Chip in His Shoulder, A

by Witt, L. A.

  “Good thing I wasn’t bluffing then, isn’t it?” I said, struggling just to breathe through the pain.

  “I knew you weren’t.”

  “Then why the fuck did you still shoot me?”

  “Because I fucking well wanted to.” There wasn’t a trace of humor in his voice or expression as he added, “Just be glad I didn’t go for my first choice of targets.”

  “Should’ve had this conversation before I kissed you,” I muttered.

  “You still would have kissed me.” He slid the gun into his waistband. “So, now that I have that out of my system, let’s work on getting out of here.”

  “Daniel. You fucking shot me.” I looked at the blood on my hand, then showed him my palm. “What the—”

  “And you’ll be fine.” His eyes flicked toward me. “Look, I’m asking you to carve something out of my shoulder and then help me out of the building. I need to know I have at least some defense against you if you decide to turn on me.”

  I pointed sharply at my bloody shoulder, which the nanobots were slowly rebuilding. “Satisfied?”

  “Very.”

  “I’m so thrilled. So, what do you know about the security in the building?” I looked around the penthouse. “I mean, I’m surprised your dad doesn’t have this place lined with cameras.”

  “Oh, he does.” Daniel shrugged. “I think he gave up trying to get them to work the third time I scrambled their signals.” He threw a quick glance around the room. “The cameras are hidden, but they won’t do him any good. As for security, Sky police are on call, and he has his own hired security on the premises.”

  “And they would be alerted to any problems, how?”

  He nodded toward the door. “That door opens, they’ll be on their way. Your access code was specifically programmed to put this penthouse on lockdown. Anyone opens the door now, everyone on Dad’s security payroll is going to know about it.”

  “How much time will we have once the door opens?”

  “Five minutes max before the first wave gets here.”

  “What about cameras outside the room?”

  He pursed his lips and furrowed his brow. “Every inch of the place is under constant surveillance.”

  “What about the insides of the elevator shafts?”

  “The elevators themselves are monitored, but no, not the shafts.”

  “That’s what I thought.” I shrugged out of my ruined jacket. “Can you disable the cameras?” I tossed my jacket over a chair, not really giving a fuck if it got blood on his furniture. “Like, the entire system?”

  “I can bring the whole thing down, but not for long. Might be able to buy us ten minutes. Fifteen tops.”

  As I inspected my healing wound through the bloody hole in my shirt, I mentally ran through the layout of this floor and all the emergency exit routes I’d considered. “Okay. That’ll give us enough time.”

  “All right, let me grab a few things before we go.” He brushed past me toward the living room area and picked up his laptop off the coffee table. He disconnected a peripheral palm-sized computer, and as he pocketed the device, he said, “So I can get us out the door, and I can shut down the cameras. What do we do after that?”

  “Do you still have a car?”

  He nodded. “In the parking garage downstairs. Dad’s got some shit installed to disable it and, if it moves, track it, but I can get rid of that easily enough.” He paused. “But how do we get to the parking garage? Security will be all over the lobby and stairwells.”

  I chuckled. “I’ve got about seventeen different escape routes already plotted out, taking security’s presence into consideration every time.” And one plan in particular that you would never agree to if you knew about it. “You just follow my lead and do as you’re told, and we’ll get out of here.”

  He fidgeted, eyeing me skeptically, but finally nodded.

  “Now let’s walk through this.” I reached for the mod on my temple and pressed a tiny switch just below my hairline. A projected schematic of the entire building appeared between us.

  Daniel’s lip curled, but he didn’t say anything. Now wasn’t the time to get pissy about mods.

  “All right, here’s the plan.” I gestured at the visual mockup of the building. “We’re going to get out via the maintenance elevator shaft. That’ll get us as far as the first floor. Security will probably be closing in on the upper floors, and they’ll be waiting in both the lobby and the parking garage.” I glanced at him. “Still with me?”

  “So far, so good.”

  “I’ll take care of getting us to the parking garage. Where’s your car?”

  Daniel pointed to the northeast corner of the garage’s third level.

