Checkmate: Checkmate, #8

by Finn, Emilia

  “Okay.” I hate how my voice cracks on my word. “Not on the certificate. But when it’s just me and you, you’re Gunner. I can’t make love to Theo. I can’t make babies with– Oh my God.” I hate the way my body deflates. “What would our babies’ names be?”

  He swallows. “Griffin is a good name. It’s strong, worthy, and named for a good man. It’s the name our children will bear, and the empire they’ll one day rule. Stop thinking of it as a second choice, and instead remember that I chose it. It’s not the runner-up, but the winner. It’s the choice I made when I could have picked anything.” He drops a kiss on the corner of my lips. “I actually like my new name. I’m proud of it. I hope one day you can be, too.”

  “But… Gunner is what your mom named you. And Gunner is the name of that boy I watched run down a set of stairs. Gunner is the boy that hugged me in the cold wind, and he’s the boy I talked to about all of my deepest secrets.” My voice gives a pathetic wobble that annoys me. “I can’t let him go.”

  “Just let him go on paper.” He releases my hands, and with a gentle smile, brings one to his chest so it’s almost crushed between us. “I’m still the same person in here. I’ll still hold you when you’re cold, and there’s nothing you can’t tell me. I’m still the arrogant kid that teased your knees, and I’ll forever be the guy that taught you ‘hard spot, soft spot’.”

  A memory from a million years ago races through my mind. We were standing in that office of the club, and Gunner touched my knuckles in demonstration. Hard spot. Then his throat. Soft spot. He touched his elbow. Hard spot. His eye. Soft spot. His knee. Hard spot. And finally, his crotch. Soft spot.

  “I forgot you taught me that.” I clear my throat and swallow down the same grief I had to swallow all the way through high school. “It’s like, you showed me that day, and then it was washed out of my brain again before you even hit the bottom of the stairs.”

  His eyes turn indulgent. “That was my best move, and you didn’t even listen to me. I’m kinda pissed right now.”

  “I wanna marry you. And I wanna call you Gunner, at least when it’s just the two of us.”

  He nods. “Deal. Because you had first dibs.”

  “Okay.”

  “But when it’s not just us…”

  I nod. “Theo-Stupidface-Griffin.”

  He chuckles. “Well… yeah, okay. We’ll roll with that.”

  “Okay. Love you.”

  He’s humored by me, but it doesn’t matter, because within seconds, he has my pants down around my ankles and the tip of his dick nestled against my opening. “Say yes.”

  I nod, and fight against the need to close my eyes when he slowly begins to nudge inside. “Yes.”

  “Spit shake?”

  Laughing, I nod again. “Spit shake.”

  24

  Gunner

  Complacency

  The hot tub warms. The hot cocoa is made, and the alcohol is discreetly destroyed while Libby changes.

  The woman I promise the rest of my life to blows her macros way out when she eats enough marshmallows in her cocoa to feed an army, and the next day, when I show her the home gym attached to the kitchen, we fuck again.

  Lifting weights turns my girl the hell on.

  Tuesday is spent working out, making love, walking the woods, and for the twenty minutes she naps on the couch during The Office reruns, I check my emails and take care of what needs taking care of.

  Wednesday is much of the same. Staying active, eating reasonably well, walking in the silence of the woods, and checking my emails when she’s least likely to notice. Not because she’d get mad that I’m working, but because I don’t want to remind her that there’s a shitty world outside of this cabin.

  This is how we spend our quasi-honeymoon. Together, happy, with no outside interference, exactly the way we’re supposed to. She gives her body to me every night when we go to bed, and sometimes in the woods, if my flirt game is strong. She shows her body off each morning while we work out in tandem. She’s not chatty when she’s in a gym – home or pro. She wants the music loud, and the talk low. She doesn’t care to compete with me, she doesn’t watch to see my reps and try to one-up me, she doesn’t get mad if I change the music, so long as it stays loud, but the couple times I’ve attempted to spot her, she growled, and I had to walk away before she ate my head and tried to do away with me.

