Excerpt of A Rhapsody of Ravens and Revenge

Welcome to the elite world of Dynamis Security. Check out A Rhapsody of Ravens and Revenge, an edge-of-your-seat suspense novel, coming wherever books are sold.

He decoded numbers and patterns like most people breathed, and computers had been an extension of his body since before puberty. Even stuck in an elevator shaft, with sweat dripping down his spine, his fingers flew across the keyboard of his laptop, closing in on one of the most dangerous hackers in the world. They called her The Black Lily. But to Cypher, she was as close to his equal as he’d ever found. And this game excited him like no other.

The elevator jerked to a stop and the doors slid open with a clatter, but his fingers stayed steady. The smell of dust, something dead in one of the ventilator shafts, and rusted metal burned the inside of his nostrils. The temperature was almost unbearable—his skin slicked with sweat and amplified by the heavy gray coveralls he wore.

The heating system in the old building seemed to shoot directly into the elevator shaft instead of the cavernous space where the heart thumping techno music shook the rafters and writhing bodies danced with abandon. But he knew how to separate pain and discomfort from the job. The job came first. Always.

His adrenaline spiked and his blood pumped faster as the death trap below him picked up speed and took him to the fifth floor. The spinning turbine above and the jagged edges of metal gave him some concern, but he’d programmed the elevator he was on top of to go no higher than the fifth floor. The sixth floor was shut down for construction. But still…there was the sharp edge of worry that something might go wrong. But a little bit of fear was a healthy thing. It kept the mind alert and the body ready for anything.

“You okay, Cyph?” Ghost asked through the comm unit in his ear. “Your heart rate is through the roof.”

Gabe Brennan was team leader for this mission. He was the oldest of all of them and had been in the game the longest. And his call sign couldn’t have been more appropriate. He was a ghost. Because Gabe Brennan didn’t exist, and no one could find him if he didn’t want to be found. Not even Cypher. And that was an ability that deserved enormous respect.

“I’m fine, mom. Just enjoying the ride to the top. And praying to God you don’t have to scrape my guts out of that turbine.”

“I’ll pass on that job,” Warlock said from his position across the street as lookout. “You had that leftover Thai for breakfast and an entire pizza for lunch. If you didn’t work out like a machine you’d be seven hundred pounds.”

“Jealousy doesn’t become you, War,” he said without heat. “It must be nice sitting across the street eating Russian donuts while we’re doing real work over here.”

Warlock—also known as Nathan Locke—huffed out a laugh. “It’s not so bad, now that you mention it. There’s a hot little brunette that just paid off the bouncer. Lord have mercy.”

“If you ladies are done, we’re supposed to be on a mission here,” Reaper interrupted.

Cypher grinned even as sweat dripped into his eyes. Atticus Cameron’s voice got softer the more irritated he became. And by the sound of it, he was very irritated.

“Any change in Yukov’s status, Ghost?” Atticus asked.

“We’re about ten minutes away from the club,” Gabe answered. “He’s not in any hurry. Stopped to get cigarettes. You’d never know by looking at him that he’s about to buy nuclear launch codes and try to start World War III.”

“A wily kind of guy, that Yukov,” Atticus said. “I wish I could say the same about our ever so outgoing financial wizard. Kraus hasn’t moved from the VIP lounge for the last hour and a half. His nervous ticks are so obvious they’re making me nervous. And he’s about halfway through his third whiskey.”

“Yukov only needs him to make sure the money is deposited in their account and then rerouted to a safer location before The Black Lily double crosses him,” Gabe said. “I’d be nervous too if I was Kraus and knew I had to go up against The Black Lily’s computer skills. If Kraus fails, Yukov will put a bullet in his head right in the middle of that VIP lounge and he won’t care who sees him. Yukov is invincible in this country.”

“Well, that’ll be fun,” Atticus said. “How’s it going, Cyph? Any closer to pinning her down?”

“In the last half hour she’s bounced me from Paducah, Kentucky to Amsterdam to Antarctica to Greenland. If she’s half as attractive as her computer skills then I can’t wait to meet her in person.”

“That’s assuming she’d give you the time of day to begin with,” Warlock said with a snort. “Women have a tendency to run the other direction whenever they see you. You’re a scary looking dude. Your reputation precedes you.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“Focus, Cyph,” Gabe interrupted. “We’ve got about twenty minutes before this whole mission goes to hell. Find her.”

“On it, boss. I’ve narrowed her down to a three-mile radius. She’s in the city, just like you suspected.”

