Corruption

by Jessica Shirvington

  That Quentin and I were the focus of Garrett’s attention wasn’t a surprise to anyone. Part of Eliza’s cover was to show panic for her missing son’s well-being. So while she didn’t want to feed Garrett’s paranoia or encourage him to take steps to find Quentin or me, she had to act like she was expecting results. I didn’t envy her position.

  Eliza knew Garrett’s priority was to find us so that he could silence us. More than anything, he was worried we would go public, and he knew I had a certain amount of supporting evidence. Not to mention his son by my side.

  There was a warrant out for my arrest – they had pinned the explosions at Roosevelt Island on me, describing me as a ‘violent criminal’. Anyone with information that could lead to my whereabouts had been encouraged to call the authorities. And, of course, the authorities had all been notified to pass any information directly to M-Corp.

  Everyone, apart from Eliza, remained on a communications lockdown to avoid any intel leaks, and Quentin and I had been doing our best to get on with preparations. On the third day, there was a funeral service for Kelsey and we had a small gathering to remember Travis as well. It was pretty lame given that none of us knew him all that well, but I couldn’t let his death go by unrecognised. The more I’d gone back over the events of that terrible night underground, the more I was sure that Travis had stepped into the line of fire to protect Quentin. I’d never know why. But he had.

  Quentin and I trained a number of times during the day, preferring to spar with one another rather than the other commandos. It wasn’t that we didn’t believe they were after the same goal, or that they weren’t nice, once we managed to break the ice; it was more that … any excuse to partner up or be close was all we needed.

  From behind me, a pair or arms snaked around my waist and pulled me to my feet. My body, which already knew those arms so well, willingly folded back into him with complete trust. Once I was on my feet, he started to shuffle backwards, planting a small kiss laced with intention just below my ear.

  In between the training sessions, visits to the labs to talk with Michael, and running through the blueprints and attack plan with Gus and Alex, Quentin had taken to wrapping his arms around me and sneaking me back to his room, or mine, or behind a corner or even a quiet hallway – despite my arguments that there were cameras – just to press his lips against mine for whatever small amount of time we managed to steal. I could feel how his entire being relaxed the moment we were in contact and had come to understand that he needed me in his arms just as much as I needed to be there.

  He backed up in small steps, making me smile as he made quick work of getting us away from any prying eyes, and scooting me around the corner and into the equipment room.

  ‘Hey,’ he breathed, still holding me in place, my back to his chest. Slowly he ran a hand down my side and then across my belly, finding the base of my T-shirt and lifting it just enough to let his fingers graze my skin, causing instant heat to wash through my body.

  ‘You’re all sweaty,’ I said, in a fake attempt to sound grossed out. Out of the corner of my eye I could see a group of troops testing one of the plastic containment shells. They’d been having problems with getting some of them to fully inflate.

  ‘So are you,’ Quentin replied, bringing me back to him. I could feel his smile as he ran his lips down my neck.

  Suddenly I spun around in his arms, tired of leaving him with all of the control. And, of course, that was exactly what he’d been waiting for – the moment I turned he pounced, his lips crashing against mine, his arms wrapping around my lower back so tightly that it was blissfully painful. In the back of my mind I knew we were too caught up in one another. That this fire between us was dangerous and possibly the very thing we should fear the most – and yet, I didn’t care. I needed this. Us. Someone to fight for. And yes, I’d be lying if I didn’t admit that there was a part of me, buried deep, that relished what we had, because loving him so completely gave me the strength I needed to go back down there. To face this final act with the kind of conviction that could only come from knowing there was someone I was willing to die for.

  Quentin pushed me away slightly, breaking the kiss, his breathing heavy and his eyes locked on mine as if he knew my thoughts, knew what his love was giving me the strength to do.

  ‘Where are you?’ he whispered.

  I ran my hand through his hair, my thumb down the scar on his forehead. ‘I’m right here. With you,’ I responded.

  He searched my eyes, looking for my deepest, darkest thoughts. I let him have my eyes, but showed him instead my deepest desires and my truest love. And with that, I saw him come undone – his control slipped away and his lips crashed back to mine.

  Quentin had become my world quite some time ago, but now he knew it and that frightened me. We were aware of one another’s every move and somehow we seemed to move in sync, a crackling energy always pulsing between us, so intense I’d swear at times I could literally see it encircling us.

  My betrayals had been forgiven. I knew that. But they had not been forgotten. How could they be when there was still so much to process? I knew that time would be the only thing that would fully cure us. That and normality, and that meant getting through this fight against M-Corp. It meant making it to the other side.

  I would do whatever it took to get him there. Even if it meant he went there without me.

  The door flew open and Quentin reluctantly let me go as Alex, Liam and three other commandos walked into the room, unfazed by how they’d found us. They were used to it by now.

  ‘Weapons training in five minutes down in the firing range,’ Alex stated, grabbing his gun from the armoury cages – the other three men doing the same. The lower levels of the theatre consisted of three floors, the bottom one taken up entirely by a large shooting range.

  Quentin pulled his bag out from under the bench and threw on a shirt while I started massaging my calves again.