  I wonder if this is how it could have always been. I mean, swap the luxurious home for cardboard boxes and rats. Swap the meals we prepare in my kitchen for scraps we find wherever we could. The gym in that scenario is just a street and whatever we can find, but I started with flipping tires. Everyone has spare tires laying around. If we swap the technology we have now for stargazing, I still think the laughter would have been there, the silliness, the jokes. We still would have tried to talk over each other in an effort to zing the other first, and I would have spent my nights then just as I do now; watching over her, and drawing while her lashes twitch with sleep.

  Our week flies by like it was only minutes rather than seven days, so when Monday rolls around again and I realize neither of us are ready to go, I make a few phone calls to my office, and Libby does the same with her chief, and just like that, we extend our time, and my staff remains clueless that I’m not even in the plaza.

  It all sounds so easy. So fucking seamless.

  You’d think I’d know better by now that life isn’t that easy. You’d think I’d be smarter about gloating about my happiness, even if that gloating was only to myself. But no, I don’t bother to sit back and assess my happiness. I ride it, I surround myself in all things Libby, I consume her in every way I can.

  So when Jay Bishop, Sophia Solomon, and Spencer Serrano – that seven-foot-tall fucker that stood guard at Kane’s boardroom entryway – randomly turn up on my doorstep with enough firepower to fight a war, I find myself a little… caught off guard.

  Out of instinct, I try to slam the door in their faces, only for it to bounce back when Jay pushes his boot in. He wears camo pants, a black muscle shirt, and that beanie that, for some reason, hurts me on a soul-deep level. I don’t know the guy, I certainly don’t like him, but knowing the scar he hides under it, and knowing the blame for that lays on Colum Bishop, makes my stomach cramp.

  He tried to assassinate his own fucking son.

  I literally might have gotten the best deal out of all of us. My mother is dead, but I knew the man for one hour, and of that hour, I spent only minutes with him. Jay and Kane were raised in that household, they were tormented and trained under his rule.

  I see the machines he created in them, but then I see the scars, and realize we’re on the same team.

  “Open up, Griffin.” Jay’s black eyes glitter with anger. “We’ve gotta talk. And you don’t get to raincheck this shit.”

  * * *

  Three of them. Two large men and their one little ballerina. They fill my home, but despite the size discrepancies, Sophia is still the leader of their pack.

  I picked the worst possible target when I went to Checkmate that day. The very worst target, short of hitting on a visibly pregnant Jess.

  We sit in my living room now, in a circle of sorts. Jay and Soph sit on the couch, Lib and I sit on the coffee table opposite them, and Spence stands guard against the wall. It’s what he does; he’s the soldier, and he won’t fail in this mission.

  “What do you mean I’m sending you emails?” I stare into Sophia’s eyes, then Jay’s. “I’ve literally been out of the office for weeks.”

  “Funny, we asked around while on the road today,” Soph counters. “Your receptionist said you were out to lunch, and would be back in a little while.”

  “She’s paid to say that! Libby and I have been here for weeks. I assure you, I’m not sending you love letters via email. I don’t give a single fuck about you people, and there’s nothing I want to say, in email or otherwise.”

  Jay sits so close to Soph he’s almost sitting on her. Part of me wonders why h
e does that, but then I notice the way Libby sits beside me. She holds my hand the way Soph holds Jay’s. She wears this mask of quiet confidence the same way Soph does. And that’s when I realize the Bishop blood runs thick, and he needs Soph the way I need Libby.

  With a perfectly calm voice, Soph turns her ever present laptop around and shows me her screen. Nobody mentions the elephant in the room – the giant Griffin logo obnoxiously taking up the front of her laptop screen. Nobody wants to admit that my tech is the best tech, that they swore they would no longer support Griffin Industries. You can’t replace the best, and smart people know to make business decisions with their brain, and not their hurt feelings.

  “Someone is trying to access our files,” Soph says. “They continue to try to slide into our accounts, but here’s the thing, every time someone searches my shit, they leave a fingerprint of sorts.”

