LOGINOliverI’m standing in a shipping container, but the walls are breathing.The ribbed steel is lined with thousands of server racks, humming with a low, wet sound. It’s freezing. I’m trying to type, but the keyboard is melting, the plastic keys fusing to my fingertips. Every time I try to pull my hands away, a heavy metal door slams shut somewhere in the dark.I look down. I’m not holding a mouse. I’m holding a printed manifest. Vintage '14. The paper is impossibly heavy. It twists, small bones grinding under the pulp, and suddenly I’m gripping a child by the wrist. He has hollow, terrified eyes. He pulls, frantic and desperate, but my fingers are locked, hardwired into his skin.I’m the one keeping him here.The server bays rupture. A landslide of twisted limbs and broken alphanumeric strings spills out onto the rusted floor.Snowdrop. Untethered. They pile around my knees, the weight of them dragging me down. I try to scream, but my throat is packed tight with shredded transit l
KirThe distance across the concrete floor is exactly forty-two feet.I know, because I’ve calculated the precise time it would take me to cross it, rip the monitors off the desk, and smash them into pieces.My hands are curled into fists so tight the knuckles are stark white against my skin. The muscles in my arms and chest are locked, straining against a violent, feral urge to intervene. It takes every ounce of discipline I possess to stay on the opposite side of the warehouse while the man I have come to care about more deeply than I want to admit, is tearing himself to shreds.I watch as Jozef and Ray translate some of the codes for him and he realizes the depth of the lake of depravity he’s being forced to swim in.His breathing hitches, a jagged, broken sound that spears right down into the deepest part of me.The urge to protect him slams through me, sharp and immediate. I want to drag him away from the computer, bury his face in my neck, and shield him from the staggering e
OliverI’m still floating in a bubble of euphoria when we arrive at the warehouse.A few hours ago, I was buried under Kir’s crushing weight. I was wrapped in the safest, warmest dark I’ve ever known, listening to the rough drag of his breath against my neck. For a few hours, the syndicate didn't exist. The forty-eight thousand names didn't exist. There was only the brutal, honest reality of what we’re becoming to each other.I felt cared for. Cherished. But the sun is up now and the moment the doors lock behind us with a loud metallic clang, the illusion shatters.The rigid, icy commander slides right back into place, in a seamless and terrifying transformation. His jaw locks. His shoulders square. The whiplash is nauseating.A bitter, jagged resentment claws up the back of my throat. It’s not like I wasn’t expecting it. This isn’t our first day here. He’s shown me exactly who he is in public. But knowing it and surviving it are two very different things.Fuck it. I’ve got sh
KirOliver hasn’t said a word to me since we left the warehouse. He looks shattered. His skin is pulled tight over his cheekbones, his eyes bloodshot from staring at the monitors for hours. But underneath the exhaustion is a sharp, jagged resentment directed squarely at me.He puts as much distance between us as the architecture of the penthouse allows, his shoulders rigid, the air in the room vibrating with his silent, simmering rage.He drops his bag onto the floor with a heavy thud and doesn't look in my direction. He just turns and starts walking toward the guest bedroom.He hasn’t slept there in weeks and the message he’s sending is loud and clear. But I pretend to be deaf and blind.I catch his arm before he can take another step.He jerks away instantly, his muscles bunching with hostile energy. "Don't," he snaps, his voice hoarse and scraped raw. "Keep your hands to yourself, Kirill. I’m done playing whatever game this is. Fuck the hacker in private and scorn him in public
OliverPeople think coding is about order. They think it’s about hiding in a safe, predictable little box where the rules of syntax protect you from the chaos of the real world.That’s bullshit.Writing a parser isn't a sanctuary. It’s a crowbar. It’s taking a chaotic, encrypted mess of a system and forcing it to bend to your will until it gives you exactly what you want. I don't hide in the code. I use it to break things open. For the last six years, I’ve made digital security my bitch, skimming offshore accounts, blackmailing corrupt politicians, and targeting billionaires who thought their firewalls made them untouchable.I treat the information from Scott’s servers exactly the same way.The raw data we dumped from the syndicate is an ugly, massive wall of corrupted text, hexadecimal strings, and broken database tables. There are no names or faces yet, just abstract information. It’s a puzzle, and I attack it with the same cynical detachment I use for every other hack.String
KirThe city map spread across the metal table is a goddamn mess of exit routes and choke points, and I can’t focus on a single inch of it.Scott’s shadow empire is sitting on Chana’s drives.If he finds out we’re the ones who breached his servers, he won't send a discreet hit squad. He’ll send an army to wipe this entire block off the map.I need to be calculating defense vectors. I need to lock this warehouse down.Instead, all I can hear is Oliver’s voice."I'm just saying, if you're offering to buy me a drink after we save the world, I prefer cocktails to bourbon," Oliver says.I don't look up, but I know exactly what he looks like.He’s leaning back in the chair next to Chana, his long legs stretched out under the table.He’s talking to Tariq. His tone is easy, dropping into that smooth, careless charm he wears like a second skin.He isn't trying to be seductive. He’s just existing, tossing out effortless flirtation while I stand ten feet away, my jaw locked so tight my teeth ach







