Chapter 25
Twenty-Five
“C an you pull the chicken dip out of the oven? It should be done, even if the timer hasn’t gone off yet! I don’t want to be late to Mae’s!” Sloane finished swiping her mascara across her lashes and stared at herself in the bathroom mirror. For all the fear, the anxiety, the dread that had been swirling through her since Kimi came to town, she looked so much better than she was anticipating.
There were dark circles under her eyes, sure. And training so much over the last few weeks had her face slimming down, the angles of her jaw and cheekbones becoming sharper, more pronounced. But Sloane also looked strong. There was a sparkle in her eyes, even if they were hidden behind the protection of her brown contact lenses. She could see the determination pouring out of her in her reflection. She truly believed Gage and the guys were going to have a breakthrough with Kimi and her team, and they’d keep her safe.
And that felt so good.
“Yeah, I’ve got it!” Gage called back from the kitchen. Sloane wasn’t particularly excited to watch a hockey game, but she was excited to spend time with her friends.
A whistle from the hallway had her turning around as she smoothed her hands over her vintage shirt and jeans.
“Wow, baby. You look incredible.” Lust flared in Gage’s eyes and she didn’t even bother to hide her reaction. She smiled with her whole heart back at the man who made her feel so loved, and so safe. Her eyes raked up and down his body. Grey sweatpants, a black shirt that formed to every muscle on his torso and still showed off the tattoos on his arm, and… holy shit. He was wearing his glasses with a baseball cap flipped around backwards.
She was about to wipe the drool from her chin and tell him to forget the dip, they were going back into the bedroom!
“You okay, Red?”
“You have to change. There’s no way I’m going to be able to control myself around our friends with you looking like that.”
He chuckled. “And here I was thinking the same thing about you.”
“Me? In this ratty old outfit?”
His hand came up to cup her cheek, tilting her head back while his gaze dropped to her dark red lips. “Yes, you. That deep red lipstick is really doing something for me, Red. I want to kiss you so badly, but I know better than to ruin what a beautiful woman has spent so much time perfecting.”
“Golly, you really are laying it on thick tonight, aren’t you, Clark?” Her hands came to rest on his chest.
“I was thinking maybe tonight we could work again on your exposure therapy. Maybe start in the kitchen, get a little messy, and then work our way to the shower?”
She went up on her tiptoes, pressing her lips to the underside of his jaw right above his pulse point. “Leave that there all night so our friends can see that I’ve claimed you as mine, and we can work on whatever touch exposure you want tonight.”
Gage groaned, and her gaze dropped to where he was adjusting a rather noticeable bulge in his pants.
“I don’t think I’ll ever get over the way you can wind me up, Sloane.”
“Good. It’s one of my favorite things to do.” She giggled as she walked around him into the kitchen, grabbing her purse off the edge of the counter. “Is everyone going tonight?”
“I think outside of the usual suspects, Mae invited Seb and Emma, but Addie had a dance thing tonight they didn’t want to skip. Hawk mentioned talking to Elias, but he’s back in New York. So, I think maybe it's just Jessie?”
“Jessie? Really.”
Gage shrugged. “Something’s going on between her and Hawk, but I said my piece to him. As long as it doesn’t get us all banned from Dolly’s, they’re two consenting adults so…”
A buzzing sound came from behind Gage.
“What’s that in your pocket? A toy for later?” She reached behind him, pulling his phone out and placing it in his hand. “Boring.”
“You sure are wound up tonight, aren’t you?”
“I know it’s crazy, but I just feel good. In the middle of everything, I feel more free from my anxiety than I have for as long as I can remember.”
“That’s great, babe.” He looked at his phone. “Shit.”
“What is it?”
“I need to get my computer.”
He turned, heading across the hall to his office. So much for fun times before they had to leave. Sloane made her way to the kitchen, grabbing some foil to put over the top of her dip. She put the oven mitts on top of the foil cover so she could just grab them on their way upstairs.
Sloane walked towards Gage. She could hear him typing on his keyboard before she even made it into his office.
“What’s going on?”
“Can you call Hawk? On my phone.”
“Call him? Not a message?”
“Yeah. Call him. Tell him someone is trying to hack into our secure network and I need him to come over here with his laptop. Now.”
* * *
“You think this is the guy?” Hawk asked as he typed on his laptop next to Gage.
“Who else would it fucking be? He’s got to be looking for a way to get to Sloane. If he’s able to get into our system, he can change the security permissions to the building, to our apartments. If I hadn’t set up that trip wire to alert me, we would have been sitting ducks.”
“So, do we let him take the codes? Let him get in and see how he decides to play it?”
Gage’s heartbeat throbbed in his head. “You want me to let a fucking serial killer get access to all of our apartments and just have him walk right into the building? Fuck no, Phoenix. No.”
“Look, Sloane doesn’t even have to be here. We can move her to a secure location. Call Agent Liu. Have her send a team in from the Dallas office and wait for this guy to make a move.”
