“Where the fuck is he?” Glitch hissed to Scratch.
“Your guess is as good as mine. Keep an eye out.”
“Where’s Jack?” Glitch whispered.
“Moving, I’d think,” Scratch answered. The sound of flesh hitting flesh and then a grunt filled the server rom. Glitch took a moment to look over at his screen. Not enough time. Jack rolled between two large ports for the server, hand over fist with a man.
“Who are you?” Jack asked, raising a knife into the air. It glinted silver in the light. Shit had gone downhill fast.
“Answer. We wouldn’t want to mess up that pretty face,” Scratch ordered.
“Yeah, not that easy,” the guy said. He twisted under Jack, and lifted his lower body until Jack had to move to brace himself. The man moved and wrapped his legs around Jack’s arm, pulling it with his hands until Jack released the blade. With his other hand, Jack punched him in the sides, repeatedly, until the man pushed away, getting to his feet.
He was bigger than Jack, at about six foot tall, with black hair cut short to his scalp. He wore a black t-shirt and camo pants, much like the three of them wore. Glitch looked at his screen again, three minutes.
“We’ve got guns, asshole, so this shit is for the birds. Back the fuck down,” Scratch ordered.
“Shoot me then, and alert everyone you’re here. What do I care? But I’m getting to that computer,” the man returned.
He moved, even as Scratch was screwing on a silencer. He was fast though, barreling towards Glitch. Glitch waited until the man was close, and then sidestepped, bringing the butt of his gun down hard on the back of his skull.
“Lights out,” Jack said and then whistled. “I hope you didn’t crack his head with that one. And you say I’m the dangerous one.”
“Not good. He’s seen us here and will alert his superiors. What the hell is going on here?” Scratch thundered.
“He’s trained, pretty damn good,” Jack said, walking up to the prone man. “Give no information, deflect, fight. He didn’t come through the doors, so that means he was already here. Not the normal movement for security.”
“If he was in here he waited a long time to see what we were doing. He should have come out first,” Scratch mused, the guy’s leg. “Yeah, he’s out.”
“Idea. Crazy one, but it could work. A hacker would watch. They would want to know what was being done. Watch it and see what could be done.”
“You saying he’s a hacker?” Scratch asked.
“I’m thinking he’s like us. Amsterix is smaller than Hawk, but it’s a subsidiary. Why wouldn’t Eagle have someone working here like we work for him? Why wouldn’t there be others out there? He wouldn’t get rid of us and be left with no one to do his dirty work. That’s the reason he’s coming after us now,” Glitch said.
“We need to get the fuck out of here, and we need to keep him quiet. Glitch, is your program downloaded?” Scratch asked. Glitch looked at his screen and saw, code scrolling over the screen. A quick scan made his stomach clench.
“Yeah, and we got a problem.”
“What’s up?” Jack asked.
“Bastard used my own program, the one I made for Hawk. He tweaked it, but I recognize some of the lines. If this doesn’t give us the proof we need, I don’t know what will.”
“Then we leave him like this. We don’t have a choice. If we kill him it sends off flags. At this point, he can tell his handlers, but if Eagle says anything he tips his hands. As far as he’s concerned it was work, as usual,” Jack said, hefting the hitman into the back of the room.
As one, all men cleared the room. Glitch disconnected from Amsterix servers making sure there were no traces. Scratch brought out cloth and wiped down connections, even though they had made sure to wear gloves. Jack got them cleared from the building and then they were getting into the van, without setting off a single alarm. Glitch cracked open the laptop on the drive and looked over the code. He was right, it was based on the code he’d designed for Hawk Global as a security measure, and made it easier for him to wipe their tracks.
To see that his own program had been altered and used against him made him feel better that he hadn’t messed up. He’d just stepped into a plan he hadn’t been prepared for. But now he was prepared, and he refused to have Eagle keep bending them all over. The fact that Eagle was able to get his code switched also validated the hunch that there was another hacker at Hawk Global as well. It seemed that every avenue they went down did nothing but make them realize just how stuck in the mire they really were.
Eagle had another thing coming to him though. They were going to get out, and he was going to be screwed when they did it.
Chapter 12
They’d worked long enough after Araceli asked how things had gone. All night and most of the next day with very little sleep, except a couple of catnaps here and there to get Eagle’s deadline met. At least they’d completed that job, even if they hadn’t been able to do much else. Still, working for over twenty-four hours straight could make anyone agitated. He figured he’d do something nice for Araceli. Something to tell her how much he appreciated what she was doing for them. And besides, he just wanted a chance to get her close again. He couldn’t forget the taste of her lips or her body writhing under his.
He wanted to feel it again.
“I think they got everything you need,” Glitch called from his bedroom after a quick shower. Araceli hadn’t so much as moved from her perch in the living room. Considering that things probably were becoming more than real for her at that moment weighed on his mind. It wasn’t every day that someone gave up their entire life in one fell swoop.
