by Debora Geary
Nell held out her palm, small flames frolicking with slanted summer sun and the occasional dust mite. And felt the same wonder as she had as a little girl, watching her magic behave for the first time.
Caro had taught her the beauty of control and discipline. To channel power—and then to unleash it. Nell looked up at the slashes of color on her walls, the gorgeous and fierce art that had been a gift from her trainer of few words and patient hands.
And wondered, as she sometimes did, what she was meant to paint with her life.
Shaking her head, Nell reached for her laptop bag. Way too much philosophy, and she had work to do. Or rather, a ghost to track. She’d downloaded log files from The Hacker’s last game session in Realm. Something about it was tweaking her instincts, that sixth sense smart gamers learned to trust.
Someone was skulking on her turf. She leaned back against a big pillow and swung her feet up on the couch, idly scrolling through the logs. And began, cuddled by the pillows of her sanctuary, to learn about their talented and shadowy invader.
-o0o-
Jamie pushed through the door of his townhouse, takeout pizza in one hand, laptop bag and motorcycle keys in the other. A quick ride down the coast had unclogged his brain—now it was time to get to work.
Realm was a mess. And while he smelled a rat, the lights going off in the middle of a duel that was already being written into Realm history was reading as simple power overload. Whatever Nell had pulled out of her cache, it had blown the system.
There was apparently no fury quite like a scorned and wet fire witch.
And when the lights came back on, The Hacker had vanished. Again. Which had not dampened his sister’s fury any.
Jamie dropped the pizza box on the dining room table. Should be safe—both his brothers were at work. Probably. Devin changed jobs every other week—it was hard to keep up. He dropped a stink-bomb spell over the pizza just in case.
Sliding into the kitchen, he grabbed a beer mug and filled it with milk. It had been a really long, weird day, and he was already a way-over-caffeinated witch.
He’d expected Nell’s temper when her duel had vanished into thin air. But she’d been strangely shaky, too. Enough so that he’d sent Sammy a stealth email. And then gotten to spend the entire afternoon cleaning up Realm by himself while his sister dealt with some concocted cookie emergency.
He sat back down at his laptop with a sigh. Deck-swabbing detail wasn’t nearly done. He detoured into his email first—maybe Govin was available for some fill-in duty. And blinked at the message at the top of his inbox. No freaking way.
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To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Subject: Want some help?
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You have some security issues. I can show you how to deal with those. I’m also a pretty good coder, and Realm’s going some interesting places. Lemme know if you might be interested in some help.
Sincerely,
The Hacker
Jamie read—and snorted. “Are you kidding, guy? My sister would wipe the floor with my nose snot—and then she’d get started on you.”
He switched monitors, pulled up the list of Realm’s minor emergencies, and groaned. When they’d rolled out spellcoding three years ago, it had brought new life to their sleepy online game. Witches had flocked to a world that let them blend real magic and programming code. And when they’d started, it had mostly been limited to blooming flowers or lighting the occasional small fire.
Three years of practice had changed a few things.
He scanned the top of the list. Two minor tornados, a lost fire-breathing dragon, pink water in a deep forest well, and suspicious fires in the southern kingdoms. He shook his head and sent a message to the dragon’s owner. Check the southern kingdoms. Happy travels, and add a locator beacon to your dragon spell next time.
The tornados, he moved to Nell’s list. Creating a tornado wasn’t all that hard. Stopping one was damned tricky, especially in a land full of bricks and boulders. Next time he created an online world, it was going to be made out of welded steel.
Leaning over, he reached for the pizza box—and remembered the stink-bomb spell just in time. Damn. Second time this week he’d almost eaten skunk-flavored dinner. Too much to do, too little time.
They needed programmers, badly, and The Hacker was an excellent coder. One whose ethics might be suspect, but at this point, making a deal with the devil was not out of the question, especially if he was only a minorly shady demon. And a witch, to boot. It would be nice to have minions to send on dragon clean-up.
