“Fine.”
I glance between them, both still frowning and brooding. “Okay, boys. Now kiss and make up.”
“Fuck you.”
“Fuck off.”
My chuckle follows them out of my office as I dig out something for this headache and pour a glass of scotch from the bar in my office. Their footsteps echo down the hall as I sink into my chair and boot up the computer. Swallowing the pills and amber liquid in one fiery go, my thoughts drift away. More of my failures shine through each day. I failed fifteen years ago to keep our family whole and safe, and the further thisgets, the more I am being pulled in every direction. We could walk away from it all, but that would destroy the brotherhood that we carved out of the trauma that came from losing Luna. We could keep going, but that means using Fallon and fuck if that doesn’t make me twist with some foreign feeling.Disgust, guilt... Fear?
Lost in thought, I glance up to see that not only has an hour passed, but I’m viewing the cameras in Fallon’s room. She lies curled beneath the blankets, looking so small and delicate it makes my heart clench. All of that rage drains from her face as she sleeps. The urge to protect her hits me harder than any punch to the gut.
I can't take my eyes off of her. Suddenly I see her body tense, and a whimper of fear comes through the audio feed, followed by her begging, “Please… get off me… stop…”
I’m running out of the room. I find myself in the basement, hand on her door before I realize what I’m doing. Fuck, I don’t have my mask.How comforting is that scary ass mask to a girl having a nightmare?I know enough about panic attacks and the murmurs in her sleep to know something happened. Inside, I twist with the need to hold her, but I know I can't. I have to keep my family safe. Instead, I put my back to the door, and slide down until I’m sitting, offering the only comfort that I can give: my guarding presence that she can't ever know about.
Akio
After getting Fallon back downstairs, I don’t mention to the guys that I gave her a chance to shower before getting her settled in her original room. That was the longest twenty minutes of my life, standing in thebathroom, knowing she was dripping wet behind that thin curtain. Apparently being told that I am a god among men is too much to ask for, but I did at least get a thank you from her, so here is to progress.
I head down the hall to my computer cave after exiting my brother’s office. I can't believe that I nearly lost control on Declan. I feel sick over what just took place. The need to defend Fallon brought out another side of me. A side that I vowed long ago to never let loose on my brothers. I head to the room I have claimed as my own, which I keep dark. Monitors are spread across one corner of the room. Neon lighting beams from the equipment while I collapse in my gaming chair.
Tossing my mask onto the desk next to the main monitor I lean back, closing my eyes. My mind goes back in time, picturing the dark, hateful eyes as well as the softer blue ones; both of which haunted my childhood. Neither is innocent, neither gets to have a role in my life any longer. It’s been years since I’ve thought about my parents. Years since the last time I lost control and showed that I will never fully outrun my monster. I will never forget the terror in the man’s eyes. I may not have killed the target they chose for me, but I ended someone’s life. The first death of what would become many. The night the monster was born.
I shake my head, forcing these thoughts back to the tiny corner of my mind that I keep them locked in. Scrolling through the file I created earlier, I review Fallon’s friend, Quinn Cadieux. She works in the IT department at Helix, graduated top of her class at MIT, sends money to her younger brother monthly and often takes trips to see him. That is the easy stuff to find. What is more interesting is the amount of cyber protection she has on her system. Unfortunately for her, nothing is impenetrable, and I managed to get a case file from her system that had no business being there. It’s a police file on her dead uncle who had areputation for bad news. According to the lead detective, Quinn was the one who killed him but it was ruled self-defense and closed quickly. I have my doubts, though considering the crime scene photos clearly show he was attacked in his sleep.
My mouse moves of its own accord, and I snap to attention. I immediately counteract whoever the fuck is hijacking my system. Code flies across my laptop as I try to make the connection through a back door. The file on Quinn disappears before my eyes.
I fight for control of the system and end up in a dance of bypassing firewalls and countering encryption. My fingers fly over the keyboard but for every access point that I gain, I lose another. Every time I get close to removing this son of a bitch from my system, they slip away, deploying scripts and keeping me from taking full control. It's not too late to completely restart the system, but that would leave me blind and us defenseless. Fuck. Just before I pull the trigger, the mouse pulls up the app with video monitoring and opens the visual feed on Fallon. A chat appears on my screen.
Gotcha.
I kill the system. Fuck. Fallon was right about her little friend. There is no other person who could have pulled this off. I have to tell the guys. We were already on the clock since taking Fallon and people will start looking for her soon.
But if Quinn knows who we are, that clock just sped up.
Chapter 10
Matteo
“Idon’t need a fucking chaperone,” Declan grumbles from beneath his mask as we head down the stairs to the basement.
We’ve been making these trips twice daily for the past few days, taking turns walking our mouthy prisoner up and down the halls in hopes that she’ll loosen up and share what she knows about what goes down behind closed doors in Helix or anything that could remotely help us nail her father to the wall. So far, Akio and I have been unsuccessful, managing only snide comments and threats from her. Today is Declan’s first day on Fallon duty, and after what happened on the roof, I’m reluctant to leave him alone with her.
“Debatable,” I reply, sliding my mask into place as we stop in front of the door to the panic room. “Knowing you, you’d get a wild idea and toss her into the pool, threatening to drown her until she squeals something useful.”
Dec tilts his head in my direction. “Well…”
“No,” I grind out. “It wasn’t a suggestion.”
“You’re the one who brought it up.”
“I didn’t–” I sigh. “Never mind. Let’s just do this.” I unlock the door with the retina scanner, and step into the room. Then freeze.
“Fuck me.” Declan groans quietly from beside me, his eyes glued to Fallon’s bare ass sticking up in the air. She’s bent over on the floor in the narrow space between the bed and the wall with one leg stretched toward the ceiling and her forearms bracing her body weight. She glances over at us for a brief second, but flicks her gaze away in dismissal.
“Morning,” she says. “Or evening? I can’t really be sure since there’s not even a fucking clock in this shithole.” She swings her leg forward and lowers into a stretch that makes my dick twitch. Which only serves to piss me off more.
“Where the fuck are your pants?” I bark, trying and failing to ignore the way her panties barely cover her in this position.
