Page 482 of Black Reign

And somehow, impossibly, we built Pierre.

Our smallest hacker.

Our greatest vulnerability.

Our best piece of code.

My husband kisses my forehead.

Behind us, another alert sounds from his computer.

Xavier sighs.

“Pierre.”

A tiny voice answers.

“Yes, Papa?”

“Out of my root directory.”

A pause.

Then:

“No.”

I smile.

Perfect.

Absolutely perfect.

Four months later

Pierre is too quiet.

This is never good.

I know this because silence in our house generally means one of three things.

He is asleep.

He is dismantling something expensive.

Or he is somewhere on the internet he has specifically been told not to be.

Considering it is four seventeen in the afternoon and I can hear the faint click-click-click of a keyboard coming from Xavier’s study, I eliminate sleep immediately.

I stop outside the open door.

Pierre is sitting in his father’s chair.

Again.

His feet don't reach the floor, so they swing beneath him while his fingers move rapidly over the keyboard. A pair of blue-light glasses sits slightly crooked on his nose. Dark hair sticks up in the back where he has apparently been running his hands through it.

He looks exactly like Xavier when he works.