Page 85 of Her Unflinching Warrior (Omega Sky)
“But, Miles,” the blonde whined.
“Do as I say,” Miles ordered sharply. Gideon could tell that Jenny would regret not obeying him. She must have sensed it too.
“All right,” she acquiesced.
“So, tell me how you phonied up the evidence,” Miles prompted again.
Gideon gave a harsh laugh. “You’re kidding, right? By the time I went to the F.B.I., you had managed to do everything but rob a kid’s lemonade stand and the March of Dimes.”
“I was on my way to an initial public offering. Streetgamezzz was valued at fifty million dollars, you little fuck!”
“Only because you’d managed to embezzle five times the amount that every one of your investors was willing to invest with you. You even tapped into the Special Olympics, you idiot.”
“There was absolutely no way the fumbling imbeciles at the F.B.I. could have found anything. There was nothing to find. I did the coding myself!” The toes of his shoes were brushing Gideon’s forehead. His eyes were wild with anger. “My plan was bulletproof. You had to have manufactured something to give to them.”
“I didn’t have to do shit. You were careless. You were always careless. Because of hubris, you were just sure you were smarter than everyone else. Just like now. But we were on to you. We know about Sid Bonham and what he was working on. You’re going down…Again.” Gideon forced a laugh.
“You know nothing.” Kendall’s laugh sounded genuine. “I’m going to rule the world. I’ll be bigger than Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos, just watch and see.”
“You’re psychotic.”
Kendall kicked him in the chest. “I don’t like that word. I’m a genius. How else would I have been able to take over the real Miles Albright’s identity and life as easily as I did? That was the work of a creative genius. I’ve been willing to play the long game.”
“How did you do that?” Gideon asked, forcing himself to sound impressed.
“I’d hatched my plan in prison. I knew I had to find some civil servant with a strong technical background. Someone who had a fantastic bio, but absolutely no life, no nothing. He had to be a ghost, with no friends or family.” Kendall laughed. “It was really surprising how many poor slobs I had to choose from.”
Gideon imagined that was true. He worked to keep Kendall talking. “Well, that didn’t take a genius,” he taunted.
“But the next part took fortitude. Not many men have it in them to follow through when it’s really necessary, but I can. Ican,” he mumbled the last bit to himself.
“What did you do?” Gideon asked in a bored voice.
“Why I killed him, of course. But only after he retired and went to that wretched fishing cabin that he’d bought by the lake. By that time, I’d already had some surgery done, and I’d shaved my head so I looked like him. It was perfect. Nobody from his old life would ever run into me when I went to Reynolds as the CTO, but even if they ran into me, they’d walk by me, because nobody at DoD realized that Miles Albright existed there.” Kendall laughed. It wasn’t nice.
“Why didn’t you just apply for a job with Risk Guard, if that’s where you needed to be? Didn’t they want you?” Again, Gideon worked overtime to ridicule his old tormentor.
“I couldn’t be that obvious,” Kendall told him like he was explaining things to an elementary school child. “You wouldn’t be any good at this, my boy. It’s all about keeping things at arm’s length. Being a member of the Board of Directors for Risk Guard was perfect. It kept me in the know and able to affect change, without being directly responsible.”
Fuck, Kendall Douglas is still as intelligent, devious, and sleazy as he ever was.
Kendall crouched close, looking Gideon dead in the eye. “And now you’re going to pay for what you did to me,” he whispered. “Make her scream,” he yelled over his shoulder.
Gideon did an ab curl and powered up, He butted his forehead up into the bridge of Kendall’s nose, doing what he could to push the cartilage up into his brain. Blood spurted all over Gideon, but he was prepared and had his eyes closed.
Kendall screamed out with pain. His screams mixed with Jada’s cries of pain.
“What the fuck?” It sounded like the behemoth who had carried Jada out of Gideon’s house. He heard running feet heading toward him, then he was kicked in the ribs hard enough to send him sliding across the rough floor. He squinted through the blood obscuring his vision and saw the big man picking up Kendall and slinging him over his shoulder.
“Miles!” the blonde psycho cried out. “Somebody help Miles!” she ordered. Gideon heard even more feet come running toward him.
Jada wasn’t making any noise.
From far across the warehouse, Gideon heard breaking glass.
“Shit! Someone’s breaking in,” a man yelled.
“Get in the SUV,” someone else shouted.
