This is it. The heart of it all.
Every secret the Red Tribunal has ever collected lives here. These servers house every crime, every betrayal, and every murder that never went public.
And that’s why I’m here. To extract and delete the evidence they claim to have on Connor.
The central terminal stands apart from the rest, a solitary workstation ringed by servers like a throne room built for a beast of a machine. I slide into the chair, fingers already moving over the buttons.
The interface blooms to life at my touch, layers of encryption making this place a damn fortress.
Da’s voice echoes in my head. “Download everything they have on him and us, Tierney. Purge the originals. And get the hell out of there before the vault doors lock you in.”
I plug in the USB drive, custom-built and burning warmagainst my palm. The decryption software spins up, chewing through the first layer of protection.
My fingers fly as I navigate directories and subdirectories, code cascading across the screen, and witness the volume of information they hold.
The scale of it is obscene, going back years. Centuries even, the evidence digitized and preserved, so it’s never forgotten.
From what I can see, there are financial records, operational logs, and footage that could be so dark I’d never be able to unsee it.
I’m not here for that intel, though.
I click on the ‘pending acquisitions’ folder and find it empty.
My stomach drops.
I search again, typing in our surname, Blake. When it comes up blank, I use alternate spellings and internal tags Da had warned me about.
But the cursor blinks back at me and the screen stays blank.
I check the timer on my watch again, my breath uneven now as a wave of panic sets in.
Eight minutes left.
I dig deeper because this is where my training comes into play. When the plan breaks, I push on and widen the search parameters, forcing the system to show me more.
Connor’s footage remains buried in the masses of folders, with more encryption locking it away. And I’m running out of time to break the code.
Sixminutes.
A folder catches my eye with the well known Italian mafia family name, Viacava.
They’re forged from old power and strengthened by a recent marriage to our Irish rivals, the O’Callaghans. We all saw the wedding photos of Kingston and his bride, Olivia, splashed across the tabloids.
That family is untouchable and lethal in the flesh.
My brows tug tighter, the further I fall into the Viacava never-ending rabbit hole. Christ, the files stored on these men are extensive. Information that could bring their empire to its knees.
I save it to the USB, even though their dirty laundry isn’t what I came for. If I can’t save my brother myself, I’ll bring home enough fire to burn a path that’ll save him.
The bulk download begins. Data floods the drive, the white digital progress bar inching forward with agonizing slowness.
Sixty-seven percent downloaded… Seventy-four.
“C’mon…c’mon,” I whisper, glancing over my shoulder.
Sweat beads at my temples, my pulse louder than the servers whirring. Connor’s laugh fills my head. The way he used to trail after me as a kid, calling me Tier-Tier and the destroyed look on his face when Ma died, glassy eyes wide, waiting for me to fix everything.
Ninety-three percent…ninety-seven.
