CHAPTER 16 #2
I stare at the blue glow of the screens, the data reflecting in the glass.
The truth is, I’ve always felt like I was holding back at the Bureau.
Like I had to constantly throttle my own ambition so I didn't scare the suits on the seventh floor.
Leon is handing me a blank check to use every vicious, brilliant tactical skill I have, with zero oversight.
"Show me that cold, beautiful mind," he whispers.
He reaches around me, his arm grazing mine, and taps a specific coordinate on the map. Sector 4. The rival's main supply hub.
"You were perfect today," he says, his tone shifting into something that sounds dangerously like pride. "I saw the way you looked at the gun. You didn't hate it."
"I was trying not to get shot."
"You’re more alive right now than you’ve ever been." He steps back, just enough to give me breathing room. "Give me the plan, and I’ll give you the world."
The internal dam finally shatters. The federal agent I spent years building just drops dead, right there on the carpet. Fine. They want a traitor? I’ll give them the most efficient, lethal traitor they’ve ever seen in their pathetic lives.
I stand up. I push the oversized sleeves of his dress shirt up past my elbows, revealing the bandaged arm like it’s a badge of office.
I don't look at him as I walk toward the massive digital map.
I reach out and swipe my hand across the glass, dragging a layer of civilian data out of the way to reveal the underlying infrastructure.
"If we’re going to do this, we’re going to do it right," I say, my voice clipping into a hard, professional rhythm that I haven't used in three years. "I need more than this map."
Leon steps closer, but I hold up a hand. "Move. You’re in my light."
He actually steps aside.
"I want every asset you have on standby," I demand. I snap my fingers, pointing toward the heavy encrypted tablet sitting idle on the far side of his desk. "I need the encrypted tablet. Now."
He picks it up, watching me with a look of predatory triumph.
"We aren't just going to hit them; we’re going to vanish before the first 911 call is even logged," I tell him, my brain firing on all cylinders. I am practically buzzing. "I'm going to use the Bureau's own eyes against them."
"By hacking the feed."
"By owning the feed," I correct him. "This is going to be a ghost strike."
Leon walks over and hands me the tablet. As I take it, his fingers linger on mine for a second too long. He crosses his ankles, leaning his hip against the edge of the desk. His expensive shoes gleam in the low light.
"You look better in my chair than I do," he says, a dark smirk playing on his lips.
I drop into the leather chair, pulling the keyboard closer. "Show me how you break into their world," he demands softly.
"Just watch."
"Is it as easy as you made it look three years ago?"
"Easier. They're lazy." I crack my knuckles. "Don't stop. I want to see everything."
I bite my lower lip, my eyes darting across the code interface.
I bypass his corrupted software and dig straight into the back-end terminal.
I type out a 64-character passcode from muscle memory, slipping right past the FBI's secondary firewalls and dropping straight into Shadow-Net.
The command prompt turns green. I have full access to the tactical coordination grid for the entire eastern seaboard.
"They haven't updated the backdoor protocols since I left," I say, a disgusted scoff escaping me. "Arrogance is the Bureau's biggest weakness."
I pull up the local patrol routes, filtering by active GPS trackers on the black-and-whites.
"There. That’s the gap. Three minutes of total silence in the Fourth Precinct." I hit enter, locking the patrol schedule onto the main wall. "It’s almost too easy."
I cross-reference the rival syndicate's warehouse with the Bureau's surveillance grid. I sweep my hand across the tablet, flinging the raw data onto the wall monitor with a sharp digital chime. The map blooms with purple zones.
"That warehouse? It’s a black hole in the city’s grid," I explain, my fingers flying over the glass screen. "The FBI ignores that sector because of a standing deal with the Port Authority."
Leon’s eyes scan the purple overlay. "Your rivals think they’re safe there. They’re wrong."
"We have a twenty-minute window where the nearest patrol is four miles away," I tell him.