Jamie re-read the email. Took his life into his own hands. And replied.
Chapter 6
Jamie kept his head low and his mind innocent. He could hear Nell’s footsteps on the stairs, and he didn’t want her catching any of his stray thoughts. With grumpy elder siblings, timing was everything.
He was prepared for fireworks. In the sober light of day, responding to The Hacker’s email was looking a lot less sane—an opinion his sister would likely share in very short order.
Nell clomped into The Dungeon, coffee in one hand, box of cookies in the other.
Jamie sighed. He was really, really going to miss Sammy. The Sullivans needed to find more friends who could cook. He made a mean tomato sauce, but man could not live on sauce alone.
Nell stared suspiciously at the Doritos on her desk. “What do you want?”
He’d pinged the big-sister radar already—damn. Sometimes he could slide things through before her coffee landed. “We need to go to the downtown office.”
Her eyebrows winged up. “Why?”
They only went downtown for one reason—to meet people they wanted to impress. The official offices of Enchanter’s Realm were hip, classy, and full of marketing weenies and accounting types. Pretty much nothing resembling actual work happened there. “I found a new candidate to be our programming lead. He’s coming in for an interview.”
“Really?” Nell looked interested—she was carrying most of the extra load left by Govin’s sudden departure for full-time weather geeking. “What’s he worked on?”
That’s where things got kind of sticky—Jamie had no idea where The Hacker had learned his stuff. “Different places. He’s got coding chops and gaming smarts.” And hot skills fighting from behind bushes, but that probably wasn’t the smartest thing to mention at the moment. He waved at the Doritos. “Eat some breakfast and we’ll go. Meeting’s in ten minutes. I’ll port us over in five.” Teleporting rocked for trips downtown. Sitting in traffic made him feel like one of those sad weenies in a suit.
Nell looked down at her clothes and scowled. “If you’d warned me, I’d have dressed right.”
Uh, oh. Dangerous territory. “You look fine.” She did. A red skirt and a top without noticeable wrinkles. High fashion for The Dungeon—must be laundry day at Nell’s apartment again.
Her scowl hadn’t improved any. “I’m wearing a freaking skirt.”
Nineteen years and he still didn’t understand girls. He did, however, know better than to open his mouth. Boy Sullivans didn’t comment on what Girl Sullivans wore. Family rule, and one of the few that every male Sullivan complied with absolutely.
Nell chomped on a handful of Doritos. “Coders don’t take me seriously if I wear a skirt.”
“Sure they do.” Jamie reached for the chips. Might as well go into the meeting fully tanked. “They just ogle your legs first.”
No response—just a swat with a mental two-by-four, and then the banging of keys as Nell hopped online. “What’s the new guy’s name? I’ll look him up.”
Another one of those little details Jamie couldn’t answer. Maybe a fashion crisis wasn’t a bad idea after all. “What’s that stuff on your shirt?”
His sister looked down. “What stuff?”
“It’s on the back.” Nell craned her head, trying to lo
ok behind her—and then pinned him with the kind of look that told him the caffeine was running strong and the trouble he’d landed in was deep.
Crap. He swallowed, readied a teleporting spell, and bit the bullet. “We’re meeting The Hacker.” There was just enough time to see his sister’s eyes spew nails before the spell activated.
Even by Sullivan standards, it was going to be an interesting morning.
-o0o-
She was going to kill her baby brother dead.
Nell spun around as they landed in the staircase of Realm’s downtown offices—and discovered she was alone. Her smart-ass baby brother had ported himself somewhere else.
Not a problem—there weren’t many places you could port in undetected. Nell headed for the broom closet, preparing a very quiet pants-on-fire spell. It was one of the few that hadn’t lost its impact over the years.
She made it three steps when Lisa, the chic, fiercely organized woman who manned the front desk, blew through the stairwell doors. “Nell! So glad you’re here. Daniel’s in the conference room, waiting to meet the two of you.” She looked around. “Where’s Jamie?”