  Alex handed us both a gun and was halfway out the door when he looked back at us. ‘You two are incredibly annoying. You realise that?’

  I nodded guiltily. Quentin not so much.

  ‘You also realise that in less than twenty-four hours we are moving out?’ he snapped.

  We both nodded again.

  Alex gave a grunt. ‘Be downstairs in two minutes.’

  We had been locked in the theatre with over a hundred commandos for almost three weeks by the time I found myself pulling on my army-issue boots and tying my hair back in a tight ponytail before readying my weapons.

  This was it.

  Game day. No. It was Super Bowl night.

  I hadn’t seen much of Gus in the first week or so, but five days ago, the entire theatre – every room – had been blasted with the song Gus had decided should be our anthem back in the apartment above Burn. It had taken him longer than he’d predicted to finish the program, but the moment I’d heard the opening lines to ‘Uprising’, I knew he’d cracked it.

  Since then, the entire place had been a flurry of activity. Eliza coming in and out when she could, and Alex and Grace preparing all the troops into various teams.

  The first team had left in choppers three hours ago to get into position for the initial strike.

  Unfortunately it had become increasingly clear that the Pre-Evo numbers just didn’t stack up. Even once we’d pulled in all of the other operatives they had positioned around the country, we still only had a full team of about two hundred. Yes, they were all highly trained, but without Gus’s program there was little hope for success. And they knew it. Which was why Gus had been appointed twenty-four-hour bodyguards, just in case there was a traitor amongst them. Or amongst us.

  Consequently I had only seen Gus during evening meals. But he seemed to be happy playing his part and would quickly disappear, back to work.

  Quentin and I had settled into a quiet acceptance. We were doing this and there was no point thinking of all the things that could go wrong. For me, this was my last chance to make things
right and I knew I had to give it everything I had.

  ‘Ready?’ Quentin asked softly from where he’d been loading his bag on the bed.

  I nodded, looking at him in the mirror. ‘Ready.’

  And yet, neither one of us moved.

  ‘Mags, I … I’ve been thinking that if I get the chance down there, if we come across my brothers …’

  I bit down on the inside of my cheek. I’d been waiting for this.

  I turned to face him and closed the distance. ‘You’ll do what you think is right. Things are going to get crazy down there, Quin. In the end, you’re going to have to trust yourself. Trust your instincts. Whatever you decide, you have my support.’

  He swallowed, taking my hand in his. ‘I’ve been over it in my head so many times and I can accept all of it, except for Sebastian. Zachery was always a power-hungry bastard. And my father … well, I get it. But Seb … we were always together. I can’t believe he would choose this life if he had a choice.’

  I squeezed his hands. ‘Do you trust your mother?’

  He shifted uncomfortably. ‘She came to see me yesterday. We talked.’

  ‘About?’

  ‘About why she made the choices she made. About the future she believes we can help give the world. It all made sense.’ He shrugged, but I could tell whatever she’d said had helped bridge the divide between them.

  ‘I’m glad you gave her a chance,’ I said, meaning it.

  He stepped back and let out a breath as he rubbed the back of his neck. ‘As for the trust part? I honestly can’t be sure.’

  ‘Then trust yourself. You’ll know. If you see him, you’ll know.’

  Quentin nodded. ‘It’s crazy how much I love you. Just promise me you’ll look after yourself down there. It’s already taking every ounce of strength I have to let you do this in the first place.’

  ‘Let me?’ I questioned, raising my eyebrows.

  His brow furrowed. ‘You know what I mean. Last time we went to the core I lost you. I never knew if I’d get you back and every day you were gone I couldn’t get the images out of my mind of what you were going through. I didn’t know if you were alive, dead, in a neg hub. I conjured every terrible and unforgivable thing and imagined it was happening to you.’ His body was shaking. ‘So, yes, it’s goddamn almost impossible to force myself not to lock you up somewhere safe where only I can ever find you.’

  I had to bite my teeth together to stop my quivering jaw, seeing him come apart like that and seeing the ghosts of all he’d been through during that time …

  I placed my hands on either side of his face, sharing my strength with him. ‘I’m sorry. I … I’m so used to doing everything alone that I forget sometimes that my choices should be ours.’ I ran my thumbs over his cheeks and mustered the strength to bare just a little more of my soul to this man. ‘It’s going to be okay, Quin. We are going to do this together,’ I explained, trying to keep my voice steady. ‘It isn’t possible we could be separated from one another. And I know this because I’ve got so much love to give you it will take more than any ordinary lifetime. But there are people down there, locked away, and our fathers are responsible for that. It falls to us more than anyone to stop the suffering and the lies. So let’s get this done and then we can get on with living, okay?’

  Quentin’s eyes cleared more and more as I spoke and when I finished he was watching me with awe. ‘You amaze me,’ he whispered. ‘I don’t know what I did, in this lifetime or any other, to have earned this chance with you, to be your true match. But I promise you I’ll never take it, or you, for granted.’ He pulled me in for a kiss. ‘When this is done, I’m going to give you everything.’

  ‘Paradise will do,’ I said with a smile.

