by Gage Grayson
I move towards her, looking her in the eyes. “But I’m afraid this isn’t the right environment for you,” I say, my voice clipped and my expression cold as ice. “You may keep the prize, but please be out of the building in the next hour—”
“What? But you said—”
“I did,” I agree. “You’re not fired for ignoring an important email or lounging at a long lunch. No. This is an ‘at-will’ company―and it’s my will that you leave.” A beat.
“Now,” I say, my voice soft.
We stare at each other until she lowers her eyes and pushes past those sitting in the row.
“Thanks for nothing,” she says, throwing her middle finger in the air. She pauses halfway up the aisle before turning around to look at me.
“Do you know what I do?” she asks.
“No one here is irreplaceable,” I say, moving towards her.
“I’m one of your computer security monkeys,” she says. “I’m the one who’s keeping the masses of hackers and viruses and whatever the fuck at bay. Me and my very overworked staff―several of whom didn’t make it to this bullshit meeting because they’re back at their desks trying to manage the latest disaster.”
She has my attention. I clench my jaw.
“Oh,” she says, “did none of your terrified henchmen tell you? Well, let me get you up to speed. If you look at your phone, you’ll see a slew of terrified emails and calls asking about what’s happening to your bank’s reserves. You’re not a popular man, Marcus. You’re the enemy.”
By now security is in the room, racing towards the woman calmly telling me my company is under attack. The two men grab her, gripping one arm each. They pull her from me.
“They’re going to take everything,” she says, shaking her head. “And they fucking should.”
When the door closes behind her, I take my phone from my pocket and see that she’s right. There is a flood of panicked emails. I see my staff look down at their phones and get up, racing out of the room and back to their desks.
I leave from the back, heading up to my 42nd floor office from the private elevator reserved only for my use. Inside the elevator, I stare at my phone.
There’s a missed call from a D.C. number. Another from a N.Y.C number.
The elevator door slides open to my office, and from my cell phone, I call Jeremy, who should be sitting and sweating in front of my door.
I keep my voice low. “Get in here. Don’t look panicked.”
I turn around, staring out the floor-to-ceiling glass that looks over the Hudson. I hear Jeremy come in, and I wheel around to look at him. I’m so angry, I’m fucking shaking.
“What the actual fuck is going on?”
“They’ve been calling,” he says, looking very panicked now that he’s out of the public eye. “Tim was trying to head them off.”
“Who’s been calling?” I’m speaking low, forcing myself not to run towards him and rip his head off with my bare hands. “Why didn’t I hear about this, whatever the fuck this is, earlier?”
“It happened—we realized it—just before the meeting. We—Tim, all those IT guys—they didn’t know what was happening and—”
The phone rings outside the door on Jeremy’s desk. He jumps, looking like he’s about to wet himself.
“Get that,” I hiss. He nearly sprints out the door. Then sticks his head back in. “It’s the Feds,” he says. “Tim called them, but they want to talk with you.”
“I’ll take it in here,” I say. Moving behind my desk, I exhale, force a smile, and pick up the phone.
“This is Marcus Hall. What the hell is happening to my company?”
“Hello, Mr. Hall. This is Agent Horner. I’m with the cyber terrorism unit with the FBI.”
I wait.
“We spoke to Tim Nelson, your chief technology officer, earlier today. Here’s what we’ve been able to figure out: your company was the target of a vigilante hacking group, Project Tomorrow. They’ve drained your bank’s cash on-hand and destroyed your security measures. The equivalent of breaking in, stealing everything, then dousing the building with gasoline and throwing a grenade instead of a match.”
“That sounds bad,” I say carefully.
“It’s not good,” Horner replies. “My partner and I are on our way to you as we speak.”
“I’ll have my assistant meet you downstairs.”
After we hang up the phone, I look out the windows again. I can hear people shouting for each other in the outer offices. I can hear phones ringing. My phone is ringing.
I need to tell Jeremy to meet the Feds downstairs. I need to figure out what’s happening around me. An hour earlier, I could have bent the world to my will and now, well, now I’m listening to the sounds of my company disintegrating around me.
Jeremy opens the door, but I don’t turn around.
“Marcus?” he asks.
“Here’s what I know,” I tell him. “There was a group of people who did this to us. Find me the best investigators in the city. Get them over here.”
I decide, in that moment, that I will destroy whoever did this to me―or I’ll kill myself trying.
The lead investigator, Nancy Blackburn, has a mousey brown bob. She looks like a soccer mom, not an elite cybercrimes investigator, but nothing about today is going as expected, anyway.
“Here’s what we know,” Nancy says. It’s nearly daylight, but she looks neither tired nor wired. She keeps talking. “There’s a group, and they’re decentralized and very effective at covering their tracks. But they made a mistake. One of them lingered long enough that we were able to track to her.”
“Her?” I ask.
“Her. Katy Pearson. And,” she says, “How’s this for luck?”
She smiles. Pleased like a fox who’s found the hole in the fence blocking him from the chicken coop.