“I assume he’ll join us any minute.” Nell sent out a furious mental message to make sure it happened, and then turned back to the only person present who’d actually met The Hacker in real life. It was always good to walk into battle prepared. “What’s this Daniel like?” If he was an obnoxious twelve-year-old, she might let him live.
Lisa blinked. “Well, he doesn’t seem like your typical programming type.”
That was interesting. Unless he was twelve. “Why not?”
Their receptionist grinned. “He didn’t stutter when I said hello. And he’s totally hot.”
Nell wondered briefly if the universe had gotten together with her brothers and Sammy and concocted some sort of evil practical joke. Clearly their mystery guy wasn’t twelve—and Lisa was hard to impress. “Anything else?” They’d hired their receptionist for her brains and her excellent intuition. A lot of job candidates never made it past her desk.
“He didn’t dress up for the interview. Seems awfully sure of himself.” Lisa waved at Jamie, who was walking out of the back offices. Reading the interplay between brother and sister, she backed away. “I’ll go get coffee. And sugar. Lots and lots of sugar.”
Lisa was also married to an air witch.
Nell waited until their receptionist was out of range and her brother wasn’t—and then let her fury fly. How could you do something this stupid?
It’s not stupid. Jamie leaned against a wall, all casual nonchalance. His mind wasn’t quite as laid back. He’s obviously got great coding skills and lots of gaming experience. We hire people from our player ranks all the time.
She sent a mental picture of his head about to meet a really big hammer. Not the ones who hack us, lamebrain!
You’d rather leave him running around loose?
Jamie’s mind had snapped into the sharp, slightly pissed-off mode that she’d learned to respect over the last two years. Her brother was a smart businessman—and no pushover. And he had a point. Better the devil you knew.
The minor devil she was related to pushed off the wall. In that case, let’s go meet him and decide if you’re going to let him live.
Nell grinned—sibling understanding ran both ways. She tried to keep her evil cackle under wraps. There were no bushes in the conference room. No place to hide. One lawbreaking witch, about to find out what happened when he messed with her turf.
She headed out of the main reception area for the conference room, pulling power as she went. Time to make an entrance. A really big one.
-o0o-
She was gorgeous.
Daniel picked his jaw up off the floor and tried to rearrange the brain cells that had just been scrambled by one Nell Sullivan.
Warrior-bright eyes, traffic-stopping curves, and thrumming with the kind of energy that had his caveman brain ready to explode. She was pure sex in a red skirt.
It was time to fight. Or run. Preferably with one warrior goddess thrown over his shoulder.
He was pretty sure either would be a really bad idea.
Pulling his brain back online, he ignored the bombshell that was Nell Sullivan and reached out his hand to the guy who must be her brother. “Hey. I’m Daniel Walker.”
Recognition pinged on Jamie’s face. “The Daniel Walker? UC Berkeley’s MVP pitcher four years running? You should have made the bigs. Totally raw deal with the whole Giants trade thing.”
Daniel tried to make room in his brain for baseball. “Could have waited them out. I chose to walk away.” When you were twenty-one and stupid, ego drove way too many decisions.
“Maybe. They were dumb to make you wait.”
Old ground, and not where he wanted to be headed this morning. “Thanks for agreeing to meet with me.”
Flashes of humor tracked through Jamie’s eyes—and something that looked almost like empathy. “You made quite an impression. We figured it was a good idea to have a chat with the guy who made mincemeat of our security protocols.”
A growl suggested his sister didn’t consider herself part of the “we.” Daniel kept ignoring her. No way he could talk code with a brain lost in testosterone haze. “Your security’s pretty tight, but I could make it better.”
“Is that why you hacked your way in?” Any traces of good nature had vanished from Jamie’s eyes. “To make a point about our ‘pretty tight’ security?”
