45. Siren
Chapter forty-five
I’ve been staring at my computer screens for too long without blinking. That’s why my eyes are watering. Not because I’m staring my dead brother in the face for the first time in years.
Roman and I hadn’t spoken since our parents kicked me out of the house at eighteen, though that’s mostly been on me. I’d always assumed he didn’t want to talk to me because he never tried to reach out. I didn’t make myself untraceable until I met my team. But even then…
No, that’s not fair. No one except someone with my skillset or better can find me now. And Roman wasn’t a tech guy, never was. He could barely work the smart television.
I chuckle to myself remembering all the times I had to help him, sniffling slightly.
I’d seen this article before, but somehow his death hadn’t seemed real until today.
Now that Delilah, his omega, has fallen into my team’s collective laps, and his killer is after her, and I have his name and face in front of me…
I shift my eyes from Roman’s face to Tyler Dunne’s and a growl builds in my throat.
I’m not surprised I didn’t recognize him at first, but now I realize who it is I’m looking at.
Tyler was in Roman’s grade in school, a few years ahead of me.
He didn’t hang out with my brother, but it shouldn’t surprise me at all that he ended up in Roman’s orbit.
My brother had a way of picking up buddies and friends like corduroy pants pick up lint.
I shift the cursor over into a different window, looking at the file I managed to track down for this psycho.
He has a rap sheet that reads like a true crime junkie’s wet dream: animal abuse, vandalism, arson, assault, domestic violence, assault with a deadly weapon, and on and on.
But nothing ever stuck and landed him in prison.
Not that I’m surprised by that. Tyler Dunne is the son of a Silicon Valley tech mogul, and nothing makes catching psychopaths harder than a rich daddy to cover everything up.
I jump nearly out of my skin as the security room door opens with a loud creak, and I whip around to see Phantom entering with a metal dish in his hands. I let out an exhale, turning back to my computer station.
“They got it out,” Phantom says, pulling up a chair and setting the metal dish down on my desk between us.
I look down at the chip, my upper lip twitching up in disgust. I can’t imagine the sort of sick, twisted individual who could tag a person like they were some sort of animal. Omegas are rare, but they are still people.
“Mav wants to know if there’s any more information you can get off this,” Phantom says, tone a little softer.
I sigh and shrug. “Possibly. What do you think he’s looking to find?”
Phantom runs his fingers through his hair, loosening his top knot. His undercut is growing in a little, and it needs a trim soon or he’s going to get cranky. Life has been so crazy that he must have forgotten to ask.
“If I had to guess, probably a way to track the signal back,” Phantom says.
I hum thoughtfully, pulling the damp tracker out of the metal dish and setting it on the desk.
I run the scanner over it and wait for the code to come up on my screen.
I’m still a little irritated that it took me so long to crack through the encryption.
Though that only confirmed my suspicions that whoever is ultimately behind it isn’t some sociopathic alpha with a grudge.
I read line after line, looking for anything that might point to a possible return pathway to the tracking signal. But my quick scan doesn’t reveal anything obvious, and it would take days to read through every line.
“It would take time, and even then there’s no guarantee. If I were designing these chips, I wouldn’t want there to be anything that could lead back to the origin point. Because this sort of human lo-jack is at least four different kinds of illegal,” I reply.
Phantom swears under his breath before letting out a sigh. I know it’s not the answer anyone wants to hear, but I’ve never been the type to dance around the truth.
“It’s probably just a one-way ping. Though we could still use that to our advantage,” I say, speaking the words as the thought occurs to me.
Phantom looks up at me, those crystal blue eyes spearing me like a knife to my gut. We have messed around in the past, but I’ve been in a masc mindset for so long that I don’t know if I could stand to take a knot. And Phantom will do a lot, but bottoming isn’t one of them.
But that doesn’t mean an alpha doesn’t have needs.
Before I can elaborate on my point, movement downstairs draws both of our attention.
Without needing to speak, Phantom and I get up, and I grab my tablet from my desk, taking it with me as we leave the loft and meet the others as they come in from the barn.
When I step fully into the living room, I catch Joker carrying Delilah away down the hall toward their room, but Bones and Cross linger.
It’s only once we hear the door to Joker’s room close that Bones finally tears his gaze away and looks at me and Phantom.
“Anything new?” he asks sternly.
He hasn’t put his mask back on, which is odd considering his recent behavior. Before Delilah came around, he’d only wear it on missions, like the rest of us. But with the new omega, he’s been keeping his face hidden almost all the time.
I shake my head. “It’ll take me a while to parse through all the data. And to look through the website I found that’s linked to the tracker.”
“How long?” Cross asks seriously.
“It’s a lot of data. I can try to make a bot to look through it for me, but it would help if I knew what I was looking for,” I reply with a shrug.
Bones growls, but I’m so used to his grumpy attitude that it doesn’t faze me. If he wanted me to fall in line, he knows better than to pull any alpha posturing shit.
“Do you think it’s safe to destroy the chip?” Phantom asks, wisely redirecting the conversation.
He moves away, sitting down at the table and leaning heavily on it, his forearms flexing as he twists his hands. I follow suit, taking my usual seat as Bones and Cross get the hint and join us. I set down my tablet and connect to my remote server, pulling up the data from the chip.
“I mean, it’s not going to explode, so I suppose?” I answer with a shrug.
“I don’t think we should,” Cross mutters, speaking so low it’s almost to himself.
All of us whip our heads around to look at him, expressions a mix of confusion and alarm. But he’s not really looking at any of us, his jade green gaze fixed on the surface of the table, lost in thought. There are several tense moments of silence as we wait for him to elaborate.
“If we destroy it, then he knows we’re onto him. And I don’t like that he knows where we are,” Cross says, tone unchanging.
“Well, what do you propose we do about that?” Phantom asks, a hint of irritation hidden behind his flippant attitude.
Cross looks up at that, and my heart kicks a little harder in my chest as a Cheshire cat smile spreads across his handsome face. Whatever plan he’s cooked up, it’s going to be good.