Page 19 of Ruined Omega

“Look, they can’t even log in.”

“Not yet,” she hisses. “But no security system is invincible, Tal. Whoever these people are, they’ll take it back to their headquarters and their hackers will crack the code.”

She’s panicking now. Starting to hyperventilate.

“Calm down,” I say in a hushed voice. “What’s on that computer that’s so important anyway.”

“It’s…it’s…oh, there’s no time to explain!”

Across the street, the fake cop is saying something to his companions who are searching other parts of the apartment with flashlights. He gestures toward the computer. Another fake cop wanders over to look.

“Shit,” I mutter, “Look, what the hell do you want me to do about it? It’s not like I can just run in and grab the computer. Maybe if it were just me, by myself, I could do it. But I’m not going to put you at risk, Hines. My primary mission is to keep you safe. And I don’t intend to fail.”

Her eyes, trembling with tears, turn toward the card table where my 10mm pistol is lying in its holster.

“You can shoot it,” says Hines.

“What?”

“You’re an Alpha, right?” she says, a hint of challenge in her voice. “With your eyesight, you can easily make that shot.”

She’s right, I could easily make the shot, but that’s not the point. The gun has no silencer, and a 10mm is a big ass handgun. One shot and all of those phony cops are going to know our location.

I grab Hines and give her a firm shake. She lets out a startled gasp.

“Are you crazy?” I hiss. “You’re already hip-deep in shit as it is, Hines. I don’t know who these guys are, but they obviously have bad intentions. If I shoot that gun, they’ll be on us like a swarm of angry hornets.”

Her tiny hands emerge from the baggy sleeves of the coat and clutch at the fabric of my tank top.

“Tal, if you knew what was on that computer…”

“Tell me.”

She presses her lips together in a tight seam. More tears well and wobble at the corners of her eyes and her chin dimples with crying.

“Tal, please…”

I glance back across the street. Now one of the officers has shut down the laptop and picked it up, preparing to carry it away. It’s now or never.

“Source damn it,” I growl under my breath.

In a flash, I have the 10mm drawn, safety off, sights lined up on the laptop in the man’s hands across the street.

“Plug your ears,” I command, no longer bothering to keep my voice quiet. “This will be loud.”

I squeeze the trigger and the small room lights up in a flash of lightning. For a fraction of a second, I see the two of us, me and Hines, mirrored in the glass panes by the light of the muzzle flash.

The pistol barks. The sound is painfully sharp in this enclosed space. The glass of the window spiderwebs with cracks. Across the street, the laptop erupts in a shower of sparks.

And two dozen pairs of eyes all turn in our direction.

“Time to go,” I say, tucking the pistol into the back of my jeans.

My arm coils around Hines’s waist, and I lift her easily and whisk her away from the window.

A half second after, the glass erupts with gunfire. Bullets angled upward from the street smack into the ceiling. I shield Hines from the shards of glass and raining plaster.

“Oh God, we’re gonna die!” she cries.