“My family can’t be held responsible for how Jeff was treated if we didn’t know he was part of us.” Marcus paused. “What do you want?”
“I want you to know how it feels when decisions made have far reaching and long lasting effects.”
Marcus stared at Jeff who sat slumped forward in his chair. “Have I done something to you?”
“To me. To others. To your employees. To your family.”
A set of hands landed on his shoulders and squeezed. He suspected it was Alex because he more than anyone else would understand the responsibility Marcus felt for the people who worked for their company. Marcus continued to sit erect, his head held high with no expression on his face. This person was not going to get a reaction from him if he could help it.
“I am prepared to do for Jeff what I would do for anyone who was in his position.”
“Did you think of anyone else when you’d take on those secret missions? When you’d take out someone you deemed disposable? What about their family? Did you think about them? Did you care what would happen to them after you killed their loved one?”
Marcus’s mind flipped back through the years, memories assailing him. Nothing the man had said had narrowed it down for him. There had been too many missions that he had been sent on and that he had sent others on to know who, in particular, this guy was referencing. Or was it just about all of them? What he wondered, though, was if it wasn’t from personal experience, how did he know?
There was a shuffling noise that came through the speakers of the laptop followed by some muffled conversation which seemed to validate Trent’s thought that someone was helping the man behind the voice.
“Why don’t you think about that, Marcus, and get back to me? Don’t disconnect the laptop or you won’t see Jeff again.”
Before anyone could respond, the screen went black. Marcus glanced over at Trent who had a frustrated look on his face.
“They’re gone. I knew they were tracking us tracking them. I’m not entirely sure how they’ve done it, but they have.”
Anger coursed through Marcus as he got to his feet. He hated being at someone else’s mercy. There was an undercurrent of fear that they wouldn’t get to Jeff in time, but it didn’t seem like the guy was done with him yet, so hopefully they had some time. Hopefully, the guy was slipping up somewhere so they could take advantage of a mistake on his part. Marcus knew his team was better than this guy. They would get him. They had to.
“Trent, are you going to have someone monitoring things here?” Marcus asked as he turned to once again stare at the black screen.
“I will be staying here but also bringing one of the guys from the office to help out.”
Marcus realized that as much as he wanted it to be business as usual for the rest of them, he needed to stay at the house too. When the guy popped back up on the screen of Meredith’s computer, he had to be there to talk to him.
With a nod at the guys still standing around the desk, Marcus pulled the phone from his pocket as he walked to the kitchen. He needed to touch base with Alicia and figure out how they would work if this lasted longer than a day.
Marcus lifted the mug to take his first sip of coffee of the morning but paused when he heard the buzzer go on the security panel. Meredith was seated at the island and also froze at the sound. Marcus wasn’t sure why they were acting that way. Trent was supposed to show up at any time, so it wasn’t like the buzzer going was unexpected.
Nothing had happened overnight. The laptop monitor had stayed black. Trent had finally left around midnight at Marcus’s insistence but had planned to return first thing that morning with a new laptop for Meredith. Since her laptop had been hijacked, she needed something to use. Marcus was hoping that Trent could set it up so that she could use the programs she wanted. He knew that Meredith used the laptop to interact with the world in a way she couldn’t physically.
“It’s Alicia,” Derek said as he joined them in the kitchen. “I’ve opened the gates for her. I’ll go out and meet her to make sure everything is okay.”
Marcus nodded. “Bring her in here afterward.”
He took a sip of his coffee, wondering why his assistant was at his house instead of the office. Even though he hadn’t planned to go in, he’d assumed that she still would.
“Can she stay with me?”
Marcus turned to look at his sister. Her gaze was on her tablet as she sipped a glass of orange juice. “You want her to stay here with you?”
“Yes. I enjoyed her company yesterday. It kept me from worrying.” She glanced over at him. “And she’s good at puzzles.”
