Chapter 15 Erryn
ERRYN
“Ihave you on a red eye tonight,” Ben said as a notification pinged. “I’ve sent through the flight details. I see you have signed off on the integrations?”
I nodded to Artemis as she pointed me toward where Helena waited, following the opulent corridor with a raised brow at the row of sculptures lining one side.
“Artemis took me through the information sent by Maxim. I would ideally like more time, but we are running against the clock with the Obáir investigation,” I said quietly.
“Boucher and Maxim have been discussing Vanguard for a while. I’m just unsure why I have been kept out of the loop, and Artemis has similar concerns.
But that can be a discussion between the Chairs once the dust has settled. ”
“And how do you want me to proceed with your business in Paris?”
“It’s settled,” I said with genuine relief.
“Has Boucher approved the sign off as well?” he asked. “I can wait to add his signature to the file closure I’m forwarding to the Head.”
I laughed under my breath. “Some was lost in translation, but his opinion was along the lines of ‘conniving bitch’ when I informed him of the decision. Send it through to the Head, it’s signed on my authority.”
That conversation had been particularly enjoyable, and alongside Helena’s messages, confirmed everything I had suspected.
Boucher knew he was a breath away from losing Paris to Artemis, and he was holding her allegiance hostage by not signing.
I had just ensured her alliance, and I was confident that her direction was compatible with mine.
A shame that stent held up to his tantrum, really.
I felt Helena’s gaze on me the second I entered what looked to be a bar-style rec area, though it took me a second to see her, tucked away observing in an unassuming corner.
“Have you been having fun?” I asked as I neared.
There was a slight tilt to her lips, though she maintained her composure under the weight of multiple agents surreptitiously watching us.
“Oh, so much,” she said. ‘I’ve been making so many friends.”
I huffed softly, narrowing my eyes.
“Did you keep your hands to yourself?”
“Define to myself,” she said with a sly look that I refused to acknowledge.
“Do I need to add more strikes to your compensation package?”
She contemplated that for a moment. “I’d like to negotiate one.” She looked past me to a dark-haired agent on a laptop in a corner booth by the entrance. “That wankstain needs some adjustment.”
“Is he the one who said I had a deadly tongue?”
Her gaze snapped to mine, neck flushed with rage, and I breathed a laugh as she slipped from her seat, stopping her with a hand on her stomach.
“Non, petite sauvage. Il dit vrai. Ma langue est aussi mortelle qu’il l’affirme.”
Helena scowled. “We have already confirmed that my French is less than satisfactory.”
“You will find out what it means later,” I said, keeping my expression impassive as I gestured for us to leave. “We leave Paris tonight. Everything here is settled.”
Helena grunted, trailing me as I led the way. I felt her pause as we passed the agent, turning on instinct to see her leaning down and speaking to him.
“Hel—”
My warning was drowned out by the sound of bone crunching as she picked up his laptop and cracked it across his face.
Oh, for fuck’s sake.
I wasn’t entirely sure how I managed to get Helena out of France without another strike.
The compromise was a ninety-day ban from the Paris faction base, which, under the circumstances, I considered a victory.
The flight back was thankfully turbulence-free, and the car was waiting for us when we landed, but it was still with utter relief that I walked back into my home as the sun rose, my bed the only thing I could think about.
My body was protesting the far too many hours on my feet.
I sent Ben a message to clear my day as I blearily washed the feel of travel off my skin before collapsing into bed.
I was out before I could even set an alarm.
I had intended to sleep until lunch, so it was with utter confusion that I opened my eyes to a dusk-heavy sky, my sleep-addled mind trying to figure out what year it was and momentarily pulling a blank.
I felt slightly more coherent, which was a good start, though my hip was loudly protesting being slept on for what must have been just shy of a short coma.
Fuck. I looked at my phone and the endless line of notifications. Ten hours.
I groaned as I unfurled myself from the cocoon of blankets, retrieved the pain medication from my side table, and made my way to the kitchen for a glass of water.
“Oh there you are, love,” Claire said as I entered, the air thick with the smell of baking. “I wasn’t sure if you would want a full meal, so I made a quiche. I can add a salad if you are hungry? I’m just plating Helena’s now to take out as well.”
“Thank you,” I said, my voice gravelly from sleep as I downed a couple of the pills, my gaze falling on what she was doing. “Wait.”
Claire froze, a small jug of what I assumed was dressing hovering over the plate she had been preparing.
