“Actually, it was his idea.” She glanced at Scott and their gazes met. Her stomach dipped. God, she hoped he couldn’t tell how much he scrambled her brain.
“How’s that?” he asked.
Valerie stretched her fingers over her keyboard and took a deep breath. If she wanted things to be easier with Scott, maybe it was time to share. “After Dad died and Papá went to jail, I lived with my aunt’s family in Four Creeks, California.”
His brows furrowed. “I thought your dad went to jail. Who’s Papa?”
“I figured you already knew all this. You didn’t investigate me?”
“It was a surveillance job, not a background check.”
The tightness in her chest loosened. He didn’t already know her every secret. “I grew up with two fathers. They couldn’t marry, but they used a surrogate to have me. To avoid confusion, I learned to call one of them Papá and the other Dad.”
“Ah. I’m sorry. About both of them.”
She nodded, not letting her mind go down that dark hallway.
“I’ve never met anyone with two dads before.” Scott didn’t look disturbed by the idea, just curious. Another point in his favor. “That I know of, anyway.”
“Well, it didn’t go over well in Texas, but they tried to protect me from the backlash as much as possible.” She shrugged. “Still, kids can be cruel.”
“Yes,” he said simply, like a man who could relate. “Where’s Four Creeks?”
She waved vaguely toward the parking lot. “Inland, near Yosemite. Mostly farmland. I badly wanted to get out, but there was no money for college, and I didn’t have the grades for a scholarship.”
“Sounds familiar,” he said, something unreadable flickering across his face.
“But then Alan stepped in with the money. He claimed Papá had helped him earn it, and that I deserved a share.”
He frowned. “Generous.”
So now they were making conversation as if they hadn’t been groping each other in the dark mere hours before. As if she couldn’t still feel his lips on her neck, his hand on her breast. A little tremor moved through her.
“What did you major in?” he asked.
“Materials engineering.”
He smiled, his face relaxing into breath-stealing handsomeness. “Seriously?”
Squaring her shoulders, she said, “Yes. Why?”
“I don’t know.” He shrugged. “I guess I just figured computer science or something like that.”
“Uh-uh. I wanted to get as far away from that world as possible. I didn’t want to be anything like Papá.” Dammit. She hadn’t meant to spill that.
Scott nodded his understanding. “My dad was a carpenter. I wanted to be an engineer.” He scoffed. “Those two aren’t as different as I once imagined, really. My sophomore science project was a comparison of the load-bearing capacity of three different types of bridges.” His voice filled with pride. “I used to eat that shit up. I spent months researching and building bridges and consulting with my teacher. She thought I had a good chance of placing in my division.”
Valerie ignored her computer, lapping up every morsel about his youth like a cat with milk. “Did you?”
“I didn’t enter.” Scott’s face remained impassive, but his voice had a hard edge.
“Why not?”
The desperate look of anger and hurt that flashed in his eyes sent a chill down her spine. “My dad destroyed my project.”
“Oh, God.” Her hand flew to her mouth. “I’m so sorry.”
“Yeah, well.” He shrugged and shifted his gaze, returning his attention to their surroundings.
Her heart ached for him, but he had put up his walls again. Forcing herself to focus on the computer, she posted a message.
SPYDRCH1C4: @BLACKBARD Do you like flowers?
Scott’s hand on her shoulder made her jump. “You’re nothing like him,” he said softly. “Your father.”
Tears burned the back of her eyes, catching her by surprise. She thought she’d mastered that urge years ago. “That’s not how the rest of the world sees it.”
Yuck. When had she turned sulky and whiny?
“They will.”
If only she shared his confidence. She knew how easy it was to ruin someone. Even if she and Scott proved their innocence, the stain of everything that happened—the doubts—would be on them forever.
Think positive, mija. She could almost hear her dad’s voice—calling her mija his one concession to his heritage—and the tears pricked again.
All Valerie could do was nod.
