AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Let me finish. The first time, I got in and out. But the second time, I got caught.”
“The second time?” Aidan demanded, jerking to his feet. “What the fuck did you go in a second time for? In and out!” He clicked his fingers. “In and goddamn out, Conor. Did having Padraig as a godfather teach you nothing?!”
“It taught me plenty,” I snapped. “But I wanted to gain access to a satellite.”
“Did you?” Eoghan inquired, his tone as calm as ever. Even when he dealt blows, he sounded calm—it was starting to get annoying.
“I did, but it’s now defunct.” That still pissed me off.
“What were the repercussions?” my youngest brother asked.
“The NSA swooped in and made me an offer I couldn’t refuse.”
As one, my brothers sucked in a breath. Shocking them like that would have been impressive at another time, but this was bad. I knew it—they did too.
“What kind of offer?” Finn rasped.
“They wanted me to work for them. Test their software and ensure their hardware was impenetrable. Eventually,” I admitted after clearing my throat, “I got to be important. No one else on their staff could do what I could.”
“It gave you power?” Aidan murmured, his eyes still wide but respect creeping into them now.
“It did. I used it to leverage our family’s safety.”
This time, they didn’t suck in a breath; they just gaped at me.
For a full minute.
Okay, now I was impressed with how impressed they were.
When they carried on staring, I sheepishly rubbed my nape. “It’s why we’ve been so untouchable.”
“Not Da…?” Declan whispered.
“No.”
“Jesus fuck, that’s how important you are to the NSA?” Eoghan rumbled, the sound of his hand slapping the desk loud amid the echoing silence from my other brothers.
“Used to be. That usefulness wore out recently.”
“And that’s why you’re telling us? You’re warning us?” Aidan asked carefully.
“No. Maybe? I’m not sure. I guess it might be for the best that we're trying to behave outwardly.” I paused, reflecting on Anton and how he’d probably protect us if Star asked nicely. “I’m telling you because…” Though I’d spent last night sleepless, trying to figure out how to explain this to them in the fewest words possible, I was still coming up dry. “Okay, so…” I hesitated. “Right, I mean…” I coughed. “It started…” I sighed.
“Just spit it out, Conor, for fuck’s sake.”
Brennan’s use of my real name had me cringing. Not that I appreciated my nickname, but that meant he was pissed. I didn’t have a problem with annoying my siblings, but I kind of needed them on my side if today was going to end how I wanted it to.
“I’m just trying to explain how this particular ‘situation’ happened,” I defended before blurting out, “You know how I can listen in to your calls and texts?”
“No, we forgot,” Declan drawled, but unlike Brennan, he appeared amused rather than annoyed with me.
My lips twitched. “It’s a clever piece of tech. It’s adaptable for any device with an internet connection—”
“Fuck,” Eoghan rasped, four steps ahead. “They got their hands on it? They’ve been gathering intel on us?”
“They did have it in their possession. For a short while. But they weren’t collecting data on us.
“Anyway, the clever part isn’t accessing any device. Long story short, collating that much information requires a lot of storage so I developed a new method of storing all that data.
