Page 18 of Avenging Jessie (Black Swan Division Thrillers #3)

Eighteen

Spence

Hastings’ smirk didn’t waver, but the way his fingers flexed on the pistol told Spence he was already recalculating.

“I heard you enjoy the dramatic entrance, Stirling,” he drawled. “Tell me—did you practice that little speech in the mirror, or did it just come to you while you were babysitting your trigger-happy swan?”

Jessie stiffened at the jab. She didn’t look at Spence, but he caught the subtle shift in her posture—shoulders loose, chin dipped, back straight and ready to pounce.

Spence ignored the bait and nodded toward the hackers, still hammering frantically at their keyboards as error messages multiplied across their screens. “Call them off, Hastings. Before I decide, this virus gets hungrier.”

Hastings gave a lazy shrug. “You think I care about them? They’re replaceable.

Always have been.” His gaze slid to Jessie, hard and calculating.

“She’s the interesting one. Pretty, dangerous, and if I’m gauging that killer look in her eyes, still loyal enough to throw herself in front of you.

I wonder what it would take to break that. ”

Spence’s jaw locked. “Don’t test me.”

“Oh, I think I will.” Hastings shifted his weight just enough to make every muscle in Spence’s back coil tight. “Let’s see how dirty you want to fight.”

Spence took a slow step forward, angling himself so Hastings had to pivot to keep the gun lined up.

“You know what you are, Hastings? You’re a petty ex-Agency employee with a bruised ego.

Brewer’s playing on the world stage, and you’re down here in the basement like some wannabe Bond villain, running side hustles and nursing your grudge against Langley. ”

Hastings’ eyes narrowed, the muscle in his jaw twitching.

“You’re not even in his league,” Spence pressed.

“Brewer wants to control the future. You?” He let the word hang like a bad smell.

“You’re just hoping the Agency notices you long enough to admit they were wrong about you.

Spoiler alert—they weren’t. You were never good enough for anything more than running a few noncritical missions.

Hell, you weren’t even good enough to work solo. ”

Hastings’ smirk faltered, replaced by something harder, uglier.

“Does Brewer even know about this side gig?” Spence asked, tilting his head toward the hackers. “Or are you hoping you can sell the intel before he finds out? Guess we’ll see who kills you first.”

That did it. The flash of rage in Hastings’ eyes came with a sharp, deliberate motion—he swung the gun away from Jessie and leveled both weapons square at Spence’s chest. Walked toward him.

Just like Spence wanted.

Jessie moved like lightning. She kicked the leg of the chair next to her, sending it toppling with a crash. The noise ricocheted around the server room, pulling Hastings’ aim just a fraction off-center.

Spence lunged.

The guns went off—loud, concussive, close enough to make his ears ring. The hackers shrieked, diving under their table.

Pain exploded through his right hand as his palm smacked against the barrel in mid-grapple, but he kept driving forward, momentum carrying both men into the edge of a server rack.

The server rack shuddered from the impact, plastic casing cracking as metal screamed. Spence’s shoulder took the brunt. Hastings fought like a man possessed.

One gun clattered to the floor. Spence went for it, but Hastings slammed a forearm across his throat, driving him back against the rack.

Pain flared white-hot along his windpipe. He jerked his knee up, catching Hastings in the thigh, and shoved back hard enough to break the chokehold. Hastings retaliated with a wild right hook, and Spence ducked. The blow glanced off the side of his skull, but still rattled his teeth.

He swung with his right hand, aiming for Hastings’ jaw. The connection was hard enough to ring his bell. The other gun dropped, but something popped in Spence’s wrist. His fingers went numb, a sick heat radiating up into his forearm. Agony ripped from wrist to fingertip.

Hastings saw it.

He caught Spence’s right hand in both of his and wrenched it back at an angle hands weren’t meant to go. Bone grated—a sharp, tearing sensation shot through the tendons.

Spence’s vision narrowed to a tunnel. He snarled through the pain, shifted his weight, and slammed his left fist into Hastings’ ribs—once, twice—until the other man’s grip loosened.

Jessie was shouting something—his name, maybe—but the roar of blood in his ears made it sound far away.

The guns were still on the floor; one had been kicked closer to Jessie during the scuffle. Hastings realized it at the same time Spence did.

Both men lunged.

Jessie beat them both. One hard kick sent the gun skittering under the hacker table. Hastings swore, lunging after it.

Spence used the opening. He hooked his left arm around Hastings’ neck in a brutal half-clinch and drove him backward, slamming him into the edge of the server rack. The impact sent a ripple of blinking lights across the consoles.

Hackers ran for the door. Jessie grabbed and pointed her weapon, but couldn’t get a clear shot.

Hastings twisted, elbowing Spence square in the ribs. Pain exploded in his side, but it was nothing compared to the raw fire chewing through his right hand every time it so much as twitched. Jessie tossed him her gun. Spence caught it with his left hand and brought it down on Hastings’ skull.

The man staggered, grabbing his head. Blood oozed through his fingers. An alarm sounded—at least one of the guards had realized what was going on.

Jessie darted past them, grabbed the flash drive from where Spence had dropped it, and yanked him toward the far aisle. She snatched her gun from his hand. “We need to go!”

He couldn’t let Hastings get by with this, but her grip was firm enough to keep him off balance. He staggered, adrenaline dulling the pain enough to keep his feet under him. “I’ve got to take care of…”

Hastings pushed off the rack and came after them, fury etched deep into every line of his face.