Scott removed his hand, leaving behind a warm imprint. “So, Blackbard?”
Grateful for the redirect, she swallowed and took a deep breath. “Yeah. Sort of a play on pirates and poets.”
A young man with brassy blond swimmer’s hair who’d been pushing a mop around the tile floor—rather ineffectively to her eye—moved within several feet of their table. He couldn’t see her screen since she had her back to the wall, but her heart sped up.
“I like the garage on this one,” Scott said without missing a beat. “It’s big enough to fit the motorcycle too.”
She parted her lips and furrowed her brow. “You promised to get rid of the bike.”
His sheepish expression was so on point, she almost forgot they were faking. “Well, yeah, when I thought we wouldn’t have room for it. But if we got that place…” He gestured vaguely toward her computer.
A message popped up on the monitor.
BLACKBARD: @SPYDRCH1C4 Daisies. A dozen white.
“I just worry about you,” she said as the kid with the mop worked slowly away from their table without even looking at them. Dip, wring, splat, swirl, repeat. “You know what happened to my brother.”
Scott hooked an arm around her shoulders and pulled her in close, dropping a kiss on her forehead before she even knew what was happening. “I know. Just think about it, okay?”
Her brain buzzed from the contact even though he’d already released her. Through the fog, she processed her old friend’s response.
Once the mop boy was out of range, she said, “We’re meeting him in the Botanical Building at Balboa Park at noon.”
Scott knew how to be idle. The most important quality of a sniper wasn’t good aim, it was patience. He had a deeper well than most.
Waiting to meet with Valerie’s friend of dubious moral character—as if he were one to judge—gave him time to establish a baseline for the café’s activity, time to take measure of its normal pace and tempo and mood. And keep track of its customers.
As much as he wanted to watch Valerie at work, nothing on her screen made sense to him. He’d rather play bored-boyfriend-reading-a-book than feel like a simpleton watching her navigate through what she called the “dark web.” He’d heard of it. That was about it.
Not to mention, focusing on Valerie lowered his IQ by about thirty points. He was no more immune to her ample tits hugged tightly by a thin gray shirt than the next guy.
Including the forty-something man with receding brown hair browsing the magazine section who couldn’t keep his eyes off her.
Scott ignored the irritating burn in his chest that he had no right to and flipped another page of the Ken Follett novel he’d picked up when they arrived, keeping the man in his peripheral vision. White guy, medium build, trim but soft, black T-shirt, tan shorts, black Nikes with a red swoosh, oversized silver watch, no visible tattoos.
The man caught Scott’s eye and turned away, working his way toward the front of the store, picking up a magazine here and there, flipping through it.
A pretty Asian woman, pushing a red-faced toddler in a small stroller, set down two drinks and pastries on the table next to Valerie and settled her kid in a booster seat.
People came and went, couples of all ages, a group of thirty-something men with little kids, college-aged girls wearing yoga pants and fur-lined boots, old women debating politics and the best places for vacation, young professionals in blazers w
ith laptops and cell phones. Scott catalogued them all.
“How’s it going?” he asked, leaning toward Valerie and inhaling deeply of her light flowery scent. It was different than before, probably from the travel bottle of shampoo she’d used after dying her hair, but still a tantalizing reminder of their lava-hot hands-on time in the back of the van.
“I sent an email with a document attachment to Duncan’s assistant. As soon as she opens the doc, I should have a backdoor into the system.”
His eyebrows rose against his will. “It’s that easy?”
“Not usually, but I have the advantage of knowing Aggressor’s employees and their email addresses. There’s a pattern to them, and I’ve emailed Meseret enough times to have hers memorized. I spoofed the email address from the head of HR, so when she sees the message, she won’t think twice about opening the file.”
“Like a Trojan horse. She welcomes it inside the gates without a clue.”
Valerie smiled and Scott couldn’t look away. “Exactly. It’s even called that.”
