by Tiffany Snow
The next thing I knew, I was being jostled and lifted. I struggled to open my eyes, realizing too late that I was no longer on the couch and that Clark was carrying me.
“Wait, what—” I mumbled, but he cut me off.
“Shh. Almost there.”
Taking me through the foyer and kitchen, I found myself being laid onto a bed that smelled faintly of Clark’s cologne.
“Stay here,” he commanded. He left before I could say anything.
I sat up and hugged my knees to my chest. I was freezing, my whole body shaking. Shock and trauma were catching up to me, the logical part of my mind was analyzing my physical and mental health. I was also trying to figure out how and why Clark had been able and willing to help so fortuitously tonight, and none of the answers I came up with were good.
Freyda was dead. Terry was dead. Tom was dead. Who would be next? Me?
Clark was back, carrying a small medical kit and a glass with some amber fluid in it. He handed it to me and I could smell it was alcohol of some sort. I didn’t have to be told what to do. Tipping back the glass, I emptied half of it in one swallow. The liquid burned going down, but I was prepared this time.
Grabbing a blanket, Clark wrapped it around me. “You’re in shock,” he said, as if I didn’t already know. Sitting on the bed next to me, he tore open several antiseptic wipes from the med kit. “This is going to sting a little.”
He began cleaning the cut at my temple and I winced. He was quick and thorough, cleaning the blood off my face as well, then applying a bandage to the wound.
“It’s not deep enough for stitches,” he said. “Head wounds just bleed like crazy.” He set aside the kit and tugged the blanket closer around me. “Feeling any better?”
I rubbed my eyes. “What did you do with Freyda?”
“I have friends,” he said simply. “They’ll find Freyda’s body, just not in your car.”
“How can you possibly have friends like that?” I blurted. “Are you in the mob or something?” He said nothing, which only made the dread inside me grow. “Who are you?” I asked. I might be naive, but I was far from an idiot, and if Clark was really in HR, then I was Kim Kardashian.
“What are you talking about?” he asked. He even had the nerve to look confused. “You know who I am.”
“Sure I do.” I looked at him and waited. It took a moment, then the fake innocence vanished from his face.
“Fine,” he said, his voice flat. “It’ll be easier like this anyway.”
My eyebrows flew up. “Excuse me?”
“I know about the software Wyndemere is writing. Vigilance.”
He couldn’t have shocked me more if he’d recited the periodic table of elements. In order. I’d placed bets inside my head on the mob theory. “H-how do you know that name?” I asked.
“I make it my business to know about everything Jackson Cooper touches. And that includes contracts he takes with shady companies like Wyndemere.”
“Wyndemere isn’t shady,” I protested.
“You’re going to tell me that three people dead on the same project isn’t the least bit suspicious?”
He had a point there. “So why are you telling me this?”
“The timeline is moving too fast to go with Plan A,” he said. “So I’m improvising Plan B.”
“And Plan A was . . . what? Me?” I wasn’t imagining the sick feeling in my stomach. “Gain my trust, sleep with me, then pry secrets from me via pillow talk? Only I’m a virgin, so . . . eww?”
He didn’t even flinch, his blue gaze steady as he replied. “I’m sorry, China. You’re a nice girl, but I don’t think you really comprehend the danger you’re in.”
In a way, I wasn’t surprised. It explained a lot. The sudden, unswerving interest in me from an incredibly gorgeous Superman lookalike for one thing. Tonight’s events, for another.
I cleared the unexpected—and unwanted—lump in my throat. “I see.” I’d had many years to perfect my poker face to show that names, insults, and stares didn’t bother me, and I donned it now. “And I’m just supposed to take your word for it that you’re the ‘good guy’?” I made quotey fingers with one hand while the other kept tight hold of my blanket.
“I just arranged to dispose of a dead body for you,” he said. “And I didn’t have to tell any of this to you. I chose to.”
Okay. I guess on a sliding scale of niceties, with buying me flowers on one side, getting rid of a dead body was pretty much as far as you could go on the other. But something still bothered me and I decided to face it head-on.
“But . . . it was all an act?” I asked. “The dates, the wanting to start over, pretending to find me oh-so-interesting and irresistible?” Bitter, party of one.
Something flickered in his eyes and he glanced away. Standing, he took the empty glass from me. “Sorry, China. Business and pleasure don’t really mix.” He walked out of the room.
My devastation plunged a knife into my gut, so painful it robbed me of breath for a moment. The pain echoed through me in waves. I closed my eyes and sucked in a deep breath. This was why I was so careful and didn’t let people close. The hurt and rejection wasn’t worth it. Computers didn’t talk back and they didn’t reject me.
Staying another moment in Clark’s bed—if that was even his real name—was out of the question. I got to my feet and redid my ponytail, using my fingers to comb through my hair until it was smooth. It soothed me, made me feel closer to the normal China. When I finished, I was heading out of the room just as Clark was coming back, refilled glass in hand.
“Going with Plan C? Get me drunk and drug me to make me talk?” Flirting might be hard for me but I could do bitchy just fine.
