Read ahead to discover the next turn in the story.

The men outside weren't just thugs; they were professionals. I could hear them sweeping the warehouse, their movements precise, their communication minimal. They were clearing the floor, moving toward the shipping containers. They didn't know we were beneath them, but they knew we were in the building.

I turned to Alejandro. He was staring at the weapon in my hand as if it were an alien artifact. He looked so small, so pathetic, so completely out of his depth.

"You knew how to use that?" he asked.

"I grew up in the shadow of the port, Alejandro," I said, my voice devoid of emotion. "You think I built this empire by asking politely? I learned to defend what was mine before you even graduated from business school."

I gestured to the monitors. "Start the upload. If you don't broadcast the fake data within the next three minutes, they’re going to reach the hatch, and we’re both finished. Keep your eyes on the feed. Watch the signal. If they try to ping the source, reroute it to the secondary server in the basement of the old embassy."

"Why the old embassy?"

"Because it’s wired to explode if the security protocol is tripped," I said. "It’ll incinerate their trail and anyone tracking it. Now move."

He moved, his fear replaced by a strange, focused terror. He typed, his movements jerky. The data began to flow. The fake tracking signals—each one perfectly crafted to look like a high-value shipment—began to ping across the encrypted channels.

I moved to the hatch and reinforced the locks. It wouldn't hold forever, but it would buy us time. I checked the perimeter cameras. They were converging on our position.

"Seventy percent uploaded," Alejandro whispered.

"Hurry," I said.

A heavy thud hit the hatch. Then another. They were using a battering ram. The steel groaned, the bolts straining.

"Ninety percent."

"They're on the door," I said, steadying my weapon.

"Done! It’s live!"

I moved to the terminal, grabbed the hard drive, and initiated the final wipe of the local system. "Get behind the racking. If the hatch goes, don't shoot until I say."

The door flew open with a screech of tortured metal. Three men flooded in, their weapons raised. They were wearing tactical gear, their faces hidden behind balaclavas. They scanned the room, their flashlights cutting through the dust.

They saw the empty terminal. They saw the open hatch.

"They're gone," one said, his voice clipped.

"Check the basement," another replied.

They stepped toward the stairwell, oblivious to the fact that we were hiding behind the massive, floor-to-ceiling storage racks only ten feet away.

I signaled Alejandro. I didn't want to kill them. I wanted to trap them.

I pulled the manual release on the fire-suppression system—the one that dumped pure CO2 into the room, instantly dropping the temperature and suffocating any open flame or oxygen.

The room hissed. A dense, white fog exploded from the overhead pipes.

The men gagged, their weapons dropping as they clutched at their throats, disoriented and blind.

"Now!" I screamed.

We ran. We didn't head for the hatch; we headed for the air duct I had crawled through as a child when I was testing the warehouse security. It was narrow, cramped, and filled with grime, but it was our only way out.

We squeezed in, the metal biting into our skin. We crawled, our breath ragged, the sounds of the men choking behind us echoing in the vent.

"Where are we going?" Alejandro gasped.

"To the roof," I said. "There’s a crane line that leads to the parking garage across the street. We’re going to slide out."

"You’re insane."

"I’m alive," I corrected.

We emerged on the roof, the night air freezing. The crane arm was stretched out, a cable dangling in the darkness. I grabbed the hook, secured the harness, and looked at Alejandro.

"Slide," I said.

He didn't argue. He jumped, his weight sending the line whipping toward the garage. I followed, the wind tearing at my clothes.

We landed on the concrete floor of the garage, the impact jarring my ribs. I pulled the harness off and didn't look back.

We were in the clear. But as we walked toward the exit, I saw something that made my blood run cold.

A black sedan was sitting in the corner of the garage. And leaning against it, smoking a cigarette, was the one person I had hoped never to see again: Teresa.

She wasn't wearing her elegant dinner dress. She was wearing a trench coat, her hair pulled back, her face hard and unforgiving.

"You thought you were so clever," she said, her voice echoing in the empty space. "Did you really think I’d let you ruin my son's future because of a little theft?"

She pointed a gun at us, her aim steady.