It helped, he figured, that she felt something for him. He couldn’t put words to exactly what she felt. Hell, he was having enough trouble trying to decipher his own emotions, but he knew, nonetheless, that the bond was there. That they had stalked across some boundary between the time of him realizing who she was in the back of the van and him making a meal of her on his kitchen table.
A meal that he could still delightfully taste on his tongue.
Damn, but she tasted good, he thought to himself and forced himself not to adjust his already hardening cock. Okay, so he was selfish enough to admit that her making the choice to ride this thing out made him happy as hell. Scratch, for all intents and purposes, was the ladies’ man. And Jack? Well, Jack had an aura of danger around him that women just gravitated towards even as he scared them out of their minds. But Araceli was just for him. He was her type, and he was happy that was the case. He couldn’t really see himself without her.
And that scared the shit out of him.
With Eagle planning something on the horizon, he didn’t really want her in danger. It may be just a little too late now to think of that consequence, but it didn’t stop it from being true. Time to switch gears. Maybe something a little lighter would make them both feel better. Take her mind of a major change in her life, and his off the fact that if anything happened to her it would be his fault.
“How about dinner?” he asked out loud. She turned to him with a small smile on her face.
“Don’t tell me that you are going to make me DiGiorno and think that will impress me,” she teased as she stood up.
“No, was thinking more along the line of Bruschetta Chicken with a light Vodka cream sauce and a good pinot noir.” He laughed when he saw her expression. Yeah, Scratch had taught him that lesson well. Show a girl you could cook, clean up after yourself, and clean a plate she was sitting on and you were in the good. Happy to see he’d gotten two of the three good so far.
“Leftovers?” she asked but he ignored her as he pulled out some penne, Vodka, chicken, fresh tomatoes, and other ingredients. Actions spoke louder than words anyway. In no time at all he had the vodka cooking off in the sauce, chicken seasoned and grilling with the pasta cooking to just after al dente.
“I think I’ve died and gone to heaven,” Araceli said as she perched up on a stool in his kitchen and watched hi
m. “Where’d you learn to do this?”
“From Scratch. I never really cared much about cooking. Most of the time I ate out, just to give myself an escape from being in the apartment so much. It at least gave me an outlet into the outside world. But then, crowds started to bother me. I didn’t feel as comfortable in densely populated places, and so started staying in more. Delivery is dangerous for us. I think Scratch got tired of my frozen dinners.”
“So he taught you to cook?”
“It started out as a joke and turned into a hobby of mine. Pretty soon we were swapping recipes. Although, my training was pretty biased as he taught me mostly authentic Italian cuisine. I tend to just put my own spin on them now when I’m bored.”
It felt good having a normal conversation with her. Domestic really. He was finishing up the meal as she got up and set the table without being asked. She searched his fridge for the aforementioned wine and had it popped and poured before he could turn around with the plates. He, at least, beat her to putting the plates on the table and lighting some candles.
“Beautiful,” she whispered.
“Agreed,” he answered, staring at her. She blushed prettily and he thought it was one of the most attractive things he’d ever seen her do. He couldn’t stop a smile from spreading and the warmth in his heart from growing.
“This is amazing,” she said.
“Thank you.”
“But why dense populated areas?” she asked. He stared at her in confusion for a moment.
“You said going out to eat became a problem for you. Why?” Why indeed. But could he tell her? Some of their histories weren't pretty. Would she still see him as the man she’d been searching for? Or would telling her make her look at him differently?
“You can talk to me, Liam. I’ve made the decision to leave my life behind. The least you could do is share a bit of yours.” Her words made his decision for him. Staring into his glass of wine he spoke.
“I don’t know if I will have to watch them die one day, or if I will destroy them,” he answered. “Working for Eagle means that, at any given moment, I could be destroying the company they work for. I could be helping orchestrate a plan to kidnap, torture, and then eliminate one of them with Jack. I could be sharing a meal with someone who is going to die soon. It’s rarely the case, of course, but my mind couldn’t let it go. Most of this area is professional buildings and companies that cater to them. My line of work, in essence, puts me in the position to be hated by them.”
“That’s no way to live, Liam. Even hackers have lives outside of the portal. We survive in tight-knit communities. Hey, what we do isn’t epic unless we have an audience of people smart enough to know what the hell we’ve been doing.”
Lord, if she wasn’t right. Hackers did tend to put their stamp on their work. While they got amazing satisfaction from pulling jobs off, it made them feel even better when other hackers of their ilk knew it must be their work. Some strip of code or the way it was done would tell which black hat the hack belonged to. Glitch had lost that audience, truly, when he’d started working for Eagle. Eagle didn’t give a shit if the work was poetic or raunchy. He just wanted the shit done. And as dirty as their job could get sometimes, Glitch had started to feel much safer in his own corner of the world.
“He really messed you guys up,” Araceli commented.