“She’s too greedy.” Cypher could hear Gabe’s smile over the comm unit—like a shark right before it bit into its prey. “She could’ve made this entire transaction go through from halfway across the world. But she likes to watch.”

“My kind of woman,” Cypher said, smirking as he closed in on The Black Lily’s location. She was practically right under their nose. Now they just had to find her in the crowd.

The Black Lily had been the bane of his existence for the past four years. He’d had no idea where she’d come from. Hackers—or at least the good hackers—could recognize the work of others, and there was a hierarchy. Once certain tasks were accomplished then the hacker would move up the chain to establish his or her reputation.

He’d been ten the first time he’d hacked into the Pentagon and CIA databases. If only the world really knew what happened to John F. Kennedy, boy would the stuff hit the fan.

At twelve he’d managed to bring Vegas to a screeching halt. It was hard for casinos to operate when all their money had vanished. And hey, he’d given it back. Eventually.

At fourteen he’d been too cocky for his own good and interfered in a military operation that could have cost the lives of a lot of soldiers. He’d been lucky it had been Robert Lockwood who’d showed up on his doorstep one afternoon and not the FBI ready to drag him away in cuffs and lock him away forever on any number of charges.

Lockwood had been Assistant Deputy Director of the CIA at that point and he’d given Cypher two choices—go to prison and never touch a computer again, or come work for the CIA.

It hadn’t been as easy a choice as one might think. He’d thought of running. He had money and skills most people only dreamed of. Not to mention he didn’t particularly want to be on the right side of the law. He was too good at being bad. And it paid a whole lot more.

But there’d been something about Robert Lockwood that had made him rethink his choices. He was a man who commanded respect, and he said exactly what he thought and always meant what he said.

So he’d reluctantly shaken hands with his new mentor, packed his bags, and left the life of a teenage boy behind for something bigger. But boy did he miss that punch of adrenaline at knowing he could slip in and out of any system in the world and take whatever he wanted. He tempered those needs by breaking as many rules as he could get away with and generally being a pain in everyone’s behind.

The name Cypher was legendary, even twelve years after the day Robert Lockwood had found him. And still, no one had ever managed to pull off the fetes he’d accomplished when he’d walked on the wrong side of the law. But The Black Lily had come close.

The disturbing thing about The Black Lily was she’d appeared out of nowhere. Which meant she was either very, very young when she’d started or she’d been lying low, biding her time in the underground community and studying her prey.

He’d been searching for her identity for the last four years—where she’d come from, what she looked like. But that information was as elusive as the woman herself. He’d set traps for her and watched time after time as she’d slipped through his fingers like grains of sand. It had become his personal mission to bring her down.

And then the opportunity had practically fallen into his lap. Sometimes luck was better for solving cases than anything else. Michel Yukov had been high priority on the CIA’s watch list for almost a decade—International terrorist, broker, arms dealer, assassination attempts—pretty much any crime that could be thought of if the price was high enough from the buyer.

“Gotcha,” Cypher grinned. “You’re all mine, baby.”

“Good job, Cyph,” Gabe said. “We’re about three blocks away. Don’t take your eyes off our targets. Once the meet between Yukov and Kraus takes place those launch codes will be in the wind. You’ve got to intercept those codes.”

“I’m on it,” Cypher said, the salt of sweat stinging his eyes. “It’s showing she’s on the third floor, VIP lounge, northwest corner.”

“Umm, I hate to break it to you, Cyph,” Atticus said, “but I’m staring straight at the northwest corner of the VIP lounge and the only person sitting there is Kraus.”

“Look harder.” Frustration compounded the headache brewing behind his eyes and he built more traps, trying to see where she’d slipped by him. But the report came back the same. “She’s there, Reaper. Keep looking. She’ll be young. Very young. Late teens to early twenties.”

“I’ve got the profile memorized,” Atticus said. “And I’m telling you she’s not here.”

“Hell,” he said, slamming his fist down on top of the elevator.

“One block out and closing,” Gabe said through his earpiece.

“Uh, oh,” Warlock said. “We’ve got agency interference that just walked through the front door like she owns the place. All one hundred and ten pounds of fiery redhead.”

They all listened as Gabe swore under his breath. “What is she doing here? That woman drives me crazy.”

“That’s exactly the reason she’s here,” Atticus said dryly. “You guys need to learn how to date like normal people.”

“I’m going to blister her for this.”

All of a sudden there was a new voice speaking through the earpiece.

“You boys are a man short for a job like this,” a sultry voice said. “Kill Shot reporting for duty.”