Dammit, it had been a compliment. Realm was better protected than most banks. “Look, I’m good at what I do, okay? There’s only a handful of people out there with the coding skills to do what I did.”
“So you say.”
Tough room. Daniel sighed. “Pitching isn’t my only skill, believe it or not. You’ve done most of the hard work. Realm’s tight, and it won’t take much to make it even better.”
More compliments landing like bricks. He cursed Pedro under his breath and swore never to take career advice from a psychologist again.
“Where’s the vulnerability?” Nell finally joined the conversation, her voice carrying the same flinty steel as her brother.
Daniel felt more of his brain melt. His ability to focus had been the stuff of college-pitching legend. It was a damn good thing she’d never been in the stands. “You have a couple of variable calls that go over the wall. Avatar images, stuff like that.”
“Bullshit.” Jamie leaned in, lead-off batter calling his bluff. “That’s a rookie mistake, leaving images on non-secure servers. We don’t make rookie mistakes.”
Not usually, they didn’t… Daniel prepared to yank on the lion’s mane and hoped the pretty receptionist would hand him back his head on the way out. “Not your main image storage, no. But you have a way for players to upload a personal image stash. Custom avatars. A couple of your players got sloppy.”
If there was a God, they wouldn’t ask who.
For a moment, he thought he’d made it past the lion. Brother and sister exchanged glances, tinges of concern in the looks. They smelled the truth in what he said.
Jamie looked at him, cop face back in place. “Whose stream did you ride in on? We have kids playing the game.”
Daniel’s temper flared. He gritted his teeth and tried to remember that the guy across the table was only nineteen. “I don’t hijack kids.” Adults and dumb bank CFOs were fair game, but kids were a different story. “You had a couple under-eighteen accounts with holes. I patched them.”
Surprise flitted across both Sullivan faces.
Screw them. He wasn’t the scum they thought he was. “Look—do your own homework, okay? You have a vulnerability, I found it. I thought you might want some help with that, but clearly you don’t want my dirty hands all over your pretty game.” He stood up from the table. Enough waste of a morning—this kind of team he didn’t need.
“Wait.” Nell’s eyes held command—and something else he didn’t quite catch. The first carried him almost to the door. Bossy sex
in a red skirt he could live without.
But when you’d spent four years looking hundreds of batters in the eye, you learned to read the stuff under the bravado. He stopped at the door, needing one more look. And cursed the truth his eyes could see. Beneath the spit and fire, Nell Sullivan had layers. Lots of them—and to a hacker, layers were irresistible.
He sighed and leaned back against the door frame. Apparently he wasn’t quite ready to leave.
-o0o-
Common sense warred with Nell’s fury. Realm was her baby, and letting the guy who’d poked holes in her baby walk out the door was just plain stupid.
He’s not slime, sent Jamie quietly. Dial down your mad.
It was already dialed down plenty. And if Daniel Walker couldn’t handle a little temper, he wasn’t the coder they needed.
He handled you walking in the door coated in fire power. Her brother sounded duly impressed. I don’t think he scares easily.
Nell took a good look at the man standing by the door, one eyebrow raised, waiting for whatever she was going to say next. And felt oddly unbalanced.
There were high-stakes moments in gaming—fragments of time where hours of strategy went up in flames or emerged victorious. Sammy swore the same thing happened with cookies. And watching the cool, contained panther that was The Hacker, Nell suddenly wondered if the same thing applied to men.
Or thieves. “You always run from a fight?”
His eyes flared. “No. You always pick fights with people half your size?”
It was a miracle the conference-room table didn’t melt. “You messed with my game.”
“You left a hole.”
Jamie slapped a file folder down on the table. “So. About that job.”
If looks could have killed, her brother would have been dead several times over. And finding herself on the same side of furious as The Hacker tumbled Nell back to unbalanced.
Daniel watched both of them. “You don’t think much of me.”
She didn’t. Her brother was rapidly coming to like the guy. Stupid Y chromosomes.