Chapter 17 A Bodyguard’s Loyalty Test #3
The building wanted his identity confirmation to open the override. It wasn’t enough that he was standing there. It wasn’t enough that he had physical access. The enemy had tied the system to voice biometrics, to recordings, to impersonated authentication.
Enzo’s anger burned so hard it turned to something numb. They weren’t just testing his protectors. They were testing his identity. They were teaching the system to believe a fake Enzo.
The handler watched with satisfaction. “See? You can’t even save her unless your voice says you’re you.”
Enzo’s jaw clenched until his teeth hurt. “You’re using my recordings.”
“I’m using what you left behind,” the handler corrected softly. “Your trust. Your routines. Your habits.”
Enzo’s mind flashed to earlier scenes, to times he’d spoken too freely into channels he thought were secure. To messages delivered over networks he assumed couldn’t be hijacked. To the way The Shadows had always been one step ahead - until now.
He had to stop the killing attempt, not just protect the integrity of his security.
He turned his head toward the suite door. “Valentina,” he called, voice low, not into the comm but into the air - direct, unrecorded, raw. “Open your line. It’s Enzo.”
There was a pause behind the door. Then a faint sound: a click, like someone tapping a hidden intercom.
Valentina’s voice came through, tight and wary. “Enzo?”
Relief hit him so hard it almost broke him. He swallowed it down. “Are you alone in there?”
“No.” Her breath sounded shallow, like she’d been bracing herself. “There’s a man. Someone - he’s not one of yours.”
Enzo’s blood went colder. “Is he armed?”
“I don’t know.” Valentina’s voice cracked on the last word. “He keeps repeating… your voice. Like he’s trying to drown me in it.”
Enzo shut his eyes for half a beat. The enemy wasn’t just trying to kill her physically. They were trying to poison her trust. They were trying to get her to doubt her own protections by making them sound like him.
He forced himself to calm. “Listen to me. Do not open the door. Do not obey any voice that tells you to open anything.”
Valentina’s silence stretched. Then she spoke, slow and careful. “You sound like you’re in control.”
Enzo’s throat tightened. “I am.”
But he wasn’t. Not really. His control was being rerouted through a system that only believed his recordings.
The handler stepped closer to Enzo, raising one gloved hand like he was offering a lesson. “You can’t tell her what to do if the system doesn’t recognize you.”
Enzo turned his head, eyes like knives. “Then I’ll make it recognize me another way.”
The handler’s smile faded slightly, the first crack in his confidence. “What way?”
Enzo glanced at the emergency panel again. AUTHORIZATION REQUIRED - MATCH ENZO. Voice biometric. Voice.
Enzo didn’t have his real voice on the line. He had a room full of people who might be listening, might be recording, might be using his words against him.
He needed a way to produce recognition without giving the handler what he wanted.
He reached into the pocket of his coat and pulled out the burner phone again.
He didn’t call the handler. He didn’t respond to messages.
He opened the audio file he’d been sent earlier - the one the handler had used for the voice.
Enzo hadn’t listened to it fully. He’d assumed it was a recording.
Now he needed to know what format it was, how it was being recognized.
The audio waveform on the screen looked wrong. Too clean. Too compressed. Like it had been processed.
Processed meant the handler had a way to alter voice signatures. That meant there was a second weakness: if the system was matching his voice, it might be matching a specific sample.
Enzo looked at the handler. “You’re not just using my voice. You’re using a specific clip.”
The handler’s eyes narrowed. “Of course.”
Enzo’s mind raced. If the system was matching a clip, it might be checking for certain phrases - commands that the handler had embedded. The handler had started with “Hold position.” Then “Valentina. Open the door. You’re safe. I’m coming.” Then “Don’t interfere. Valentina needs space.”
Different lines. Different commands. But maybe the biometric system didn’t care about the words - maybe it cared about the voice signature only. If so, Enzo couldn’t beat it by choosing different phrases.
Unless - unless the system expected the clip to be delivered through a specific channel, through the corridor speakers. If Enzo could disrupt the speaker feed, he could prevent the handler’s clip from reaching the biometric matcher.
Enzo turned toward the wall speaker near the ceiling. The grille was just visible, a small metal mesh. He reached up and twisted it loose with a sharp jerk. The speaker screeched, then went dead.
The corridor lights flickered once, then steadied.
Vito’s voice burst through comm, panicked. “Enzo, what did you do?”
