7

"Where the hell is the ledger, Ethan?"

Caleb’s voice sliced through the hum of the server room. He didn't look up from his monitor. The blue light washed over his sharp features, turning his skin into marble.

"I’m working on it." I didn't look back. My fingers flew across the mechanical keyboard. Each click sounded like a bone snapping in the silence. "The encryption on these offshore accounts is heavier than you said. You’re hiding more than just tax breaks, aren't you?"

"I'm hiding us." Caleb stood up. His chair scraped the floor. A harsh, grating sound. He walked over, his shadow swallowing my desk. "Don't dig where you don't belong."

"I belong wherever my name is signed." I hit Enter. A progress bar crawled across the screen. 12%. "And since you tied my personal assets to your debt, I’m digging until I find the kill switch."

"The kill switch?" Caleb laughed. It was a cold, jagged sound. He leaned down, his hand catching the back of my neck. His thumb pressed into the sensitive skin behind my ear. "You still think you’re going to bankrupt me? After everything we did in that warehouse?"

My throat went dry. The memory of the metal table against my spine flared up. I shoved his hand away. "That was adrenaline. This is business."

"It's the same thing." He grabbed the edge of my desk, leaning in until I could smell the espresso on his breath. "You want to ruin me so you can stop wanting me. It won't work."

"Watch me." I pointed at the screen. 18%. "Once I have the routing numbers for the 'Stage One' infusion, I’m pulling the plug. You’ll be back in the gutter by noon."

Caleb’s eyes darkened. He didn't yell. He just reached over and shut the monitor off.

"Hey!" I lunged for the power button.

He caught my wrist. Hard. He twisted, forcing me out of the chair. I stumbled, my lower back hitting the edge of the server rack.

"Gym. Now," Caleb commanded. "You’re wound too tight. You’re going to make a mistake."

"I don't need a workout. I need those files."

"You need to remember who's in charge." He dragged me toward the door. I fought him, digging my heels into the carpet, but he didn't stop. He pushed through the heavy glass doors of the private executive gym.

The air was thick. Rubber. Sweat. Stale oxygen. Caleb tossed a pair of sparring gloves at my chest.

"Put them on." He kicked his shoes off. He was already in his undershirt, the fabric clinging to the muscles of his back. The bandages from the warehouse were gone, replaced by a jagged, red scar.

"I’m not sparring with you, Caleb." I dropped the gloves.

"Then just stand there and take it." He moved. Fast.

His fist caught my shoulder. A blunt, stinging impact. I gasped, the air leaving my lungs. I didn't think. I swung back. My knuckles grazed his jaw.

"Better," Caleb grunted. He stepped inside my guard. He headbutted me. Not hard enough to break skin, but enough to make the room spin.

"You fucker!" I tackled him.

We hit the mat. Hard. I was on top, my knees pinning his arms. I swung a wild punch. He moved his head. My fist hit the floor.

"You’re sloppy, Ethan." Caleb bucked his hips. He flipped me like I weighed nothing.

Now he was on top. He pinned my wrists over my head. His chest heaved against mine. Sweat dripped from his chin onto my lip. It tasted salt.

"Get off me." I bucked, trying to throw him, but he was a mountain.

"Tell me why you’re really digging into those accounts." Caleb leaned down. His nose brushed mine. "Tell me it's not because you’re scared I actually saved you."

"You didn't save me. You trapped me." I spat the words at him. "You used my name as a shield for Lucas Reed's filth."

"I used your name to keep you alive!" Caleb roared. He slammed my wrists back against the mat. "If your name wasn't on those accounts, Lucas would have put a bullet in your head the night of the gala. I’m the only reason you’re breathing."

"Is that why I found this?" I wrenched one hand free. I reached for my suit jacket lying on the bench. I pulled a small, black disc from the lining of the lapel. "A tracking device, Caleb. Found it ten minutes ago."

Caleb went still. The anger in his face vanished, replaced by a cold, sharp dread. He took the disc. He turned it over in his fingers.

"This isn't mine," Caleb whispered.

"Don't lie to me."

"Ethan, look at the casing." He shoved it under my nose. A small, etched logo. A stylized 'R'. "Reed. This has been on you since before the warehouse. Since the office."

My blood turned to ice. "The safe houses. The server room. Everything we’ve done... he’s heard it all?"

