The next three weeks were full of activity. Chi made her move at IQ Security, setting plans in motion that would result in the discovery of some irregular financial records and the requisite investigation. Andrés mentally thanked Liv once again for starting with the financial data; it was proving useful in more ways than one. No further data came, but he wasn't surprised.

He waited a week to send an email to her Glitch address, letting her know that he wanted to be friends. Andrés cringed as he wrote it, feeling pathetic and desperate but not knowing what else to do. He wanted her back, so a little humility was in order, but it was still the first and only time he'd gone sniffing after someone like a cur looking for scraps. It stung his pride and made him check his email more frequently than usual, which put him in a foul mood.

Carlin had been instructed to do what she could to improve cybersecurity while keeping an eye out for more hack attempts and repulsing them immediately if discovered.

Nothing happened.

Andrés knew Liv was up to something. He knew how driven she was, that she wouldn't be able to help herself. The pattern had been set: Imogen attacked her brother, so Liv, as Glitch, took her down. KAP attacked people she was invested in protecting, so she took them down. Andrés had used her and taken advantage of their relationship, so some sort of revenge would be forthcoming.

He knew that Liv wasn't a petty or vengeful person so much as one with an unerring and uncompromising sense of fairness and balance, and she was too impatient to leave retribution up to karma. She would strike, and computers would be her tool of choice. He just didn't know what she would do, and it made tension crawl under his skin.

The anxiety made it harder to keep old, paranoid habits in their mental box. He didn't sleep in the same place two nights running, started keeping a gun on him again, didn't go anywhere he hadn't already scouted.

He refused to see Liv as his enemy. He didn't take any action to hunt her down, but she hadn't responded to his message, either. It left them in an unsettling limbo that he wasn't sure how to deal with. Reminding himself that trust and faith were the keys to resolving the situation did nothing for him. He needed action and it wasn't his place to take it. Not this time, not with her.

It was worse at night, especially when he tortured himself by sleeping at the Chiswick flat. Unusually for him, he hadn't changed the sheets on the bed, unwilling to give up the residual scent of her. Whiskey comforted him those nights, too much of it, so in addition to feeling apprehensive and paranoid, he usually had a pounding headache in the morning.

He was a mess, and he knew it, but every day that passed without something from Liv, some clue as to how she might react, only strung him tighter. Everyone except Chi and Cillian went in fear of him for a fortnight; those two snapped and snarled right back, but left little impression on his attitude. On the upside, the company was running more efficiently than it had in years as he turned his focus to projects that had been neglected or stalled and put in inhumanly long hours attending to them.

Andrés was finally starting to settle and wrangle himself into a semblance of order when Liv broke her long silence.

He'd been in the middle of a conversation with one of the R&D managers when his phone rang, buzzing in his pocket. Nobody had dared to call him in over a week, so he fished it out, assuming it meant an emergency. Surprise washed over him when he saw the ID and he nodded to the R&D manager to indicate he needed to take the call. She nodded back and started walking away.

"Liv," he answered, hoping his voice sounded steady as his pulse raced.

If he'd been surprised before, her next words made his heart skip in shock. "Hello, there. I'm looking for the Raven," she purred.

The blood drained from his face as he took the last few steps to his office in a rush and shut the door firmly. "Where did you hear that name?"

She hinted at a response, suggesting that she'd hacked together the information with help from her AI. More than ever, he wished he had either taken Liv in hand or dealt with her definitively. She was dangerous and he'd thoroughly underestimated her.

Her next words were steel sheathed in velvet. "Did you mean it when you said you wanted to be friends?"

That was an easy question. "Yes," he replied, not elaborating. If he could have a second chance to make her an ally, he'd never lie to her again, even by omission, even if she didn't want to be his lover anymore.

"Just friends?" she asked sharply, and he felt his breath catch. What game is she playing? He asked what she was offering, fighting for control of his voice. If he could have her back in his bed as well as back on his side...he locked his knees to keep from wavering.

"I'll be in touch. See you around, Andrés. Don't forget about the favor you owe me."

The call ended, and he stood staring at his phone. I'm an idiot, he cursed himself. He'd seen her potential but hadn't anticipated how quickly she would go from naive initiate to credible threat. And on top of that, he owed her a favor.

Days passed without anything further from Liv. Andrés knew she'd be in touch again because she clearly intended to claim her pound of flesh, but no more calls or emails were forthcoming.

Then there was her odd statement: "See you around." What had she meant by that? He slept at Perdition two nights running, telling himself it was strategy and not cowardice, not wanting a repeat of the encounter with Zoë outside his flat in Chiswick. The third night he slept in the Regent's Park flat, hoping that the security measures installed there could deter her, whatever she was planning.

Nothing happened.

Chi called him out in their video conference catch-up the next morning. "Andrés, I don't know what the fuck is going on with you and that hacker, but this has got to stop. Make a plan, take control of the situation, and move the fuck on. You've got everyone on eggshells and it's starting to affect business, especially with this merger offer in play. Lord save me but this is why I hate when you insist on mixing business and pleasure."

Glaring, Andrés snapped, "I have it under control. I —"

"You don't," Chi interrupted just as sharply, "because you have that dead look in your eyes that says you're – someone else." They stared at each other for long seconds. Chi had known him before, so she recognized the signs, but was wise enough not to speak the name aloud.

Breaking eye contact, she sighed and slumped in her chair. "I'm worried about you, is all. You know you're like family to me, after the way you took me in," she said quietly. "I've seen you when a deal goes off or a job goes wrong, and you've never been this bad before. Cillian agrees."

"So you're both ganging up on me. Lovely," Andrés snarled.

Chi scoffed and rolled her eyes, unaffected by the accusation. "Don't be a child. We care about you. You're allowed to let people care about you. You're also allowed to care about other people," she said pointedly. "I imagine that's why this hacker is still alive and you're running."

I'm not running, he insisted in his head as he glared at her some more. "Fine. I'll deal with Hayes. Can we finish talking about the merger now, Director?" He emphasized her title, reminding her that he was the boss.

It slid right off her. Glancing at her watch, Chi said, "No. We've overrun, and I have another meeting to get to. That is, if you're still going to put me in charge of IQ Security once this is all over."

Sighing, Andrés waved a hand. "Fine. We'll talk later. Keep me posted." Chi nodded and ended the call.

When you have to tell people you're the boss, you're not the boss, he admonished himself. If he was so off-kilter that he was playing such obvious power games with someone who needed no warning, then the situation was well out of hand.

Right. I'll make a plan. It would be a relief to have it all decided, one way or another.

Aguilar caught him in the corridor on the way back to his office. They nodded at Bradley, going the opposite direction, and passed through to the executive suite. The R&D director was asking about something important, but Andrés lost concentration at the repeated flicker of movement inside his office as they approached. He held up a fisted hand in the signal to stop, which Aguilar obeyed immediately, eyes darting for the threat.

How in hell had someone gotten into his office? Aside from building security and the standing requirement for all employees to challenge strangers, his office had a fingerprint lock and his was the only print it granted access to.

The flickering inside the room reminded him of the flicker of computer monitors behind a spinning chair, and there was only one person who had both the skill and the lack of self-preservation to break in and then do chair spins.

Livia Hayes.