Ice Monkeys Read online

  He leaned in, pressing forward, thrusting his hips as he tried to find the sweet spot he sought.

  “You’re just showing off now,” Uni teased. He’d shifted position so he could play with her breasts, his thumbs and fingers tugging at her nipples and driving her even closer to another release. “Overachiever.”

  “That’s me,” Victor said. “Go big, or go home. And since I consider her home, only option I got is to go big.”

  She held onto his arms, which were planted on either side of her head. Like this, her world ending with them, it was easy to let her brain think like that, that her future held nothing but this, them, happiness and hot nights. Hot enough to keep her warm on the coldest night and then some.

  And she’d be happy for it.

  This was something else no other lover had ever achieved with her—making her come just with his cock.

  Although these two guys had made her come more already than her last two lovers combined—how sad was that?

  Between Victor’s cock fucking her so well and Uni playing with her nipples, she soon found herself tipping over the edge again.

  “That’s it,” Victor said, fucking her harder, faster, quickly catching up with her before his balls emptied his load inside her. Leaning in, he kissed her. “So fucking good,” he whispered. “I love you.”

  “Love you, too.”

  She looked at Uni, who wore a handsome smile.

  “Love you, baby,” he whispered.

  “Love you, too.”

  Yes, she’d call this love. It sure as hell felt more like it than anything else she’d ever experienced in her life with a guy.

  Victor rolled onto his back, taking her with him, so that she was straddling him. Uni lifted her hips, making Victor’s soft cock fall from her, but Uni quickly replaced it with his.

  From underneath her, Victor smiled, his hands now on her breasts and taking up where Uni left off. “I think we unlocked your secret,” he teased.

  Uni nudged her legs a little farther apart and adjusted his angle of thrust, and then…

  Zoom. Donna closed her eyes and kissed Victor, crying out as the orgasm washed through her while Uni stroked her ass. He grabbed her by the hips. “That’s it, baby,” he said as he fucked her, hard, making her come even harder. “We know you, now. You are definitely ours, and if you think we’re ever letting you get away, think again.”

  Victor pinched her nipples even harder, drawing another cry out of her as her clit rubbed against his body and, inside her, Uni’s cock thoroughly plowed her. She fucked herself back against Uni, their bodies slapping together until, finally, he came, too.

  Together, they collapsed on top of Victor, eventually flopping onto their sides so that she was in the middle, her back against Uni.

  Uni feathered his lips along the nape of her neck. “Sleep well, sweetheart.”

  She pulled his arms around her. “You, too.”

  With her head tucked against Victor’s shoulder, she crashed into sleep.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Ax didn’t head to the regular coffee shop he frequented the most on Tuesday. He had Tuesday and Wednesday off, but he needed to go someplace different and take his throwaway laptop with him. His usual place was fairly close to their apartment, which was one of the reasons he went there so often.

  But he was hoping for another payday today, meaning he’d need to send the video clips. No sense in taking an unnecessary risk. He’d done well so far.

  While he was out, he would do a little more dredging for info about this new Reverend Karsu. So far, he’d found bupkis. Well, nothing interesting. Nothing that contradicted anything the government had officially put out. No whiff of scandal.

  He already added that to his blog, too, a snarky post hinting that it was strange to find someone so squeaky clean in the first place. The truth was he doubted the guy had a shadowed past, but it would totally be in line with his blog’s history of questioning everything tossed out there by “the authorities.”

  Still no reply from Tank yet. He tried not to worry about his friend. He’d never met her in real life, and it wasn’t like he actually “knew” her.

  He was hoping for the best for her group, that they survived, at the very least.

  Maybe once he had finished milking the Hannibal Silo evidence and disappeared from Atlanta, he could try to find them and help them out, if they needed it.

  Of course there was a lot of buzz online, even in hacker circles, about the Kite vaccine research information starting to emerge. So far, what the US government had released appeared to be genuine. Other governments who still had the resources to fund labs were scrambling to try to replicate the results as well as submit their own data for analysis.

  For once, there was hope.

  That was a good thing for many reasons, including the fact that it would allow people to devote brain cells to the scandal that was Hannibal Silo.

  It meant that Ax could relax a little and look forward to the future for a change. Maybe he wouldn’t have to go all prepper-crazy and build up a secret stash of stuff in a storage locker somewhere, just waiting for him to bug out.

  He’d do his best to take care of his brothers in the process. Not like he hardly saw them anymore with their work schedules.

  Once he’d taken his revenge and could walk away, he’d tell them what he’d done. How he’d given Silo payback for ordering their parents be killed to silence their mother.

  They probably wouldn’t believe him, and that was okay, too.

  Maybe I shouldn’t tell them.

  He could always lie and say, if things got bad and they had to leave, that he’d done a little hacking on the side and saved up some money. Not like if things got to that point that he’d be worried about law enforcement.

  Best to keep silent for now.

