Finn Reid was a thirty-three-year-old man from Derry who had come from a seemingly well-off family. Middle class, with the finances to travel, which he had. When and where he’d been turned into a metahuman, they didn’t know. Whether he had been radicalized before or after getting hit with Splice was something the UMG was in the process of uncovering.
“If the Reborn IRA is recruiting metahumans and intent on outbidding the Russians for the Splice lab, we’ll have more bombings in our future,” Bailey said.
“Like last year, ma’am?” Oliver asked, thinking about the Victoria and Albert Museum mess.
“More like twenty or thirty years ago.”
Oliver had only read about the Third Troubles, a generation removed from the second resurgence of Northern Ireland issues that had stemmed from Splice. The number of old wars and disagreements that had been resurrected off and on over time due to the deadly chemical and how easy it was to deploy once people got their hands on it were measured by loss of life. Oliver hoped it wouldn’t start up again, but he was realistic enough to know that it could.
“Murphy wasn’t on the field, but all signs point to him sanctioning the attack,” Oliver said.
“Pinning down the location of the buy would be easier if we weren’t dealing with an ex-CIA officer. People who never spent their lives in the intelligence community make more mistakes.”
That, Oliver could agree with.
He looked away from the data listing out Finn Reid’s life in favor of the muted holoscreens showing a dozen different news streams. The attack on Ascot was international news and all anyone could talk about. Current drone views of the racetrack showed everyone had finally been evacuated, and the only ones remaining were government employees and first responders. Processing the scene would take hours.
Aside from reporting on the attack, the media was also reporting on the government’s decision to allow Ascot to go forward after what had happened at Victoria Station. The negative spin was doing the UMG, MI5, and MI6 no favors.
“Analysts will be doing the heavy lifting tonight. Chatter always spikes when these attacks happen. You’ve been debriefed. I’m sure your family would like to see you, Agent Archer.”
The dismissal was clear, and Oliver knew better than to fight it. As things stood, he wastired, desperately wanted food, a shower, and his bed. The chrono on the nearest holoscreen showed the time was past 2100 and he’d been up since before dawn.
“Yes, ma’am,” Oliver replied, giving her a respectful nod.
He left the still busy floor for the lift, leaving MI6 behind in favor of the long drive home in the back of an automated black cab. Oliver’s eyes were dry and gritty, and while a short stint under a nurse’s hand had gotten rid of his headache, it couldn’t do anything about the tension from stress his body carried.
Walking into his home was better than medicine. The door shut behind him, and Oliver leaned against it, letting it hold him up for a few seconds. The house was quiet around him, the lights slowly brightening courtesy of the attending computer. No one lived there but him, and some days it was too much space, or too little. After everything that happened today, he couldn’t figure out which it was, and which he would prefer.
Pushing away from the door, Oliver shrugged out of his dirty suit jacket and left it draped over an armchair as he passed through the living area toward the stairs. He wanted a shower more than he wanted food at the moment, needing to wash off the sweat and grime that had accumulated on his skin from the long day.
The en suite connected to his master bedroom had a separate shower and bathtub. Oliver chose to shower rather than wait for the tub to fill with water. Stripping out of the rest of his clothes, he stepped under the warm spray and let the heat seep into his tight muscles. The shower went a long way toward easing the stress in his body, and by the time Oliver stepped out and dried off, he felt marginally better.
He pulled on a pair of pajama bottoms and didn’t bother with a shirt. The growling in his stomach reminded him he hadn’t eaten since breakfast and was well overdue for food. Oliver headed back downstairs and was almost to the kitchen when a chime sounded through his home, announcing a visitor.
Oliver pinched the bridge of his nose. If it were his family, his parents wouldn’t have bothered to announce themselves, they would’ve walked inside. He wasn’t expecting anyone, which made him itch for a gun after everything that had happened that day, but his spare gun was upstairs in a biolocked safe.
The chime sounded again, and Oliver made his way toward the front of the house, pausing only long enough to check the control screen at the end of the hall to get eyes outside. He stared at the figure standing on the pavement beyond the metal gate, meeting Liam’s gaze through the security camera.
“Bloody hell,” Oliver muttered, closing his eyes for a brief second. When he opened them again, he stabbed a finger at the comms icon, opening an uplink. “If I tell you to go away, will you?”
“I thought about breaking in earlier to take a kip, but I didn’t think you’d appreciate it,” Liam replied. “Can you open the gate?”
Oliver ran his tongue against the back of his teeth, thinking about that moment of weakness on the side of the road, knowing that he shouldn’t let Liam inside his house or his life again. That he should cut the connection without opening the gate, but Oliver had a history of poor decision-making where Liam was concerned.
This was no different.
He hit the icon to unlock the front gate, allowing Liam entry, and went to unlock the front door. Liam was stepping onto the porch when Oliver opened the door. Oliver didn’t miss the way Liam’s gaze flicked up and down his half-dressed body.
Liam had ditched his ruined suit for a set of dark jeans and a T-shirt that must have been borrowed because it looked to be a size too small. It showed off his muscles in a way that made it difficult not to stare. Oliver managed to drag his gaze away from Liam’s biceps after a few seconds through sheer will alone.
Liam’s face was healed, the skin where bruises and scrapes had been a little pink but whole and no longer swollen. He seemed tired but determined, a look in his eyes Oliver couldn’t read. Liam came to a stop at the threshold, staring at Oliver, standing so close that Oliver had to tilt his head back a little to look him in the eye.
“What are you doing here, Colonel Wessex?” Oliver asked, not moving out of the doorway.
“We didn’t finish our chat, though it’s not the sort of conversation I’d want to share with your neighbors.”
“You’re like a dog with a bone about this.”