Before Marcus could respond, Alicia walked into the kitchen with Derek behind her. She was dressed for the office in the brown suit she often wore, just changing out the blouses she paired with it. Today’s blouse was a deep turquoise that complimented her light auburn hair. She had a concerned and tentative expression on her face.
“Good morning, Alicia.” Marcus set his mug on the counter then leaned his hip against the counter, crossing his arms. “What brings you by?”
“Would you like some coffee, Alicia?” Meredith asked before Alicia could reply.
The woman’s gaze bounced between them. “Uh, sure, I’ll have a cup if it’s not too much trouble.”
“No trouble at all,” Meredith said as she popped up off her stool and moved toward the cupboard where the mugs were.
Alicia looked back to Marcus. “I thought perhaps I should stop by to see if there was anything you needed me to do.”
“Here you go.” Meredith slid the mug of coffee across the counter. “Do you want sugar or cream?”
“Black is fine,” Alicia said with a smile. “Thank you, Meredith.”
“Have a seat,” Marcus said and gestured to the stool on the opposite side of the island to Meredith.
Alicia looked a little uncertain as she sat down and picked up the mug. She took a sip before looking at him again, her brow arched slightly.
“If you could stay here with Meredith for a couple of hours, that would be helpful. Just check email periodically for now. Everyone is basically focused on this situation so not a whole lot is getting done on other projects. Eric got the proposal off, and that was the main thing that needed to be done. Other than that, having you nearby would be good in case I do need something. Maybe have Kelsey forward our office line to your cell phone.”
With a nod, Alicia pulled out her phone and tapped the screen. She took another sip of her coffee, wincing slightly as she swallowed. Marcus wondered if she did, in fact, usually take cream and sugar with her coffee, and if so, why she hadn’t just said so.
“Hey, Kelsey. It’s Alicia. How are you doing?” As she listened to whatever Kelsey was saying, Alicia’s face tightened in concern, her brows drawing together. “I thought things were going well between you two. When was the last time you heard from him?”
It dawned on Marcus then that Kelsey was most likely telling Alicia that she hadn’t heard from her boyfriend—Jeff—in at least a day. Marcus hadn’t told Alicia what they’d discovered on the laptop, so she had no idea what had really happened with Jeff.
“I’m sure he’ll get back to you. It seemed like you guys were getting closer.” Alicia listened again then her gaze darted to Marcus. “Okay. I’ll tell him.”
“Get Jeff’s number from Kelsey,” Marcus said, keeping his voice low.
Alicia nodded. “Uh, Kelsey, can you give me Jeff’s number?” She paused. “Marcus asked for it. Maybe they can figure out if something happened to Jeff. Also, can you forward our office line to my cell phone for me?”
Marcus handed her his phone with a contact screen open so she could input the number. As she was doing that, the gate buzzer went again. Derek left the kitchen to deal with it while Marcus waited for Alicia to get off the phone.
“What did she say?” he demanded as soon as she hung up.
Apparently taking his brusque tone in stride, she handed his phone back to him and said, “
She said she hasn’t heard from Jeff in a couple of days, and also, her laptop is missing. There was a laptop in her laptop bag, but when she pulled it out today, she realized it wasn’t hers. She doesn’t know when the exchange happened because she doesn’t use her laptop every day since she has the desktop at work. The last time she knows for sure that she used it was last week.”
Marcus gave her a nod, and when Trent walked into the kitchen a moment later, he said, “Trent, you’re with me. Give the laptop to Derek, and he can get Meredith set up with it.”
Trent handed over the box he was carrying then followed Marcus from the room. It wasn’t until they reached the office where one of Trent’s tech guys was hunched over Meredith’s old laptop that he said anything.
“What’s up?” Trent asked as he set his bag on the desk. He glanced at the black screen on the laptop. “Did something happen?”
“Not with that, but I have a couple of leads I want you to follow up on. I think that Jeff was supposed to get close to Kelsey to gain access to the company. She noticed today that her laptop is missing. It looks like it was swapped out at some point over the past week.”