  He rested his head on mine. ‘With you, paradise is easy,’ he whispered.

  Sirens started in the hallway outside our room. The signal that it was time to move out.

  Quentin stepped back, passing me my bag, then grabbing his own. He smiled sadly as I opened the door. ‘I suppose this is the part where one of us says it’s time to save the world, right?’

  I shook my head. ‘Let’s settle for just trying to restore a little of what’s been taken.’

  Twenty-seven

  When we entered the main room, it was overflowing with troops dressed head to toe in black. Fully loaded weapons attached to their backs and waists. Much like us.

  The plan was intricate and we were only a small element. Observing the way Eliza and Alex had orchestrated the multi-pronged attack highlighted how inept my little missions over the past two years had really been.

  But despite our team – just Liam, Quentin and myself – being the smallest and least qualified, we were all acutely aware that if we failed, the entire plan fell apart. Nothing like a little pressure.

  While Quentin checked in with Liam, I headed off in search of Gus but soon spotted someone and made a bee-line in his direction.

  ‘You’re not a part of this, are you?’ I asked.

  Master Rua turned to face me, his eyebrows raised. He appreciated manners and I had none. It had been a constant problem for us.

  I crossed my arms, refusing to backtrack.

  Master Rua sighed. ‘Nice to see you too, Maggie. You think I’m too old?’

  Yes!

  ‘Yes,’ I answered, aloud this time.

  Master Rua gave me a rare smile. ‘With all hands on deck and both the tech and science teams being moved to the secure mobile site, I’m here as a point of contact if anyone gets separated from their teams and is forced to return,’ he said, pointing to the tech geniuses and scientists standing around with their equipment waiting to be moved out to the bus that had been set up as travelling headquarters.

  I read between the lines. He was here in case we were ambushed and there were any survivors who made it back. I nodded, lost for the right words.

  Michael, who had just sent off another pallet of supplies, noticed us watching and came over.

  ‘Maggie, Alak,’ he said with a nod, using Master Rua’s first name.

  Master Rua nodded in greeting.

  ‘Everything set?’ I asked.

  Michael held his hands out. ‘As much as possible until we have the actual antidote in our possession. Our two main labs in Canada have been prepped and we have the mobile units equipped with as much of the chemicals we think we’re going to need as possible. If your teams are successful, we believe we can have the antidote produced within eighteen hours – possibly sooner.’

  I knew this part. This was one of the elements of the plan that fell to me. ‘If I can help you find out what the active ingredient is,’ I said.

  Michael sighed. ‘I know we’re asking a lot of you, Maggie. But it really would make a difference if we had that information as well as a sample of the antidote. It would save us a lot of time if we didn’t have to break it down to identify what’s in it.’

  ‘And once you have the capability to produce it?’ Master Rua interjected, saving me from having to make any more promises than I already had.

  ‘We believe we can have enough of the antidote replicated for America within thirty-six hours and for the rest of the world within seventy-two to ninety-six hours. Then we hand over to aviation and weather control.’

  Within the underground networks around the world, it would be simple enough to administer the antidote. But in the third-world countries already affected on mass the hope was that, just as M-Corp had released the negative disruption from the air, they would also be able to deliver it from the sky. But this time by seeding the clouds, with the antidote embedded in the mix.

  Someone in a lab coat called Michael’s name.

  He sighed. ‘Well, we’re all loaded and set to push off.’ He took my hand in both of his. ‘Good luck, Maggie.’ And then he was gone in a sea of white coats.

  ‘The punters keep complaining you haven’t been showing up for the fights,’ Master Rua said. ‘You were always a sure bet.’

  ‘So the centre i
sn’t just a front?’ I asked, voicing the question I had been wondering since first seeing him with Eliza.

  ‘I’m a Muay Thai instructor. That is all I have ever been. I just happen to have played a role training some influential and powerful people. At times I have been brought in to consult or be part of tactical training. If I believe in the cause, I offer my services.’

  ‘And that’s good enough for them?’

  He shrugged. ‘Eliza trusts me, and trust is a rare thing in this world. It cuts through a lot of red tape.’

  I glanced at Quentin who was talking with Liam. ‘Yes,’ I said, swallowing the lump in my throat, remembering all the lies I’d told to gain Quentin’s trust in the beginning. ‘It does.’

  ‘Now is not the time to dwell, Maggie,’ Master Rua chastised, reading my thoughts.

  I half smiled. ‘Sorry if I’m costing you money by no longer fighting for you.’

  ‘You should be. You should also be apologising that my days are now considerably less entertaining.’ His smile dropped. ‘And I imagine they never will be again. Am I correct?’

  I swallowed, thrown by the display of emotion from my combat mentor who had also become one of the few people I’d learned to trust.

  I looked into his probing eyes and nodded. ‘Once this is done, I’m done. I can’t live this life forever. It will eat me up and spew me out.’

  He clenched his jaw and looked away. ‘At least you are strong enough to know it.’ I followed his line of sight to Eliza. ‘You’re a good girl, Maggie. Remember that when you are down there tonight. But also remember that even the best of us must fight to win.’