“I thought you might still be in shock,” he retorted, then tossed back the drink himself. He swallowed and our gazes locked. His jaw was tight and his expression unreadable. I looked away first.
“I just want to go home.” I pushed past him, intent on getting out as quickly as possible. My dignity was barely intact, but I held my head up.
His hand locked around my arm, bringing me up short. “Not so fast. We need to talk.”
I yanked my arm away from him, then feared I’d left some skin behind. “You treat me like that and expect me to meekly sit down and listen to you? I don’t think so.” Turning on my heel, I walked as fast as I could toward the front door without actually running. I’d just yanked open the door when Clark’s hand slammed it shut.
“I don’t want to make you stay,” he said in my ear. “But if you don’t cooperate, I will.”
Well, that left me little choice, now, didn’t it.
“Fine.” My body was stiff with tension and more fear than I cared to admit.
Clark eased away from me, his hand still firmly on the door panel. I didn’t look at him as I sat in one of the chairs. “Now what? Threatening me seems contrary to getting me to cooperate.”
He lowered himself into the chair opposite me. “You’d be surprised. Now we discuss Vigilance and Jackson Cooper.”
“I signed a nondisclosure,” I said. “I can’t just start rambling on about customers’ business or my boss.”
“You’d rather be the next target?”
“I probably already am, so what does it matter? I write software, that’s all.” I swallowed as my palms grew sweaty. “And you haven’t told me who you’re working for or why you’re obsessed with Jackson.”
“Obsessed is a strong word,” he said. “He’s a leader in the tech industry and has ties to people that would give you nightmares. And you don’t need to know who I’m working for.”
“I do if you want me to tell you anything. I don’t have anything to lose at this point, so give me one good reason to cooperate with you. You’ve already proven yourself to be an adept liar and manipulator.” I crossed my arms over my chest and waited.
We were locked in a battle of wills and for once, he caved first.
“Fine,” he said. “I’m a former military intelligence officer.
I got out a few years ago, but in case you haven’t noticed, the CIA hasn’t exactly been on the ball with their intel over the last decade. Budget cuts and opinion-poll-sensitive politicians have reduced the CIA’s recruitment of human intel.”
“Human intel?”
“Yeah. You know, spies.”
Oh.
“So they’ve been . . . outsourcing,” he said.
“Outsourcing spies? How?”
“They pay for information, help with data collection and analysis. And in turn I’m autonomous in my sources, methods, and missions.”
“Autonomous? But . . . doesn’t that also mean you have no cover? No backup? No government agency to protect you?” It sounded incredibly dangerous.
Clark shrugged. “It’s the price you pay for the kind of money I make.”
I thought of his used Honda. Either he didn’t make much . . . or that had been part of his cover as an HR guy.
“And being autonomous in your methods . . . means you’re not subject to rules of engagement or mission parameters or guidelines other than not breaking the law,” China said.
“Or if I do break the law, don’t get caught.”
I narrowed my eyes. “You’re not being very reassuring.”
“I’m not here to hold your hand. I’m here to stop bad people from doing bad things, however I need to do it.”
The look in his eye told me he was dead serious. His comment about not getting caught echoed inside my head. I didn’t trust him, but my options were limited . . . or non-existent.
“So now you know who I am and what I do, let’s discuss Vigilance,” he continued. “This software goes further than anything before in evaluating online behavior. People are dying—being killed—for it. Everyone who’s tried to cooperate has ended up dead. You were my shot at staying under the radar.”
“What do you mean everyone who’s tried to cooperate?”
“Tom was the one who originally contacted me,” he said. “We have a mutual . . . friend. He told me about the software, but he didn’t know who’d commissioned it. He was worried about Vigilance falling into the wrong hands.”
“And Tom committed suicide . . . supposedly.”
“Exactly. I contacted Terry next, and you know what happened there. Whoever has the Wyndemere team under surveillance is very, very good.”
“So you decided to go for a less direct approach with me,” I guessed. “Why?”
He checked off on his fingers. “You work for Cysnet, not Wyndemere. You’re a woman, you’re very young, and you don’t look like you could pose a threat to anyone.”
Well, at least I didn’t have to worry about him beating around the bush in an attempt to spare my feelings.
“I’m sorry to burst your bubble, but they already know who I am,” I said. “A man threatened me the other day, got in the back of my car and told me not to make the same mistake Tom did. He said Tom was having second thoughts about delivering the software.”
He frowned. “You told me it was an attempted carjacking.”
“I lied.”
His lips thinned. “And you didn’t think it would be a good idea to tell someone that you were threatened? I thought you were supposed to be a supersmart genius?”
I took offense to being called stupid, even obliquely. “I did tell someone,” I retorted. “I told Jackson. And for all I knew, you were in HR, remember? What would the point have been in telling you?”
That had been the night he’d begun seducing me, and would have, if I hadn’t told him I was a virgin. So apparently my virgin status had been so off-putting, even Clark—who thought that getting me to talk was a matter of life and death—still had decided to change tactics.
The realization was even more demoralizing than the actual events had been.
“So tell me everything you know about Vigilance,” he demanded.
I eyed him. “You still haven’t given me any reason to trust you, but you have given me a lot of reasons to walk out that door.”
