Chapter 43 Brie
Brie
Will and Lark were locked in a battle for control of the rifle. Lark—eyes still closed from whatever Will had sprayed into them—drove his elbow into Will’s ribs, followed by a vicious headbutt that snapped Will’s head back. Will careened into the server rack door, blood streaming down his face.
Lark opened one eye enough to close the distance and bring his knee up hard.
Help him!
I took a step forward, but strong hands grabbed my waist, yanking me backward around the corner of the server cluster.
Two black-kitted men stormed past me, weapons raised. Tactical commands echoed through the data center.
“You don’t have any way out, Lark!”
“Step away from him!”
The blur of activity slowed, and Rav’s face came into focus. Of course, he’d been the one to grab me. But he didn’t look at me. He just barked, “Brooke!”
“I’ve got her! Go!” A woman—Brooke?—tugged me around the corner into one of the other rows. She wore the same thick vest laden with gear, and the helmet with its comms, but she didn’t have a weapon. She forced a smile at me. “Hopefully, they’ll be fast.”
Rav had been quick and gentle, but between his body armor and helmet, the shouting, and being tugged every which way, nothing felt gentle.
“Step away from him!” came the order again.
“Drop the weapon!”
A burst of gunfire erupted from the server row—rapid, suppressed pops that seemed to come from overhead.
“Will!” I struggled against Brooke’s hold. That was my man fighting with Lark. Had he been shot? Was he all right?
Oh my god, was he still alive? “Will!”
Brooke tightened her grip as I fought to break free. The tactical team’s shouting intensified, but I couldn’t make out the specific words.
Then Lark’s voice cut through everything. A strangled cry unlike the menace he’d hissed into my ear. “The phoenix will rise!”
Another gunshot. One. Not suppressed.
The shouting stopped abruptly, replaced by urgent but quieter communications I couldn’t make out. My stomach twisted into knots. I had to know if Will was alive. Had to—
“Let me go!” I twisted free from Brooke’s grasp, panic overriding every logical thought in my brain.
I sprinted around the corner, my gut churning with fear and adrenaline. Where was he? Was he hurt? Was he—
“Get out!” Will’s voice, raw and desperate, cut through my panic. He was alive.
Relief crashed through me so hard my knees nearly buckled. But the relief ended when I rounded the corner of cluster fifty-seven and saw him.
“Bomb!” He stumbled through the aisle, waving the Pendragon team out of the area. Blood covered half his face, streaming from a wound over his eye. Fresh blood, wet and bright red, soaked his torn shirt. “Everyone move!”
So much blood.
His eyes found mine, and he surged forward, shoving aside one of the men as he ran toward me. He gained speed as he reached me, scooping me up in his arms without breaking stride, my feet leaving the ground as he carried me away from the server cluster.
He’d come for me. He’d risked his life for me.
God, I loved this man.
“I’ve got you, Bug,” he gasped, crushing me against his chest. The scent of blood and chemicals surrounded me.
He made a turn, ricocheted off a rack door, and threw us both to the ground, his body covering mine as the world exploded.
The sound wasn’t just loud—it was massive, seeming to come from inside my bones.
The raised floor shook beneath us like an earthquake, and chunks of concrete and metal rained down around us.
Will braced my head with his forearms, covering my face.
The air was filled with choking smoke and the acrid smell of burning electronics.
Will’s weight pressed me into the floor, solid and warm and wonderfully, impossibly alive.
Debris fell for ages—metal fragments pinging off surfaces, the groan of damaged infrastructure adjusting to the blast. When it finally stopped, the air itself felt different, thicker. As though the world had expanded, but was still contained in this server room.
Will lifted his head cautiously, blood still seeping from the gash across his forehead. His brown eyes were wild, pupils dilated, but focused entirely on me.
“Are you hurt?” He sprang off me, running his hands over my arms and shoulders, checking for injuries with frantic thoroughness, his fingers trembling.
I took inventory: Taste of smoke and concrete dust, check. Heart racing, check. Nothing obviously broken or bleeding, check. “I don’t know if I got all of Fenix’s data.”
Will stared at me for a heartbeat, then spluttered a laugh. It quickly evolved into deep belly laughter that shook his whole body. He settled on the floor next to me, tears mixing with the blood on his face, cutting clean tracks through the dust and grime.
“Only you,” he said, still laughing between gasping breaths, “would nearly die and immediately worry about whether your files finished uploading.”
True. It was an odd comment for the moment. “I’m probably in shock.”
“I’m definitely in shock.” He took a long breath, steadying himself, and cupped my face in his hands. His thumbs moved against my cheeks in gentle, comforting strokes.
“Tell me that’s not your blood?” I said.
He shook his head. “Only a little of it.”
I ran my fingers through his hair, damp from sweat and probably more blood. “I think I’m done with fieldwork, Will.”
