Midnight Kiss

by Lisa Marie Rice

  There was another way out that intersected with the highway ten miles up. But it was entirely possible that video cameras along the main highway had caught him driving into the trailer park. But if so, they’d also have caught Hope Ellis and whoever was with her.

  He sat in his truck and quickly worked the problem. He had the exact GPS coordinates of three of the closest videocams. They were connected to the Traffic Department of the Municipality of Sacramento. Sacramento had not spent much on cybersecurity, that was for sure. It took him a quarter of an hour working from his phone, and he was in the entire system.

  Hope Ellis and the man had been here the day before, so he ran footage from 9 am onward. The closest videocam on the highway didn’t cover the actual turnoff. He had to deduce it by the turning on of the indicator light. Resnick himself switched on the indicator light at the very last minute, out of habit. He’d trained himself to always consider himself followed and rarely gave much advance notice as to what he was going to do. Some people were like him. Others turned on the lights five minutes before turning.

  There were two hundred twenty cars in the time frame between 9 am and 5 pm. This was going to require a bigger and better monitor than his phone and was going to take time.

  On his way back to the motel room that hadn’t bothered with ID and whose surveillance cameras were switched off, he stopped by a drive-through hamburger place, making sure his cap’s bill hid his face. He drove to the motel, ate his cheeseburger and went to work.

  Four hours later, he had seven cars that were possible. Three had a single passenger. He grabbed the license plates of the four that were left. Three were registered in Sacramento to private citizens and the fourth was a corporate car he couldn’t see into.

  He sat back, thinking. A corporate car. Sounded right. Owned by a company registered in Aruba. Which was owned by two other companies. From experience, Resnick knew that this was a rabbit hole. He wasn’t going to find out anything by chasing down who owned the car on paper. That was irrelevant. He was going to get somewhere by chasing down the car itself.

  It was going to take time. He was going to have to monitor all the traffic cams in Sacramento. Luckily, he had a program that could speed it up but it would still take a long time.

  After five hours, he ordered a steak and fries from a nearby diner and then got back down to work, knowing it would probably take all night.

  Sooner or later he’d find Hope Ellis and the guy. And smoke them. Court Redfield had been very clear on that.

  This was important to Redfield. Resnick knew he’d move way up that greasy pole if he accomplished this mission. Just the thought of being the power behind the throne to the President of the United States gave him goosebumps. The Presidency was such a long long way from the trailer park he’d grown up in.

  Oh yeah, he’d accomplish this mission. Hope Ellis was a dead woman walking.

  How was she expected to reason her way through this with Luke … right there? Right in her face? So very handsome, even with that grim expression. How could he be so good looking yet so very serious? All the good looking men Hope had ever seen had expressions ranging from smiling to sulky but not serious. And they’d been on screens or in glossy magazines, never in meatspace. And certainly never so close to her.

  Really close. She’d spent all night with her nose right up against his skin, with his body close up against her. And a lot of time with him inside her. She knew how he smelled. Some intoxicating blend of soap and testosterone that should be classified as a Schedule 1 drug, certainly addictive for anyone possessing two X chromosomes. Should absolutely be against the law.

  If every male on earth smelled like that, felt like that, no work would get done. Ever. Women would just sit around, smelling and touching their males.

  Not that Luke was her male. He was … she had no idea what he was to her. He hadn’t run screaming after they’d made love, there was that. Any of the times. She hadn’t had men run screaming from her bed, but most of them were more interested in her algorithms than in her. And she hadn’t been all that impressed with her four — no, three lovers. One of them hadn’t really been a lover, not in the technical sense of the term. He’d tried, but his systems had malfunctioned.

  None of them had been even remotely like Luke.

  The others had eventually left, but Luke hadn’t. But then again, at the moment, he was professionally attached at the hip to her. Was he with her just because she was his job?

  “You okay?”

  Hope was jolted out of her thoughts by his low voice, thankful that her face was buried against his shoulder, so he couldn’t see her blush. She was more than okay. It felt like she finally understood sex. Like she’d been eating wax fruit all these years and finally someone had handed her an apple. A real one, juicy and sweet.

