“You throw quite the punch, Congressman Lassiter.”
“Damn straight.” He winced as she held the ice up to his eye. “Although I will say that getting hit in the face sucks. Like, really sucks.”
She nodded and sipped on her milkshake. “I forgive you,” she said.
His eyebrows popped up. “What?”
“I understand why you trained and I understand why you didn’t tell me about it. My first instinct will always be to protect you, to throw myself in front of you if there’s a risk. So I understand why I might not be the best person to train you.”
He ran his hand along her cheek. “Thank you. And I won’t keep anything from you again. That’s not how we operate.”
She barely had time to put her milk shake in the cup holder before his mouth was on hers. His hand traveled up her ribcage to cup her breast and she gasped at the contact.
It had been too long.
The last ten minutes to her apartment—which was closer than his—were agony. Their hands roamed over clothes while their tongues tangled. She wanted nothing more than to undo his pants and straddle him.
The driver had barely put the car in Park before they had stumbled out of the car and up the walk to her apartment. She felt like a drunk, horny teenager.
Abbie pushed him down on the couch, not wanting to take the time to make it the additional fifteen feet into the bedroom. She undid his belt and ripped open his pants in record time. His hand ran under her skirt, up her leg, and then pulled down her panties. He slipped a finger into her and she moaned, pulses shooting through her. Then his finger found her clit and gently massaged the nub.
She lowered herself onto him. He gripped her hip with one hand and pulled open her blouse with the other, pulling a lace-covered nipple into his mouth.
She ran her tongue along the sensitive spot behind his ear and his body pulsed beneath her. Then she looked into his eyes and began to move, slowly at first, excruciatingly slowly as the tension built in her center. He gripped her hips, urging her to pick up the pace.
She refused, wanting to savor the sensation created by their joined bodies. Biting her lip, she gripped his shoulders as she pushed both of them to the brink and held them there.
“God, I love you,” Jonathan ground out. Hearing those words pushed her over the edge, his name on her lips. He fell with her, his face buried in her neck.
Chapter 31
As soon as Abbie walked into the office, all eyes were on her. She frowned. “What the hell? Don’t you have something better to do?”
Sophie snickered when Abbie walked over to her workstation. “Who would have thought the congressman had it in him?”
“Is that what this is about? Christ, you’d think none of them had ever seen a man throw a punch before.”
Sophie shrugged. “Things have been pretty boring around here. I’m sure they’re now all card-carrying members of Jonathan’s fan club.”
“If that’s the case, they’d better hope I don’t become director. I’ll fire all their asses.”
Sophie laughed. “Are you going to fire me? I’ve been a member for months.”
Abbie’s jaw dropped. “Are you serious?”
Abbie’s phone rang, and Sophie just smirked and walked away.
“Whitmore.”
“You think you’re so damn smart. Cleaver? Are you serious? The man is dumber than a box of rocks.”
Abbie’s hand immediately stilled.
Who the hell was this?
Oh, my God. It was the hacker.
“I don’t know,” Abbie said slowly. “He did hack into several Fortune 500 companies.”
“Please,” the voice scoffed. “You don’t know a damn thing about it.”
Abbie almost let go of the phone. This whole time she’d been searching for a man, when the hacker was a woman. Her stomach dropped.
Have I missed her hiding in plain sight?
She dismissed the thought and listened intently, trying to hear any background noises that might give away the caller’s location.
“What do you want?” Abbie asked.
“Nothing. I don’t want anything from you. You had your chance. But you didn’t think I was good enough. So tell me, do you think I’m good enough now? Check your e-mail, Agent.”
Abbie cursed as the call disconnected. By then Sophie had come back over and was staring at her intently.
“That was him, wasn’t it?” Sophie asked.
Abbie tossed her the phone. “Trace the number,” she said, even though she knew it wouldn’t do them any good. “And it’s not a him. It’s a her.”
Chapter 32
Abbie hated to follow the directions of the hacker, but she took a deep breath and pulled up her e-mail. Sure enough, she had one unread message in her inbox.
It contained an attachment with the personal information for not only all of the Cartwright agents, but all of their family members, too. And she meant all—parents, siblings, aunts, uncles. Hell, there were even a few second cousins on that list.
How long must this list have taken to compile? And more importantly, what was the hacker going to do with it?
Abbie looked around at her fellow agents. Their eyes were on her again, but for a different reason this time. Instead of being filled with teasing, their eyes were filled with trust.
Shit. How could she tell them that she might be responsible for ruining the lives of everyone the agents held dear?
She’d have to deal with that later. Because now, she needed them focused. And it might not be too late to stop it. The hacker hadn’t said what she was doing with the information. This was all a big cat and mouse game to her. She wouldn’t release the information right away. No, she’d want the agents to worry for a while first.
Damn it! Abbie knew the profile—this woman was egotistical, a stereotypical hacker. She needed to be recognized for her work. Abbie should have played upon that earlier. It was dumb luck that the Cleaver thing got caught on camera and was broadcast.
But there was nothing she could do about that now.
