Chapter Four
Klarissa leaned backin the chair, stretching her arms above her head and smiling at the freedom of the movement.No more stitches pulling at her side, but the tightness of healing skin was still there.No more aching with every step, but if she missed a step or extended herself too far, there was definite twinges of pain, especially around her ribs.But she felt better—so much better—and it showed in the energy buzzing through her veins.
She was in what Violet called the Bat Cave, and Klarissa couldn’t help but think back to the first time she had seen it just over a week ago.She had wanted to come here sooner, dive into the hum of machines and the glow of monitors, but Kamon and Rune had refused.At first it stung, their denial hitting her pride like a slap.But now, with distance, she understood.It hadn’t been control—it had been care.They hadn’t wanted her to tear herself apart before she had healed.And she couldn’t even resent them for that.
Still, walking into the Bat Cave had been like a child stepping into a candy store.Walls of monitors displayed cascading code, camera feeds, and encrypted pathways.High-powered servers hummed like a symphony.Workstations gleamed with cutting-edge processors and specialized rigs, all locked behind layers of biometric security.Klarissa had practically salivated at the sight.
“Holy hell,” she had whispered that first day, unable to stop herself.“This is ...gorgeous.”
Violet had snorted.“Only a science geek would call a room full of machines gorgeous.”
Klarissa had grinned without shame.“Then I’m guilty as charged.”
What she loved most, though, was the genius of the setup.Everything interconnected, shielded, impossible to penetrate without the right keys.And at the heart of it were Violet and her assistant, Dot—two forces of nature who made digital architecture look like fine art.Klarissa remembered the moment the three of them had sat down together, shoulder to shoulder, hands flying across keyboards as they cracked into Caruso’s data.
She had expected chaos.Instead, she found rhythm.Violet’s sarcastic quips, Dot’s voice chiming in over the call from New Zealand, and her own precision had meshed seamlessly.Dot had been working with the Ministry of Education there, but still managed to keep Violet from getting distracted, her dry comments pulling them back on target whenever the hacker’s enthusiasm threatened to spill over.
“Focus, Vi,” Dot had said more than once, her dry voice coming from the speakers in the room.“Less fireworks, more results.We don’t have time for you to waste on shiny code.”
“Bossy much?”Violet had shot back, fingers still flying across the keys.
“Efficient,” Dot corrected.“You’ll thank me when we’re not caught.You’re welcome.”
Klarissa had smiled at the exchange, feeling oddly at home between them.They worked well together, pulling firewalls down layer by layer until the files opened, revealing horrors and relief all at once.Caruso’s people had not made as much progress on the virus as she had feared.It was still unstable, still a weapon that killed humans as easily as it did shifters.Almost as though they didn’t care.
But buried deeper in the files, almost hidden in routine logs, they had found something else—shipment records, coded and incomplete.At first glance they looked meaningless, just numbers and initials attached to locations.
Violet frowned at the screen.“Looks like garbage data to me.Half-finished manifests, nothing special.”
“Could be a red herring,” Dot’s voice chimed in.“Or just admin notes.I wouldn’t waste time on it.”
Klarissa leaned closer, her instincts prickling.“No.This isn’t random.He’s moving something, preparing for something.It might look meaningless now, but it matters.Trust me on this.”
The two women had exchanged a look, Violet rolling her eyes while Dot muttered something about gut instincts, but they’d let Klarissa flag the files.And deep down, Klarissa knew this detail would matter in the end.It chilled her to think it might be the breadcrumb that led them to his next move.
That knowledge had chilled her, but what made her stomach twist was how close they were to perfecting it anyway.She could see the path, the narrowing gap between what they had and what would end them all.Too close.
Violet had hovered over the delete key, eyes flashing.“One click and it’s gone.Poof.Wipe the bastards clean.”
But Klarissa had stopped her.“No.That’s too overt.They’d know someone had breached them.We need something else.”