  Mmmm.

  She ran his words around her head, trying to focus. Was she okay?

  Why yes, yes she was. She was more than okay.

  “I’m fine,” she said, smiling. There wasn’t much to smile about. A good friend had been murdered because he knew something about her past. Geraldo had died because of something in her past. That past was murky, unknown, and was reaching out with clawed fingers to catch her and drag her down.

  And yet.

  And yet here she was in the arms of the most attractive man she’d ever seen, who’d loved her all night and who was still holding her tightly. She’d come to know his body almost as well as her own. To know the smell of his skin, the way he’d tighten his arms each time she moved. His taste when he kissed her. The way the light caught on the dark blond hairs on his chest and the light hairs along his forearms.

  He was incredibly strong. The muscles she was touching were hard as wood, though warm. She felt like a fairy-tale princess behind magic walls, protected from the dragons outside.

  Luke pulled away and tucked his chin down to look her in the eyes. She met his gaze calmly.

  “You sure?”

  “Yeah.” She said the words on a sigh and rested her cheek against his shoulder.

  It was true. Hope was a planner. To do her job, she needed to keep a lot of data in her head and it all had to be structured. Time was one of the elements she kept in her head and it was omnipresent in all her processing. Her life was one eternal timeline. But right now, it felt like she had stepped outside of time. There was no past and no future, just an eternal now, wrapped in a strong man’s arms.

  Not to mention the fact that those strong arms seemed to have swept away all the thoughts in her head. Though right now she didn’t need thoughts so much as the man himself.

  Wow. That was primitive thinking. One night of really good sex regressed her about ten thousand years, punching her right back into the Stone Age.

  But — how on earth could she have known? Have realized what it meant to be held? Her parents had never hugged her, not that she could recall. Her best friends, Felicity, Riley and Emma, hugged her but she hadn’t seen any of them for two years now. What few boyfriends she’d had weren’t big touchers. One had been so awkward he never touched her until he’d lunged at her suddenly, having worked up the courage to do so entirely inside his own head. He’d essentially humped her through their clothes like a German shepherd humping the couch pillow.

  Not huggers, any of them.

  Oh man, it was so great being held. She didn’t have to do anything. She was draped over Luke bonelessly, touching as much of him with as much of her as possible. They smelled of sex and each other. She could hear his heartbeat against her ear and feel it against her skin. He had one long strong arm around her back, stroking her buttocks and one big hand against the back of her head.

  Hope realized that for the very first time in her life she felt safe. There was someone else between her and the world, this world that was sometimes cruel and always cold and indifferent and had lately been trying to take big bites out of her.

  Luke wasn’t cruel and he wasn’t cold and indifferent. For now, at least. And what
else was there but the now?

  “I’m glad you’re okay.” Luke pressed a kiss to the top of her head and let his own head fall back to the pillow. “I, um, I haven’t had a lot of practice lately. That first time, I didn’t know if I’d remember how to do it right.”

  A laugh exploded out of her.

  “That’s funny?” he asked, voice lazy, ruffling her hair.

  “Yeah, that’s really funny. I think I’ve had a lot less practice than you and with, um, guys whose main relationship is and always will be more with their computers than with real life women.”

  His hand stopped. “That’s so weird.”

  She frowned. “What’s weird?”

  He lifted his head again. “You’re so beautiful and so smart. I can’t imagine any man not wanting to take you to bed.”

  She traced the line of his pecs with a finger. Man, this was a chest. He had this intriguing valley between his pecs, a little scrum of blond hairs softening the skin and arrowing down to … um … oh yeah. “That’s really nice of you to say that, but you don’t need to flatter me.”

  “Whoa.” He blinked, surprised. “I’m not flattering you, Hope. I’m assuming you sometimes look into a mirror. You’re gorgeous. Just … perfect. The only women I’ve seen who are as good looking as you are, are the wives and girlfriends of my teammates at ASI. They all seem to have lucked out in the female department.”

