Champagne Brunch: The Stiletto Sisters Series

by Ainsley St Claire

  I shrug. “I think I’m going through the stages of grief. I’d really just like it to be over so I can stop thinking about it all the time.”

  We hang out and chat for the rest of the afternoon. As we go our separate ways, Claire pulls me aside. “I don’t mean to be a downer on your relationship with Axel.”

  “I don’t feel that at all. You know I don’t want to advertise what’s going on. That way when it goes sideways, it’s less painful.” I shrug.

  She brings me in for a tight embrace. “You’re wonderful. If you need to get together tomorrow after you meet with Marci, just let me know. I promise I can be a good friend.”

  “You’re always a good friend.”

  Though my appointment with Marci isn’t until late morning, it’s still a Monday, so the drive over is difficult.

  “I swear the traffic gets worse and worse every year,” I mutter.

  “Frank says the same thing,” Peter says. Frank is his partner. They have three children.

  I realize I said that out loud. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be complaining. You’re the one driving.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” he says. “They keep squeezing in bicycle lanes. Before long, this will be a walking-only city.”

  “That will chase a lot of people away—including me. I don’t mind public transportation, but it’s just too hard for you to keep me safe.”

  “Trust me, Jim Adelson has spoken to every one of the city supervisors, and they’re very clear on that.”

  We finally pull up to Marci’s building. It’s an all-glass, seventy-story tower on the Bay. I ride up to her offices on the forty-third floor with Peter close at hand. I get looks from a few men, but they’re mostly recognition, not appreciation.

  When we arrive, I’m ushered into a large, glass-walled conference room that overlooks the Bay Bridge and the East Bay. I stand at the window. The cars look like Matchbox cars, and the people look like ants below. I wonder where they’re all going. What’s on their schedule today?

  The air pressure in the room changes as Marci opens the glass door. “Good morning.”

  I turn and see three associates with her. “Good morning.”

  Marci holds the door for the receptionist as she brings in a silver coffee and tea service, as well as bottles of water and a few soft drinks. She arranges everything on the table. It’s going to be a long day. Marci points me to a seat at the head of the long table, and the team fills in on both sides of me.

  “Did you have fun at the game last week?” Marci asks.

  I nod. “I did, and thanks to Nate, I got to meet Jeremy Hamilton. He’s a cute kid—and at seventeen, he’s definitely a kid.”

  She nods. “I think Walker was a bit jealous that he didn’t think about going. We’re going to see him play Thursday when he’s due to pitch at home.”

  “I’m going to try to go to that game, too. That is, if Walker doesn’t need me for something that day.”

  “Let’s see what we can do.” Marci smiles.

  I know she’s on my side, but I’m nervous. I didn’t do anything, but I don’t know what Viviana did, and not knowing has me second-guessing all of our time together and every conversation we had.

  “Let me introduce you to your team,” she continues. “This is Raven Stewart and Katie Sullivan. They’re helping me with the case. And Cindy Thomas is my paralegal.”

  I nod and smile. “Nice to meet you all.”

  “Viviana’s counsel has asked for a change in venue, given that Viviana knows Walker Clifton personally. We’re aiming for the District of Oregon, but we just don’t know yet.”

  “Will you be able to represent me in another state?” I ask.

  “Yes,” Marci affirms. “This is federal court, so it doesn’t require admission to the Oregon bar.”

  I take a deep breath. “Thank goodness.”

  Marci straightens her pen next to her notebook. “You and Nate are high on the list of people who will be deposed.”

  I nod. “And you’re representing both of us.”

  Marci nods. “But that’s why Raven and Katie are here.”

  “All right then. Where do we start?” I ask.

  “I have notes from Jim Adelson and his team as they’ve gone through your system at Diamond Analytics. They’ve found eight hundred and ninety-two attempted breaches from outside sources. However, they were only attempts. Your firewall prevented them from getting through. And, there’s no way of knowing whether Russian hackers would have been trying even without Viviana’s help. Also, it could very well be other government entities.”

  I like hearing that since that’s what my IT crew gets paid for. Because we collect data, we’re often a target for these kinds of attempted breaches.

  “They did find a string of code that had been introduced via a small, portable drive—like a jump drive inserted into your computer. It was logged into the system on February second at eight a.m.”

  I pull out my phone and look at my calendar. That was a Tuesday morning, and I didn’t see Viviana. “I was in a staff meeting at that time, but no one would have been admitted to my office without me being there—not even someone like Viviana that I knew.”

  Marci nods. “That makes sense. Did you see Viviana the night before?”

  My calendar shows drinks with the girls. “It looks like I had drinks with friends, but I don’t typically take my computer to a bar.”

  “Did Viviana give you anything to look at on a jump drive—maybe pictures or something?”

  I try to think of that night. “She’s never given me a jump drive with any pictures.”

  “Do you recall a time when Viviana might have returned with you to your place after drinks?”