“How about we save that for later? Right now, I want to enjoy your company and relax a little. The last few days have been a lot more hectic than I think either one of us is used to.” He filled their glasses with the wine she had picked out for dinner, waiting for her to accept hers so that he could clink her glass in a silent toast.
“So other than hacking and kidnapping, what do you do in your free time?” Araceli took a small sip of her wine, causing Glitch to momentarily forget her question when she licked a few drops from her lips. Clearing his throat, he shrugged as he tried his best to appease her.
“What do I like to do when I’m not in hack mode? I don’t know. I guess I don’t really analyze myself the way I do everything else. Let’s see... I’ve gotten into running. I like working out with the guys, but I prefer running and swimming to weights or martial arts. Even though, I will admit that I learned to use t’ai chi to calm my brain when my thoughts try to take over.” He tapped his head for effect, and Araceli giggled.
“I really owe Scratch for any outside hobbies I may have. He’s got so much damn energy that he needs to burn off so he’s always on the move. Staying inside would drive him nuts, and he would drag me out with him. Jack too, but not as much. So now I indoor rock climb about twice a month which I actually really enjoy.” Taking a break from talking about himself, he took the first bite of his dinner. Araceli had been eating while he spoke, and judging by the little moans of pleasure between bites, she was enjoying it. She seemed to also enjoy listening to him talk. The only time she took her eyes off him was to load her fork with another bite.
“So I guess you’re out of that Emo phase,” she said with a mischievous twinkle in her eye. Glitch grimaced at her description of him.
“Emo? You’ve got to be kidding me. I was just into different shit. We both know I’m far from emotional,” he denied hotly.
“See, I call bullshit. I think under that cool exterior, and beyond all that intelligent thought, you have a very big heart. It’s hard to hide,” she argued.
Glitch didn’t know what to make of the direction of their conversation. He wasn’t warm and fuzzy and he hoped that she wasn’t holding onto some hyped-up fantasy version of who she thought he was. Yes, he cared about the people who were important to him, and if they needed him for anything he was there, but he would never be the man that relished in flowers and candies or sweet nothings. Couldn’t be that. He wondered if that’s what she was expecting and the notion began to fill his chest with cold worry. He was a cold man, but when it came to her his passion ran hot. Was it possible to merge the two?
Glitch stared across at Araceli while she continued to recant the memories she had of him when he was her hacking partner in crime. Back when he was known simply as Zero-D00m. Her chocolate brown eyes lighting up with amusement and fondness. By now, dinner was long over and they sat opposite each other taking sips of wine while they talked. The feeling of worry began to grow as she spoke, and his mind began to fill with doubt. Had she mistaken his acceptance of her help as some sort of declaration of love? A sign that they were meant to be? Was he even capable of having a relationship? For the first time in years, he began to consider if he made a mistake.
“Liam?” Her voice called to him with uncertainty.
“Yeah,” he replied vaguely. He was trying to decide if he should explain to her what was on his mind, and searched for the words to do so tactfully.
“What happened? You just sort of checked out on me over there.” Her eyes searched his for answers. She was too perceptive. Glitch new he had to talk to her for she wasn’t the typical woman either. Maybe she would understand.
Raking his hands through his hair, he rose from the table. He paced back and forth while finishing his wine, still trying to find the right words.
“Look Araceli. This entire situation... Everything has happened so suddenly.” He struggled to find the right words until he finally gave up and decided to give it to her straight. “You need to understand some things about me,” he said finally. Her eyes widened slightly at his clipped delivery.
“Ok,” she said warily.
“Zero-D00m? I’m not that guy anymore, and despite whether you want to call bullshit or not, I’m not some repressed lover boy. I’m not ever going to be Mr. Romantic. I don’t know what your expectations are, but I don’t want you to be let down. I’ll always treat you well, and I’ll always give you what you need, but I can’t promise you more than that,” he explained. Not wanting to see the disappointment in her eyes, he turned away and headed over to his couch, settling into the comfortable brown suede.
Araceli remained quiet as she sat at the tabl
e and gulped the rest of her wine. Had he hurt her feelings? He couldn’t be sure, but he wasn’t going to pretend with her. Things were already screwed up, and he didn’t need to add to it with unnecessary relationship drama. This is exactly why he didn’t do serious. All he wanted was a nice dinner, but by the way her eyes glared at him like angry laser beams, he would be lucky if she didn’t really cut his balls off and take them as a souvenir when she left for good. Maybe he should have listened to Scratch.
He was in way over his head.
Chapter 13
Glitch watched Araceli as she carefully set down her glass, wiped her hands on her cloth napkin, and got up from the table. He braced himself for her wrath, more than familiar with her fiery temperament. His eyes remained fixed on hers as he was unable to look away. She approached him slowly, purposefully, and he stood up defensively in case she decided to attack him.
“For the record,” she said sharply. “Did I say that I wanted a Mr. Romantic?”
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