  I deactivated the mod, and the three-dimensional model disappeared. “How long will it take you to disengage anything your dad’s put on the car?”

  “I’d guess three minutes or less, assuming he has both the tracker and the ignition blocker on it.”

  “Can you do it in two?”

  “I can try. There’s also a security mechanism on the gate.” He held up the palm computer. “I can remotely override that while you’re driving.”

  “Perfect.”

  “Where do we go after we get out of the garage?”

  “Once we lose anyone who’s following us? The Gutter.”

  Daniel gulped. “The . . . Gutter?”

  “Did you have someplace else in mind?”

  “I, um. No.”

  “The Gutter it is, then.”

  He took a deep breath and nodded. “Let me get some things off my computer before we go. Then you can—” he shuddered “—pull this thing out of my back, and we can get the fuck out of here.”

  He sat at his computer, brow furrowed and hands blurring over the keyboard. Then he stopped, hit one key, and sat back. “There. Everything’s backed up.” He disconnected a tiny peripheral—a hard drive, I guessed—and slipped it into his pocket with the palm device. Then he connected one more peripheral to the laptop, closed the screen, and nodded toward the door as he stood. “Let’s do this.”

  “What about the computer itself?” I nodded toward his laptop. “If someone finds it?”

  He shrugged. “I have everything I need on the flash drive.” He pointed over his shoulder at the computer. “That thing’s uploading a virus right now that’ll render it completely useless. Besides, anyone at Cybernetix who’s competent enough to break into that computer already works for me. I’m not concerned.” He started toward the kitchenette. “As for this mod, we need a knife.”

  I stopped him with a hand on his arm.

  When he looked at me, I withdrew a small knife from a compartment on the side of my shoulder holster. “This is sharper than anything you’ll have here. It’ll cut cleaner.”

  His Adam’s apple bobbed, and he lost some color. A pang of sympathy tugged at my gut.

  I squeezed his arm. “I’ll do the best I can to keep the pain to a minimum.”

  Throwing a sheepish glance at my wounded shoulder, Daniel said, “We’re probably even where pain is concerned.”

  I couldn’t help a wry chuckle. “Yeah, something like that. Now let’s do this. Do you have any clean towels?”

  “Yeah. I . . .” He swallowed, then gestured toward the kitchenette. “In there.”

  “Go get them. And get a clean shirt too.”

  “A clean shirt? What—” His eyes darted toward the crime scene he’d made out of my left shoulder. He paled a little more. “Right. A clean shirt and . . .” He waved his hand, shivered, and went to get everything I’d requested.

  “Ready?” I asked when I had what I needed.

  “Not even close.” He paused, eyes darting around the room. “Once you’re done, I’ll break into the security system and enable an access code. You’ll need to punch it in and open the door. Except somehow I doubt . . .” He closed his eyes and swallowed. “I doubt I’ll be quite steady on my feet by then.”

  “Then we should do this as
close to the door as we can. And it would be best if you’re lying down, so . . .” I glanced around the apartment, then pointed at the leather couch beside the coffee table maybe three meters from the door. “That’ll do. Lie on that, on your stomach.”

  He did, and I sat beside him, my heart pounding with more than just nerves. Seeing him like this, with his shirtless back to me, brought countless memories rushing back to the surface. Daniel Harding was one beautiful man, and what I wouldn’t have given to remove a few more articles of clothing right about now.

  “Come on, Liam,” he said through clenched teeth. “Just get this over with.”

  “Sorry.” I leaned in closer and splayed my fingers on his back, the mod between my thumb and forefinger. I pulled his skin tight, took a deep breath, and raised the knife. The first contact would undoubtedly make him jump, so I laid the flat of the blade on his skin.

  “Fuck.” He jerked away as much as his position allowed.

  I kept the blade against him until he relaxed. Sort of. Then, carefully and quickly, I made the first incision along one side of the mod.

  Daniel’s entire body tensed, his spine bowing, but my hand on his back kept him somewhat still. “Holy shit,” he gasped.

