Chapter 28
MAVERICK
Boone walks in with a greasy bag of breakfast tacos from his buddy up the street.
“Got you the extra hot salsa,” he says, closing the door with his foot.
I jump up and manhandle him a bit before I walk into the little kitchen area.
Despite my world-class distraction, he clocks the project I’ve started.
“Did you take all my clothes out of the closet?”
“I did,” I say, peeking into the bag.
The smell of chorizo and fresh salsa hit me like a delicious punch to the face.
“Why are there two piles?”
I grab two tacos, along with one of the little tubs of salsa. “Why do you think there are two piles?”
He quirks a brow. “Looks like you’re trying to throw away half of my clothes.”
“Oh good,” I say, taking my time to carefully unwrap the dripping deliciousness. “So glad I didn’t have to explain that to you.”
I also called in a favor for the reversed faucets because my man deserves good plumbing.
He kisses the back of my neck. “You can’t throw away half of my clothes,” he grouses as he digs around for his tacos. “The department frowns on nudity.”
“There will be no nudity. We’re going thrifting after breakfast,” I explain through a big bite of taco. “Though I suppose this is really lunch.”
Swear to God, this is the best chorizo I’ve ever had in my mouth.
“You seem way too excited about that.”
“The thrifting or the tacos?”
“Both.”
I wink. “One of my good buddies owns a massive thrift shop on South Lamar, and it’s going to change your life.”
“I know I agreed to let you dress me, but I can’t afford to replace half of my wardrobe, Mav. Even thrifted.”
My smile broadens, supremely confident. “Don’t worry about it. My friend owes me a favor.”
“So is this how it’s going to be?” Boone asks, doing a shit job of hiding his grin. “You just toss your money and influence around, and I’m supposed to accept it?”
“Basically.” I lean across the table to kiss him. “I’ve posted from his shop, like a dozen times, and every single time, he gets run over and sells out of everything. A couple of basics for my hot, hot boyfriend will not hurt his feelings.”
“How do you know that? Did you ask him?”
I hold up my phone, wiggling it at him. “I did. He’s excited to meet the guy who set my social media on fire for all of thirty seconds.”
“Is he hot, this thrift store friend of yours?”
“As a matter of fact, he is.”
Boone chews slowly, his glare entirely unconvincing.
“Thankfully, his wife agrees.”
He wrinkles his nose, swallowing the last of his first taco. “Okay, fine.”
“Knew you’d see it my way,” I say, polishing off my second taco with a moan. “God, these taste like somebody’s grandmother made them.”
“Which is why I always get extra,” he says, shaking the bag.
I’m diving in for another taco when we’re interrupted by a knock on the door.
“Maintenance.”
“The faucet,” Boone says, rising from his seat. “I can’t believe they finally sent somebody over for that.”
I’m happy to let him believe that.
“See?” I say, speaking with a mouthful of holy fucking delicious. “Things are looking up.”
Boone snorts and wipes his hands on his jeans as he makes his way over to the door.
He barely turns the knob before the door explodes inward, four men in dark-gray gear piling into the apartment, weapons raised.
Shit. Shit.
What do I—
My father’s voice comes to me, something from one of our weapons training sessions. “First things first, settle on the logistics. Number of bad guys, number of weapons at our disposal, location of exits.”
I take a deep breath.
These bad guys have terrible logistics.
They might’ve been more successful if there were only two people with handguns, but the four operatives with their massive rifles cannot maneuver in the space, and Boone immediately takes advantage.
He disarms the lead guy, using the confiscated gun to shoot the second one through the door before hitting the first guy with the butt of his own rifle.
Boone’s tiny apartment—plus his quick thinking—just saved our lives.
While he’s busy with those two, I latch onto the guy closest to me and have him on the ground in seconds.
I knock him out with a sharp elbow to his temple.
Before the fourth guy can even pivot, I hook him behind his knee and pull him down.
Boone steps in, kicking the man in the face with such violence that he immediately goes still beneath me.
Boone sweeps the room with his commandeered rifle.
The lead guy, woozy and bleeding profusely from his mouth, reaches for something in a side pocket. Boone pulls the trigger. No hesitation, just a spray of blood, and the man slumps dead.
Boone fires off two more head shots, ensuring no one is getting up. Blood seeps from a scrape on his cheekbone.
“Your face.” I stand, reaching for him.
“I’m fine,” he says, his voice weird. “More incoming.”
That’s the only warning I get before the door slams open again.
Two more men fill the doorway, but before either of us can react, one guy’s head disappears in a puff of…ash? I belatedly register a low, pulsing sound. The other guy spins, and before he can even raise his weapon—poof—collapses into a second, larger pile of ash.
“Back,” Boone yells, holding his rifle in the ready position. He gingerly steps forward, checking over the railing.
“Holy shit.” He stumbles back into the apartment, as if propelled by his own shock.
“Oh my God, how many are there?” I ask, realizing how not prepared I am for this kind of combat.
“We got the ones down here,” a familiar voice says. I blink, confused. Boone gestures for me to look, so I walk to the railing.
Uncle Hopper and Silas are in the parking lot, surrounded by several distinct piles of ash.
“Sorry we let those two get past us,” Sy says, pointing his rifle at the tree line.
The rifle emits a low pulse—sound and light together—like a bass note you can see.
Another pile of ash.
I…what?
I look over at Boone.
Neither of us, it seems, has the words.
By the time we refocus on Sy and Hopper, they’re already up the stairs and pushing past us into the apartment, short, futuristic rifles drawn. There’s a look in Hopper’s eye that I’ve never seen before. I can’t even see Silas’s eyes because he’s wearing those goddamn dark sunglasses again.