For a brief moment, his chest felt lighter. “If she mentions it to this HR guy, won’t they realize something’s up?”
“Yes, but it’s unlikely she’ll say anything. They don’t talk much, and the file is a mind-numbingly dull notification about new language in an obscure employment law.”
“Smart.” He pulled his gaze away from her face for a quick check of the area. “What’s next?”
“I’m going through the information I collected on Duncan before I located Jay.” She blinked rapidly a few times and took a deep breath, but soldiered on. “I spent most of my nights these last two weeks digging up everything I could find on my boss. Some of his info was in a database file that hackers snagged from the Veterans Administration a few years ago, so I have his social, birthdate, and address.”
Scott grimaced. “All my information is probably out there too.”
“Might be.” Valerie nodded, tracing the edge of her computer with one pink-tipped finger. “You get one free credit report a year from each of the reporting companies, so pick a different one every quarter and keep an eye on things.”
Good idea. He hadn’t taken the data theft too seriously until he started working for Steele and learned just how much damage someone with bad intentions could do to a person’s life without ever meeting them face to face.
“Does it bother you?” he asked. “Dealing with those guys?”
She looked up and waited a beat before answering. “Sometimes. On one hand, I am one of ‘those guys.’ Or, I was. I understand them. I get the excitement of solving the puzzle. Hacking is like the intellectual equivalent of drag racing. You know it’s wrong, but the thrill is addictive.
“Not every hacker is trying to hurt individual people, though” she said. “Some want to make a statement, stick it to the big corporations, or damage a government’s reputation—”
“Never mind that innocent people get strafed in the process.”
Her lips compressed. “Kind of like your war.”
“It wasn’t mine.” But she had a point.
“Look, some of these guys are straight-up criminals, some fancy themselves crusaders, others like the challenge. Papá may have started out with some ideals and become addicted to the rush, but he forgot to draw a line. I want to fight guys like him, but if I’m going to help vulnerable companies and government organizations find their security holes so they can plug the leaks, I have to know the tools and tricks.”
“Like working undercover, except online.”
“Yeah, pretty much.”
Scott sighed and held up his hands. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to attack your career choice. I’m hardly one who should be throwing stones.”
He squeezed the back of his neck and scanned the tables and bookshelves nearby. He was a hands-on kind of guy, and while he didn’t have any trouble sitting surveillance, he also liked to know that he added value. In the Marines, there had never been a doubt. He knew how to take down an enemy standing directly in front of him, or one a thousand yards away. But this whole underground battle taking place over transatlantic cables was something he didn’t comprehend and didn’t have a clue how to fight. He was as useful as a fifth leg on a dog watching Valerie bang away at her keyboard.
Their partnership was not equal at all. In the beginning, he’d protected her, saved her. But now, without her, he had no chance at clearing his name. Not even a clue where to start.
Not to mention, she’d brought most of the money to the party.
Any goon with moderate intelligence could provide her security. She didn’t need Scott.
But he needed her.
And he wanted her.
Fuck.
“It’s okay,” she said.
He gave her a blank look, trying to backtrack to what he’d said, because for damn sure she wasn’t reading his mind or her expression would be far different.
“We’re both under a lot of stress.” She toyed absently with her ponytail and took a sip of her frothy iced coffee. “And, to be fair, I was part of the black hat community before.”
Relaxing somewhat, he said, “To be fair, you were a kid.”
She gave him a humorless smile that said she appreciated his efforts but didn’t agree. “I knew the difference between right and wrong.”
“Maybe. But did you feel like you could quit? Would your papá have let you?”
Her face turned pale and she stared at her keyboard, elegant hands at the ready but not moving. “No.” She shook her head. “I know he wouldn’t. My dads used to fight about it, but Papá and I never stopped.”
Setting down his book, Scott placed his palm over one of her small hands and tried to think of something to say.
“It’s our fault Dad died,” she said.
“What do you mean?”