“Is that Helena’s?”
“Yes?” She looked at me in confusion.
“Put the dressing in a separate dish,” I said. “And separate the feta and tomato from the rest of the salad. Nothing touching.”
“Oh. Okay.” Claire set the jug down, looking a little crestfallen.
“You can make mine look as appetizing as you always do,” I said, forcing my voice to be gentle. “Just separate Helena’s. Please.”
She busied herself following my instructions as I made my way out to the dining room to tackle my notifications while I waited.
I had barely made a dent in them before she was sliding my dinner in front of me.
I was scrolling through the day’s report from Ben, nearly finished eating, when Helena arrived.
“I’ve updated the home security with a new deadlock system on the internal door,” she said, wandering in looking far too bright-eyed for someone who had spent the entire night traveling. “It will trigger if there is any override attempt in the central system.”
I studied her over my tea, my mind sluggishly processing her words.
“You did what?”
“Big-ass deadbolt,” she said, holding her hands about six inches apart.
“On the foyer door?” I asked. “When?”
“This morning. It took some time to integrate properly. I noticed the Vanguard Tech rollout into your home system, so I’ve kept the deadlock on a separate control line for now. The existing system will trigger it, but it’s operating in parallel until the new integration has been fully tested.”
“Did you not think to wait for me to sign off before you modified my home?” I asked as Claire slipped in silently with Helena’s tray.
“I think the response you are looking for is, ‘Thank you, Helena. Look at my pretty deadbolt. I feel so safe,’” Helena said, a smirk playing at the corner of her lips as she took a seat adjacent to me.
“I know it’s not—” She trailed off as Claire placed her tray down with an artistic array of little serving plates with a selection of food in each, all separated neatly, with small ramekins of sauces on the side.
Her gaze snapped back up to mine, her expression guarded.
“Thank you, Helena,” I said casually, sipping my tea as I turned back to my phone and carried on working.
There was a long silence, only broken by the soft clinks of Helena’s knife against porcelain as she ate in silence, and after the shit she had pulled in France, I was enjoying having her on the back foot far too much.
“I need to be in the office early tomorrow,” I said after the silence stretched on. “I’m having trouble accessing some of the base systems remotely. I think I’ll need to hard-sync my primary control device to the core network so I can push authorization across faction systems.”
Helena frowned, still looking a little flushed. “It should be integrating seamlessly.”
“Yes, well.” I huffed. “That would suggest anything is doing what I want it to at the moment.” It was just enough of a dig to get that obstinate little set to her jaw, the barely veiled challenge far too tempting for her.
“I beg to differ,” she said. “I think you have had some things go your way recently.”
“Oh?” I mused. “And what would that be, Helena?”
She raised a brow.
“If you are going to reference your behavior,” I said coolly, holding up my phone so she could see the email I had opened.
“Shall I direct your attention to the medical report from one”—I checked the email again—“Jean-Marc Laurent, indicating a fractured orbital wall with medical leave for the foreseeable future?”
Helena snorted. “Not bad for a MacBook Pro. Those things are flimsy as fuck.”
I gave her a long look.
“He fucking deserved it!”
I narrowed my look.
“He said you had a deadly tongue.” She scowled. “The prick had a baguette up his ass over disrespecting his beloved Madame Artemis.” She thickened her accent as she mocked him. “And then he goes and disrespects you.”
I found her oddly fascinating, given the little bits of information I had learned about her over the last few days.
I had done the generalized background check on her before we had taken her on.
Her mother had died of aggressive cancer at six years old, and she had been subsequently raised by her father, Hector Rossi, an Italian laundry owner, until the age of seventeen, when she had fallen off the radar until five years later when she had turned up in London at the end of my gun, without an ounce of fear.
She was, for all intents and purposes, the perfect agent: no close familial ties and a lust for adrenaline.
But I wanted to know more. I wanted to know her.
And I wanted to see just how deep that submissive streak went, so at odds with the fiery exterior she wore like armor.
“Chivalry isn’t dead, I see,” I murmured. “We can work on the rest.”
“Do you have any suggestions?” she flung back.
“Oh, Helena,” I said, giving in to the nagging need this woman had created.
I was going to hell anyway—I may as well have fun on the way.
I needed more after the taste I had in France.
“I have many. But first, I need to introduce you to the consequences of your actions. Shall we see how well you take it? Go wait in the lounge.”