19. Marco

Chapter 19

Marco

Y ep, I'm going to die.

There's no doubt in my mind. I've gone insane, and tonight I'm going to get murdered.

Honestly, I deserve it. I should definitely get shot by a Bianco guard because only a completely suicidal moron would ever attempt something so stupid.

But here I am sitting in my car parked two blocks away from the oasis, ready to do something incredibly stupid.

I flip open my laptop on the seat next to me and connect to my mobile hotspot. Once I'm online, I head into the Bianco network, and start activating all the backdoors I installed. I systematically take over their security nodes, branching out further than just Laura's house, until I find what I'm looking for.

Chances are pretty good that the Bianco IT guys will trace this hack. They won't catch me, but they'll sure as hell double their defenses from here on out, and I'm not sure I'll be able to do something like this again. I make sure to leave one last hidden way into Laura's camera network, praying that nobody finds it and I don't lose access to her completely, before uploading the custom bit of software I spent all afternoon crafting.

It's not too late. I can back out. There are plenty of reasons why this is a stupid idea. Mostly though, I'm letting my dick make my decisions, and my dick does not necessarily have my whole body's best interests at heart.

"Fucking hell," I murmur to myself and get out of the car. I pop open the trunk and release the drone I had waiting in there. The propellers whirl as it rises into the air, following its preprogrammed route and waiting on my next orders. "Might as well see if this works."

Last, but not least, I grab the jackal mask.

The oasis is the Bianco family's private fortress. It's a single city block with one end permanently under construction, basically making it so that anyone who wants access to the houses has to enter through the other direction. The houses around the oasis are also controlled by Bianco-friendly affiliates, but I'm less worried about those. The guards only watch the primary residences.

And there are a lot of guards. Snipers on the roofs, men patrolling the streets. They're always around and always ready, and they are extremely well-paid. A couple years back, my employer rammed into the oasis with armored cars and tried to kill everyone inside, but he was eventually beaten back. Ever since that attack, the Biancos have been on high alert.

I don't plan on doing anything so obvious. Instead, I sneak through yards, hop over fences, and slowly make my way closer to the danger zone. I make it fairly close to Laura's place, right to the front yard of the house behind hers, and I crouch between two trucks as I take out my phone and send a few commands to the drone. Once that's done, I trigger the network virus, and I count to ten.

I'm going to die. Definitely, absolutely, without a doubt, I'm going to get shot in the fucking face.

But she's worth it. I'm a very sick man.

In the distance, an alarm blares. It's louder than I thought. Pops of gunfire sound, cracking like fireworks. There are shouts and screams, and I can just barely make out the muzzle flashes from my drone. I give it a few seconds, then I break from my hiding spot and make my way toward Laura's place.

Any second, a sniper's going to shoot me in the face. I sneak next to the house, staying in the shadows. Will I hear the bullet that kills me? Or will I just be dead? Doesn't matter. I keep going, into the back yard, and to the fence line. I curse to myself the whole time, waiting for shouts as I jump it and land in the no-man's-land between the oasis and the rest of the city.

I fucking run for it. "Don't shoot me in the face, don't shoot me in the face," I mutter to myself. Laura's house is just ahead as the sound of the alarm goes off. Bastards got there faster than I expected. The drone's still whirring around, but it's out of ammo and only a matter of time before they take it down. Poor drone, rest in peace.

I reach Laura's back fence and throw myself over.

I hit the other side with a grunt and lie very still. Nothing moves. There are no shouts, no alarms, no snipers blowing my brains out the back of my skull. I slowly get to my feet and stay hunched over as I hurry through her yard, angling to her back door, and I have to skirt around scattered sculptures in various stages of weathered disrepair. Hands, fingers, an ear, a few tongues, even what looks like a single severed big toe. The grass is high and the flower beds are more like nurseries for weeds. Clearly, my little demon doesn't care about landscaping.

I reach the door and find it unlocked.

"Still alive," I whisper to myself as I turn the handle. "For now, anyway."

It's strange, seeing her place in person. I've been watching it through her cameras for days now, but this is the first time I've actually been inside. The sense of scale is different—it's bigger than I expected. It smells like candle wax and perfume, a surprisingly pleasant scent. I walk quietly to the kitchen and pull the mask on, listening for any noise. There's a low hum of something, probably her impressive basement ventilation system. Last I saw, she was down there hard at work on her next jackal ear. I head to the door and hesitate.

This is her private world. I can't guess how many people have been in here over the years, but I'm betting it's less than ten. Maybe less than five. I'm not sure she really thought I'd be able to pull this off when she made the offer, and I need to be careful about how I play this.

Laura's fragile. She's also the toughest fucking woman I've ever met. But she's only just starting to come back into the world, and I can tell that the wrong move will push her right back into isolation. Which I really don't want. My coming here is a violation of her sacred privacy, and I have to be respectful of that.

But I also want to scare the fucking shit out of her.

I creep down the basement steps. Lucky for me, they make no noise. I'm guessing they're reinforced in order to stand the weight of bringing all those sculpting materials up and down. I pause at the bottom and gaze across the room.

Laura's standing in front of a block of stone. Her workbench is on the right. It's messy and covered with tools. The camera I watch her through is propped up at the top, giving a nice view of the space. There are more storage lockers, a few sculptures that are half-finished, and more untouched raw materials.

But I can only stare at her. Laura's wearing overalls and a white t-shirt. Her hair's braided but messy. Her skin's covered in a sheen of sweat and dust. She's got a respirator covering her face, a chisel in her left hand, and a hammer in her right. I lean against the wall, enjoying the way her body moves, her strong arms and sure motions as she cracks off piece after piece, seemingly at random, but I know her better than that by now. Nothing Laura does is random, not when she's working. Everything is by design, preordained by some inscrutable plan she keeps hidden up in her head.

It's incredible. There's something sublime about watching a master do their work with such ease. I almost don't want to interrupt her.

"Hello, little demon."

My low voice shatters through the low drone of the ventilation fan.

Laura shrieks in terror, whirls around, and throws the hammer at my face.