"Not heard. Tracked." Caleb stood up, pulling me with him. His grip was frantic now. "He wasn't waiting for us to make a mistake. He was waiting for us to be in one place long enough to clear the perimeter."

"Caleb—"

"Shut up." He grabbed my jacket. He ripped the lining out. He started checking his own clothes. "If he’s tracking this, he’s already—"

A low, vibrating hum started beneath our feet. Not a machine. A growl.

BOOM.

The floor bucked. I hit the ceiling. Or the ceiling hit me. Everything went white.

Glass shattered. A billion diamonds screaming through the air. I hit the weight rack. My ribs ground together. A sharp, white-hot flash of pain blinded me.

"Ethan!"

Caleb’s voice sounded like it was underwater. I tried to open my eyes. My lashes were stuck. Wet. I wiped my face. My hand came away red.

The parking garage below us had vanished into a fireball. The gym floor was tilted at a twenty-degree angle. Smoke, black and thick like oil, rolled through the broken windows.

"Caleb?" I coughed. My throat felt like I’d swallowed glass.

I saw him. He was pinned under a fallen cable machine. His face was covered in dust.

"Move," he wheezed. "Ethan, get out!"

I crawled toward him. The floor groaned. A section of the concrete near the door crumbled, falling into the inferno below.

"I'm not leaving you." I grabbed the steel frame of the machine. I pulled. My muscles screamed. The heat was rising. I could smell burning rubber. Burning hair.

"Ethan, stop. Look." Caleb pointed at the shattered window.

A black helicopter hovered in the smoke. No markings. A man stood in the open door. Lucas Reed. He held a long, black rifle. He wasn't looking at Caleb. He was looking at me.

"He’s not here for the money," I whispered.

Lucas raised the rifle. He adjusted the scope. He smiled. It wasn't a business smile. It was a hunter's grin.

"Down!" Caleb lunged, his hand catching my ankle, pulling me behind the heavy base of the leg press machine.

A bullet sparked off the steel where my head had been a second ago.

"He wants the drive," Caleb hissed. He was bleeding from a gash on his thigh. "The one you took from the table. Give it to me."

"No." I gripped the drive in my pocket. "If I give it to you, you’ll run."

"If you keep it, he’ll kill you right now!" Caleb grabbed my collar. He shook me. "Ethan, give me the fucking drive!"

I looked at him. The man who scammed me. The man who broke me. The man who was currently bleeding out under a pile of scrap metal while a sniper tried to take my head off.

"I'm the kill switch, Caleb," I said.

I stood up. I didn't run for the door. I ran toward the broken window. Toward the helicopter.

"Ethan, no!"

I held the drive up. I saw Lucas shift his aim.

I didn't throw it. I dropped it. Straight down into the fire of the parking garage.

Lucas’s face contorted. He roared something I couldn't hear over the blades. He turned the rifle.

I didn't wait for the shot. I jumped.

Not out the window. I dove back toward Caleb, grabbing a stray weight plate. I slammed it into the emergency sprinkler head above us.

The room exploded again. Not fire this time. Water. Cold, high-pressure water.

The smoke turned to gray mist. The world went dark.

I felt Caleb’s hand find mine in the deluge. He pulled me close.

"You idiot," he whispered into my ear. "You just burned forty million dollars."

"I burned the leash, Caleb." I wiped the blood and water from my eyes. "Now we're both in the gutter. Let's see who survives the fall."

The helicopter circled. The spotlight cut through the mist, searching for us.

"The stairs," Caleb said. He pulled me up. "If we get to the basement, we can—"

The floor beneath us gave way.

We fell. Not into fire, but into the darkness of the elevator shaft.

I reached out. I caught a cable. My palms burned. I felt Caleb grab my waist, his weight dragging us both down.

We slid. Ten floors. Twenty.

We hit the top of the elevator car with a bone-shattering thud.

I lay there, gasping for air. My heart was a frantic drum.

Caleb crawled over me. He grabbed my face. He kissed me. Hard. Deep. A desperate, filthy claim in the dark.

"You're insane," he said.

"I'm your partner," I corrected.

The elevator doors above us were ripped open.

"Found them." A voice. Cold. Professional.

It wasn't Lucas.

It was Noah Bennett. And he was holding a suppressed pistol.

"Noah?" I looked up.

"Sorry, Ethan," Noah said. He leveled the gun at Caleb’s head. "The Paris files were just the beginning. Stage two is much cleaner."

He pulled the trigger.