Trent immediately turned to his bag and pulled out his laptop. “If they have her laptop, we should be able to trace it. Our laptops are all equipped with GPS chips so we can track them.” He hesitated and looked over at Marcus. “But don’t get your hopes up too much since I’m pretty sure that whoever is helping this guy knows how to disable it. I just hope that they stop at one and don’t realize we double chip them.”
“Also, I have Jeff’s cell phone number. Can you do anything with that?”
Trent’s movements stilled. “I can’t, but I know someone who probably could. It’s just…well, I’d like to say that it would be a gray area, but really, cell phone hacking tends to land squarely in the black area. I trust the guy, though, but I need you to know that it’s not exactly ethical. Something like this we should really turn over to the police.”
Marcus shoved his hands into his pockets and nodded. For the most part, he’d tried to stay firmly in the white area of black and white, but sometimes he’d allowed things to slide into the gray. The black though…he wasn’t too sure about that. And he was pretty certain that Alex would adamantly oppose it.
“What type of information could we get from just having the number?” Marcus asked.
“Possibly the location of the phone. Maybe even be able to track the phone’s previous movements. He might have to hack cell towers to get a dump of their information too.” Trent shrugged. “To be honest, I never really asked him too many questions about it. When I was hacking, I had no interest in cell phones, so I’m not sure what all my friend could do with just the number.”
Marcus contemplated the information while Trent finished unpacking his laptop bag. He wanted to go all out to find the information that would help them locate Jeff and put a stop to the attacks on the company for the last time. Having the opportunity to finally put an end to the situation that had dragged out over the past couple of years made it tempting to step right over the gray area and hire Trent’s hacker buddy.
Why was he even conflicted about this? A man’s life could be in the balance.
Marcus walked over to the window that looked out over the landscaped yard. He’d had a rough time falling asleep the previous night so he’d sat in bed with his tablet and done a little surfing looking for Jeff. He’d found Kelsey’s Facebook page first and then had surfed through her surprisingly insecure page looking for a photo with a tag to Jeff. It ended up being a picture from Lindsay and Than’s wedding. The two of them with their heads pressed together, smiling at the camera.
Jeff Ross.
He wondered if Ross was his last name or a middle name. He knew that some people—like Meredith—used their middle name instead of their last name on social media, and in Jeff’s situation, it would make sense. Unfortunately, most of Jeff’s page was restricted. There were a couple of pictures of him with an older woman and younger one who looked like she was in her early twenties. Marcus had wondered if that was his mother and sister. He hadn’t thought much beyond Jeff being his half-brother. Was that young woman also his half-sister? Had his father had a second family?
He felt a rush of anger toward his father. It wasn’t a new emotion. After all, the man had basically wiped out two families—his and Justin’s. Anger was definitely a justified emotion when he thought of his father and what he’d done. Had he messed up another family as well? Was it possible that this other family had threatened to impact his father’s life with them? For sure if his mother had divorced him over that, his father would have ended up with nothing. The wealth of their family had come from his mom’s profession, not his dad’s. His father had had a lot to lose. But was that enough to motivate him to do what he did?
Marcus didn’t accept that. There must have been a mental issue because he couldn’t accept that someone in their sane mind would believe that killing their family had been the best solution to whatever situation he’d been facing. He wanted to save Jeff just because it was the right thing to do, but he also hoped that Jeff would provide a few more pieces of the puzzle.
Marcus turned from the window and moved back to where Trent had set up his stuff. “Do what you can with the laptop. We’ll leave the phone as a last resort.”
Trent nodded and began to type on his laptop. “We’ll see what we can find.”
Marcus looked at the still dark screen of the laptop. He hated being at the mercy of this person. But that was going to change. He had confidence in his team. They would figure out where the guy was and then his tactical team would move in and deal with it. And then he’d have to figure out how Jeff fit into his life.
