Chapter 1 INTERRUPTION #2
And his daughter just walked into our headquarters.
“I’m the director of the National Reconnaissance Office,” she corrects.
Her voice doesn’t waver. “I control the satellites Phoenix is trying to hijack. I’ve spent the last three weeks gathering evidence that my father has been using my agency to facilitate assassination by algorithm.
And I have approximately seventy-two hours to stop an artificial intelligence from achieving digital omniscience before it kills everyone in this room and takes over the world’s surveillance network. ”
She opens the folder. Spreads papers across the table. Schematics. Satellite codes. Facility blueprints.
“Forest Summers said you were the only people capable of helping me do that.” Those brown eyes find Ghost’s pale gray ones. “Was he wrong?”
Ghost doesn’t answer immediately. He studies her the way he studies everything—with the patience of a predator that knows its prey isn’t going anywhere.
“You disabled our security system,” he says finally.
“Your hardlines were vulnerable at the junction box. Amateur installation. You should fire whoever did the wiring.”
“That was me.”
“Then you should retrain yourself.”
Brass makes a sound that might be a suppressed laugh. Or a choke. Hard to tell.
Ghost’s expression doesn’t change. “Why should we trust you?”
“Because if I wanted to betray you, I wouldn’t have walked through your front door.
I would have used the satellite access I still have to pinpoint your location and call in an airstrike.
” She meets his gaze without blinking. “I’m asking you to trust the woman who’s about to destroy her own father to save the people he’s trying to kill.
If that’s not enough—” She gathers the papers, starts to reassemble the folder. “Then I’ll find another way.”
“Wait.”
Ghost’s voice is soft. The dangerous kind of soft.
She stops. Waits.
“How did you find Forest Summers?”
“I have the highest security clearance in the intelligence community. Forest Summers has run classified joint operations with the NRO for years. Finding him wasn’t difficult.
Convincing him to send me here was harder.
” Something shifts in her expression. The first crack in the ice.
“He said you were the ones who burned Phoenix’s servers in Chicago.
He said if anyone could stop the upload, it was Cerberus. ”
“And your father? What does he think you’re doing right now?”
“My father thinks I’m having a mental health crisis.
” The words are bitter. Sharp. “That’s the story Phoenix is spreading.
By tomorrow, every major network will be running pieces about the NRO director who snapped under pressure.
By the end of the week, I’ll be a cautionary tale about women in high-stress positions. ”
“And instead?”
“Instead, I’m going to burn his empire to the ground and salt the earth so nothing ever grows there again.” She lifts her chin. “Now—are you going to help me, or not?”
Ghost looks at her for a long moment. Then at the papers on the table. Then at me.
My expression gives me away because his mouth twitches. Not quite a smile. Never quite a smile with Ghost.
“Torque,” he says. “What do you think?”
Everyone turns to me. Including her. Those calculating brown eyes sharpen with surprise—she didn’t expect to be assessed by the guy who answers doors.
“I think anyone who can disable our security, find our safehouse, piss off Ghost, and still walk into a room full of armed operators like she owns the place is either exactly who she says she is—” I meet her gaze. Hold it. “—or the most interesting honeypot we’ve ever seen.”
“And which do you think I am?”
The question is a challenge. A test. She’s used to people underestimating her—it’s in the set of her shoulders, the tilt of her chin. She’s been fighting to be taken seriously her whole life.
I grin. Can’t help it.
“Only one way to find out.”
She blinks. It’s the first time her composure has cracked.
“Ghost.” I turn to our commander. “I say we hear her out. Worst case, it’s a trap, and we kill our way out. Best case …” I look at the blueprints spread across the table. Facility schematics. Satellite codes. The kind of intel we’d kill for. “She just handed us the keys to the castle.”
Ghost nods once. “Brass. Lock us down. Full security protocol.”
“On it.”
“Whisper, Fuse—stand down but stay alert. Halo—”
“Running her background now.”
“Good.” Ghost turns to the woman standing in the center of our safehouse, surrounded by enough firepower to start a small war. “Director Vance. You have five minutes to convince me not to kill you.”
“All I need is three.”
She starts talking.
I lean against the wall, keys still, watching the ice queen who just walked into our lives. What the hell have we gotten ourselves into?
She catches me staring. Our eyes meet across the room.
Something flickers in those brown depths. Annoyance. Assessment. Something else I can’t name.
I grin wider.
This is going to be fun.