Chapter 37
Brie
I sat zip tied to a rolling chair in a small break room off the data center security checkpoint.
Two armed men in tactical gear flanked the door, their faces hidden behind masks, weapons at the ready.
I’d been asking questions for the past ten minutes—who they were, what they wanted, why I was here—but they remained silent.
Their gear was professional, as were the people: suppressed weapons, precise movements, military bearing.
But which military?
Or which agency?
The lack of identifying patches or insignia was deliberate. Contractors? Mercenaries?
Were they with Fenix? Was Claire stationed here to protect their server and call these men in for anyone coming after them? That didn’t make sense. If she was with Fenix, she should have recognized Will, me, or Rav.
One of the masked men stepped out. I strained to listen for sounds outside the room—voices, movement, anything that might tell me what was going on.
Are you okay, Will?
My phone sat on a table nearby. If I could grab it, maybe I could send him a message. Except he was in custody, too. Could I send a message out through the Wi-Fi to inform the team about this?
Why bother? There wasn’t anything they could do anyway.
The armed man returned, closing the door behind himself with a soft click. He pointed to the camera on the ceiling, near the corner. “Bobcat wants that off.”
His partner nodded and climbed onto a side table, allowing him to break the camera at its stem.
“Why do they want the camera off?” I asked, as though that would be the question they’d answer. “What are you going to do to me?”
“So long as you behave yourself,” said the armed man on the ground, “you’ll be fine.”
As his partner hopped down from the table, the armed man moved with sudden, fluid violence. A knife appeared in his hand as if from nowhere. His partner’s eyes went wide with shock as he realized what was happening.
“Lark,” he whispered in disbelief, the name escaping his lips just before the blade sliced across his throat. Blood poured from the wound as he dropped his gun on its strap, frantically trying to stop the inevitable.
He fell onto the man with the knife, who lowered him to the ground.
Soundless.
My vision narrowed. I couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t think.
He’d murdered his partner right in front of me.
Lark wiped the blade clean on the dead man’s gear, then called toward the door, his voice casual and conversational. “Hey! Can you guys give me a hand in here? I need some help.”
Two guards from the security checkpoint responded immediately, their boots heavy on the floor as they approached. They trusted him.
I should have screamed, warned them, done something, but all I could do was try to breathe.
The moment they stepped through the doorway, Lark raised his suppressed rifle and fired. Twice. The sound was so much louder than in the movies.
Both men dropped where they stood, their bodies hitting the floor with dull thuds.
I couldn’t look away. Three dead men. On the floor. In front of me.
Black spots crowded my vision, and bile climbed up my throat. My whole body shook. This wasn’t real. This couldn’t be happening.
Were the shots loud enough that someone would hear them over the Code Blue beeping throughout the facility? Where was the third guard from the checkpoint?
Lark removed the security badge from one of the men’s belts and turned to face me.
Oh fuck! Will! He’s going to kill me!
Will’s smile filled my memory. Lying naked next to him. For once, letting my barriers down and feeling what I wanted to feel. No telling myself it was wrong, no second-guessing.
Saying the words I’d told him a million times over, but so different this time.
And now I was going to die.
But instead of raising his weapon, Lark leaned against the wall, studying me with narrowed eyes. “I know you’re a hacker, and I know you’ve been into Haddad’s server. You’re going to get me his research.”
I sucked in slow breaths—as slow as possible. If he was giving me a chance, I had to take control. Otherwise, I’d be useless, and he’d kill me as easily as he’d killed the others.
“If you scream, I’ll shoot you,” Lark continued calmly. “And don’t bother denying you know about Haddad. Claire showed the whole Pendragon crew how your team worked together to get you into his server.”
Pendragon. My mind raced. The name was familiar in the military contracting sphere. But didn’t they work for the US government? What did it mean?
And how was Claire involved? Was she working for Pendragon? Why take me into the Atlantic server room and let me—
Pieces clicked into place. Not the whole puzzle, but enough to get started. She’d set me up. Given me the chance to do my thing, and when I did, she’d grabbed the video as proof. Then, she’d brought in this team.
That doesn’t make sense. If this is about the Meridian server, why bring up this Haddad guy?