  I narrow my eyes. I know this. I might almost know more about this shit than she does… almost. “What’s that got to do with me?”

  “Well, you searched us. You admit to searching us, and that’s fine.” She waves me off. “We’ve established you’re not our enemy–”

  “We didn’t decide that, Soph.” Jay’s jaw ticks with residual anger. “You decided, and you’re not always the smartest person in the room.”

  She rolls her eyes. “I didn’t give you access to anything I didn’t want you to have. But now fresh searches are being made. They’re a little clumsier than yours, but… here’s the kicker. They’re coming from your system.”

  “Mine?” My heart gives a fast one-two-thump. “Come again,” I growl, “and reword your accusation so we’re all on the same page.”

  “I’m not accusing you of anything, dummy. If I was, we wouldn’t have knocked on your front door. We’d have executed you and gone back to Kane and Jess’ sweet babies for more snuggle time. You wouldn’t be the first I’ve removed from–” She looks to Lib. Licks her lips. Swallows. “Forget I said that, officer.” Her eyes come back to me. “I’m saying we have problems, and since those searches are coming from inside your office at Griffin Plaza, or they at least appear to be routed through there, then I’m led to believe that you and I may have the same problems. Someone is trying to get up in our business, and whether you did it or not, it still ties back to your company. Someone is on your payroll, and they’re awfully interested in our lives.” She pokes a thumb toward herself, to Jay, to Spence. “We’ve come here to fix this, and we’re gonna do it before Kane’s babies grow up and he leaves his house. When he joins this expedition, shit is gonna get worse.”

  “Why’s it gonna get worse?”

  “Because he isn’t playing,” Jay inserts. “We’re looking for this person, we’re being tactical about it. Hell, we’re even using our manners, and since this guy hasn’t technically threatened us yet, we’re not coming in with a fuckin’ Uzi. But Kane will. He’ll throw gasoline and light up a flamethrower. He’s at a vulnerable point in his life, he’s not gonna ask questions and risk a slippery sucker getting away.”

  “Define ‘hasn’t technically threatened’ you.” I look from one face to the next. “If he’s not a threat, why the fuck are you in our space?”

  “Nice home.” Spence looks around, nods his approval.

  “I didn’t say he wasn’t a threat,” Jay says. “I said he hasn’t made a threat. He’s searching our shit, so that’s a problem whichever way you wanna slice it. He doesn’t have our permission to do that, so we stop it.”

  “Get better security,” I demand. “Jesus, are we looking for a foreign prince that asked your grandma for a thousand bucks, or is this a real threat? I’ll spot you a new firewall system if it’ll get you outta here.”

  “Don’t forget,” Spence grumbles. “His grandma is your grandma. That makes this your problem, too.”

  And there it is, the bomb has been dropped. Jay drops his gaze for the first time since arriving. He can’t look me in the eyes when talks of family are brought up. He can’t face biology.

  “It’s not a firewall problem,” Soph says. “I see him moving in and out. I replace the files he wants with information I don’t mind if he has, I let him poke around. The best way to find out who he is, is to study him, right? He slides into Checkmate, into my dance school, into the gym accounts. He’s even trying to poke at Griffin.”

  “At Griffin? How the fuck do you know he’s poking at Griffin?”

  “Because I slid through your fancy pants firewalls in the three hours between you trying to buy me and our date. I am always the smartest person in the room, and there’s not a damn thing you can do about it.”

  “You can’t enter my fucking data, Solomon!”

  “But you can slide into Checkmate?” She challenges me with a look. “I’m not there to cause harm, and we both know you can still walk in and out of Checkmate whenever you please. We both know you do, and have since our meet. You’re just looking, and so am I.”

  “You’ve been in their accounts?” Lib squeezes my hand to pull me around. “When?”

  “Three days ago,” Soph answers. “A week ago. Three weeks ago.”

  “Gunner!”

  So much for holding onto the Theo cover when it’s not just us.

  “Why? We’re here on a damn honeymoon, and you’re sneaking into their accounts?”

  Spence’s eyes widen. “Honeymoon?”