Gage’s fingers moved smoothly across his keyboard as he worked to chase the hacker. “Let me fucking think for a second. I’ve almost got this asshole to the trap door. If he goes in there, it’s all over for him.”
Hawk pulled his cell phone out, but Gage was too focused on the screen in front of him to care about whatever his buddy was doing. If he could route the hacker into a corner, they might be able to snag?—
“Oh, shit. Nice try asshole.”
“You good?”
“Yeah, and let’s be thankful whoever the hell this is isn’t as good as me.”
“What do you mean?”
“It’s some amateur. I don’t know why the fuck someone who didn’t know the difference between encoding and encryption would be trying to hack into a system I spent months meticulously building with those cyber-security assholes Cap insisted we work with, but whoever this is is about to get written into a corner they’re never going to get out of. Let’s see how they like it when I flip the fucking script on them.”
A few more keystrokes and Gage laid the perfect trap. Now, they just needed to wait and see?—
“Well, he took the bait faster than I thought. Idiot.”
“You able to track the IP address or anything?”
“Working on it.” His eyes had to be fucking deceiving him. “What the fuck?”
“What are you seeing that I’m missing?”
“This.” Gage pointed to a section of code. A trailing slash written into the code set off alarm bells. “This just gave them away.”
“And I’m taking it from your expression that you know who this is?”
“Yeah. You know them too. It’s Elias.”
* * *
“Sloane?” Gage’s voice startled her as she tipped the open bag of chips out into a serving bowl.
“Hey. I was just going to go bring this up to Mae. Do you need something before I go?”
“Have you been in contact with Agent Liu today?” Hawk asked.
“No.” A sinking feeling worked its way into her stomach. “She was traveling back to Virginia today though. I messaged her this afternoon, but thought she might just be in the air when I didn’t hear back from her.”
“Fuck,” Gage muttered.
“What is it?”
“There’s something going on with the Montgomery Defense security.”
“Right. That’s why Hawk was here. Did you guys figure it out?”
“Yeah. Sloane, have you heard from Courtney tonight?”
“No. What the hell is going on?”
“We need to know where Elias is.”
“I thought you said he was in New York?”
“That’s what the IP address suggests,” she heard him say under his breath.
“I can call her…”
As if summoned by the conversation they were having, Sloane felt her phone buzzing in her hand, only to look down and see Court’s name flashing across the screen.
“Speaking of Courtney and Elias.” She held up the ringing phone for Gage to read the caller ID before she answered. “Hey, Court.”
“Sloane?” Courtney’s voice was shaking.
Sloane’s face snapped to look at Gage. “Hey, where are you? What’s wrong?”
“I’m at the shelter. Ellie’s gone and I took Darius out for a walk, but… I’m so sorry, Sloane. I’m sorry.”
Her heart sank. “What happened?”
“He’s not doing well. I ran to get something from the office and the latch on his room must have not clicked into place. I think he ate something off the counter and I can’t get him to move or lift him to get him to my car.”
Sloane pointed to the door, making her way to slip on her shoes. “It’s okay, Court. I’m coming. Give me ten minutes. Just stay with him.”
“Make sure you bring Gage. I would have called Elias but he doesn’t get back from his work trip until tomorrow and I don’t know anyone else strong enough to lift him. I don’t think you and I can do it on our own.”
“I will. He’s right here beside me and we’re coming. Just try to keep him comfortable, okay.”
“I’m so sorry. Please hurry.”
“Court, stop. Accidents happen. We’re on our way.”
Gage’s hand landed on top of hers as she reached to grab the keys to his truck.
“What’s going on?”
“Darius got into something. Court said she’s the only one there.”
His brows furrowed as he took the keys from her. “We can’t go, Red. She needs to call someone else. We don’t know what’s going on with security and Elias?—”
“I don’t care about Elias right now, Gage! We need to get Darius to the vets. I can’t lose him…”
“Fuck. Hawk?”
“Yeah. Hold on. I sent a group S.O.S.—”
Pounding on the apartment door had Sloane nearly jumping out of her skin. And seeing the guys stalk into the room one after the other with their eyes locked onto Gage did nothing to settle her nerves.
“Explain.” Gunner ordered, Lily tucked into his side. Mae was standing next to Stone, who was holding on to Sage.
“Someone tripped the wire I had programmed into our cybersecurity system. They were looking for passcodes.”
“Passcodes to where?” Nash asked.
“This building. But that’s not the part we need to address right now.”
“So what is?” Gunner grumbled.
“We need to find Elias. He was the person trying to hack into the system.”
“How the fuck do you know that?”
“Gage, please. We don’t have time. Darius—” Sloane reached out for his hand.
“I’m sorry, Red. But this is about your safety. If Elias was looking for the codes to get in here…”
Her stomach was going to revolt. The worry in his eyes was screaming at her to understand without him having to say the words out loud. And in that instant, she did. “You think he’s… him?? You think Elias is coming after me?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know what to think. Every hacker has a signature thing, a way they write their code, or a little quirk that sets them apart. Elias and I have talked about his before. And I just saw it in action. We need to get a hold of Agent Liu. And we also need to contact the FBI Field Office in Dallas at the very least.”
