Read Online The Ultimates: Against All Enemies by Alex Irvine - Free Book Online Page B

said, "and I meant it."
    The one thing Fury had left on his desktop was a copy of the business section of that day's New York Times , the front page of which featured a story about a breakthrough Chitauri screening technology. Accompanying the article was an illustration of Tony's screener, run through Photoshop just enough to avoid being identical. A single line midway through the piece noted the breakthrough had been "partially derived from a canceled defense project," which Nick read as a wink from someone in Washington who had authorized the leak. Limiting himself to people who had attended the meeting where Tony's project was discussed, Nick had done some initial handicapping of likely sources. His early favorite for the leak was Garza, although it might have been any of them. Even Alto-belli or Bright, who had made such a big deal out of the security risks. The way Washington worked, that might have been nothing but a charade to polish up their collective deniability.
    Nick quashed an impulse to find out whether either Altobelli or Bright held directorships or stock in Stark Industries or in the company that had miraculously invented a tech that did exactly what Tony's would have. What bothered Nick more than identifying the source of the leak from Washington was that the leaker had used Steve Rogers to pipeline the project specs to this, who was it... SKR TechEnt. Ten minutes on Google had taught Nick that SKR was a development clearinghouse, basically four walls and a roof where control-freak venture capitalists funneled projects they wanted to keep an eye on. But Nick had been around the block long enough to figure out that more was going on there than met the eye. The whole setup screamed shell company. Who had decided an outfit like SKR could possibly be the best company for the job?
    "Tony's going to be here any minute," Fury said. "Keep your mouth shut until I tell you to open it. That's an order."
    Steve didn't like it, but he was a soldier. "Yes, sir, General," he said. As if on cue, Tony Stark barged in without knocking. "Nick, goddammit," he began, then caught himself up short when he saw Steve standing off to the side of Nick's desk. "Ah," he said. "This goes higher than I'd thought."
    "How do you mean that?" Nick asked.
    "Him," Tony said, pointing at Steve. "If you were just going to do this yourself, you wouldn't need to wave the Human Flag over there."
    "Permission to speak, General," Steve said.
    Fury didn't take his eyes off Tony. "Granted."
    "I did it, Tony," Steve said. "General Fury didn't know."
    "He—" Tony took this in for a long moment. "Well. What a coincidence. And am I to assume that when you were picking up little bits of fricasseed Chitauri, and you said to General Fury something about how we could have done something, it had nothing to do with today's newspaper article?"
    "Saw this, did you?" Fury said. He picked up the paper. "Figured you might have. I was as surprised as you until Captain Rogers here showed up and let me in on what happened." Fury didn't look at Steve as he said this. They could get their stories straight later. Right now the important thing was keeping Tony on board, and if Tony could blame Steve for the whole thing, he might just be able to get over it and remain a member of the team. Apart from the fact that Steve had done it, so Nick had told the truth, mostly. Steve hadn't let him in on what happened yet, but he was damn sure going to the minute Tony left.
    "I hope, at least, that some kind of insubordination or espionage charge is going to keep me from losing sleep over all the money this just cost me," Tony said. He shoved his hands in his pockets. "I wasn't that pissed about this when it was just me not making as much money as I might have. This is different. Now someone else is making money that should have been mine. And the PR, Jesus. This is killing me."
    "No, the tumor's killing you," Steve said. "Also I'm hoping it's the tumor making you complain about money