Leon moves behind my chair. The heat of his body acts like a wall, trapping me completely between him and the glowing monitors. He leans over, placing one hand flat on the desk and the other gripping the back of my chair. I can smell the bourbon on his breath.
"You’re doing a beautiful thing, Alessia," he murmurs.
I keep typing, though my heart rate just spiked. "Look at that. You’ve paralyzed an entire precinct for me."
"I haven't even started."
"Stay focused. I want to see where you’ll put the shooters." He notices the slight tremor in my fingers. "You’re shivering. Is it the cold, or is it the power?"
I don't answer. I just grip the digital stylus and drag a jagged, precise line across the city grid, cutting straight through the industrial sector using alleys and dead-end access tunnels.
Leon’s lips graze the shell of my ear. The jolt of electricity that shoots down my neck is completely unhinged.
"So smart. So lethal," he whispers.
I keep my eyes locked on the screen. "Tell me more about how you’ll kill them, Alessia."
"My clever, corrupted girl." He runs his nose along the line of my jaw. "The FBI never deserved a mind like yours. You were always mine."
I swallow the lump in my throat and finalize the path.
"This is the route. If your drivers are as good as you say, they’ll never be seen.
" I tap the screen, highlighting the municipal depot.
"We’ll use the salt trucks as cover. The GPS signals won't match, so the automated system will ignore the anomaly. "
Leon studies the path. "It’s a clean line."
"They’ll be dead before they can even reach for their phones."
I pull up the architectural blueprints for the rival warehouse, a document I stole off a server two years ago and kept buried in a secure file. I tap the screen three times, dropping small, lethal red dots onto the map.
"Place your best shooters here, here, and here," I command. "Cross-fire. No one gets out the back door."
Leon nods, his eyes tracking the kill zones.
"Use suppressed weapons for the first floor," I add, typing in the final execution sequence. "If you do this exactly like I’m telling you, the police won't even find the bodies until the shift change at 6:00 AM."
I hit the save button. The system locks the data, distributing the encrypted strike plan to Leon’s lieutenants. A sick, exhilarating thrill washes over me. The lack of red tape, the absolute lack of oversight—it’s intoxicating.
I lean back into Leon’s chest for just a second, a completely voluntary surrender to the man standing behind me.
"It’s done," I say.
Leon’s hand slides off the back of the chair and rests heavy on my shoulder.
"I’ve never been able to work this fast at the Bureau," I admit, staring at the perfect, bloody blueprint I just created. "The red tape always got in the way of the result."
"I like the result," Leon says softly.
I push the chair back. He steps back to let me stand. I turn to face him. We are so close my toes are touching the tips of his shoes. I have to tilt my head back to look him in the eye. My chest is heaving under his shirt.
"Is that what you wanted?" I ask.
His ice-blue eyes are burning.
"Tell me if it’s enough," I challenge him, needing to hear it.
"They’re dead, Leon. They just don't know it yet." I step half an inch closer. "Say it."
Leon looks from the map—my flawless architecture of a mass murder—down to me.
The look on his face isn't just lust. It’s a twisted, possessive pride.
He reaches out and runs a single finger down the line of my throat, tracing the rapid pulse beating there, following the path right down to my collarbone.
"It’s more than I hoped for," he says, his voice rough. "You’re a natural-born killer, Alessia."
I don't blink. I don't look away.
"I’ve never seen anything so beautiful as you in this light," he continues, his finger resting flat against my skin. "This is who you were always meant to be."
He grips my chin, his bruised knuckles rough against my jaw, forcing my head up. He is marking his territory, and I let him. I reach up and place my hand over his on my chin, my fingers intertwining with his battered ones.
"You don't belong to the law anymore," he states, a hard, absolute fact.
"I know."
"You’re mine. My partner. My strategist. My creature."
He leans down, his mouth hovering just an inch from mine.
"We’re going to burn this city down, Alessia."
I drop my hand from his, sidestepping his grip, and grab my secure comms unit off the desk.
"Let’s go find their safehouse."