Total pages in book: 67
Estimated words: 63866 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 319(@200wpm)___ 255(@250wpm)___ 213(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 63866 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 319(@200wpm)___ 255(@250wpm)___ 213(@300wpm)
“I’m here to collect,” he tells her. “Came for War’s wife, but I think I’ll take this one too. The way Cyberius spoke about her, we can put her to work in more than a few ways.”
I have no freaking clue who this man is, but when I picked up the extra heat signatures in the building when I first tracked Cyberius down, Ronan told me it was likely protection of some sort.
It made me wonder if he’d brought them with him or if he hired random-ass people when he got to the city. Except I don’t miss the Italian accent. Not after living in Italy for a month.
Offhandedly, Ronan had said it could be possible he recruited people who don’t care for the Marino family now that Cyberius knew where I was staying. That whole enemy of my enemy thing. He was right, but Ronan is always right. It’s annoying and badass at the same time.
“Tova isn’t here,” Cosima growls at him. This must be a Marino family skill set.
The gun leaves my back, and he aims it over my shoulder in front of me at Cosima. Who smirks. I’m not surprised in the least. Who knows what she has up her sleeve? She is full of surprises.
“Are you sure about that?”
“Don’t slip.” Cosima's response catches not only me off guard but I think the man too.
“What the fuck are you talking about? Where is War’s wife?” The man demands an answer. I’m still trying to catch up to what Cosima meant by her comment.
My eyes drop to Cosima’s hand, and I see the silver glint. Oh God, we are not doing this! Cosima and her freaking knives. When we’d get bored in Italy, she’d randomly teach me how to wield a knife.
Cosima is freaky good at it. My father taught me self-defense and how to handle a gun, but knives were something we never did. And I now know what she meant with her comment.
Knives are personal and close, and this man with his arm wrapped around me is as close as you can get.
“I’m sure that Marks always hits her mark.” That’s all the warning I get before Cosima is dropping to the ground. I lift my foot, bringing it down on the man’s as hard as I can, like my father taught me. I glance up just in time to catch the knife Cosima tosses to me, the same action we’ve done a million times together.
I catch the handle, gripping it hard before I jam it into the man’s thigh, making sure my hand doesn’t slip and cut my own palm in the process. He lets out a scream, and I turn the knife, the gun falling from his hand as he lets out another scream. He starts to go down too, taking me with him.
I hit the ground, bracing myself for his body to collide with mine, but it never happens. I quickly roll to my back, ready to kick him or try to get the gun that skidded across the floor.
My mouth falls open when I see Ronan, his hand in the man's hair yanking his head back as he brings a knife to his throat, slitting it. The blood sprays out, splattering everything around them.
Ronan releases the man’s head, and he drops like the dead weight that he is. Ronan and I stare at each other. His face is unreadable as he takes a step toward me and plucks me right off the ground, his mouth taking mine in a deep, hard kiss.
I wrap my arms around him, kissing him back with the same intensity. “Did my coding work?” I can’t help but ask when the kiss breaks. Ronan’s whole face softens, a small smile forming there.
“Of course it did,” he says, having never doubted it.
There are always number codes to get into everything. It can take years to crack these codes. The longer the code, the more years it can take for a computer system to break it by trying every number combination possible.
Except what Ronan had told me stuck in my mind. Nothing is random. You only have to figure out people’s patterns, and that’s just what I did. I gathered all the information I could find on Cyberius; his little cat and mouse game he thought we were playing wasn’t a game at all.
I took that information and entered it into a new system designed to track Cyberius’s patterns, using that personal information to enhance the code so the system could more accurately predict which code Cyberius would have used not only for the lock on his door but for various aspects of his life. You’re never picking a random number when you set up a key code; you might believe that, but you’re not. You’re prone to your own patterns. By identifying those patterns, you can uncover everything.