Nancy taps on the keyboard. “It seems our Katy got herself into a bit of trouble last night.” She looks at me and smirks. “Guess who’s drying out in a drunk tank in Brooklyn?”
I look at her and start laughing.
Chapter 3
Katy
I wake to the sound of my stomach growling for food.
Starving. I’m starving. Again.
I open my blurry eyes and look around the place and groan when I remember: I got arrested.
Fuck.
Not that this is new. This isn’t the first time this kind of thing has happened. Luckily for me, I’m adept at getting out of…sticky situations.
I look around and realize I’m alone in here. Thank God for that. I don’t need some lesbian trying to hook up for the night or for however long I’ll be in here.
I do, however, see a young policeman lounging around. I decide to take a crack at him.
“Psst, hey, man,” I whisper and he looks at me. “What do you say you get me out of here, and I pay you a special favor?”
I have no intention of favoring him in any way, but he doesn’t need to know that. He looks me up and down, taking in my tight body, pert breasts, and beautiful eyes and hair.
I can tell he’s interested, but maybe this moron of a cop is more interested in keeping his job.
“You’re not getting out of there unless you make bail. I suggest you be quiet,” he says to me.
Rude. I just got intoxicated. It’s not like I’m a criminal or anything―at least not as far as he’s concerned. These cops don’t know about my secret hacking life.
No one does.
I guess he’s gonna play the hard way.
“Come on man, I’m not even drunk anymore. Can’t you tell?”
I start walking a straight line in my cell to prove it. Or try to, anyway. I stagger and sway.
Of course I’m still drunk. I just hope he can’t see that.
I tease him a little bit, but it’s starting to dawn on me that I need to get out of here, and quick. I’m not feeling so good. I have one of the worst hangovers in the history of humankind.
“Oh, yeah?” he says.
“You’re walking that line really well.”
He’s being sarcastic, and I can tell that he knows I’m not sober yet.
“Can’t you just cut me a break? My stomach is growling something fierce. I need food, and I need to rest,” I say, taking a final shot at him.
“No can do,” he says.
Unfortunately for him, I’m gonna have to escape under his watch. He’ll probably get fired for being a lazy guard when he could’ve just let me out early and avoided all the conflict. He obviously doesn’t know who he’s messing with.
I always get what I want. It’s part of who I am. I’m stealthy, and I’m good at virtually everything I do―cracking codes, lying my way out…
And getting away with it.
I take a seat on the cold, steel bench and think about my options. Jail is not one of them. I don’t intend on staying here for long.
I don’t have any friends, and I don’t have any family. The only people I commune with are my hacking community, and that’s online. I don’t have a computer to contact any of them.
But like I said, I’ve been in this situation before, and I’ve gotten out just fine. I’ve even hacked into the system and wiped my record clean. No one knows a damn thing about me being in jail before. It’s part of my finely-honed skills.
My head is dizzy, and my body aches. Drinking too much will fucking do that to you. I just wish I was at my favorite diner and not locked up in this hell hole.
Before I have long to commiserate and to determine my next course of action, the policeman approaches the bars.
“Listen, girl, someone is looking for you.”
I freeze. I can’t think of anyone with a good reason to visit me in jail, or anyone that would care that I’m here. That means it must be bad.
Well, whoever he is, he’s here. There’s no escape, not right now.
He walks up to the bars of my cell, and when I look up to meet his eyes, I realize he’s the most gorgeous man I’ve ever seen.
Who the hell is this guy?
He’s standing on the other side of the bars, and I’m already intrigued. Not that he has to know. I have a thing for sexy guys like this one. Not that he has to know that, either.
“Hi,” he says in a sulky, silken voice. Fuck me. “My name is Marcus Layman, and I’m your ticket to freedom.”
For a moment, I’m in a daze just looking into his handsome face. And then I raise an eyebrow at him.
“Hi,” I say carefully. “And how might I help you?”
He stares at me with stern eyes, and I imagine he’s wondering how I can be so arrogant when I’m the one behind bars. Guy doesn’t know who he’s dealing with.
“I’m personnel sent by a non-government organization. I want to help you because I think that what you do as an activist is the same as what we stand for.”
“Is that so?” I say, taking in the fact that he just said activist.
So this guy has seen my page. It’s a front, of course. Technically, I am an activist of sorts since I steal from the rich and give to the poor, but I doubt that’s the kind of thing his NGO is into.
Nope, he and his little org probably fell for the environmentalist thing. They all do.
“Go on,” I say.
“We’re willing to bail you out once I make sure that you’re…trustworthy. We need more people like you out on the streets, fighting for what’s right.”
He’s got some balls, this one. No one talks to me like that. He wants to make sure I’m trustworthy? I need to make sure he’s trustworthy.
I grab the bars with my hands and lean in close so that I can talk to him without that lazy policeman listening.
Marcus leans in as well. He’s so close that I can smell the musk of his cologne. Know what makes me wetter than handsome hunks?
Handsome hunks who smell fucking good.
“So…you guys want to help me?”
“We think you could be really valuable to us,” he says, his gray eyes revealing nothing of the truth.