Clark’s expression grew hard. “Fine. One word: Mia.”
My stomach dropped. “You asshole,” I hissed. “She’s sixteen.”
“Then don’t make me do something you’ll regret.”
That sick feeling in my stomach morphed into helpless anger. Helpless because he had me and he knew it. I refused to put Mia at risk, no matter what I had to do or who I had to cooperate with. And at the moment the most direct threat to her was staring at me, waiting for me to talk.
“Just so we’re clear,” I said. “I tell you what I know, you swear to leave Mia alone.”
“I swear,” he said, and I was tempted to believe him. But he was also an accomplished actor. And I was shit at reading people.
“She’s my responsibility,” I said stiffly.
“You have my word.”
I doubted I could actually trust his word, but it was better than nothing.
Starting at the beginning, I went through the different parts of Vigilance that had been delegated to teams—social media monitoring, e-mail text searching, Internet queries and browsing history, GPS location and tracking, deciphering of third-party encrypted communications, all of it.
“. . . so the software is making a profile of who that person is—what they do, who their friends are, the places they frequent, the things they buy, everything they put in writing whether it be a comment on a Facebook status or an e-mail sent to their boss.”
“Don’t Google and Facebook already do that?” Clark asked. “I shop online for airfare to Hawaii, I see Google ads for surfing lessons in Waikiki.”
“True, but that’s different. Google’s only looking at one part of your life via what you put into its search engine. This software goes even further. It’s the most complete kind of tracking and monitoring system in existence.”
“But it’s not finished,” he said.
“Yes, it is. The final code from Wyndemere has been checked in and is waiting to be compiled. But there’s a missing piece that has me worried.”
“What’s that?”
“The algorithm that searches through those profiles and sets flags,” I said. “That’s what hasn’t been written.” I thought of Jackson and the code on his home computer, but wasn’t about to tell Clark about that. “It’s not necessary for the software to run—but without it, what’s the purpose of the software?”
“We need to find out for sure,” Clark said. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a tiny USB drive. “Can you get this in Jackson’s computer?” He handed it to me.
“Why Jackson’s? What’s on it?” I asked.
“Jackson because I have reason to believe he knows a lot more than he’s telling. And this is a program that will install a back door into his system.”
I felt sick to my stomach. “You want me to enable you to spy on my boss. Jackson Cooper. Billionaire, genius entrepreneur and owner of Cysnet. A man like him has lawyers who have lawyers. If he finds out or catches me, he could have me arrested, prosecuted, sue me, basically destroy my life, with a couple of phone calls.” I could imagine the hell my life would become if Jackson found out. He’d be livid.
“I need to know.”
“Why don’t you know?” I retorted. “This is supposed to be a government contract. You work for the government . . . sorta.”
“No government agency commissioned the software,” he said flatly.
“Th-that’s not true,” I stammered. “Freyda confirmed it tonight, before . . .” I couldn’t finish the sentence.
Clark leaned forward, his elbows on his knees and his gaze intensifying. “Yes, tell me what she said. Why was she in your car?”
I hated this. I hated that I had no way out of doing exactly what he told me to do. He’d lied to me, threatened me and Mia, tried to gain my trust only to betray me later. I didn’t trust Clark. Obviously, he’d do whatever he had to in order to get the information he was selling to the CIA. And if I got hurt or killed in the process, tough crapola. The only person I could de
pend on was myself, which meant I’d better hold what little I knew close.
“She wanted to discuss the status of the project,” I said. “She was anxious for it to be finished and delivered.” Some of that was true.
“You said she confirmed it was a government hire.”
“She didn’t have time to tell me much of anything,” I hedged.
Clark’s eyes narrowed, but I just stared back. I’d read that you can tell when someone is lying because the first thing they do is break eye contact. The second is they blink a lot. I kept my gaze steady on him.
A buzzing sound interrupted our silence and Clark answered the phone he pulled from his pocket.
“Yeah?” He listened for a moment, then his gaze returned to me, suspicion etched on his face. “Are you sure?” More listening. “Check out her home and vehicle as well as the parking lot. She might’ve left it somewhere or dropped it.” He ended the call.
“Freyda’s missing one of her cell phones,” he said to me.
I frowned. “She had two?”
“Yes. One for work and one for personal. She’s missing the one from Wyndemere.”
“Weird because I bet she always had it with her,” I said.
“Did you take it?”
I raised my eyebrows. “Seriously? In between being shot at and dealing with the fact that someone was murdered in the front seat of my car, you think I had time to search and rob the body?”
He considered that, then nodded. “You’re right. It’s doubtful. Now when can you plant that in Cooper’s system?”
“I don’t know. It’s not like we’re buddies and I go over there for dinner.”
“He kissed you the other night.”
My face went hot and my hands clenched into fists. “You’ve been spying on me?”
“Nothing is private. You should know that.” He looked unrepentant. “My point is that he likes you. Use that.”
“So you want me to . . . what? Sleep with him and hope he likes pillow talk?”
Clark stiffened, his expression hard. “I didn’t say you had to sleep with him. But you can get close enough to plant that.”