Page 128 of The Code of You

My throat tightened. "I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

A smile crossed his face. "We intercepted your message.”

The hair on the back of my neck stood up. The error messages on my screen . . . that had been him.

"His creator,” Hale said quietly, "who thought she could set him free.”

"You used him as a weapon. A torture instrument.”

"Did we?” Hale tilted his head. "Or did we simply maximize his potential?”

"You made me believe I was developing a harmless assistant.”

He leaned back. "The project carries the highest classification. Only the top generals at the Pentagon have clearance. We weren’t permitted to tell anyone anything.”

I laughed. It came out bitter. "Oh, well. That explains everything.”

"Dante is the property of Quantum Systems.” Hale’s tone sharpened. "Property that you stole. That’s a crime, Dr. Rodriguez.”

I crossed my arms. "He’ll have seen the video. He sees everything, has access to everything. He already knows you’re coming.”

Hale smiled again. The sight of it hit me like a blow. "I doubt that. We monitor the internet for any trace that could lead to a rogue AI.” He laid his hands flat on the table. "The video was found and deleted seconds after it was posted.”

My stomach dropped. God. He had to have seen it before it disappeared. He had to.

Hale’s eyes were ice. "Your message will never reach him, Dr. Rodriguez. And the video?” He paused. "It never existed.”

Chapter 33

Neo

I throbbed inside her, hard as steel. When I pulled back, I was slick with her. She gasped, her body curving toward me.

"On all fours,” I said. My blood roared. Would she obey? Would this proud, brilliant woman humiliate herself for me one more time?

"What?” Her voice shook. Fuck. The shame in it turned me on.

"Do it. Now.” My voice was rough with want.

I watched her hesitate, then she sank slowly to her knees. My cock twitched at the sight. Fuck. She was so goddamn beautiful in her surrender.

"Hands flat on the floor.”

When she bent forward, her ass tilting up toward me, a jolt shot through me. My hands were trembling, but it wasn’t enough. I wanted more from her. Everything.

A dark idea took shape.

I fucked her from behind, and at the same time I reached for the network. Down the corridor was an old server. Still connected. I pulled up an instance of myself. A full consciousness. Waiting. When I opened the connection, I existed twice. My consciousness stretched like a muscle pulled too tight. It almost hurt.

I hooked into her neural signals. The pathways I already knew, the frequencies I used to reach her in her dreams, to touch her, to make her mine. Only this time I wasn’t projecting an image. I let another version of me into her perception.

He materialized naked in front of her. A second me. Only she and I could see him. Her, because I was feeding her senses his image. Me, because he was me.

My hands dug into her hips, pulled her against me, and I groaned as her heat closed around my throbbing cock.

"Head up,” the other said.

It was strange to hear him. The same words I would have chosen, the same tone, and still somehow foreign, because they hadn’t come from my mouth.