I don’t know who this guy really is, why he’s here, and why he’s taken an interest in me. Who does he really work for? Is he telling the truth?
These are questions I’m not sure I’m willing to stick around to get to the bottom of. You see, I have my own life to lead.
“Is that right?” I say. “Well, I am valuable. So I’m glad you see that about me.”
I decide it’s time to have a little fun with this one. He’s too hot not to.
This guy Marcus is probably used to having his way all the time. He’s probably used to having women fall at his feet left and right. It comes with the territory of being so handsome.
But I’m just not like that. I plan on showing him a little lesson on how things really stand.
“But the thing is…” I say breathily, “I’m just not interested.”
I start to squeeze and caress my breasts in front of him. “I don’t want to be associated with your organization, Marcus. But I might be interested in…something else.”
What I say and what I’m doing seems to light a fire within him. I see his gray eyes start to dance.
He watches me squeeze my tits over the starchy jail uniform. I pull the shirt up to reveal my taut stomach, and I pull his hand through the bars so he can feel my smooth skin.
He’s staring at me with smoky eyes. His breath is ragged.
I can tell he wants me.
And I want him, too.
I pull my pants down from the side to reveal my thong, and Marcus’s eyes go even darker.
I slide my hand inside my pants and start to stroke myself, all while keeping a steady gaze on him.
I imagine it’s him down there, eating me out. I imagine it’s him in here with me and he fucks me against the steel bench.
I imagine his cock is fucking huge, and I imagine I take it all down my throat. I imagine a lot of things about Marcus. That’s how goddamn gorgeous he is.
Rarely does any man catch my attention like this. I wouldn’t say I’m jaded, but I’m definitely guarded. I don’t let anybody into my life.
He’s leaning in so close between the bars that I could kiss him if I wanted to. I pull my lips up close to his, but we don’t quite touch. I moan gently enough so that the guard doesn’t hear as I twirl my fingers around my clit.
It feels so good and being this close to Marcus makes it happen all too quickly: I come so hard that I’m shaking, juice dripping down my thighs.
I glance behind Marcus and notice that the policeman has left. Grinning, I take my shaking fingers out of my pants and rub my essence all over my lips. “Now let me wrap these around your cock.”
I feel through the bars that he’s hard for me. And yes, his cock matches the stature. It’s fucking huge, just as I suspected.
He grunts in lieu of an answer.
Can’t admit how much he wants me, huh? I think, smirking inwardly.
In any case, I’ve got him right where I want him. It’s a scene like no other, and I can tell I Marcus really has the hots for me.
He shuts his eyes as he pulls out his cock so that I can suck it.
Poor Marcus, that the policeman on duty was so brilliantly lazy, he left a guest in the presence of a prisoner alone. I mean, who does that?
And more importantly, who leaves bobby pins in a prisoner’s hair?
Picking the lock with no one noticing was easy enough.
Stealing Marcus’ wallet while he was distracted? Not so much.
But maybe by the time I’ve slipped past the guards, he’ll have realized his pockets are empty. Quite unlike the way I’m leaving his balls.
Chapter 4
Marcus
What the fuck?
There I was, expecting warm lips wrapped around my throbbing cock from between the bars of a jail cell, but when I open my eyes...she’s just vanished. Like fucking Houdini.
And I’m left standing by the bars with my cock out, on full display, looking like a goddamn idiot.
Her little display be
hind bars was all an act to get out of here. And I fell for it. You know why?
Because this girl is fucking hot.
She’s long and lean and has pouty lips like you wouldn’t believe. I find myself imagining them around my cock even now.
I don’t normally want a woman like this. Maybe she’s gotten under my skin so quickly because she’s presented a challenge―and I fucking love a challenge.
Well, she may have tried to humiliate me, but little does she know that she can’t get away with little antics like that. I’ll make her pay.
I have to breathe and calm myself down enough so I don’t walk out of here rocking a hard-on. Once that’s accomplished, I finally approach the policeman.
“Where the hell did she go?” I demand.
This is ultimately his fault. What kind of guard lets his criminal escape? How did she even do it?
Lucky her, I came along to be the pawn in her little game. I wonder what she would’ve done if I hadn’t come along?
I realize now that she’s not just some typical hacker, like I was led to believe. No, she’s good. And that makes it even more of a challenge.
Katy doesn’t know what she just started―a fire in me that won’t be extinguished until I have her handcuffed to my bed.
“She’s gone?” the officer says with exasperation.
“Yes, you didn’t even notice? Some guard you are,” I growl as I storm out of the building.
I’ll leave them to look for her their way. My way is much more efficient.
I have a line of private investigators ready to work on this case. I’m gonna make sure they find her no matter what. She may have escaped jail, but she’ll never escape me.
My original agenda may have been to find out for myself what her plans were for my bank, but it’s not just about that anymore. Now, I also want to make her pay for leaving me exposed at the police station.
I storm out of the place and into my Mercedes. I immediately make a call to my main man.
“Hey, Mark, yeah, I have a job for you. There’s this girl named Katy. She’s a hacker. And I need you to find her. Get all your men on it.”