  “Just don’t move.” I quickly made the second cut, and Daniel again tried to squirm away. He probably swore and groaned, but my own heartbeat drowned him out as blood slid down his skin and pooled in the grooves between his muscles. My mouth watered. My head spun. I’d lost too much of my own blood to be this close to his, but . . .

  “Motherfucker.” Daniel groaned as I pressed the blade to his skin for the third incision. “God, hurry up, Liam.”

  “I’m trying.” I held the skin tight, forced myself to concentrate, to ignore my hunger and the warm blood gathering in the crook of my index finger, and made the third cut.

  He grunted, but this time didn’t form any words. Sweat beaded on the back of his neck, and his muscles quivered. I slipped the blade under the flap of skin, separating it from fascia as carefully as I could, struggling not to notice, stare at, crave his flowing blood. The strangled sounds he made may have been a few choice curses, but I was too focused on what I was doing to take heed.

  Swallowing hard, I pressed a towel to his skin to soak up some of the blood—God, his blood always tasted like heaven—so I could see what I was doing. Then, with the blade, I lifted the skin and peeled it back to reveal the device. A tiny yellow diode suddenly came to life, blinking in time with the seconds slipping past. My heart pounded. Every blink was one second closer to this thing deploying whether I tried to pull it free or not. No turning back now unless I wanted Daniel dead.

  Daniel groaned again, sweat rolling down his shaking shoulders.

  “I’m getting there,” I murmured, not sure who I was talking to.

  I inched my hand closer to the implant, but didn’t touch it yet. I’d only get one chance. Even the slightest accidental jostle could trigger the security mechanism. Damn it, that retractable claw mod I’d turned down a few months ago—when the fuck would I need something like that?—would have been really convenient right now.

  “Liam.” Daniel’s voice was taut, forced through clenched teeth. “Quit fucking around. Get it out.”

  “I’m working on it. Stay absolutely still.”

  “I will,” he growled. “Just . . . fuck, just do it.”

  “I’m working on it.”

  The only shot I had was to get the tip of the blade beneath the device, then shove it under and pry the mod off in a single, quick motion. Preferably without jamming the knife into Daniel or taking a chunk of flesh with it.

  I put my hand on his sweat-slicked shoulder to steady us both. Then, holding my breath and moving as carefully as I could, I lined up the blade with the lower edge of the mod.

  “This is going to hurt.”

  His voice trembled as badly as his shoulders as he said, “It already hurts.”

  “I know.” I slid the knife as close as I could to the mod without touching it. “Whatever you do, do not move.”

  Without giving him a chance to get any more worked up or preemptively flinch, I forced the knife under the device and yanked it back, prying the mod free.

  Daniel roared and lurched beneath me. The mod clattered to the floor. I quickly grabbed a towel and pressed it against the bloody wound. He shook violently, alternately trying to get out from under me and force me off him.

  “Daniel,” I said. “Daniel, it’s done. The mod’s out.”

  He released a breath, but still struggled feebly against me.

  “I’m going to close the wound.” I kept my voice as even as I could. Fuck, the scent of his blood. The anticipation of the taste. The wet heat saturating the towel in my hand. I swallowed. “Daniel, listen to me. Hold. Still.”

  He took a breath, held it, then exhaled slowly. “Hurry up,” he whimpered. “Please.”

  “It only takes a few seconds.”

  “I know. We’ve done this before.”

  Head spinning, I closed my eyes and exhaled. We had. Many times. And this would be so, so much safer for him if I’d never tasted his blood before. Safer still if I hadn’t lost so much of my own earlier.

  There was no other choice, though, so I pushed the flap of skin back over the wound, then leaned down and closed my mouth over it. Daniel jumped, sucking in a sharp breath. His blood on my tongue sent shivers through me, raising goosebumps all the way up and down my spine. Calling on every ounce of restraint I had, I gently ran the tip of my tongue along the three incisions. The skin fused back together, cutting off the metallic sweetness. My every instinct commanded me to tear deeper into his flesh, to encourage the blood to flow and drink until the dizziness had passed. But I was stronger than my instincts, damn it.

  Pulling in a slow, ragged breath, I lifted myself away from him and wiped my lips with the back of my hand, pausing to catch a stray bead of blood off my finger with the tip of my tongue.