8
Alicia had been surprised when Marcus asked her to stay with Meredith once more. After what had happened the previous day, she’d been certain that he wouldn’t let her anywhere near his sister again. But here she was, following Meredith to the sunroom once again, each of them with a cup of coffee in their hands. Bond stuck close to his owner’s side as they walked through the house.
Knowing that she was still responsible for any work-related calls and emails, Alicia had brought the bag with the laptop and her phone with her. She wished she knew what was going on, especially since Marcus had seemed overly interested in Kelsey’s missing boyfriend. She was sure that she wasn’t the only one who was thinking that perhaps the switched-out laptop and missing boyfriend were connected. If that was the case, she felt very sorry for Kelsey. Though she didn’t know the woman well, she could only imagine what it must feel like to realize that perhaps the man she had fallen in love with had been using her.
“Sorry about yesterday,” Meredith murmured as they settled into the same seats they’d used the day before.
“Don’t worry about it. I’m sorry if I upset you.”
“You didn’t. It’s just sometimes my memories get the better of me.” She lifted her mug and took a sip. “Do you think Marcus will still have to stay in the house tonight?”
Alicia paused in her movements to set up her laptop and glanced over at Meredith. “Stay in the house?”
“Yeah. Will he be able to go out this evening?” She twisted a strand of hair around her finger. “He said he couldn’t leave the house when I asked him why he didn’t go to work this morning.”
“Oh.” Alicia resumed setting up the laptop. “Well, I’m not sure if everything will be resolved by then or not.”
Meredith frowned. “I just hoped that since he didn’t go on his business trip that he’d be able to go out with me tonight.”
“Did you need to go somewhere?”
“We usually go dancing on Tuesday nights.” Meredith sighed. “I know he was supposed to be away this week anyway, but I had hoped that since he was home, he’d be able to go with me.”
“Oh right. You mentioned that.” Alicia still couldn’t really picture Marcus dancing. But even so, it shifted her perception of him a little bit more. Th
e idea that he took Meredith dancing each week, even though that likely wasn’t his first choice of how to spend an evening, intrigued her.
Though she found it a little odd that Meredith had seemed to completely forget about the circumstances that had brought Alicia and Marcus to the house the previous day, Alicia decided that she wouldn’t bring up any of that. “Have you been dancing for a long time?”
Meredith nodded. “He started taking me when I was around seventeen. At first, I took lessons, but then when I wanted to do it beyond just lessons, he was willing to learn so he could go with me.”
“You said the waltz was your favorite dance?” Alicia asked as she brought up the email from the office.
“Yes. I like the beauty of it, but performing some of the more intricate Latin dances give me a sense of accomplishment. It took Marcus awhile to get the hang of those dances, but he’s as good as me now.”
Again, Alicia was struck by the lengths to which Marcus would go to indulge his sister. She wasn’t sure that Eric would have taken on something like that for Tori or Brooke. Now he might do it for his daughter, but highly unlikely for his sisters.
“Everything going okay in here?”
Alicia looked over at the entrance to the sunroom and saw Marcus standing there. Without his usual suit, he seemed more approachable. He wore a pair of black dress pants with a light blue button down shirt. His sleeves were rolled up to his elbows, revealing his strong forearms. He leaned against the door frame, arms crossed, watching them.
“We’re fine, Marcus,” Meredith said with a quick glance in his direction. “Are we going dancing tonight?”
Alicia waited to see if Marcus looked embarrassed by his sister’s revelation. Instead, he just looked at her then shook his head. “Not tonight, Meri. I doubt that this situation will be resolved in time. I’m sorry.”
Meredith lifted her mug, a slight smile playing on her lips. “One of these days I’m going to take Derek and make him learn how to dance so when you’re not around, he can go with me.”
A Sense of Security: A Christian Romance (BlackThorpe Security Book 6) Page 10