Chapter 51 Narrow

Chapter 51 Narrow
Zayd

While Jim paced the living room restlessly, I sat sprawled lazily on the couch in the middle of the large space, arms crossed, watching Ladi's face through the screen on the table.

"Two days," Jim said. "It's been two full days and it's still circulating. How is that possible?"

"Liam is obviously slacking off or it is way above his power" I remarked. 

Ladi didn't blink. He almost never did, the kid processed information the way most people breathed, without thinking twice about it. 

"Because whoever posted it isn't some kid with a laptop, Jim. This is layered and mirrored across servers and I can't casually touch without tripping something on the other end. Every time they scrub one copy, three more show up somewhere else."

"So he's good."

"He's really good."

Jim stopped pacing. "How good? Compared to you."

The question caught my interest as well, and I sat up, anything about this person who was up against Montgomery all of a sudden interested me. 

He paused, just long enough to annoy me. Ladi's mouth twitched obviously enjoying watching me finally looking agitated since this call began.

"Eighty percent."

Jim let out a low whistle and took a seat beside me. "Eighty. That's not a compliment, that's a warning shot." He looked over at me. 

"You know what that means, right?"

Of course, I do. Whoever this is was good because Ladi here could go toe-to-toe with Allen Lincoln. The legend  Warren Hacker. And this person is almost as good as Ladi.

If they couldn't even pull the video down, tracing who had put it up in the first place was going to be nearly impossible. Whoever this was had built themselves a fortress before they ever hit upload.

"Montgomery should have handled this by now," I said, mostly to myself. "Two days. That's not like him."

"Unless he can't," Jim said quietly.

"Obviously, he can't" Ladi shrugged. "If Liam kisses my feet, I might help" he added snickering. 

I didn't react to the joke as my mind drifted to a name I didn't want to bring up. That old man a few miles from here in his fucking chair, who collected leverage the way other people collected watches. 

But the thought didn't survive long. That wasn't his style. If he had wanted Chris ruined, he wouldn't have hidden behind some anonymous account. 

He would have had him dragged into a room full of cameras and made an example of him in broad daylight right in front of Dalton Montgomery. He was too proud for anything quieter than that.

No. This was someone smaller. Someone with a grudge and just enough skill to be dangerous with it.

"Ladi," I said, "pull whatever you can on server access tied to Montgomery's team over the last week or two. I want to know if anyone on the inside had a reason to want this out before he was ready to handle it himself."

Ladi's eyebrows lifted slightly. "You have someone in mind?"

I did. Matt's face was already sitting in the back of my head, refusing to leave. The way he had gone quiet every time Montgomery's name came up lately, the history between them that never quite got explained to my satisfaction. But I wasn't ready to say it out loud.

"Just get me the list," I said. "I'll narrow it down myself."

Amrah:

I pushed through the glass doors of the V building and caught sight of the familiar face near the fountain. Daphy was already there, sunglasses pushed up into her hair, and the second she spotted me she was on her feet.

"There she is." She pulled me into a hug tight enough that I nearly lost my footing. "I was starting to think you had ghosted me for good."

"I did not ghost you." I laughed into her shoulder and pulled back. 

"I passed out the second I got to my apartment this morning. Didn't even take my shoes off."

"You left me on read for six hours, Amrah."

"I was unconscious, Daphy, not ignoring you." I held up both hands. "And then I had the special classes for the ongoing contest right after. I have basically been busy since I woke up”

She studied my face for a second like she was deciding whether to believe me, then sighed and looped her arm through mine, pulling me toward the fountain's edge. 

"Fine. You are barely forgiven. How did the classes go? Did they finally give you the actual brief for round two, or are they still being annoyingly mysterious about it?"

"Still mysterious. I genuinely think they enjoy watching us suffer."

"That tracks. Everyone running that contest has resting villain face." She grinned, and for a second it felt like the last few hours hadn't happened at all. 

No party or orphanage, no Zayd or some headache-inducing video, just the two of us and the easy rhythm we had always had. 

"Okay but seriously. How are you? Like actually." I knew what she meant by that look. She wanted to talk about everything. 

The party and the videos.

I opened my mouth to answer, and that was the exact moment I heard my name.

"Amrah."

I turned, and Chris was already closing the distance with jaw tight, and wild eyes that I had never gotten used to. 

The same dark eyes I see whenever he gets angry with me. Before I could get a word out, his hand closed around my arm and he yanked me forward hard enough that I stumbled into him.

"Chris—"

"Do you have any idea what you have done?" His voice cracked, loud enough that the few people near the fountain were already turning to stare. He shook me, once, like he was trying to rattle an answer out of me.

"Let go of me." I tried to twist free, but his grip only tightened.

"You couldn't just let it go, could you?" His face was inches from mine now, I pulled back as much as I could and Daphy was already grabbing at his arm, shouting something I couldn't quite process over the pounding in my own ears. 

I didn't expect to see Daphy's leg shoot up in a skillful way and kick Chris right in his jaw, he stumbled off and Daphy was quick to push me behind her.

"Bloody fucker"