  “The door,” I said as I toweled excess blood off his back with an unsteady hand. The smell and lingering aftertaste of Daniel’s blood made the expanding stain on the towel more than a little tempting. No, no time to think about feeding right now. Another little taste when I was this hungry wouldn’t help my ability to resist sinking my teeth into Daniel again, so I made myself toss the saturated towel aside. “Come on, we don’t have much time.”

  “Fucking. Shit.” Daniel shuddered. “Let me catch my—”

  “No time. Open it.”

  Still cursing under his breath, Daniel pushed himself up onto shaking forearms and picked up the palm computer. With hands as unsteady as mine, he swept his fingers over the keypad. “Go to the door,” he said, hands still flying across the keys. “The code won’t stay enabled for long.”

  I got up, pausing when my head spun, then went to the door.

  Something beeped.

  “Enter this code. Quickly.” He rattled off a seven-digit number, which I punched into the keypad beside the door.

  I was certain it would come back unrecognized, but Daniel knew what he was doing.

  Access Key Accepted.

  The door slid open.

  Daniel started to sit up, but faltered.

  “Hang on,” I said. “Don’t move yet.” I shoved my briefcase into the open doorway to keep the door from closing again, then went to Daniel’s side and put a hand on his arm to steady him. “Get up slowly. You lost a fair amount of blood.”

  “No shit,” he muttered, and with a little help, eased himself upright. Once he was sitting, he closed his eyes and drew a few deep breaths.

  “You all right?”

  Daniel was quiet for a moment. His skin was still pale and slick with sweat, but after a full minute, he opened his eyes and nodded. “I’m fine.” He reached down and picked up his shirt. “Now let’s get out of here.”

  Freedom had never tasted as sweet as it did when we stepped through that door. Even though we were far from out of the woods, at least we were out of
this goddamned penthouse.

  Out in the hall, Daniel leaned against the wall and furrowed his brow over the palm computer. His fingers moved quickly across the keypad, and after a moment and a little bit of cursing, he said, “Okay. Cameras are down.”

  “This way.” I led him to the maintenance elevator and opened the doors via the manual override. Then I turned on the emergency lights lining the inside of the shaft.

  Daniel peered down the dimly lit shaft as I knelt and popped the latch on the briefcase. “Um, Liam?”

  “Hmm?” I looked up from pulling the coil of climbing rope and the grappling hook out of the briefcase. His gaze darted to the equipment, then back to the elevator shaft, and as his eyes widened, I swore I heard the Oh shit! going through his head from here.

  “I’m actually afraid to hear the answer,” he said. “But what exactly are we doing?”

  I stood, rope in hand. “Ever done any rappelling?”

  He raised an eyebrow. “Um, no.”

  “Then pay attention,” I said. “Because if you fuck up, you’ll break your neck or hang yourself.”

  “Well. That’s encouraging.”

  I shrugged. “Just being realistic. This won’t be pleasant with your shoulder either. The cuts are sealed, but the damage won’t heal overnight.”

  “Great,” he muttered.

  “Something to be said for nanobots.” I rolled my own mostly-healed shoulder.

  He glared at me. “Just tell me what the fuck we’re doing.”

  “The rope is long enough to go down five or six floors at a time,” I said. “I’ll go first, then steady the rope for you.”

  “So we get to leapfrog the whole way down,” he said dryly. “The whole way down a fucking elevator shaft.”

  “Not technically leapfrogging, but now’s not the time for semantics. So unless you have any better—”

  “Fine, fine.” He waved a hand. “How do I do this?”

  “It’s going to be a crash course, so—”

  “Liam. For fuck’s sake.” He exhaled hard. “Could you pick a better description? Please?”

  “Whatever.” I gestured with the coil. “Pay attention.”

  I explained the steps, starting with looping the rope under my right thigh, around my right side, and over my left shoulder. I kept things as simple as I could while still being thorough; we didn’t have a lot of time, but this wasn’t easy to learn. It was also dangerous as all hell, and most of the errors that could kill him were exactly the kinds of errors he might make now: the fuck-ups of a novice.