The Gender Lie (The Gender Game #3) by Bella Forrest (i have read the book a hundred times .txt) 📕

Only Owen and I remained behind Thomas, watching the smaller man work. He was humming something under his breath, but I couldn’t make out the tune, until I caught a word—“programming”—and I realized he was singing instructions to himself.

The mannerism was so strange that I had to shoot a glance at Owen to see if he heard it too. His blue eyes found mine and crinkled in a smile that made me want to throttle him for a moment. Him and his damned secrets—there was no reason for him not to tell me about Thomas.

In fact, I was even more irritated with Owen for putting us in a room with a clearly deranged lunatic. Who knew what sorts of things were going through his head? Was he calculating how to kill the five of us if the mission went bad, or had he already done that? Would he sell me out to the government? I wasn’t naïve enough to think that the Patrian government had not put a hefty bounty on my head.

Thomas lifted his hands up in silent victory, breaking me out of my suspicious thoughts. He clicked a few buttons, and then the screen directly in front of us—which took up almost the entire wall—lit up to show an empty road.

We all fell silent as we searched the image, trying to see what Thomas saw.

It was Owen who spoke first. “All right, I’ll bite, what is this?” he asked.

Thomas beamed up at him, his face squishing together like a toad about to fall asleep. “It’s the only camera feed I could find remotely near to the location you and Desmond provided,” he said, an edge of excitement to his voice.

Owen frowned, his eyebrows coming together. “Thomas… this video shows us absolutely nothing.”

Thomas nodded. “They run their cameras on a closed system,” he said, standing up. I watched as he waddled over to some file cabinets that were tucked away in a corner. He pulled open a drawer and retrieved a thick folder. “You and Desmond are definitely onto something—it took a lot to get these blueprints.”

He rolled out the bundle of papers on the table. “They don’t even exist in digital media—if they had, I would’ve found them. As it stands, I had to liquidate the supplier just to be sure word about this didn’t get out.”

Owen’s gaze found mine and I frowned at him, crossing my arms over my chest. “Thomas… you know you’re not supposed to liquidate the assets,” Owen said.

I rolled my eyes at him. If he thought I was so dumb as to not know what an “asset” was or what it meant to “liquidate” one, he had another thing coming.

Thomas raised a dismissive hand, his entire focus on the blueprints in front of him. “He wasn’t an asset,” he said. “Not one of yours, anyway. The Porteque gang are the only ones who will miss him, and as far as they are concerned, he just disappeared.” Thomas looked at me, his lenses reflecting the white coming off the screen. “I know how to cover my tracks,” he finished.

The words sounded threatening, and I didn’t like them at all. I took a step forward, but Solomon placed a heavy hand on my shoulder. I looked up at him, and he shook his head, mouthing the word don’t at me.

I felt my mouth flatten into a thin line as a wave of irritation rolled through me. I backed off though, distancing myself a few steps. Thomas was dangerous—he had just confirmed it—and for some reason he had decided to focus on me. I wasn’t sure why he had, but if he did try anything, I was going to be ready for it.

Thomas had already continued speaking, in spite of my disturbance, and it took my brain a moment to catch up with him in the conversation. “The building is an original, which is why it’s perfect! Lots of things were built and then torn down in the early days, so this place is practically a relic. The security around it will be antiquated at best. I also managed to get eyes on the facility, and there’s only a handful of guards!”

“Inside?” Owen asked.

“No—all of my intelligence says that they are outside. I got a hold of the shipping invoices from the past year, and it helped me narrow things down considerably based on who signed for them. There are several buildings on the property—five, to be precise: two warehouses and three office-like structures. Now, I’ve managed to narrow the location of the surgical laser to one of these two buildings here. Most of the shipping manifests indicate that medical supplies are being kept in a specific office in this building, while in the warehouse, they’re being housed between aisles A and D. It was the best I could do.”

“How do you know all this?” I asked, cutting in.

Thomas faltered, his mouth working up and down. “I… I have a thing that… that I use…”

He floundered, looking to Owen for support. Owen patted him on the shoulder and I found myself frowning again at the tender support Owen was giving him. “It’s okay, Thomas. Violet should know better than to ask a magician to reveal his tricks.”

I gaped at the admonishment so casually leveled at me, and for a moment, I felt my temper boiling up. I wasn’t trying to cause problems; I was just curious as to how he got his information. Until I reminded myself that it ultimately didn’t matter—as long as I could get what I needed to help Viggo.

I smiled at Thomas. “Owen’s right. I’m very sorry, Thomas. This is excellent work.”

Thomas eyed me dubiously for a few seconds, and then nodded with a huff, turning back to Owen.

I didn’t know what the deal was, but it was clear that Owen was indulging Thomas, and I intended to ask him about it later. Owen and Thomas were already bent over going over the plans, so I had little choice save