Hopper sweeps the apartment, nodding in what I assume is approval.
“Stole his rifle, shot this guy, bashed this guy with his own weapon.” He notes the two closest to me. “Who wrestled this one to the floor?”
I hold up my hand. “I did.”
Silas turns to me. “Really? Didn’t know you had that in you.”
“Yeah, well, I’m sure you didn’t,” I spit out, rage—or adrenaline—boiling just under the surface. “You don’t know a damn thing about me. None of you do.”
Silas’s eyebrows shoot up, and Hopper steps back. “You took this one down, too, didn’t you?” He points to the fourth guy.
“Yes.”
“But you didn’t shoot them in the head?”
“That was me,” Boone says. “And I’m going to need both of you to explain what the fuck is happening right now.” He gestures to the dead bodies and the piles of ash in the doorway. “Maybe start with who the fuck attacked us and how you got here so quickly.”
“Whitaker.” Hopper pops his brows. “And we got the jump on his plans because Jake snuck into his system undetected.”
Boone shakes his head. “Whitaker as in Preston Whitaker?”
Hopper’s face goes flat. “Yep.”
“And who the fuck is Jake?”
“You remember,” Hopper says. “The multimedia piece.”
Boone pinches the bridge of his nose. “So… Jake the artist is also Jake the hacker?”
I lean in and whisper, “Jake is one of my uncles. He runs a WhiteHat group that keeps tabs on Hell_AI. I’m guessing he’s pretty good at general surveillance.”
“Wait.” Boone holds up his hand, then stares at Hopper. “You have people illegally monitoring Preston Whitaker? Do you have a fucking death wish?”
“Not particularly,” Silas says, unbothered by Boone’s anger.
Boone turns to focus his ire on Silas, then steps back.
Fair. Silas is really fucking terrifying.
Boone refocuses on the headless body and piles of ash in my doorway. “I also need someone to explain to me—really fucking quickly—how you’ve come into possession of the kind of weapon that can do this.”
Hopper’s eyes sparkle and shine as he gestures at the carnage.
“I’ll share all of that with you in due time, but I am so fucking impressed by you.
Both of you. Incredible reaction times. Sharp killer instinct.
” He shifts the blinds and looks out the window.
“To be clear, I’m just saving the explanation for when we’re not in an active op. ”
Boone looks to me, and I stand there. Hopper said killer instinct with such pride. I can’t…
Hopper kills people?
I’m gonna be sick.
“I killed these men in self-defense,” Boone counters, the vein in his forehead throbbing. “I put bullets in their head because I had to protect Maverick. I’m not a murderer.”
“Potato, to-mah-to,” Hopper says, kneeling next to the second guy I took down. He rocks his upper body, then reaches out, seemingly adjusting the man’s hairline.
“It’s a good hairpiece,” he says, mostly to himself. “I’d hate to send him off to the afterlife with it crooked.”
He then straightens the man’s collar and takes his gun.
“This is a nice gun.” He looks at Silas. “Make sure to gather all their weapons. No use wasting them.”
“What the hell are you doing?” Boone says, hysteria tripping over his words. “Don’t touch the guns. They’re evidence.”
“I’m so sorry.” Hopper smiles at Boone, tapping his forehead. “I’m a member of the team.”
“Team?” Boone asks, looking at me for more answers that I don’t know how to give.
“Short version?” Silas slouches back as he takes in the scene. “We’re a vigilante organization, and we can’t be here when the cops get here. So we’re gonna speed things along and explain later.”
Boone looks a little shocky. “You’ll do no such thing. You cannot touch the bodies.”
Hopper goes to say something, then something catches out of the corner of his eye and lets out a disappointed sigh. “This is all wrong.”
Working quickly, Hopper ignores Boone’s protests and aligns the bodies, adjusting them this way and that.
He steps back, then makes a few more adjustments as the sirens grow louder.
Finally, a sigh of relief.
“That’s better.”
He pulls out his phone and takes a picture.
Boone is stunned. “Hopper…”
His words trailer off as, and I’m just guessing here, the full impact of Hopper’s words finally settles in. Boone looks like he’s going to be ill.
Welcome to the party.
“Did you just set them up like The Last Supper?” Boone asks, his voice the kind of calm one reserves for a volatile mental patient.
Which…yeah.
Hopper tilts his hand. “For a full rendering of The Last Supper, we’d have to get the rest of the dead up here, but we’ve already ashed ’em.”
I look to the one-and-a-half bodies in the doorway. Ashed as in…turned to literal ash.
“Hopper,” Boone says, his demeanor frighteningly neutral. “I am confused about what I’m seeing.”
“Really?” Hopper’s look is so sincere, so him, that I can’t reconcile…any of it. “It’s like Silas explained. We’re vigilantes.”
“You’re not just vigilantes,” Boone says, understanding darkening his eyes like a sudden storm.
He sways, catching himself on a side table. It’s like when Rami does that quantum jump thing in his mind. You can actually see his brain figuring it out.
Boone gestures to Silas. “You’re the one with the scary tattoos. The one who walked that little girl to the police station.” He turns to Hopper, breathless. “Your accent. You’re the one with the funny voice. The New York accent.”
“The little girl said I had a funny voice?” Hopper asks, face lit up like Christmas. “How. Fucking. Adorable.”
“No, it’s not,” Boone says, sweat at his temples. “It means you’re John the Baptist.”
Hopper stands and sends Boone a proud grin. He throws out his arms, giving us a deep bow.
“At your service.”