Page 69 of Outlaws of Tulsa

The thought of having a rat at my compound makes me want to rip the heads off any motherfuckers who even dare to think about crossing me.

“It’s snowing,” she says in a pouty tone. “It’s boring.”

“Where’s Filter?” I ask, casting a glance past her into the hall. “Or do you care anymore?”

This gets her attention because her back straightens. “Of course I care.”

“You’re awfully cozy with my brother lately. What did you call Copper?” I smile evilly at her. “Oh, that’s right, you like calling him Jeremy.”

I lift my brow, waiting for her to lie to me and tell me he told her.

Her face goes blank. “Krista called him that a while back. It just slipped out when I was mad.”

I cross my arms over my chest and study Stormy. She has this beautiful biker bitch vibe going on, but she’s not stupid. In fact, her eyes always gleam with intelligence. It’s why she and Filter have always been a good fit. He’s smart as hell too. I just hope she’s not smarter than him. That could be a problem.

“Where did you say you came from again?” I ask, cocking my head. “Afton?”

She bites on her bottom lip. “I said it was a small town outside of Afton.”

Smart girl.

Cover your tracks.

“Hmmm.” I rake my gaze down her front, inspecting every detail. I want her to know I see right fucking through her. She’s stuck her nose in my business one too many times and now I’m fucking suspicious. “Get me Halo and go find someone else to bother.”

She flashes me the fakest smile ever. “On it, Prez.”

The moment she’s gone, I go back to what I was working on. Obsessing over Genworth. I should be focused on Putnam because he’s ghosted once again, but I can’t let go of the uneasy feeling. Copper says it’s because I want to keep the girl. Maybe. I just have a hunch. Something I can’t quite put my finger on it.

I flip open Genworth’s network and continue my combing. His firewall was airtight as fuck, but I needled my way into it because that’s what I do. What I’ve always done. What I’m really fucking good at. I analyzed the setup and located the soft areasright away. Once I found them, I wormed into it. His network is beautiful. I admire the handiwork of someone similar to myself, who is obsessed with perfection and order. Everything is airtight. For everyone else. It’s admirable. I locate his contracts right away with the NSA. His hands are dipped into about every pot available. It’s no wonder he’s a billionaire. I skip past all the obvious stuff and start looking for the hidden stuff. A man like Genworth is a man like me—we hide in plain sight. His deepest, darkest shit won’t be in some file labeled: Don’t Touch. It’ll be in something regular and orderly.

A folder stands out and seems to blink at me.

November 2009.

I rub at my chest over my shirt where my tattoo is. I try desperately not to think about that month or that year. But just seeing it has my heart clenching painfully.

The file is corrupt inside the folder.

Or so it seems.

It’s hidden behind a file named November_2009.error and from the looks of it to just anyone, it’s unusable and broken.

I’m not just anyone.

I pretty much wrote the fucking book on this shit.

Quickly, I rename the file to an exe file. When I open it, it blossoms like a rose, revealing to me hundreds of video clips, recordings, documents, screenshots, pictures, and more. What has my blood freezing in my veins is the name on the first picture I see.

Koynakov.

I click the picture open to find my old building in downtown Houston. The next picture is my Escalade. Another is a headshot I had on my website. So many pictures of me from when I was the owner of my company all those years ago. My stomach turns when I find a picture of Ellie at the gym. Ellie at the store. Ellie on the front porch.

What. The. Fuck.

It gets worse…there are multiple pictures of Blaire.

At the salon. At school. At the movies.

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