43 - Peyton
PEYTON
It was well into the evening when Theo called us together. The house was warm and dim. The lights were low.
“Martin Wayland, CFO,” asked Ripley, squinting. “Who the hell is that?”
“He’s the chief financial officer for one of Donovan’s shell corporations.”
The glow of Theo’s screen was reflected in his glasses. It shifted wildly as he punched more keys.
“So what’s he doing?”
“It’s not what he’s doing, so much as what he’s about to be doing,” Theo said smugly. “And he’s about to start shitting his pants.”
He typed some more, then slammed down on the ENTER key. It was like firing a battleship cannon.
“What’d you just do?” I asked.
“I exposed him.”
“Now we’re talking,” laughed Ripley.
Theo pushed back in his chair, interlacing his fingers behind his head. “The first domino to fall.”
“The first of many,” added Colson.
“Hey, one step at a time, boss.”
I knew the process, because we’d discussed it before: exposing the billionaire’s mid-level, expendable assets first, before going after the bigger fish. Basically, giving Donovan just enough time to join Mr. Wayland, in shitting his pants.
“And they can’t track this?” I pressed. “What you just did?”
“Encryption packets routed and re-routed through shifting URL’s, bouncing back and forth between servers on four different continents?” Theo grinned. “Not a chance.”
His pride made me smile, even as Ripley rolled his eyes. I knew the big fighter secretly admired him, though. It was just one of the things you picked up on, watching three guys interact as closely as I had.
“What comes next?” asked Colson.
Almost on cue, an alert flashed across Theo’s screen. Then another. And another, after that.
“Shit, meet fan.”
Together, we checked the screen again. It was filled with news alerts. Journalists and regulators and watchdog groups, all vying to be the first one to break the story.
“Investigations into Wayland will start pretty much immediately,” Theo explained. “His accounts will get frozen. His connections will be traced.”
“Traced back to Donovan?” I asked hopefully.
“Not at first,” he admitted. “But eventually.”
“And when that happens?”
“He’ll know it was us who fired the first salvo.”
We sat there quietly, amidst the low hum of the heating system. None of us wanted to say it, but we all knew what it meant.
From this moment on, we weren’t running. We weren’t hiding.
We were fighting a war.
“This is the beginning of the end,” said Colson, echoing my thoughts. “Things escalate quickly from here.”
“Good,” grunted Ripley. “I prefer a straight up fight to all this skulking around.” After an awkward moment, his gaze shifted to me. “Not that uh, skulking doesn’t have its benefits too. Sometimes.”
“Sometimes,” I smirked back at him.
Another series of alerts lit up on the screen. The headlines were devastating, too. The kind of life-ruining shit people in Donovan’s inner circle had nightmares about.
“Reuters picked it up,” Colson announced, excitedly.
“Fuck yeah,” Ripley hooted.
“Won’t be long before the SEC’s involved,” said Theo. “That’ll be sticky.”
“The stickier the better.”
A thought occurred to me.
“After this, it’s going to be hard to hide what we’re doing to his accounts,” I reasoned. “Donovan’s going to start combing through his financials. Getting them ready for scrutiny.”
Theo bit his lip and nodded. “I’ll accelerate the transfers then. Drain the money faster.”
“And go after more people,” said Colson. He put a finger on the screen. “Him next.”
All three of us blinked.
“Why him?”
“I know this asshole, he plays golf with Donovan. Always calls me ‘Colton,’ no matter how many times I’ve corrected him.”
“Fuck him then,” Theo nodded grimly. “He’s toast.”
I faded back, taking in the scene of all three men huddled around the glowing laptop.
The camaraderie of the moment filled me with a quiet joy.
This level of emotional inclusion was something I hadn’t felt in a very long time, and I knew it was missing in theirs, as well.
We were no longer merely uniting over a common enemy.
The bonds we’d built went so much deeper than that.
Heat flowed up and around me, wrapping me in warmth, in safety, in solidarity with these men. The glass walls of the house stood sentinel, guarding us from the storm outside.
“Our days here are numbered then,” I lamented quietly. “Aren’t they?”
I must’ve sounded borderline miserable. When they turned to face me, I saw sympathy in their eyes.
“They always were,” Theo affirmed softly.
I lowered my gaze, but only for a moment. Two hands slipped into mine. A third, tilted my chin to look up at them again.
“But after this?” Colson said, ever so gently. He took my face in his hands and smiled.
“We run at Donovan, and not from him.”