Page 169 of Stormbreaker

I check to make sure we’re completely alone, then lean in. “I need some information about the Tempestade’s research and what they have on Spark Keepers.” My voice drops with each word until I’m mouthing them by the end.

Edward’s eyebrows shoot up, his rolling gaze swinging around the room.

“Don’t say anything,” I plead. “I’m begging you.”

I don’t think he’d turn me in.

“Poet,” he hisses.

“I know, I’m asking for the world, but this is important. I wouldn’t ask otherwise.”

Edward assesses me, his shoulders relaxing after a moment. “Even if I agreed, I can’t hack into those computers. It would be a suicide mission. We’d have to do it remotely, and I don’t have the equipment I’d need to cover our tracks.”

His words are full of skepticism, but I can tell he’s already thinking about the possibilities. The challenge. Edward has always loved a puzzle, after all.

“Could you get the equipment?”

“Possibly, but it would be difficult. It’s not something you can just walk into a store and buy. I’d have to piece together various parts, probably build the entire thing myself. And all that would raise a lot of questions. Ones I’m assuming you don’t want to answer.”

His look is pointed as I huff out a breath of frustration. “There has to be a way.”

“If I could access them from inside the Citadel,” he muses, twirling his pasta and taking another bite, “then I could find out anything in those computers.”

“Inside?” I ask. “As in, break into The Shield’s security wing?”

He chews thoughtfully. “I didn’t say break in, but it’s interesting that’s where your mind went first.”

I frown. “How else would we do it? Ask nicely?”

He levels his fork at me. “You have a point.” Another twirl of spaghetti finds its way into his mouth as I cycle through a million ideas.

I recall the House Asale scion with his key card accessing the communications wing.

Would I dare ask my father?

No, I couldn’t.

I’d have to steal it.

Interesting how quickly my mind went there, too.

“What’s that look?” Edward asks, chewing and circling the tines of his fork at my face. “You’re planning something.”

“What if we could break in?” I ask. “Forget the logistics of it. What if I could get us in there? Would you do it? Could you do it?”

“Why, Poe? I could be arrested. You would be, too.”

“I know,” I whisper. “But I’m in trouble. Someone I care about . . . someone I love is in trouble. If we don’t find what we’re looking for, then I’m scared of what our futures hold.”

He studies me with his dark gaze, something flitting across his face. “You’re the only person who’s given a shit about me since Trin and I broke up,” he says. “No one else has checked up on me or asked how I’m doing.”

“Oh,” I say, confused by the shift in conversation. “I’m sorry.”

He shakes his head and wipes his mouth on a napkin. “No, I mean, I appreciate it. I’m grateful that you didn’t forget me, too.”

“We’re friends,” I say.

“Will you tell me what specifically I’m looking for?”