“Except Hamilton is president and Mathers is dead,” I remind him.
“It was going to be mine,” Jamison hisses, and the pieces are starting to slot into place for me.
I couldn’t give two fucks about Jamison and his delusions of grandeur. I want to reclaim my life, and that starts with salvaging Techxet. “Where is my father’s money?”
“I don’t know. Denton hid it offshore someplace. We’ve been searching for it but coming up blank. You won’t find anything on his home network either.”
“Don’t fucking lie to me.” I press my knife to his throat. “I know you were behind the most recent theft.”
A muscle clenches in his jaw, but he doesn’t speak. “Tell them to relieve his mother of her left hand,” I calmly say, speaking to my friends while staring at Jamison.
“No! Stop!” he shouts, his neck moving with the motion. My knife slices through his skin, making a small cut. Blood dribbles down his neck and onto his chest.
“I did take it. We needed it to incentivize Denton’s followers to switch their backing from him to me.”
I straighten up and stand back, urging him to continue with my eyes.
“Only a handful of people know Denton is dead. His followers think he’s overseas on business, and we’ve been using email to keep communication open, using it to drip feed me into the narrative. If Denton supports and trusts me, his followers will fall into line behind me when the time comes. Especially if there’s a financial benefit.”
It doesn’t miss my attention that he’s speaking in the present tense. Moving to the far end of the room, I press down on the communicator chip on my neck to speak to Diesel. I warn him to be extra vigilant for newcomers.
Drew is laughing as I step back beside my friends. “You two stupid fucks were so dumb. No one would back you. They would’ve taken your money and run straight to Hamilton.”
“Truth,” Charlie agrees.
“Where is it?” I ask.
His shoulders slump, and I can almost see the fight leave his failing body. “In an account on the Cayman Islands in the name of Arnold Bruce.”
“How did you hack into the Techxet system without detection? And who else knows how to access it?”
“I put Denton onto Murtagh, and he already had Becker in his back pocket,” he explains. “I didn’t actually do anything. Denton didn’t want me compromised. It was Becker who found a loophole and supplied the way in. He also ensured it wasn’t discovered.”
“We need that info,” Xavier says. “I know you have it stored somewhere.”
“There’s a fake app on my phone called Eat4Now,” he says, looking at Xavier. “I backed everything up there. You can see what has been done and reverse it, but there are others who know about the loophole.”
“Which others?”
“Hamilton’s men. I don’t know who they are, just that they’ve been in the system.”
“I thought you said this was all Denton?” I narrow my eyes to slits, mistrustful of every word that comes out of his scheming mouth.
“It was until Denton was gone. Now, Hamilton’s running the op.” He smirks, and it’s creepy with blood coating his teeth and dripping off his lips. “He wants that evidence your father has, and as soon as he finds it, he’s gonna hang you three out to dry.” His gaze flits between me, Anderson, and Lauder.
At least he’s confirmed what we have suspected. Hamilton does have a copy of the recording, and that’s a big problem.
“Don’t know why you’re gloating,” Anderson says. “You’re a dead man, and we’re gonna crucify Hamilton before he gets a shot at us.”
Damn fucking straight.
Xavier holds Jamison’s phone out, pushing it under his thumb. “Activate it.”
Jamison obeys without argument, and Xavier quickly changes the fingerprint to his own. I watch over his shoulder as he opens the app and scans through the files. We’re both silent as he quickly skims over the information, but it’s enough to prove we have what we need to plug the hole.
A layer of tension lifts off my shoulders as I step to the side of Xavier. Yes, we don’t know where the original missing money is, but this is more than enough to save Techxet and file for divorce from Sydney.
“Who is Argon, and what was he really doing at the apartment that day?” I ask, moving on to other answers we need.
Jamison’s eyes move to Anderson’s as a burst of gunfire breaks out outside, claiming our attention. I activate the comm channel to Diesel. “What’s going on?”
“You need to get out of there now!” Diesel yells. “Two SUVs have just pulled up and opened fire.”
Glass shatters as shots rip through the large window, spilling across the room. Everyone dives for cover, and I pull Xavier down with me, shielding him with my body. “Stay there.” I shove him behind a moth-eaten couch because he lost his gun in the blast and he’s vulnerable. I didn’t think he’d need a replacement for today, considering Diesel and his crew are protecting us outside.
Xavier nods, looking a little out of his depth.
Curling my fingers around my gun, I crawl across the floor using my elbows, doing my best to avoid broken glass, and heading toward the others. The guys are nearer to the window but staying sheltered behind the dust-laden old furniture littering the room. I duck behind a worn leather chair and aim my weapon, firing outside.
More shots fly over our head as Diesel is shouting in my ear, but I can’t hear him over the noise as we retaliate, trading gunfire with the unknown and unseen assailants outside.
And then it just stops.
I glance over at Anderson, and his confused expression matches my own. “What’s going on?” I ask Diesel as the sound of screeching tires tickles my eardrums.
“They just up and left. Are you okay? Any casualties?”
I glance over my shoulder, my eyes instantly finding Xavier, safely tucked away where I left him. Relief floods through me, but it’s short lived as I follow the line of his eyesight. “Well, shit.”
“What?” Diesel asks.
“Jamison is dead.” His mangled body is riddled with bullets, his head thrown back with one side of his face missing.
“I guess we know what that was about,” Drew says, rising to his feet, brushing dust off his clothes.
“They wanted to silence him.” Xavier climbs to his full height.
I get up and go to him. “Don’t look.”
“It’s too late,” he whispers, and I pull him into my arms. He’s shaking. Probably in shock.
“He brought this on himself, and he must’ve known this was a possibility when he came after us.” I wonder if his crew turned up late on purpose. If they wanted us to take him out. Maybe they didn’t expect him to divulge trade secrets, but they didn’t know we were holding his mother hostage to force him into speaking.
Either way, we got what we needed from him, even if I’m pissed we didn’t get to ask him more questions.
“Let’s get the fuck out of here,” Lauder says, echoing my thoughts.
I rub a hand up and down Xavier’s back. “I’m ready to go home.”