  “Felicity’s very pretty,” Hope agreed.

  “You’re prettier.” She looked up at him in surprise. Luke’s mouth was set, as if stating a law. What he was saying was ridiculous but Hope didn’t want to argue it. And anyway what he was saying was flattering. Untrue, but flattering. No one had ever flattered her looks before. Her mind, yes. Absolutely. Her gaming skills, sure. But looks? Nope.

  But somehow Luke, this amazingly handsome man, seemed taken with her looks. Who was she to look a gift horse in the mouth?

  In the earthquake that was her life, she was taking it moment by moment. Pretty soon they’d have to get out of bed and start working on the mystery of her past, on the puzzle of her parentage. And there wasn’t going to be a happy ending, guaranteed. Sometime in the past, people had abandoned her as a little girl. Just left her. Hope would find out how and maybe who, but not why. There was no why. There was no way that was justifiable.

  So there was pain and sadness in her immediate future. But not right now. Nope. Right now, there was warmth and strength and, judging from the growing column of flesh hardening against her thigh, sex.

  Their eyes met and again, there was this momentous electric connection. She could almost feel her molecules melding with his, it was that profound. He’d been looking at her with a soft gaze but all of a sudden his gaze sharpened, features tightening. Two days ago she wouldn’t have recognized that look. She’d have put it down to him suddenly solving a complex math problem or the soldierly equivalent. Now she was familiar with it.

  It was very specific and it meant that mind-blowing sex was on its way. Coming soon.

  Luke shifted a little and rolled over so that she was under him. Oh yeah. The missionary position. She was all for it, even though apparently some people found it boring. Hope couldn’t even imagine being bored with the missionary position. It was, if anything, even too exciting. Her arms were around his neck, holding him close. She’d tried to put her arms around his shoulders but they were too broad. She ended up holding onto his shoulder in the storm of sex, simply to keep herself grounded. He was very heavy for someone so lean, all this delicious weight bearing down on her, his broad shoulders blocking out the world.

  Her legs opened automatically and he settled between them, so naturally. As if it were his rightful place in the world. And he slid right in, certain of his welcome.

  His face was right above hers now, smiling down into her eyes, a devilish cast to his features All that grimness gone, replaced by heat and desire.

  Oh God, yes.

  She lifted herself slightly and his mouth covered hers. Their mouths met with almost a physical click, perfect. Their mouths were made for this, for this exact kiss.

  Both of them sighed at the same time, then laughed, their bellies meeting.

  And then it all went to hell.

  “I think —” Luke began and his cell rang. The refrain of Wild Thing. At that moment, Hope hated Jimi Hendrix, who’d died twenty years before she’d been born. If she could have, she’d have exhumed him, resuscitated him and then strangled him.

  They looked at each other for a second, two, as the refrain started up again. Luke’s head hung down between his shoulders in defeat.

  “I have to get that,” he said apologetically. “It’s the ring tone for ASI. Maybe they have news.”

  “Yeah.” Hope looked to the side so he wouldn’t see the disappointment in her eyes. They were on borrowed time. Maybe there wouldn’t ever be a chance to make love again.

  Her entire body protested when he slid out of her. When Luke lifted himself away, she felt cold, as if a blanket of ice had descended. She unfurled her hands, a moment ago full of warm hard male, now clutching the covers instead of Luke.

  She reached down and pulled on the sweater and jeans next to the bed, plucking them from the floor where they fell the night before.

  He rolled over and grabbed the cell on the night stand, right next to his gun. She’d noticed that he’d never been far from that gun. Like she was never far from her laptop.

  He pulled on his tee and jeans, really fast.

  Luke glanced at the screen and his face tightened, that grim look back.

  “Felicity, talk to me.”

  Hope startled, sat up to look over his shoulder. Felicity’s pretty face filled the screen. She was in an office.

  “I didn’t dare call Hope’s cell so I called you. Can you pass me to her?”

