Chapter 2

Reese Summers POV:

I slipped the signed divorce petition into a heavy kraft envelope, sealed the flap with red candle wax, and pressed my thumbprint into the hot seal.

I placed the envelope squarely beneath Grant's mechanical keyboard on the desk.

Next, I reached into the back of his desktop tower.

My fingers found the two hardware keys plugged into the rear USB ports—the keys that unlocked my private calibration and retraining modules. Removing them would lock those modules, leaving the dashboard on its last cached results without triggering a disconnect alert.

I yanked both keys out.

The plastic clicked sharply as they freed themselves from the ports.

I dropped them into the inner pocket of my leather jacket and zipped it tight.

In my study, I packed my spare laptop and external hard drives into my laptop bag, then slid my notebook binders into the duffel beside my clothes. I hoisted both bags onto my shoulders.

I stepped into the hallway, heading toward the staircase, when the heavy front door downstairs was kicked open with a violent thud.

I stopped instantly, pulling myself back into the deep shadow of the landing.

Grant's voice boomed through the entryway, thick with bourbon and cigar smoke.

"Leave the gear in the truck, Harper! We're drinking the good scotch tonight!"

Grant stepped inside, wearing his heavy President cut.

The leather was scuffed, the black-and-gold Red Basin rocker patches spanning his broad shoulders like an iron yoke.

Brooke was practically hanging off his left arm.

She was wearing my limited-edition Mercer Racing team jacket—the one custom-tailored for me after our first desert championship.

It hung loose on her narrow frame, but she wore it like a trophy.

Harper trailed three steps behind them, carrying a stack of my laminated tire-pressure charts against her chest.

She looked up at Grant with the eager, nervous expression of a dog waiting for a scrap of meat.

Grant tossed his heavy brass key ring onto the console table.

It clattered against the wood, skidding across the surface before hitting the wall.

He pulled Brooke against his side, dipping his head to plant a sloppy kiss on her forehead.

"Told you the board wouldn't blink," Grant muttered, his thumb tracing Brooke's jaw. "You put on that smile, drop a few racing buzzwords, and those old bastards hand over the sponsor checks."

"I told you I could handle it, baby." Brooke laughed, leaning up on her tiptoes. "Reese made it sound like running strategy required a doctorate. She was just gatekeeping the position so you'd stay dependent on her."

Harper nodded vigorously, rubbing her knuckles.

"Brooke's right, Grant. The formulas Reese uses are way too complicated anyway. Half the time she spent three hours adjusting for ambient humidity. We can just use the baseline averages and save ten hours of testing every week."

Grant let out a harsh bark of laughter, unbuttoning his vest.

"That's because my wife has a stick up her ass. She thinks if she isn't suffering over a screen, it doesn't count as work. Tomorrow, you take over the strategy room, Brooke. Cut out all that retraining garbage."

"Consider it done." Brooke smiled, her eyes glittering with ambition.

I stood motionless in the upstairs shadows.

A cold, razor-sharp smile touched the corners of my lips.

Cut out the retraining modules?

The vehicle dynamics algorithm I built was a living mathematical model.

It relied on continuous Kalman filters that recalibrated for track temperature, rubber degradation, and barometric pressure every single second.

Without daily parameter updates, the predictive model would begin to drift within forty-eight hours.

Within three weeks, the stale setups would have them burning through tires, losing corner speed, and failing telemetry validation. The dashboard's green lights couldn't win a race.

Every setup sheet carried an expiration date and a warning against using it outside its tested conditions. I'd gone over those warnings with Grant myself.

Harper knew that.

Or at least, she would have known it if she had paid attention during the three years I spent mentoring her instead of looking for shortcuts.

"Where is she anyway?" Grant asked suddenly, glancing toward the darkened living room. "Marlene said she came back."

Brooke rolled her eyes, tugging at his belt loop.

"Probably pouting in the guest room because nobody baked her a cake. Let her stew, Grant. She'll come crawling down tomorrow when she realizes nobody is begging for her spreadsheets."

Grant grunted, leaning down to kiss Brooke's neck.

"Let's go to the den. Harper, put those charts on the bar and get out."

Harper set the charts down carefully, gave Grant a quick wave, and slipped out the front door into the chilly night.

I waited until Grant and Brooke disappeared into the downstairs entertainment room, their muffled laughter swallowed by the heavy timber walls.

I moved silently down the rear hallway, slipping into the small server closet tucked beneath the back stairs.

I opened my laptop, plugged directly into the local switch, and opened a terminal window.

The green text blinked steadily against the black background.

I typed in my master administrative credentials.

Summers_Root_Override.

I didn't wipe the hard drives.

Wiping the drives would trigger immediate alarms on Grant's phone, and he'd come charging up the stairs with his Glock drawn before I could clear the driveway.

Instead, I executed a script I had prepared three days ago.

I revoked Mercer Racing's access to my private update service and disabled live data ingestion into the model.

The retraining loop was now locked to the hardware keys in my pocket.

Then, I routed the public dashboard to a static, read-only cache.

To Grant and Brooke, the screens would still show green status lights.

The numbers would continue to fluctuate in realistic-looking patterns based on historical data from last season.

It would look completely healthy—a hollow, rotting shell producing comforting lies.

I tapped the Enter key.

The progress bar flashed to 100%.

Private modules locked. Historical cache active.

I closed the laptop, slid it into my bag, and pushed open the heavy steel fire door that led out to the back patio.

The cold Nevada desert wind hit my face like a bucket of ice water.

The scent of sagebrush, dust, and dry pine filled my lungs.

I walked along the gravel pathway around the side of the garage, keeping low beneath the security camera blind spots I had mapped out myself.

Tucked into the far corner of the detached shed was my bike.

A matte-black Harley Low Rider S with a customized 117 engine, stripped of all chrome, badges, and club identifiers.

I strapped my duffel bag across the rear fender and secured the laptop case in the left saddlebag.

I put the bike in neutral and wheeled it out of the shed with the ignition off. The service lane sloped gently downhill. I pushed it a few hundred yards, until the house disappeared behind a low ridge.

I pulled my full-face helmet over my head, snapping the dark visor down.

I turned the ignition switch.

My thumb hit the starter button.

The big twin engine roared to life with a thunderous, guttural rumble that shook the gravel beneath my tires.

I kicked the shifter down into first gear, dumped the clutch, and twisted the throttle.

The rear tire bit into the dirt, launching the bike forward down the access road.

I didn't look in the rearview mirror once.