  He’d already downed three high-caffeine energy drinks by the time he arrived at the coffee shop, one on the far south side of Atlanta. There, he grabbed an espresso to maintain the pleasant edge of his caffeine buzz before he found himself a corner seat. Then he fired up the throwaway laptop and, sure enough, he found a payment waiting from the CMM people. He also had follow-up e-mails from the other networks, looking for more clips.

  Glancing around at the fairly crowded room over the top of his surgical mask, he struggled not to giggle. Another thirty grand quickly transferred out of that MacCoin account and bounced around the ether a few times before dropping it into his secret overseas bank account.

  He tucked his hands under the table and shook them out, trying to work out a little of the jitters before he prepped the first e-mail. That one to CMM, with the file-clip info.

  Then “invoices” to the other networks for their next clips.

  While waiting to see if the other networks would respond right away, he logged into the bulletin board to check for Tank.

  A little relief filled him when he saw he had a private message from her waiting in his account.

  That relief fled when he opened the message she’d sent before dawn local time, and read it.

  Situation far worse than lamestream media reporting. Refugees from LA area starting to make it to SLC and elsewhere. Many of them K-pos. Military euthanizing them at road blocks. CDC not reporting accurate numbers, even this board’s mods infiltrated by gov stooges. On-ground sources say deaths in thousands, not dozens. Burn piles and mass graves. Tks for the coin, desperately needed. We’re going to move east away from incoming K wave. Will update when I can, or after we’re settled. <3 Tank.

  That was enough of a shock to his gut to boost his adrenaline, knocking his caffeine buzz off and leaving him feeling sick.

  Maybe leaving Atlanta with his brothers would be best. Sooner, rather than later.

  Sure, explaining the money would be damned near impossible, but staying alive was worth any side-eye or recriminations they might try to lay on him.

  Right?

  He doubted Noel would bullshit him. Throughout all of this, she had pr
ovided what always turned out to be accurate information, not just throwing every little bit of shit that rolled in over her data transom back out into the world without confirmation first. That was one good thing about these “anarchists.” They had an aversion for falsehoods and only wanted to spread facts they could confirm.

  He sat back and read her message again before sending her a reply.

  Will drop some more coin for you. Good luck. Pls keep me posted. K vax info looks good though, right? Stay safe.

  He made the donation and was about to sign off twenty minutes later when she replied.

  Trust no one. Can’t confirm/deny vax info yet. Gov track record sux. Tks for the coin! One of our guys has family in Iowa. Might head there. <3 Tank.

  Of course he didn’t trust the US government, but they’d have to be in cahoots with several other very desperate nations, such as the UK, Germany, Australia, France, Canada, Russia, and others if they were faking the information they’d posted so far.

  Right?

  That wasn’t even counting the private pharmacology companies and other research labs who’d jumped onto Kite vaccine research as well out of desperation. No, there wouldn’t be a profit in it, but saving the world—including their own asses in the process—was a pretty inspiring goal in and of itself.

  Some countries would likely never recover. China, India, Pakistan, South Korea, Japan, and several other nations in that region.

  Most other nations in that region.

  Already in the UN were rumbles about the ambassadors to many of those countries—most of them safely buttoned-up in their New York City penthouses—who appeared to be the highest-ranking officials left in their countries and how they should give serious thought to turning their countries over to UN control. New countries from the dust, some of them merged.

  Some of the back-traffic channels on the boards Ax frequented talked about the vast arsenals of military hardware now just laying around and waiting for anyone to bulldoze through the piles of Kite bodies and scoop them up.

  Anyone.

  Including any batshit crazy asshole who might possibly have a lot of money and overseas connections like Rev. Hannibal Silo.

  That last part was an extrapolation on Ax’s part, but he shivered as he contemplated the ramifications.

  What if…

  How much of a stretch was it to think that a man like Hannibal Silo, who literally had billions of dollars floating around the globe right now, couldn’t hire a team to go in and take over some of those weapons?

  It wasn’t much of a stretch for Ax. Not much of one at all.

  Cold sweat broke out along his spine.

  I have to stop him sooner rather than later.

  Instead of logging off and leaving like he’d planned, he did something he’d sworn he wouldn’t do, because he hadn’t wanted to draw any extra attention to himself.

  He took a run at the Church of the Rising Sunset’s computer network.

  * * * *

  Hannibal Silo was not a happy man. Alone in his St. Louis office, locked away from all ears and eyes, he stewed, furious.

  After his arrival in St. Louis yesterday afternoon, he’d had a whirlwind tour through the entire stronghold complex, going through everything—including shit he didn’t give a flying fuck about but couldn’t say otherwise—from security to engineering, their back-up electrical grid system, the self-contained water and sewage facilities, the new network broadcasting equipment, the church…

  Everything.

  Including a couple of hours he’d never get back humoring a beaming Mary Parnassus and her hydroponic farming system, and their in-house school program that now revolved completely around all school-aged children from kindergarten to high school being involved with the hydroponics and learning how to farm.

  He’d somehow managed not to fall asleep during all of that.

  But when he’d finally—finally—escaped and locked himself, alone, in his quarters, he’d closed all the blinds and cranked up his computer.

