Chapter 1

My mafia boyfriend and my best friend are Russo’s famous Cyber Twins—and both of them think I’m too useless to understand a word they say.

Ethan Russo can keep almost anyone out of a system. Vanessa Reed can break into almost anything.

And me?

I’m the girlfriend everyone thinks is lucky just to stand beside them.

Whenever the three of us are together, Ethan and Vanessa talk about exploits, access points, and security breaches while I stay quiet.

-

Vanessa glances back at me with a smile.

“Claire, do you know how many people would kill to sit here and listen to us talk?”

Ethan laughs.

“She probably doesn’t understand half of it anyway.”

I say nothing.

I understood all of it when I was eight.

That was also the year I wrote something I was never supposed to write again.

My grandfather made me promise to stay hidden.

So I did.

Until tonight.

The underground cyber challenge has barely reached halftime, and Russo is already down three to zero.

Across the room, Blake Carter leans back in his chair and looks straight at Ethan and Vanessa.

“This is the famous Russo cyber team?”

A few people laugh.

Blake’s smile widens.

“Maybe your family should stick to guns.”

No one on our side says a word.

Vanessa goes pale.

Ethan’s jaw tightens.

I already know exactly what went wrong.

Their opponent disguised probe traffic as normal requests. Russo let it through.

By the time the team noticed anything was wrong, the outer defense was already useless.

I stand.

One step.

That’s all I take before my grandfather’s voice comes back to me.

“Other people fight back and forth.”

His hand was thin around my wrist that day.

“You don’t.”

“You hunt.”

“And once you strike, you don’t leave much behind.”

He had looked at me like he was asking for the last thing I could ever give him.

“Promise me. Unless you have no other choice, don’t do it again.”

So I sit back down.

I lower my head and put my headphones on.

The same song I always use to calm myself starts playing.

I breathe out slowly.

By the time halftime begins, I look like myself again.

Quiet.

Harmless.

Forgettable.

The Russo team files into the private lounge.

No one speaks at first.

Vanessa sits on the couch with her head down.

Ethan stands beside her, rubbing her back.

I twist open a bottle of water and hold it out.

“Drink something.”

Vanessa slaps it out of my hand.

The bottle hits the floor.

“You’re happy, aren’t you?”

I stare at her.

“What?”

She looks up, eyes already red.

“You follow Ethan and me around all the time. You watch everyone praise us. You’ve been waiting for this, haven’t you?”

I frown.

“Here we go again.”

Her face hardens.

“You’re jealous.”

“No. You lose, and you take it out on whoever’s closest.”

Her eyes flash.

I continue, “You need to learn how to handle pressure. No one is obligated to—”

“Claire.”

Ethan cuts me off.

“Vanessa’s under enough pressure. Let it go.”

Something inside me goes still.

I look at him.

“She lost because she made mistakes.”

My voice is flat.

“That has nothing to do with me. I’m not responsible for her mood.”

A few team members glance over.

One of them mutters, “Easy for her to say.”

Another laughs.

“She doesn’t even understand what happened out there.”

“Yeah. She only gets in here because she’s Ethan’s girlfriend.”

I look at them.

“Eight times out of ten, I’m here because one of you asked me to bring coffee or food.”

No one answers.

I smile without humor.

“You’re real friendly when you’re eating what I brought.”

A few faces tighten.

“But now I’m useless?”

One of them scoffs.

“You think bringing coffee makes you part of the team?”

“No.”

I glance toward the scoreboard outside the lounge.

“But if you moved through a system half as fast as you switch sides, you might not be down three points.”

“Enough.”

Ethan’s voice snaps across the room.

He turns on me.

“Do you even know how many layers Blake’s team used?”

I say nothing.

“Can you write attack code?”

Still nothing.

His voice gets colder.

“What gives you the right to stand here and tell Vanessa—or any of us—that we’re bad at what we do?”

I look at him for a second.

Then I laugh.

“Ethan.”

His brows pull together.

“Keep talking to me like that and people are going to think she’s your girlfriend.”

The room goes silent.

Ethan opens his mouth.

Nothing comes out.

Vanessa stands.

Her voice shakes.

“This challenge matters to us, Claire.”

Tears gather in her eyes.

“I said a few things because I’m stressed. Why can’t you just let it go?”

I watch her.

“My pressure. Ethan’s pressure. The whole team’s pressure.”

She presses a hand to her chest.

“You have no idea what that feels like.”

I lift one finger.

“You’re right.”

Vanessa blinks.

“I don’t.”

I look straight at her.

“I’ve never lost.”