“On who’s orders?” Gabe demanded. “This isn’t your op. You’re barely out of training. When I get my hands on you?—”

“Slow down, hot stuff. Take a breath. Last time I checked Lockwood’s orders outranked yours. He said to get my skinny tail here, so here I am. I caught up on the intel on the plane.

“Fine, and we’ll talk about whatever it is you’re not wearing later.”

Cypher winced and shook his head. He could practically hear the steam shooting from Gabe’s ears, but Gabe would bury the anger and move on. One day all that repressed emotion was going to blow like a bomb.

“Enough,” Gabe said. “Cypher got a lock on her and says she’s in the building, but she’s playing with us. Keep your eyes and ears open.”

The elevator doors opened again and a man and woman stepped inside. Cypher could see them through the flimsy metal ceiling panels he’d been trying to avoid since he’d climbed through them several hours before to start the prep work. The man was tattooed on every available inch of visible skin and a barbell ran through his nose and both eyebrows.

Cypher could appreciate the artistry of tattoos—his shoulders and arms were covered in them—but he had to draw the line at so many piercings in the face and writing the words DIE across the forehead. Even he knew that couldn’t be good for job prospects.

The woman with him must have been his perfect match because her torso, neck, and face were similarly tattooed. She wore a black mesh shirt, short leather skirt and black combat boots.

Weirdly enough, Cypher felt right at home at clubs like this one. He’d always had more of an edge than the others. He shifted as quietly as he could, but still the elevator ceiling creaked beneath him. The couple didn’t notice as the bass thumped hard enough to rattle the walls, and his own heart was pounding along with the beat.

His legs were asleep and his laptops were strategically placed on the reinforced beams. The computers were Velcroed down, but still they jostled as the elevator came to a stop on the fourth floor. The doors opened and the couple stepped out into wall-to-wall bodies. The smell of sweat assaulted his senses along with the underlying sickly sweetness of marijuana.

“It’s a good thing I don’t get motion sickness,” he said as the elevator once again made its way to the bottom floor.

“That’s the least of your problems,” Warlock said. “This building is so far past fire code that you’d burn to death before you could get out of that metal death trap and through all the bodies in there.”

“As always, War, you’re just like Santa Claus with your cheery goodness.”

The elevator doors opened again and a laughing couple stood at the doors, ready to get on, but at the last second the girl wiggled out of his arms and spoke quickly in Russian, letting him know she’d meet him back at the bar after she found the restroom. The guy squeezed her arm and gave her a kiss before drunkenly making his way back toward the bar and another drink.

The girl hit the button for the third floor and then leaned back against the wall. She was a curvy little thing, fitting just right into a black leather skirt with silver studs that barely covered her. Leather boots came to just above her knees and her cleavage was nicely displayed in a leather bustier. Her hair was short and white-blonde and slicked back from a face he still hadn’t gotten a look at, but if it matched her body it would be spectacular.

It was almost too late by the time the hairs on the back of his neck stood up. The elevator picked up speed and they flew right past the third floor that had been her original destination. She looked up at him through the grated ceiling and gave him a grin that made his blood run cold. She couldn’t see him, but she knew he was there.

But he could sure see her. And the face did match the body. Unfortunately, it was a face he recognized. He’d know those stunning violet eyes anywhere. They’d always unnerved him, too large and serious to belong to a child. But she sure as heck wasn’t a child now. She’d grown into those eyes.

The floors zipped by and his pulse scrambled as they passed the fourth, then fifth floor. She’d overridden the hold he had on the elevator to stop.

“Hell,” he whispered, even as he slammed his computers closed, hoping the information inside of them would be saved on impact.

He was going to die. An agent the government would never claim, killed in the line of duty, crushed in an elevator shaft halfway across the world.

“Cypher,” Gabe commanded. “What’s happening?” A man like Gabe Brennan didn’t panic. He was ice.

“She’s in the elevator,” he said quickly. He rolled flat and used his fist to punch through the flimsy metal ceiling panels just as the elevator jerked to a stop a few feet from the spinning turbine.

He went ass over elbow into the elevator, along with his laptops and the rest of the ceiling, but he rolled to his feet quickly in case she tried to finish him off before she saw his face. His computers were toast, and that pissed him off all the more.

If it had been anyone else in this situation he would’ve laughed, but he wasn’t finding anything funny at the moment. If everyone came out of this alive and with their jobs intact they’d be lucky.

She leaned against the corner of the elevator, out of the way of the debris, as if she hadn’t a care in the world, a smirk on her full lips and her gaze buried into the tablet-like device in her hand as she issued it commands. A device that was still in the prototype phase and wasn’t out on the consumer market yet. He had one very similar to it. And he wondered where she’d been hiding it because there was barely breathing room in that outfit she wore.