“We pissed off the wrong guy.” A tear slid down her cheek, clamping a vise around Scott’s chest. “He was a carder—a dealer in stolen credit card numbers—that Papá and I had put out of business, and he’d lost everything. His money, his family, his reputation. He broke into our house one night when Papá was gone. Dad and I were eating dinner, and the guy pulled a knife and started screaming at Dad about revenge.” Her breath came faster. “I just stood there and watched, not believing what I was seeing, my feet frozen to the ground as he—” Her face crumpled, and she covered her mouth with shaking fingers. “He stabbed him.”
Fucking hell. Scott didn’t want to make a scene, but he couldn’t sit there and watch her implode. “Hey,” he reached for her.
She slammed the lid on her laptop and jumped to her feet, her chair screeching against the tile floor and drawing several gazes. “I… Excuse me.”
“V…” But he let her go, watching her race past the bakery display and through the doorway at the far side of the café marked RESTROOMS. He’d been trying to make her feel better, to prove a point about her culpability in the crimes she’d committed under her father’s direction, but obviously he’d only added to her distress.
Perfect.
He glanced at his watch. Nine forty-two. He’d give her five minutes.
Picking up his book, he returned to surreptitious people-watching, practicing his observation skills, eavesdropping on conversations. Everyone was so ordinary, going through the motions of daily life while he and Valerie were stuck in some parallel universe where their lives had gone completely off the rails.
Nothing appeared particularly unusual about the man who joined the line at the counter, and Scott didn’t initially understand why the guy had caught his attention. He looked like half a dozen other men who’d passed through the store in the last ninety minutes. Medium height and build, Oakland A’s baseball cap, square-framed glasses, brown hair peeking out from beneath his hat, 5K race tech T in dark gray, blue jeans…
Black Nikes with a red swoosh, and a nice watch.
Chapter Ten
San Diego, CA
Monday, 9:45 a.m.
�
��Valerie?” Scott’s pleasant baritone came from the other side of the stall door. Why was he always following her into the women’s restroom?
“It was my fault,” she said, her flat voice reflecting the bone-deep fatigue that had taken over her mind and body.
“You were a kid.”
“I was fourteen.” She took a deep, shuddering breath. “Old enough.”
Not a single sound gave away his presence, but under the door she could see his muscular calves covered in curly blond hair, white crew socks, and worn Sauconys. “If you had gotten in the way, he might have killed you too.”
Maybe that would have been better. Better than going through life knowing she’d failed the one person who had cared about her. She rubbed her ribs. “He tried. I was a witness after all.”
Scott swore under his breath. “Valerie.” His voice was deep and serious and sad. He let out a long sigh. “I hate to do this now, but we need to go.”
That got her attention. Wallowing in ancient history only put her at risk at a time when she needed to be alert.
She opened the stall door. Scott stood next to the sink with her flowered tote bag over one shoulder and the black duffle over the other. She might have laughed if his expression weren’t so dark and her own emotions weren’t already frayed.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
“I think someone’s watching us.”
The news was like a slap to the face. “How?”
He shook his head. “No idea, but I’ve seen the same guy twice in two different outfits.”
“You’re sure?” Not that she doubted his skills, but it was easy to get paranoid when your picture was on the front page of every newspaper. Below the fold, because a terrorist bombing in Syria had stolen the headlines, but she could hardly celebrate something so horrific.
“Same shoes, same watch,” Scott said, matter of factly. “It’s a common mistake. People change their hair, hats, glasses, shirts, but rarely think about shoes or other accessories. Once that registered, I looked more closely at his face.”
Jeez. “Do you have a photographic memory or something?”
“No, just observation training.” He waved her toward the door as she stepped up to the sink to wash her shaking hands. “Finish up, we need to move. This could be nothing, he could be watching someone else, robbing the place, who knows. But I’m not willing to take a chance.” When she was done, he handed her the flowered bag, adjusted the duffle strap across his body so his hands were free, and said, “Your laptop’s inside.”
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