Abbie knew this woman. She understood her. A faceless picture was forming in her mind. But who the hell was she? Abbie should be able to figure this out.
Think. She needed to think.
What had the woman said? “You didn’t think I was good enough.”
Who the hell had Abbie ever judged?
Her eyes widened. “Pull all the applications for the last five years,” Abbie told Agent Williams.
“There’s going to be hundreds. Maybe even a thousand.”
“Then do it quickly.”
While she waited, Abbie pulled up her file on Melinda Carew, the woman from the airport. Then she paused. No, she was probably going down the wrong trail. She’d probably still find a connection between Carew and the hacker, but it was going to be obscure.
“I can’t believe it’s a woman,” Sophie said softly.
“You and me both.” Abbie’s lips pressed into a thin line. The hacker had been right about one thing—Abbie had not been smart with this investigation.
“I should have figured it out. Me of all people—”
“Don’t,” Abbie said. “Focus on the problem. Deal with your regrets later.”
Sophie nodded. “I’ll help with the applications.”
Chapter 33
“Okay, ladies.” Abbie paced behind their workstations. “We are looking for someone who applied to the agency. Someone who has an expertise in computers. Someone I interviewed.”
Abbie had only recently stopped interviewing potential candidates. She was the first line, and when she found ones that had potential, she sent them to Director Oliver.
“Give me a batch,” Abbie said, pulling up a chair. She wasn’t above doing the grunt work, especially if it meant finding this bitch sooner. “As soon as you find a potential candidate, send the file to me.”
The quiet thickened as the moments ticked by. The only sounds were the occasional clicks on a mouse. Abbie por
ed over file after file, going through her own load of files as well as ones the agents sent her way. One by one she dismissed them.
She should remember this person, shouldn’t she? Abbie had obviously made a big impression on her.
Her computer pinged and she opened the file Agent McIntyre had just sent over. Rachel Copeland. The name didn’t even ring a bell. Then again, not many of them did.
When she pulled up the picture, though, she remembered.
Rachel was more than qualified for the position. MIT graduate, internships with some of the top tech companies in the country, glowing recommendations. Though she was mild mannered, she had a gleam in her eyes. Abbie couldn’t say why, but something had bothered her about this candidate. On paper, she was perfect. But something seemed…off.
So she’d sent the woman their standard “thanks, but no thanks” e-mail and moved on. Never thought twice about it. Why would she? They hired less than two percent of applicants, so this case was nothing special.
And now Abbie knew, without a doubt, that she’d made the right call. Because if Rachel Copeland had the capacity to wreak havoc using her skills—for purely sinister, selfish reasons—then she had no place at the Cartwright Agency.
The woman had done well for herself. She was the owner of Copeland Technical Solutions, a highly sought-after software consulting firm. The rates she charged were astronomical and people gladly paid them. She really must be good.
Her business was only two blocks from here. Two blocks. That was all that had separated them this whole time.
“This is her,” Abbie said. The agents crowded around her and read over her shoulder.
“How do you know?” Sophie asked.
“Gut feeling,” Abbie said. But damn it, even as she said it, she knew it wasn’t enough. They needed evidence.
“Let me see something.” Sophie nudged Abbie out of the way. Abbie gladly relinquished her seat while Sophie did her tech thing. Except for the tap-tap-tap of Sophie’s fingers on the keyboard, thick silence shrouded the room.
Abbie wanted to scream, but more than that, she wanted to go after this bitch.
“Damn,” Sophie muttered, lost in her own cyber world as usual. “What the hell? I don’t get it.”
“What?” Abbie asked through gritted teeth.
“Hackers sometimes leave calling cards,” Sophie explained. “This source code has a sheep.”
“A sheep?” Abbie was utterly confused. “Like the barnyard animal?”
“Exactly.” Sophie tapped a few keys and a cartoon of a fluffy white animal popped up on the screen. “This—this is part of the code. But I don’t know why the hell it’s there. Now that we’ve identified Copeland, I was hoping to be able to cross—”
“I know why,” Agent Katz interrupted, a bold move for a rookie agent who normally faded into the woodwork. She swallowed and her cheeks turned pink as all eyes focused on her.
Abbie crossed her arms and narrowed her eyes. “Why?”
“In Hebrew, Rachel means ‘ewe.’ Like a female sheep.”
Abbie and Sophie locked eyes. Son of a bitch.
“Find everything you can on her,” Abbie ordered, and the agents sprang back into action. “Give me a reason to get in her business. Business license violation, unpaid taxes, I don’t care what it is. We’re taking this bitch down.”
Chapter 34
She sharpened the blade on the flat stone she’d inherited from her grandfather. As a girl, she’d hated the family camping trips they’d dragged her on. And learning to skin various animals that had gotten caught in their traps hadn’t been her idea of a good time. The first few times she’d puked.
Now, though, she was grateful for the expertise. She literally knew more than one way to skin a cat.
Perhaps calling Agent Whitmore had been stupid. A lapse in judgment. But she would not be compared to that imbecile, Cleaver. She knew him—most hackers knew one another from time spent on the dark web—and he was an idiot. It was dumb luck he’d managed to break into any secure database. And of course he’d gotten caught.