  “I was just looking!” I protest.

  “He was just looking. He’s auditing me, in a way.” Soph turns her laptop back to face her. “And I don’t even care. We have nothing to hide from you. Just as I know you have your regular files at Griffin. Your staff have level logins. Accountants have their own files, legal has theirs. Your assistant has most, and you have sole access to the files at the top. Our guy, the one with the clunky skills, is still trying to get to mid-level. He gets a peek sometimes at accounts.”

  “How does he get those?”

  “Oh,” smiling, she waves me off. “I put them there.”

  “You p–” I can’t process… I can’t believe… “You’re so far into my files that you’re adding and taking files away? Solomon! Get the fuck outta my system!”

  “I’m not messing anything up.” She rolls her eyes. “I copied all of your legit shit, moved it, then replaced it with what I want in there. Your staff are still using the correct versions of everything. They won’t ever know things were moved. I did it in the middle of the night a week ago. Griffin staff would have gotten to work the next morning, signed in again, and moved on with their lives. Meanwhile, your hacker only has access to dummy files, your data is safe, and now we get to watch what he’s looking for. You’re welcome, by the way. That would normally cost folks tens of thousands of dollars in consultancy fees.”

  “She’s not for sale,” Jay growls before I can speak. He sits forward and pins me with a glare. “She will never be a Griffin employee, so let that thought wash straight back out of your brain.”

  The worst thing is, beneath the shock that someone would dare touch my shit, I am impressed. Beyond words. She’s a fucking genius, and Griffin Industries will always have room for more of those.

  “What about on a consult basis?”

  Soph’s lips quirk up into a small smile, but Jay doesn’t find me funny in the least.

  “Whoever the guy is,” she pats Jay’s hand and continues, “he’s leaving tracks all up and down from this state and the next. Digital and literal.”

  Libby sits forward. Is she a cop right now? Is she our ally? Is she just curious for the sake of being curious? “How do you mean?”

  “Well, his searches began in Griffin’s building.” Her glare comes to me. “Who the fuck has access to the computers at the plaza, Griffin? Because whoever this dude is, you know him on some level.”

  “I know a lot of people, Soph. My company employs more than a hundred thousand people, many of them have walked through Griffin Plaza at least once.”

  “Well this guy walked through a week ago. His digital foot
print is moving, because he started there, but now he’s traveling.”

  “Soph… I’ve been here with Lib. We’ve literally not gone anywhere further than down the mountain to get groceries once a week. We’re not leaving the house, we’re not communicating with anyone but the bare minimums.”

  “Who are your bare minimums,” Jay asks. “Who knows you’re here?”

  “The chief,” Lib says in a quiet voice. “And Theo’s top-level staff, so they can continue to run Griffin in his absence. The circle is really small.”

  “Well, it just got smaller. We’re gonna sit here and run some names through my system, and then we’re packing up and heading out.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “Not just us,” Spence says. “You too. All of us. One big happy fuckin’ family.”

  “Us? No, absolutely not.” I stand and pull Libby up. “You walk into my fucking home, you expect us to answer your shit, but you give nothing in return.”

  “I gave you six hours of dedicated computer time.”

  “You went through my files without my permission!”

  “If you were as amazing as all the commercials imply, I never would have been able to get in.”

  “Solid burn,” Spence chuckles. “She got you there. She wins, you lose, your tech is awesome, but your firewalls suck. Now you bow down like the rest of us and let her fix it. She’s the brains, and we’re the muscle that run ahead of her so she can work. Pack your bags, because you are coming with us.”

  “But…” Libby looks from one set of eyes to the next in a kind of panic. “Why? You don’t need us.”

  “Ever heard the saying keep your friends close, but your enemies closer?” Jay stands with a low grunt, fixes his beanie, then looks into my eyes with a glare. “I haven’t decided which category you fall into. Blood doesn’t equal loyalty. And even if we have the same jaw structure, according to my oh-so-fucking-astute girlfriend, that doesn’t mean I like you. So we follow our trail, we find our guy, and we keep you close, just in case.”