“You’re going to help me?” Lark asked, still calm, as though the scent of blood filling the room didn’t make him want to vomit. “Brie?”
I blinked at him. I was supposed to say yes. But my voice didn’t work.
He stepped closer, brandishing the knife.
There was nowhere to go. The plastic around my wrists wouldn’t stretch or break. I couldn’t get away from him.
“If I called you Brie Reynolds, would that get your attention?”
An adrenaline spike surged through my body, and my feet found the floor, pushing the chair away from him. He knew who I was. Who I really was.
But if he knew, why didn’t Claire know? Why’d she call us John and Jane Doe?
“I thought that might work.” He put one gloved hand on my shoulder, stopping my chair from moving. “Enzo sends his regards.”
Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit. Lark worked with the Fenix captain who’d tried to kill half my team. Who’d framed my father in the first place.
Claire and her team weren’t Fenix.
But Lark was.
Time to channel your inner Scarlett. Hoping my voice sounded steadier than I felt, I managed to ask, “You’ll let me go if I help you?”
Lark’s smile was wicked. “Of course.”
What would Scarlett do if she were here? Dammit, she’d have backup, and I didn’t. Will and Rav were in the interrogation rooms.
Oh fuck. Unless this happened to them, too?
Was Will—
Don’t think about it. You can get through this.
I had to play everything right. I had no idea who Haddad was, and if he realized I didn’t have the access he needed from me, I didn’t have a chance. I’d have to fool him. “Which company? I’ve accessed multiple servers.”
“Smart girl.” He swiveled my chair and pressed the cool blade against my wrist. He cut through my zip ties. “Claire only told us you got into one.”
“She’s not as smart as she thinks she is.” I rubbed my wrists where the plastic had bitten into my skin. “I need to refresh my memory.”
“His research company is Orchid 815.” He pushed my chair to a computer terminal in the corner of the break room. The initial squeak of the wheels shifted to a wet squelch as he rolled me through his partner’s blood.
I squeezed my eyes shut, tasting vomit at the back of my throat.
Focus, Brie. He’s with Fenix. He’s on Enzo’s side. Claire and her Pendragon team are not. Lark is only one man. All you need is to be smarter than him and stay alive until someone rescues you.
“I don’t have all day, Ms. Reynolds.”
With a deep breath, I reopened my eyes and went to work. Thank heavens I’d thrown my ID card on earlier. With a swipe of my badge, I had full control of the break room terminal. I navigated through the unfamiliar security setup but quickly found my target.
Once the support program was up and running, I found Orchid 815.
ATL-C57-R15-10.
“Atlantic server room, Row 57, Rack 15, Server 10.”
More pieces of the puzzle clicked into place. Orchid was in the same rack as Meridian—one server above. Claire must have captured me on video standing in front of Meridian’s server, assuming I was there for the one above it. For Haddad’s Orchid server.
“Got it.” I grabbed a pen from the desk and scribbled down the location.
The door opened, and a male voice said, “I brought the water you—”
Before I turned all the way around to see the new person, Lark’s rifle had already fired. Another of Mnemis’s guards fell to the floor, the water bottle he’d been holding rolling into his colleague’s blood.
He hadn’t even had time to grab his pistol.
Four men dead.
The room spun, sending my stomach into a churn so violent that acid screamed its way up my throat. I doubled over in my chair, everything I’d eaten spewing all over the floor. Tears streamed down my cheeks as I heaved the last bits out.
“Move,” Lark commanded the second I began to straighten, grabbing my arm and dragging me out of the chair, toward the door.
I stumbled after him, stepping over the bodies of the guards, avoiding the pools of blood. At the main security checkpoint for the data center, there were usually three guards. Lark had killed them all.
He shoved me forward, his rifle at my back. “Ladies first.”
The X-ray scanner’s belt continued its perpetual movement forward, an eerie reminder of what normally happened here. I stepped through the body scanner on unsteady legs, the Code Blue screens lining the walls.
Lark stayed two paces behind me. Close enough that anyone who approached wouldn’t see the gun, but far enough away that I couldn’t swing around and take it from him. That’s what Rav would do, wouldn’t he? Disarm the man and turn the tables?
All I had was my brain. I had to use it. That was the only thing that would keep me alive.