spoke, all emotion drained of her face — except one.
Fear.
Chapter 8
“Ah, sir, I think there might be a problem...” The tech rubbed his forehead, brows drawn low. Lucian looked at him for all of a second before storming over and jerking the monitor to his face.
He stared. Bit out a curse. Listened as the tech’s chair rolled back. “Very few things piss me off,” he started, his voice a deep baritone. The room, with all of it’s clicking and scrapes of paper, stilled.
“Sir, if I could just —”
“This,” he said, jabbing a finger at the monitor, “pisses me off. That right there is bullshit.”
The shout rang around the room. At that moment, it seemed as if the world had stopped. Time was still, people were still — hell, even the fax machines were silent. Lucian took a breath, clenching his hands at his sides. Carefully, oh-so-very gently, he set the monitor back on the cluttered desk and let out a breath.
“Who let this happen?” he demanded, ignoring the tech who tried to talk to him. The man had ruined his day more than once, and he swore if he heard one more thing from him, Lucian was going to rip him a new one.
No one answered. “Who let this happen?”
His bark had a young woman, short with blonde hair curled into a tight bob, jumped to her feet. Everyones’ eyes turned to her.
“Mr. Xanthis, I emailed you about it only an hour ago. I had hoped that you would...”
“You would email me about something like this?” he shouted, storming over. One of the men sitting near her stood to his feet, ready to defend her. Lucian snarled at him and jerked a thumb at his office. “In.”
She moved like a hare, practically running to his office.
The tech tried to intervene, face beaded with sweat. Lucian just looked at him and he fell back, eyes helpless.
He slammed the door shut behind him. “What were you thinking? Email? Seriously? We both know that’s bullshit.”
“Mr. Pontros, I’m so sorry!” she rushed out, eyes wide in her pale face. “I didn’t know that it was so important, or I would have came to you directly.”
He pinched his nose between his fingers, fighting for patience. “Everyone was told to come straight to me if anything like this happened — “
“I know, but —”
“Do not,” he barked, eyes flashing, “interrupt me. You’re lucky you’re a damn fast typer or you would be out of here. Fuck, you’re lucky you’re still alive.”
He strode to behind his desk, pushing a button on the stationary phone. “Harper, send in Levi and Devlin with their second in commands.” He let go of the button, turning back to the nervous woman.
“When I say ‘straight to me’ I mean it. Get out.”
The door slammed with her departure.
Lucian shoved himself into his chair, eyes staring at the wall as if he could make it explode — which he could. Long fingers curled into a tight fist. Fuck, everything was messed up now. Just fucking everything.
That man had been the one purpose for the whole mission. Now that he was gone... Lucian banged on the desk, the hard oak wood shuddering. How had they not found out sooner? Everything had been carefully placed, carefully monitored, carefully everything. No one had been allowed a break, least of all Lucian himself. The long nights at the office, monitoring, searching, filling out papers and search warrants and controlling the quickly depleting time — it had all been for nothing.
He barked out a curse, stomping to the door. It opened in time for Devlin and Levi to walk in. Devlin was tall, elegant, long haired and thin. Her hair was a fiery red, the colors mixing mysteriously in the light. Levi was dark, dull, and almost lifeless. The only reason the dead man was even on his team was because he had skills that Lucian suspected matched his own.
And Lucian was always right.
“Did anyone come to you about this? It’s been fucking months and we are just now noticing this,” he snapped, slamming the door closed behind them.
“I’ve never seen you so angry before,” Devlin purred, saddling up to his side. Her lithe body slid against his. Levi looked at her with unreadable eyes, then turned to the wall, looking out of the window that reflected the room before them, behind him..
It might be small and crowded, it might be messy and smelling of too much perfume, but it was home. On the other side of the office,