He took the comm unit from his ear and dropped it on the ground, crushing it beneath his heel. He’d never sacrificed the mission for anyone or anything before. But he was about to break that rule. Because he owed one man his life.

She didn’t bother looking at him, and he wondered where she’d gotten the balls to stand there like the stakes where too small to mess with. He would’ve admired her for it if he hadn’t been so furious.

“You’ve been out of play for too long, Cypher. You’re nosing your way into someone else’s game,” she said in Russian. “I expected much more from someone with your reputation, but it’s clear your day is over. You lose. I’ll see you down to the bottom floor so you can make your way out.”

She leaned forward to press the button to go back down, but he reached up and grabbed her arm. He wanted to shake some sense into her, and he couldn’t remember the last time he’d been so angry he was trembling with rage. Her head came up and her mouth opened to spew something at him, but she finally got a good look at his face. And all of the color left hers.

He didn’t give her a chance to work her magic on her device, but instead jerked it out of her hand and took her by the arm like a willful child. She was a willful child. What was she? Eighteen? Twenty? And when he saw the fear on her face he realized how little she knew about the kind of game she was playing.

He hit the door open button on the control panel and then pulled her into the cavernous sixth floor, quickly jamming the elevator door so no one else could use it.

Cold drafts of air blew from one side of the floor to the other. Some of the windows were missing and large sheets of plastic were tacked over them, rattling and flapping beneath the piercing wind. He welcomed the cold air as it blasted his overheated body.

“You’ve got about five minutes to explain to me why I should save you. You have got to be out of your mind, Evangeline.” The angrier he got the more pronounced his low country accent. You could take the boy out of South Carolina…

She flinched at the use of her name, but straightened her shoulders and tried to jerk out of his hold. He had an even bigger urge to cover her up. She’d changed a lot since the last time he’d seen her. And he wasn’t altogether comfortable with it.

Sweat glistened across her skin even though puffs of white from the cold escaped her mouth. Her pulse fluttered in her neck and he could see the fear in her expression. But she didn’t back down. She’d always had more attitude than common sense. Because he was really, really pissed, and that defiant tilt of her chin was close to sending him right over the edge.

“I’m twenty years old. You’re not my keeper, Cal”

“You sure as hell need one, sugar. What is your father going to say? You’re not only bringing yourself down, but you’re ruining the career and legacy of one of the best men I’ve ever known. So start explaining yourself.” He let her go and then stood with his legs slightly spread and his arms crossed over his chest.

“Chill out,” she said. “It’s just a game. You know that better than anyone. Right, Cypher?”

Her lips were slicked red and she smirked at him, arching an eyebrow in challenge. His body jerked in response. She was bad, bad, bad, and for some reason that appealed to him. He was going to be in big trouble if he didn’t get his act together.

“To think it was you all this time,” she purred. “My biggest challenge. I’ve got to say, I thought the smell of victory would be sweeter.”

“Yeah, congratulations, Evie. You win. You’re surrounded by one of the best black ops teams in existence. I’ve got your computer,” he said, holding it up, “and we have all the data showing that you’re about to sell nuclear launch codes to one of our country’s biggest enemies. So tell me again how you beat me?”

She rolled her eyes and shrugged. “It’s not like the launch codes are real. I’m not an idiot. And despite what you think, I do know what my father does for a living. Saint Robert Lockwood. America’s top spy. Looks like he doesn’t know everything.”

Tears glistened in her eyes and he wondered what happened to the little girl who’d followed him around the first time he stepped foot in the Lockwood home as a fourteen year old boy. She’d annoyed him to no end. Yet he’d never told her to go away. She’d been eight years old and one of the only friends he could remember having during his childhood.

He thought of Robert like a second father, but he had no clue what the relationship was like between father and daughter. The tug of sympathy in his chest surprised him. He wasn’t the kind of man to show empathy or dole out forgiveness. And here he was ready to do it for a half-grown girl who deserved a better life than the one she was setting herself up for.

“You should be the last person to judge.” Anger flashed in her eyes. “You know what it takes to work your way up the hierarchy. I pull this off and I’m Queen.”

“Are you really so na?ve that you think you can double cross a man like Yukov and get away with it? You think he doesn’t have his own personal army of hackers? You’ve heard of Tsar Ivan, right? He’s been off the grid as long as I have. Who do you think he’s working for?”

