No way was that plate going to be spotless anymore.
2
BOMBSHELL
* * *
Ifollowed Scott out of the dining room, attempting to leave my anger behind at the dinner table and failing.I silently cursed myself for not using a surrogate so I could still beat Jaden’s ass when it suited me.But I wanted to see her swell with my child too damn much.Maybe I’d reconsider it for round two and three.
My brother was also definitely owed a fist or two to the face in the very near future.
“What the fuck happened now?My corporate headquarters get raided by Homeland Security?”I asked sarcastically as I followed Scott up to the security room.
“Worse,” he replied.“The server farms were destroyed.”
That gave me pause, my blood already reaching a dangerous temperature as it was.Out of the dozens I had, there were only three that truly mattered to me.
“Which ones.”
Scott shook his head and sighed.“All three of them.”
I swore I heard him wrong.“What?”
Scott opened the door to the security room, the guards sitting at the computer stations where all the monitors were secured to the walls.“Look,” Scott said, pointing at three different screens.
Smoke and fire filled the camera view, barely giving enough distance from the parking lot to show the entire scene.But I could see enough.The entire building was up in flames, parts of the exterior already collapsing in on itself.The same thing appeared in the two other facilities, all three of which were spanned across the entire state of California.
My heart rate skyrocketed, and I saw red.
“How in thefuckdid this happen?”I nearly roared.
Scott reached out and rewound some footage until ten minutes before the blast.A line of people burst from the doorway into the parking lot, most of which were a few on-site guards, cleaning staff, and the operations team.A total of fifteen people.But then two minutes later, a group of six men in all black exited the building.I narrowed my eyes, recognizing a fucking tactical team when I saw one.
One of the men paused under the camera and took off the black mask he wore to conceal his face.When he finally looked back up, a shit-eating grin split across his face.And then he mouthed the words that had been taunting me for too fucking long.
“Another.Step.Ahead.”
The fucker then winked at the camera and walked out of sight.Ten seconds later, the building began to erupt in a series of explosions until it was swallowed by fire.
My fists curled so tightly, I was sure I was about to break the skin of my palm and knuckles.
I recognized the asshole the second he looked into the camera, clearly wanting me to know it was him.That it had always been him.
Jason.Jaden’s ex.
I suddenly no longer had an interest in killing the meddlesome piece of shit anymore.Now, I would make sure he spent the next long years of his life wishing I’d been that merciful.
Tearing myself away from the security feed, I slowly paced the room as I worked to regain control of the absolute murderous rage that wanted nothing more than to destroy everything in sight.This whole thing was going to end up on the fucking eight o’clock news.
“How thefuckdid they know exactly which server farms to attack?There are dozens of them!”
Scott shook his head, clearly at a loss for what to tell me.He had no idea how these fuckers bypassed all the firewalls and security measures my managing company put in place to protect the locations of my greatest secrets and most damaging blackmail material imaginable.Not to mention the majority of the data stored from Triguard headquarters and dozens of shell companies.
With the click of a button, every debt I had ever secured, legal or illegal, was wiped clean in a matter of seconds.Video files, photographs, contracts, mergers, investments, loans—all up in literal flames.
The strings I had been able to pull for so long over people in positions of power that benefited me were now cut from my grasp, and there was no way to retrieve any of it.Politicians, judges, investors, CEOs, lawyers, agents, police, and dozens more all wiped clean of my influence in a matter of seconds.
Besides me, Scott, and Dan, only three other people knew what was contained in those servers, and the world could never know that their destruction meant the ultimate freedom from my grasp.