“I’ll try Agent Liu.” Gunner started spouting off directions as Sloane tried to inch closer to the door. “Stone, take the girls back upstairs, then call Agent Ramos in Dallas. I’m sending you his information now. Kimi put me in contact with him when Sloane ended up in the hospital. He can help us.”
He turned back to Sloane. “I’m sorry, Sloane. You can’t go anywhere right now. You need to go upstairs with Mae and Lily until we can figure out next steps.”
“Courtney said that Elias was in New York. He’s not supposed to be back until tomorrow.”
She wasn’t going down without a fight.
“We have to go. She’s our friend. And Darius needs our help too.” But Gage didn’t so much as move his gaze from Hawk. “We can’t leave Courtney out of the loop about your suspicions with Elias. What if he hurts her?! I can’t live with that, Gage. I won’t.”
“Call her back and tell her to come here.”
“You’re going to just let Darius die?!” Her voice betrayed how utterly horrible she found that.
“Fuck, Red! I don’t know! The only thing that matters is keeping you safe.”
“I am safe. It doesn’t just have to be you and me, going. Nash will go with us, won’t you?” She turned to Nash who immediately put his hands up in surrender.
“Uh, I’m with Gage on this one, Sloane. Your life is more important.”
“Not more important than Courtney’s!”
“Fine.” Gunner said. “Wings, you and Tracker go. Sloane stays here.”
Her mouth dropped open. “Absolutely not. I’m going?—”
“For fuck’s sake, Sloane!” Gunner roared. “Lily, I swear to god this is your fault for being so stubborn.”
“Excuse me?” Lily’s eyes went wide as she stepped out of his hold and shoved her closed fists onto her hips. “You want to try again with what you just said?”
Gunner raked his hand over his face. “I just want everyone to take a breath and think this through.”
“I’ve taken enough breaths. Our friend is waiting for me. Gage and Nash might be okay with lifting Darius and getting him help, but Courtney is scared to death and alone and it’s not only my job as her friend, but it is my literal, actual job to help people in distressing times! I’m going. If you both want to go, you better keep up.” Sloane glared at Gunner as she reached the apartment door. “I have my tracker on. You have my permission to watch us go there and come back.”
“Let’s go, Red.” Sloane slipped her hand into Gage’s and she picked up her pace to keep up with him. By the time they reached his truck, she could feel her mask of confidence slipping away. She held it together as they drove down the road, but groaned when a sharp pang of anxiety hit. Sloane willed her stomach to settle before she made herself sick.
“You okay, Sloane?” Nash asked from the backseat while Gage’s grip on her thigh tightened.
“Yeah. My stomach is just in knots. I can’t make sense of anything right now. But thank you for coming with us.”
“It’s nothing. We’ll get your furry friend to the vet and the other guys will find Elias. It’ll all get straightened out.”
They eventually pulled up in front of the Silver Springs Animal Rescue. Gage put the truck in park, pressing a kiss to the back of Sloane’s hand before releasing her. She looked at him, knowing her worry was written all over her face.
“Whatever it is, Red, we’ll get him the help he needs. Let’s go.”
The shelter was eerily quiet. The place was completely dark, except for a few of the hallway lights leading from the reception area to the kennels.
“This is so weird. I don’t think I’ve ever seen it like this in here?”
“Ellie likes to turn some of the lights off at closing. Maybe Court was in the middle of the closing procedure if Ellie had to take off?” Gage shrugged, pulling her closer to him.
“Court? Why are the lights off?” she called out.
“In the kennel area, guys!” Courtney’s voice carried through the hallway.
They stepped into the room, but Courtney wasn’t there. One quick pass of the area and her heart sank. Sloane let go of Gage, dropping to her knees in front of the big fluff ball who was clearly in distress.
“What happened, sweetheart?”
“Let’s get him up and out to the car. Nash, can you grab us some blankets? There’s usually a pile behind the front desk.”
“On it.”
Gage stayed at the counter looking over the medications there while Sloane turned her attention back on Darius.
“It’s going to be okay, baby. We’re going to get you help.”
“Where the hell is Courtney?”
Sloane turned around to answer Gage’s question when her vision tunneled and her heart felt like it stopped beating. Because right behind Gage, straight out of her nightmares, was him .
“GAGE!” Sloane screamed, his eyes snapping to hers. She did the only thing she could think of. Pushing to her feet as fast as possible, Sloane tried to make it to his side, but as the silver glint of a needle pushed down into Gage’s neck, she knew she was too late. His eyes went wide as he tried to swing his body around. A second later, she watched as he fell, his head slamming against the counter before hitting the ground.
The masked killer turned towards her, and her heart broke as she turned away from Gage’s body. Her feet almost immediately caught on something. Darius! How could she forget he was right behind her?
Sloane’s body pitched forward as she lost her balance, her feet coming out from her as she crashed over Darius. A hand grabbed her hair, yanking her head backwards. The world went silent as she waited for him to end everything right then and there.
“Sierra.”