Chapter 25
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
SIMON
Swiveling side to side in my chair, I cracked my neck, fingers positioned over the keys I knew too well.
Already coded to destroy their fucking comms and cameras, I glanced at the screens protruding over the van.
Courtesy of Levander, this baby had technology far superior to the pitiful one Thorne had made me work with for years.
Compared to that, this was a fucking dream.
“This shit is fucking sweet, Lev!”
His voice crackled through the earpiece. “Glad you’re enjoying your upgrade.”
“Bitch about it again, Simon, I dare you,” Thorne hissed, his breathing audibly strained because of his inability to stay out of the mess while we handled it.
“Do it! I’d love to have angry sex when this is over.”
Oren.
“Fucking…” Groaning, I ran a hand down my face. This was it. Either we would rescue Liam, or we wouldn’t, and that anxiety wasn’t something I could swallow right now. My hands were sweaty, keyboard already slick with the substance.
“Yeah, fucking,” Oren replied, his cheeky laughter billowing down the line. “Sorry you all have boring sex lives—”
“My sex life is anything but boring, asshole,” Matt sharply answered, his huff evident of his annoyance.
“Mmm, I don’t know. Thorne says you’re vanilla in the bedroom.”
Thorne inhaled deeply. “That is not what I said. I said he is the furthest thing from vanilla in the bedroom.”
“Can confirm,” Lev chimed in without missing a beat.
Choking on my energy drink, I set it aside. “F-Fuck… What?”
“You fucked the Mafia boss, Matt?” Oren whistled. “Yeah, not vanilla. Definitely red.”
A sharpened exhale from Matt sent a smirk to my face, but it quickly vanished as his voice cut through. “Damn right I did, but I was the lucky one.”
“Oh my God!” Oren squealed, what sounded like sniffles following. “You found your person!”
“As much as I’d love to sit here and delve into my best friend’s love life, I believe we have a far more pertinent task on our hands, yeah?” Thorne prompted, his timbre shifting into the one he used in the ranks. “Simon. What are systems looking like? Anything we need to be wary of?”
Rolling over to the desk, I shifted the keyboard closer. Typing, that familiar string of letters greeted me as I angled my head to look at the cameras. With one final check, I clicked the last key, sending the corrupted file through the compound.
“About to be down. Give it like… thirty seconds, but you’ll need to be wary of the main doors. I’ve programmed enough to keep them from alerting the rest of the facility, but based on my cameras, you’ve got at least thirty guards plastered at the front. If you can angle—”
“I can take them down,” Oren mused, the click of his safety echoing. “Just need a signal, and I’ll ignite the bastards like the Fourth of July, or whatever the saying is.”
“Light them up like it’s the Fourth of July,” Matt corrected, unamused.
“Then take this as your order: execute them, dove.”
“Sure thing, baby. Copy!”
“Oren. The copy is supposed to go… Oh, fuck it, copy.”
Silence followed, rolling through our devices before the unmistakable whistle of Oren’s impeccable aim sounded, bleeding through with each successful hit.
Equipped with the best sniper rifle Lev could illegally purchase, his eye had improved since his time in the ranks.
Even from the nearby building he’d perched on, his marks were perfect, no error found in his decimation of their men.
Mere seconds passed before his joyful timbre appeared once more. “All clear! Uh, might be slippery when you walk through. Make sure you don’t fall and tear your stitches.”
“Are these two always this sickly adorable?” Lev asked, his renowned grin evident in his question.
“Yeah, and they fuck like rabbits,” I muttered. “Just without the spawn.”
“Oh, fucking Christ,” Matt huffed.
A sharp jingle stole my attention as the screen blinked once with its completion. “Systems down. You’re all clear.”
Lev’s voice came first. “Copy that.”
“Oh, this is when I say copy, isn’t it?” Oren chuckled, but his nerves were obvious. “Uh… Copy.”
Rolling through the line like a haunting utterance, Thorne’s gravelly timbre snuffed out the playfulness from the group as the darkness he kept confined in his mind slowly slithered from him with one desire—to kill.
“Copy. Ground unit is moving in. Going dark.”
And with that, all my trust rested in them to bring my sunshine back to me.