner, reflecting the city like it’s daring it to come closer.
I slip inside like smoke—through a service entrance, past sleeping cameras, under the pulse of motion sensors I’ve already looped. My custom drone buzzes softly at my side, flashing green when the path is clear.
Heart rate steady. Breathing controlled. No fear. I’m in the zone.
Until the actual heist, all I’ll be charged with on the extreme off chance I’m caught is corporate trespassing. A slap on the wrist or a fine or some community service. Totally worth it. But I don’t plan on getting caught.
Obsidian has the honour of being my introduction into double-digit heisting and I’ve been doing this for two years.
Up ten floors. Through the server vault. Past biometric locks. My custom key slips into the panel and I wait for the soft chime of access granted.
Ding.
I grin under the mask. Too fucking easy.
I plug in, fingers flying, siphoning encrypted data through my proxy chains, dumping it into blockchain wallets faster than a heartbeat.
The stream’s eating it up. Comments fly.
"Holy shit, she’s in."
"That’s Triple D’s master key, isn’t it??"
“Fuck, five mil. Six! Gah, seven and a half!”
“You’re on fire, Spec! Get it, girl!”
"GET OUT GET OUT?—"
Wait. Something's wrong.
The files… they're looping. Duplicating. I blink.
INTRUSION DETECTED. TRACE IN PROGRESS.
Reverse beacon triggered.
User: SPECTRE
Location: LOGGED
Protocol: Velvet Vice Fingerprint Activated.
Cold drips into my veins. My drone flashes red.
What. The. Fuck.
No .
My breath strangles in my throat. I yank the drive, slam my laptop closed, kill the stream.
How did he?—?
I’ve barely been here five minutes. To react this fast he’d have to have known. Have to have been lying in wait.
How the fuck did he know? Every piece of equipment I use is encrypted. Designed by me because I trust no one else in this world. Life lessons learned the hard way.
A voice slides through the earpiece. Not mine. Not filtered. Smooth. Male. Lethal.
“You shouldn’t have been so sloppy, little thief.”
I freeze.
There’s no fucking way. I wasn’t sloppy. I fucking wasn’t.
The voice continues, low and wicked, right in my skull. “But I’m glad you were. I’ve been waiting for you.”