  “Sure.” Luke turned and passed her his cell. “Put it on speakerphone.”

  She did, keeping it so they could both watch the monitor. She kept the video function off, though probably up in Portland it would be clear that they were really close to each other. It was still fairly early in the morning. They weren’t dummies at ASI.

  Felicity didn’t make any suggestive comments at all. She looked pale and worried. “Honey? Our system is under attack.”

  Hope frowned, turned the video function on. “Another DoS?” Troubling but not devastating.

  Felicity shook her head. “Multi-vector volumetric DDoS.”

  A Distributed Denial of Service. Now, that was serious. “Against ASI? Your company? Why?”

  Felicity’s mouth turned down. “We — I — suspect it has to do with you.”

  Hope met Luke’s grim gaze. Turned back to the screen. “Me?”

  “Yeah. Under the DDoS, someone is probing our activities over the past three days. And —” She hesitated which was totally unlike Felicity.

  “Yeah?”

  “There was a search for your name. Specifically. It’s an attack aimed at crashing our system while finding out information about you in stealth mode. It was hard to catch.”

  “How —” Hope’s mouth was dry. “How could they possibly know?”

  She felt a tremor begin deep in her body, coming from the very core of her, her insides freezing. All that warmth from last night dissipating like a spaceship leaking heat in deep space. Inside her was a dark and airless space and she recognized it as something she’d lived with all her life. The past two days were an exception.

  Felicity shook her head. “Somehow they — whoever they are — found out about our friendship. Emma and Riley have been hacked, too. Or attempts have been made. Emma’s bank and Riley’s company are undergoing a DDoS, too.”

  “Jesus,” Hope breathed. This was — this was almost worse than Kyle being killed. She’d been fond of Kyle. But she loved Felicity and Emma and Riley. If anything happened to them because of her …

  She jumped as something warm and heavy fell across her shoulders. Luke’s arm.

  She glanced u
p at him, at that grim unsmiling mouth. He looked pissed.

  “Goddamn,” he said, a muscle twitching in his cheek. “Is there any way to find out the origin?”

  “No.” Felicity’s voice was sad. “It’s coming from various sources —”

  Hope straightened. “Actually,” she said, “there might be a way. I developed a program that searches for underlying constants in data streams. A DDoS usually ramps up. When did it start?”

  “Two hours ago. We were all asleep. I was in bed. I set up an alert system to ping me and it did at 7:07 this morning.”

  “I’m so sorry, Felicity. Just when you need your rest. This is all my fault.”

  Felicity waved her hand. “It’s not,” she said fiercely. “It’s not your fault.”

  “Damn right,” Luke growled. “It’s this fucker’s fault, not yours.”

  Hope drew in a deep breath, held it, let it out in a long slow stream, just like she’d been taught in the yoga course she took many years ago while working at the NSA. The course hadn’t lasted. Yoga had proved a flimsy defense against the massive stress of her job.

  “Okay. Felicity, can you send me your records of the first five minutes of the attack? Was it recorded?”

  “Of course. Good thinking. The first five minutes would be before the botnet was fully formed.”

  “Yeah. I have a program that does a data dive for constants. The bots will be shifting but there will be constants in the command and control structure. I designed it as a tool to find stuff in massive streams of data, with a low signal-to-noise ratio. But it will work here, too. Let’s see if we can also trace it back to its origin. I’m sending it to you now.”

  “Right now they’re masking,” Felicity warned. “Bouncing around the world.”

  “Of course they are. But I think if we let the program work, give it some time, it can trace the origins, too.”

  “So this is another of your programs, Ms. Ellis?” A new voice. Basso profundo, almost too deep for her speakers. A man appeared. Very ugly, with a crooked welt of a scar on his jaw. Hope knew who he was. Felicity had given her a run down of the bosses of ASI. Douglas Kowalski. Some called him ‘the Senior’ because of his former rank in the Navy. Hope had no idea how ‘senior’ could be a rank, but still. Ugly and ferocious-looking, he was one of the good guys.