Enzo didn’t answer him directly. He spoke to Valentina through the suite’s intercom instead. “Valentina. Can you hear me clearly?”
“Yes,” she said, and her voice sounded closer now, like she’d pressed her mouth to the intercom. “But it keeps changing. It’s like the room is fighting you.”
Enzo’s stomach clenched. “Good. It means the system is listening for the wrong feed.”
The handler’s eyes widened, anger slipping through the calm for the first time. “You disabled the speaker.”
Enzo looked at him. “So now your voice can’t reach the system to authorize anything.”
The handler stepped forward, quick now. He moved like a man who’d never expected to be physically blocked. Enzo braced, but the handler didn’t attack him directly.
He darted to the emergency panel and slammed his gloved hand onto the screen, forcing a command. The panel beeped, and a new message flashed: AUDIO AUTHORIZATION - ENZO REQUIRED.
Enzo’s pulse hammered. They were switching methods. If the speaker feed was dead, they’d push audio through another channel. Another path.
Enzo grabbed the panel and ripped the casing off, exposing the wiring. The building’s interior heat rose into his palm. He shoved the wires aside, cutting the line he suspected the handler would use.
Sparks threatened but didn’t fully pop. The panel’s screen went blank.
For a second, the corridor was silent except for Valentina’s breathing through the intercom and the faint scuffle behind the suite door.
Then Vito’s voice came through comm, softer now. “Enzo… your override is working. I can’t believe it, but it’s working.”
Enzo didn’t let himself hope too soon. “How long before the suite locks fully?”
“Five seconds,” Vito said. “Four - three - ”
Enzo moved. He didn’t waste time waiting for the door to unlock automatically. He grabbed the suite door handle and yanked. The lock resisted, then released with a harsh click.
The door swung inward just as Valentina’s outline appeared in the gap - hair disheveled, eyes bright with fear she refused to let turn into helplessness. She stepped forward, then froze when
then she saw the handler’s gloved hand slide into view, not through the corridor door but from the other side of the suite - like he’d already planned the geometry of the moment.
Valentina’s breath caught. Her gaze snapped to Enzo, and for a heartbeat her expression did something dangerous: it softened into recognition, relief that tasted like betrayal because it came too late.
Enzo shoved the door wider with his shoulder. “Inside. Now.”
The handler didn’t rush anymore. He smiled as if he’d already won the only argument that mattered. “You disabled the speaker. Clever. But you didn’t disable the cameras.”
Enzo’s eyes flicked to the hallway beyond the suite opening - security domes mounted high, their lenses black and unblinking. The room’s temperature seemed to drop around them, or maybe it was just his blood turning to ice.
Valentina moved without asking permission, stepping past Enzo and into the suite.
Her legal folder wasn’t in her hands; it was where it had been secured earlier, behind the false panel Enzo had ordered Vito to check.
Still, she looked at Enzo like she expected him to be holding the answer in his palm.
Enzo caught her wrist, not gentle. “Where’s your phone?”
“Gone,” she said, voice tight. “They took it when they… when they switched the route.”
Enzo didn’t like the way she said they. Like she’d already decided the identity of the attacker and didn’t want to say it out loud.
The handler stepped into the doorway, one hand raised in a calm gesture, the other hovering near his belt.
His gloves were matte black - no shine, no fingerprints.
He wore dark tailored clothing that fit too perfectly, as if the fabric had been measured for his body and his purpose.
The air smelled faintly of ozone where Enzo had cut the wiring, but the handler carried a different scent: expensive cologne layered over something metallic and old.
“Enzo Moretti,” the handler said, and his voice carried through the suite like he’d tuned it to the room. “You’re out of position.”
Enzo hated that his name sounded like a command in someone else’s mouth. “You’re in my corridor.”
The handler’s eyes went to Valentina. “Not for long.”
Valentina’s shoulders lifted, bracing. “Don’t talk to me like I’m a - ”
Enzo cut her off with a glance. Not because he wanted silence - because he wanted control. He shifted his stance so his body blocked the line between the handler and Valentina’s front, forcing the handler to either step around him or shoot where Enzo could see it.
The handler took one step closer. “You’re not thinking about what’s actually happening.”
Enzo’s jaw flexed. “I’m thinking about you using audio authorization to force your way into a secure corridor.”
The handler’s smile widened. “So you noticed the method. Good. That means you understand the system isn’t fooled by your strength. It’s fooled by your voice.”
Valentina’s eyes sharpened. “What are you talking about?”