  And he’d read.

  And read.

  And read some more.

  Then today, he started trying to make some calls.

  Now that he was paying attention to something besides hydroponic vegetables and putting on fake, fatherly smiles for the press and the children, he’d realized something.

  There was a disturbing pattern emerging. A pattern of missing contacts, both in Washington and at the CDC in Atlanta. When he contacted the Washington CDC office, his contact there nervously said they had no idea what happened to the personnel, that they’d been moved or retired or whatnot, their replacements ordered in by someone higher up.

  Very high up.

  Seething, Hannibal Silo got up and cracked open the blinds on the bedroom window that opened out over the center of the compound. Tinted glass, no one could see in, not even at night with it backlit. A premium he’d paid but well worth it.

  He’d had plans to fuck his new bride here, with her breasts pressed up against the window as he whispered into her ear how this would all be hers now.

  Even that plan was in the crapper.

  Everything was in the crapper.

  All because of that cunt I married.

  Jerald might think he controlled all the contacts, but Silo still had a few of his own, including orders out to some of those same contacts to report everything back to him.

  Their friend in Indianapolis had kept him apprised of a developing situation in Atlanta. The other situation, not the disturbing lack of contacts in the CDC. He’d updated Silo that very morning about his latest assigned task from Jerald and asked for guidance on how to proceed.

  There was a lead. Not much of one, but a start.

  And the “consultant” hadn’t reported those findings to Jerald yet. “What do you want me to do?”

  Silo didn’t dare take any of his findings to any of his contacts in the military or government to get assistance from them. He’d first need to carefully assess how far Arliss’ reach now touched, what contacts he’d have to discard as unreliable, which ones could no longer be trusted.

  If the Atlanta CDC was now filled with personnel loyal to Arliss, it meant he wouldn’t be able to easily spirit away any research or personnel to the lab at the St. Louis stronghold.

  Another roadblock to his plans.

  General Arliss had proven a far more dangerous and wily adversary than Silo had ever imagined him to be. Definitely not the strictly regimented mind so common in many of the long-term, higher brass.

  “Don’t tell Jerald any of this,” Silo finally told the man.

  “You’re sure?”

  “Positive. You really believe this person is based out of Atlanta?”

  “Yeah. It’s a slim lead, and it might take time to—”

  “Give me the information you have.”

  After Silo received all the information the guy had about where he thought the blogger might be based, and after giving the man instructions not to update Jerald yet, Silo placed another call.

  This time, to a contact he hadn’t used in a while.

  One Jerald knew nothing about.

  Relieved to find the contact still active, he gave the order to assemble a team and proceed to Atlanta. He wanted that blogger found and brought in—alive.

  By any means necessary.

  * * * *

  Wednesday morning dawned cold enough that Ax bumped on the heat in their apartment after crawling out of bed. They tried not to run the heating and cooling system any more than absolutely necessary, and always turned it off when they weren’t home. They did their best to save money.

  As the heat kicked on, Ax giggled as he thought about the money sitting in his account, just waiting for him.

  Maybe even more money waiting for him today.

  His smile faded at the sobering thought that money might soon become worthless if what Tank reported was accurate and Kite was spreading faster than reported.

  It might mean he lost access to that mo
ney. Especially if world-wide servers went down and he couldn’t get to it.

  As he took a shower, he formulated a plan. He’d rent a storage locker, today. A large one he could get to quickly from the apartment. Pay the rent up for several months and start stockpiling supplies. Maybe even go ahead and buy a vehicle and park it there. One they could bug-out in.

  Then, when the time came they had to flee Atlanta, he could take his brothers there, load up, and leave.

  That’s a good plan. A solid plan.

  Also a plan that would stall any questions his brothers would ask up until the point he opened the door of the storage locker and said, “Get the hell in.”

  At that point, hopefully, they’d just be so grateful to be escaping that they wouldn’t question him.

  Maybe they could swing through St. Louis and get Mary, or arrange for her to meet them somewhere and she could join them.

  He didn’t want her to get caught out in the open with no way to escape Kite hordes. From the little he’d let her reveal, she was renting an apartment from a homeowner, nothing in her name—either name—to tie her to that residence.

  I’ll send her a message today and make sure she’s doing okay. Give her a heads-up to start preparing supplies in case we have to run. Figure out a way to meet up.

  Today, he’d planned to go to the south side of Atlanta again, to a different coffee shop he sometimes used. Except after he got out of the shower he had a call from work, asking him to come in and fill a shift.

  Dammit.

  He’d have to be there in five hours. That wouldn’t give him time to do everything he’d planned, and Tank’s warning drummed in his brain.

  LA died in a matter of days once Kite exploded there. And if the military was willing to blow up over a million people in Barstow, who was to say they wouldn’t blow up Atlanta if Kite got that far?

  Weighing his options, he took a wider view of the situation than just there in Atlanta. Time could be short, and, so far, there was no indication anyone in any way had discovered his trail.