Cal shook his head in frustration. “You’re playing an adult’s game with the common sense of a child. Yukov will hunt you down and kill you if you deliver him fake launch codes. And he will kill you painfully.”

“So what am I supposed to do? If you say someone like Tsar Ivan is working for Yukov then it looks like I’m screwed either way. Ivan might be out of the game, but I’ve studied his work. He’s been around a long time. And he’s good.”

“He’s not better than me,” Cal said. It wasn’t an empty boast.

“You’d fix this for me?” she asked, the surprise evident in her voice. “Why would you do something like that?”

“First of all, because of your father. He was more of a dad to me than my own ever was.”

“Yeah, I know,” she said, rolling her eyes. “All I ever heard about growing up was you. You’re the son he never had and I’m the daughter he never wanted.”

“Cut the crap, Evie. You know how many meals I’ve sat through hearing about awards you received, milestones you made, and boyfriends that would never be good enough for the daughter of Robert Lockwood? You’re that man’s world, and you’re living in a fantasy.

“Which is the second reason I’m doing this,” he said. “I remember the little girl with the curious eyes and adult brain who followed me around like a puppy. And the teenager with braces and an infectious laugh. You’re doing yourself and everyone who knows you a disservice. So yes, I’m going to fix this for you, but you’re going to do it on my terms. My rules.”

“Go to hell, Cal.”

Her eyes flashed fire and defiance, and the heat under his skin had nothing to do with the temperature inside the room. He shook his head to clear it and his anger turned toward himself. What was wrong with him?

“My rules,” he repeated. “You have ten seconds to make a decision. Then I’m going to turn you over to the team.”

Her eyes bored holes into him as he counted down the seconds. He wasn’t bluffing. And she wasn’t budging. He was about two seconds from saying to hell with it all and throwing her over his shoulder when she nodded her head.

“Fine. Your rules.”

“The Black Lily dies tonight,” he said. “Every trace of her will be wiped from existence. Game over.”

Her mouth dropped open in shock. “You can’t do that,” she argued, her voice getting louder. Her hands fisted and he wondered if she was going to take a swing at him. He couldn’t blame her if she tried. “She’s everything. The best part of me. You have no idea what you’re doing.”

“I know exactly what I’m doing to you. And you’re wrong. She’s not the best part of you. She’s a criminal. Evangeline Lockwood runs circles around her, and she’ll always be the better of the two in my mind. You relinquish everything having to do with The Black Lily. Not even a whisper of your presence in any of the underground circles. I’ll be watching.”

“You’re taking everything away from me. I’d almost rather die.”

“That’ll be your choice,” he said harshly. “Or you can grow up and put your talent to use. Finish college. Do something worthwhile instead of being hell bent for your destruction and everyone else’s. You think I don’t understand the pull? The power that comes over you when your fingers touch the keyboard? The lust to walk on the wild side anonymously from the comfort of your bedroom? I was you. And I can tell you as sure as I’m standing here that if your father hadn’t shown up on my doorstep then I wouldn’t be here today. So yes, I know exactly what I’m doing to you. And for you.”

“I don’t need the lecture. I agreed to your terms.”

“The lecture is free. Right now you’re thinking The Black Lily is your true identity. The part of you no one knows and no one really understands. She’s more interesting and smarter. But that’s nothing but a bunch of lies.

“I know Evangeline Lockwood,” he insisted. “And she’s not this person. She’s good. And kind. She makes cookies for teenage boys who find themselves at her dinner table for Thanksgiving and Christmas, and she talks to animals when she thinks no one is listening. She’s strong and smart. And interesting. And believe me when I tell you I can count on one hand the number of women I’ve met who fit that description.”

Tears streamed down her cheeks, smearing the heavy eye makeup she wore. She was a pretty girl. And one day she’d be a beautiful woman for someone else to handle. Thank God. Because she had more spirit than anyone he’d ever met. She was only a little misdirected. And he had to get the hell out of this room and away from her because she was scrambling his brains. Maybe it was her eyes. They’d always haunted him.

Between the adrenaline rush and his need to take care of her—out of a sense of guilt or camaraderie he couldn’t be sure—he felt himself being tangled in a web that would be hard to get out of. Her mind fascinated him. Her talent challenged him. And her body made him have thoughts he had no business having. There was only six years between them in age, but those six years seemed like a lifetime.

“I hate you for this,” she finally said. “I’ll do it, but I’ll hate you forever.”

He was almost relieved. “I can live with that. Plenty of people have hated me before.”

“Then what are you waiting for? It’s time for The Black Lily to die.”