“Not a good change?”
“I thought I was going to die.” The memory of Lark’s blade at my throat. Each time the gun’s barrel had found me. I wrapped my other arm around Will’s back—his strong back that had protected me from the falling debris. “And then I’d think about you.”
“Is this the shock talking?”
“Probably.” Otherwise, I might have kept the rest of my words inside. “I’ve always known I wanted you in my life, but I finally realized I was just scared of how damn much I wanted you. When I heard those gunshots”—my breath caught, but I powered through—“it was like my entire world crumbled.”
“I’m here, baby.” His thumbs brushed underneath the rim of my glasses, swiping away the tears I couldn’t hold back anymore. “I’m okay.”
“Bug, not baby,” I said with a sniffle. “I don’t want that to change.”
“You still want the rest?”
“I want everything.” I pulled his face down to mine, needing to wrap myself in him. When our lips met, it was my way of showing him how happy I was that we were alive and we were together.
His mouth tasted like metal and smoke. The blood on his shirt seeped into mine. But I didn’t care.
Nothing had ever tasted or felt better. Because I had my Will.
He was all I’d ever needed.
“Are you two okay?”
Will broke from the kiss, so we could both look up.
Rav stood over us, his dark hair gray with concrete dust. He was so tall from my spot on the ground.
The rifle slung across his chest looked natural for him, although the shorts and running shoes were a sharp contrast to the black gear worn by the tactical team members.
They were also emerging from cover positions, speaking quietly into their radios.
“The Pendragon team?” Will asked, sitting up but keeping one protective arm around me.
“Everyone got clear when you called the warning. A couple of minor injuries from debris, but everyone’s breathing.” Rav helped us both to our feet, steadying me when my legs wobbled.
“Lark?” I asked.
Will’s jaw tightened. “He got off one burst while we were fighting, before he smashed me into the server rack. When the team ordered him to drop his weapon, he tossed the rifle, but he pulled his pistol and…”
Rav put a hand on Will’s shoulder, as though telling him he didn’t have to say the words. “Lark triggered the detonation, then took his own life.”
“He was Fenix,” I said, as though Lark’s final words hadn’t made that obvious to my friends.
“Clearly,” said Rav. “Did he get what he wanted?”
They always did. Every time we went toe-to-toe with them, they always got away with what they wanted.
“I uploaded a virus with the real Haddad files, so if they grab it all, their machines will be wiped. But I also uploaded the virus to the Meridian server, so who knows. Depending on how interconnected their systems are, one of the files will get them.”
Will and I followed Rav back toward the blast zone, cautious around the scattered debris. When we reached the edge of cluster fifty-seven, Rav stopped in front of me. “You shouldn’t see it.”
He blocked most of the view, but I could see the tops of the server racks. Half of the cluster where the Orchid and Meridian servers had been was completely destroyed, little more than twisted metal and blackened circuits. Smoke and a pale mist from the fire suppression system curled in the air.
Blood. At the top of the racks.
Lark’s blood.
“Brie,” Will whispered, pulling me close so I could bury my face against his neck.
“At least six racks destroyed,” Rav said. “The power’s out on all the surrounding servers.”
“Fire protocol,” Will said, not releasing his grip on me. “They all shut down when the suppression system is triggered.”
“All the data’s backed up,” I said automatically, as though reciting something I’d learned in my training videos. Yup. Still in shock.
“Except Haddad’s research.” Brooke’s words caused me to separate from Will. She was behind me, giving me the perfect excuse to turn away from the carnage.
“Excuse me,” said Rav, as he left to speak with the Pendragon team.
Brooke watched him leave, but continued. “Claire ensured the Orchid server wasn’t included in any backup procedures.”
Will wrapped his arms around me, pulling my back to his chest, probably ensuring I didn’t collapse. “So his research is gone?”
Brooke looked at me. “Show me what files you sent.”
I couldn’t use the KVMs in this section. Even if the power had been on, I couldn’t imagine standing anywhere near what had happened. We walked a few rows over, I pulled out the KVM unit, and connected to the first functioning server I could find. “What did I send them?”
“A biochemical weapon,” she said.
My fingers froze over the keyboard, and I spluttered, “A what?”
“Don’t worry,” she said, ridiculously calm, “it was incomplete data, with a lot of false leads in it. They won’t be able to use it.”
My fingers moved automatically across the keyboard, installing a Tor browser and navigating to the hidden server where I’d uploaded the files for Lark. The connection established, and I pulled up the directory listing.
Only one file sat there: haddad_research_supplement_v2.pdf.
Fuck.
The file I’d hidden the virus in.
“Someone already pulled down the research,” I said, staring at the screen. “They didn’t grab my virus, though.”
Probably left it as proof they knew what it was.
As we watched, another file appeared in the directory. The filename made my blood run cold: thanks_for_the_help_brie.txt.