She never had. And never would.
So now she’d have to change her plan slightly—but first she had to punish herself for giving in to her anger. But that was okay.
This new incarnation would be better than the first.
Agent Whitmore deserved everything that was coming to her. Rachel had done everything right—top of her class, superior work experience, outstanding recommendations. All she’d wanted was to be part of—and eventually at the top of—the organization that touted hiring only the best of the best. She belonged there. Because she was the best.
Perfection, perfection, perfection.
It had been drilled into her every day her entire childhood. And she was perfect. But it still hadn’t been enough to please her parents. Or the Cartwright Agency.
Goddamn that Abbie Whitmore.
The first thing Rachel had done after receiving the rejection letter was hack into her file. Unsuitable it said. The director hadn’t even looked at her file. All because of Agent Whitmore. It was all her fault.
She’d like to see Agent Whitmore try to call her unsuitable as her blood leaked out of her body. Rachel closed her eyes as the vision developed in her mind.
Now that was perfection.
She pricked her finger on the knife, satisfied when a small bubble of blood formed. Then she smiled.
Chapter 35
Abbie paced in front of her team, who had the misfortune of delivering the bad news to her—Copeland was clean. For all intents and purposes, she was on the right side of the law. Or least according to everything the agents had managed to dig up in the last two hours.
Abbie had been fooling herself if she thought it would be easy. Copeland was good. They’d been saying it from the beginning. She wasn’t going to pull an Al Capone and go down for something as stupid as tax evasion.
“Okay,” Abbie said. “I want eyes on her business and residence. She’ll slip up eventually. And when she does, we’ll be waiting.”
Abbie’s fingers curled into a fist. Damn. She was so close she could taste it. And the worst part was that she couldn’t even do the surveillance herself. Copeland would recognize her.
Her phone chimed, and she sighed and turned away to check it, letting her team get to work.
It was a notification from her Google calendar. Apparently she had a dinner date with Jonathan in thirty minutes at another one of his beloved hole-in-the-wall restaurants. She didn’t even remember setting this up with him. If she left now, she’d barely make it on time.
Damn. She didn’t have time for this. Now was not a good time to leave the office.
Except what was she doing here? She’d elbowed her way into an assignment that had been created to protect her. She knew she wouldn’t be able to think straight on a case so personal. So for now, she’d be a good agent. She’d back off and let her team work.
So she might as well keep her dinner date, especially since she and Jonathan finally got their relationship back on the right track. She hadn’t told him yet, but she’d scheduled movers. It was a small step really, because she still wanted to reserve the right to back out, but she was glad that she had taken it. She knew she had to tell Jonathan soon.
She shrugged on her jacket and grabbed her purse. “I’m going to meet Jonathan. Notify me as soon as you learn something.”
The restaurant was in DC, so she opted to take the metro in. She’d stop back at the office later to check in and could pick up her car then.
Forty minutes and a loud, BO-filled train ride later, she was only ten minutes late. Considering she’d totally forgotten about the date in the first place, she considered this a win. She’d even pulled out a tube of lipstick and hastily applied it on the two-block walk to the restaurant. How was that for date night?
This place was nearly as hard to find as the Chinese restaurant. The sign wasn’t lit and the front door was battered. She stared at it warily for a moment bef
ore pushing her way through. The food better be as good as the other place.
The door had nearly closed behind her before it registered—this isn’t a restaurant.
She took a step back and put her hands up in a defensive stance, but she was a second too slow. She felt a prick on her neck and her body went limp.
Chapter 36
Jonathan frowned when his call went straight to voice mail for the second time. He’d wanted to surprise Abbie with dinner at the office, but at the last minute thought better of it. Her schedule was so unpredictable. While he didn’t mind making the drive if she would be there, he didn’t want to waste the time if she had left on assignment. So now he stood in front of the deli up the street from his office. The sweet smell of hickory bacon and curly fries tortured him.
Maybe Abbie was on another call or something. Damn, he couldn’t stand here all evening waiting for her to answer. He scrolled through his list of contacts, pleased to find Sophie’s number.
“Walters.”
“Hi, Sophie. It’s Jonathan. Listen, is Abbie around?”
There was a slight pause. “She left almost an hour ago to meet you.”
“Huh. Are you sure? We didn’t have plans.”
“She said she was meeting you. Clear as day.”
Silence stretched between them and a knot formed in Jonathan’s stomach.
“She probably just got mixed up,” Sophie offered.
“You don’t believe that, do you?”
“Not for a second.”
“Track her,” Jonathan said tersely. “And don’t even consider hanging up this phone.”
He paced while he waited, earning suspicious looks from the patrons inside the deli.
“Her phone’s not coming up.”
“What does that mean?”
“The SIM card has been damaged or destroyed. Wait. Let me try something else. I’ll call you back.”
“Don’t you hang—” As he heard the line go dead, he cursed. What he really wanted to do was punch something. Anything. He balled his hands into fists and counted to thirty, which he considered a more than reasonable amount of time, before trying to call Sophie.
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