“Him,” Spence finished.

Gunfire erupted—sharp, deafening in the narrow space. Bullets punched into the steel wall inches from Jessie’s shoulder. She ducked, fired back.

Hastings went down.

Spence shoved her through the doorway and yanked it shut. “Go!”

They pounded down the corridor, past coolant pipes and stacked crates. A guard popped out and raised a weapon. Jessie nailed him center mass and lobbed a grenade back toward the server rooms.

Every throb of his right hand felt like a countdown clock ticking louder in his skull. The injury was severe. His wrist might be broken. And without it, hacking into anything at the speed they’d need would be like fighting with one eye shut.

But that was a problem for the next breath. For now, the only mission was simple—get him and Jessie out alive.

A corridor led to an exit on the side of the hill. They burst through it, the cool night air a welcome relief. Gravel crunched under their boots as they tore across the narrow service lot, past the gated entrance, and toward the car.

Inside, the grenade exploded, sending up a huge fireball.

Shouts erupted behind them, sharp German curses slicing the dark. Spence risked a glance back and saw two guards in tactical gear closing fast, rifles already coming up.

Jessie’s hand clamped on his arm, shoving him toward the passenger side. “Come on!”

He wanted to argue, but his right hand was throbbing so hard it made his vision swim. The weapon slung over his shoulder banged against his ribs as he ducked into the seat.

She yanked his suppressed machine gun free before he could get a grip on it. “Hope you’ve got the exit plan ready.”

With a smooth, practiced motion, she stepped back from the car and opened fire in controlled bursts. The sharp cough of the suppressor was almost lost under the pounding of Spence’s pulse. Muzzle flashes lit her face in strobes, showing her narrowed eyes, set mouth, and total lethal focus.

It was hard not to appreciate it.

The guards dove for cover, pinned behind a low wall as rounds from the gun chewed the concrete inches from their heads. Jessie didn’t waste a second. She vaulted around to the driver’s side, ducked into the seat, jammed the gearshift into reverse, and slammed her foot down.

The tires squealed, the car fishtailing before she threw it into first and shot forward.

Spence’s head snapped toward her as she reached into her coat pocket. “Jess—”

She pulled the pin on a hand grenade with her teeth and lobbed it through the still-open driver’s window toward the building’s side entrance.

Damn, how many of the bloody things had she lifted from the trunk?

They were a hundred yards out when the world behind them turned white.

The explosion punched through the night, a rolling wave of fire and smoke blooming against the sky. The shockwave rattled the car, shards of glass and debris pinging off the roof as Jessie gunned it down the empty road.

In the rearview, the building vomited black smoke into the stars.

Spence slumped back against the seat. Jessie’s knuckles were white on the wheel, her jaw clenched. “Which way?” she demanded.

“East for now.” He closed his eyes for a brief moment. “Once we’re sure we don’t have a tail, we’ll hit the safe house.”

“Is he…” She shifted, and the car lurched. “Do you think Hastings is dead?”

Pivoting in the seat and ignoring his worthless wrist, he squinted back at the data center. Another explosion occurred when something struck a gas line. “I wouldn’t bet money on it.”

“And the drones? Will Brewer still launch them in the morning?”

Another unknown. But now, if Hastings was alive, they had a way to blackmail him with Brewer. “No one is safe until we deactivate them.” It was the best he could do. He raised his injured hand. “And that’s going to be a challenge for me, now.”

Her gaze flicked to him. She grimaced. “You need a doctor.”

They hit the highway and flew down the blacktop, the rain reflecting their headlights when Jessie flipped them on. “No hospitals,” he said. “No doctors. We’re off-grid, now, remember? Those places want information and answers I can’t give.”

But, holy mother, he needed some pain meds.

“This is all my fault,” she said softly. “I should have stayed in the car.”

He gritted his teeth so he didn’t lip off, You think? Bloody hell. “We stopped them, at least for now, from breaching any other U.S. intelligence service.”

“Did we? Won’t they have backups of their programs?”

“The virus I left them with will wipe out their cloud, as well as anything directly tied into those servers.” He grimaced as he shucked off his vest and tossed it in the backseat. “I’m sure Hastings’ pets have off-site backups, but for now, they’re out of commission until they can regroup.”

She fell silent as he programmed in a new route into the GPS to take them on a circular path back to the apartment. It was awkward since he had to use his left hand.

When he sat back and she seemed assured no one was following, she said, “Go ahead.”

He sank deeper into his seat, cradling his arm. “Go ahead, what?”

“Yell at me. I deserve it.”

She did, too. And he was furious.

But he’d let her put him in that situation. He’d made the call, and this was the outcome.

Stupid.

Some leader he was.

“We’ll discuss it later.” He closed his eyes and clenched his jaw. “Right now, we need to regroup.”

She started to say something, and he raised a hand to stop her. Silence fell; the only sounds were the tires on the wet road and the GPS telling them to turn right in half a kilometer.

Spence focused his anger on Hastings rather than Jessie. They had more intel now on him, and had delayed his attempts to break into the CIA, but was he the one who’d breached the Pentagon’s security? Was he using Brewer’s signature as his own?

Did Brewer know?

All questions had to wait. Until he could get back up to speed, they were lame ducks. He sneaked a peek at Jessie. By her expression, she knew it, too.

And was blaming herself.

For now, he planned to let her stew.

Which was either a tactical move…or a dangerous one.