  I shake my head. “No, I don’t think that ever happened. She’s been to my house plenty of times, but not after drinks.”

  Marci takes a few notes. “Okay, let’s try a different tact. Would Viviana have met you at your office before going over to the bar for drinks?”

  I shake my head. “Never. We always meet at the bar, and we leave from our own offices or meetings.”

  “What do you do with your computer on those occasions?” Raven asks. “Do you take it in a bag and leave it with your bodyguard or take it in the bar?”

  “I have a second laptop at home that’s networked to my office computer, so my work laptop would be left locked in my office.”

  Everyone exchanges looks. “Did the FBI ask you about this?” Raven asks.

  I look at Marci. She’s been with me at each of my meetings with the FBI. “No. Why?”

  “The FBI doesn’t have that information yet,” Marci replies. “We need to find out how the trojan horse was placed on your computer before they figure it out. Who has access to your office?”

  “My admin, Sarah Bart, and the custodial staff. Once I leave, it’s locked. There’s an alarm of sorts that alerts Clear Security if someone opens the doors after hours, and it also triggers a camera. They know the custodial staff’s entry times, but we should check with Jim. He would know who was in the building.”

  Katie nods. “I’ll do that.”

  We spend the next four hours walking through my testimony and statements. We order in lunch and just keep plowing on. I’m completely exhausted by the time we’re finished for the day, and tomorrow is our meeting with the FBI and the US Attorney from Oregon. We agree to go over together.

  Peter takes me home, and it’s late afternoon, but I need a nap. I stretch out on the couch and immediately fall asleep.

  My phone ringing wakes me sometime later. “Hello?”

  “Hey, Mia. This is Jim. I’m sorry—did I wake you?”

  I sit up and try to piece together what’s going on and why Jim would be calling me. “Ugh, I’m glad you did. I may never sleep tonight.”

  “I hate those days. Look, I spoke with Marci about your meeting today. We’ve gone through the logs, and we’re not seeing any activity that indicates someone was in your office on February second, othe
r than custodial staff.”

  “How else could someone have gotten on my computer to make that code appear when I booted up the next morning?”

  “We’re trying to determine that.”

  My mind is racing with all the possibilities. “Jim, does Diamond think I might be behind this?”

  He’s silent just a beat too long. “It has been mentioned.”

  “Fuuuuck. That means I’m going to have a fight with the board on my hands, in addition to all this shit from Viv.”

  “I am confident that you’re not behind this. I’ll make you a deal. We need to do some more looking at this, and until we have more definitive information, I won’t pass this information along to the board. As far as I’m concerned, I’ve shared our current findings with the CEO of the company.”

  I’m so grateful for Jim. “Thank you. I really appreciate this.”

  “Mia, I’ve got your back.”

  “Have you heard that they’re talking about Viv’s trial going to Oregon?”

  “Mason mentioned it. I’m on top of it because it affects both you and Nate, but not likely at the same time. I’m expecting Peter to go with you, but I’m wondering if you need to have someone else too. Or would you prefer female protection?”

  “If Peter can stand to be away from Frank and the kids, I’d prefer him. But don’t press him too hard. I can take someone else without any problem. And, stress to Peter that I’m not looking to change up my detail if he doesn’t join me.”

  “We appreciate your flexibility.”

  “Of course. Who wouldn’t be flexible?”

  “You’d be surprised. Some people are particular.”

  “I guess it’s a matter of trust.” But if you trust Jim, I don’t see what there is to worry about.

  “Anyway, I’ll be in touch, Mia.”

  We say goodbye and disconnect our call.

  I sit back and try to think through the week coming at me when my cell phone pings. It’s Axel. I smile, and my stomach flipflops.

  Axel: The guys are coming over for pizza and Fortnite, if you want to join us.

  Me: I’m not very good at Fortnite, but I’m down with some pizza. What time?

  Axel: I’m here. You can come over when you’re ready and bring an overnight bag.

  Axel: That is, if you’re comfortable staying with me and SoBe. Jeremy sometimes stays in the guest room, so we may have to be quiet.

  I chuckle. I’m comfortable.

  Mia: I’m on my way.

  Forty-five minutes later, Peter drops me off at Axel’s, and I send him home for the night. I’ll take a rideshare back if I decide for some reason not to stay.

  I knock on the door and Jake Garcia opens it, wearing just a pair of athletic shorts. “Oh, I thought you were the pizza delivery.”

  “Nope. I’m a friend of Axel’s. He invited me over.”

  His brow furrows. “Just a minute.” He shuts the door in my face, and I hear some fussing and rustling inside.

  Then Axel appears at the door. “Sorry. I wasn’t communicating well. Please come in.”

  I giggle. “No problem. I take it random women sometimes show up at your door?”

  “Well, not really.”

  “His neighbor could show up,” Jake says. “I didn’t hear him tell me you were coming. That’s my fault.”

  “It’s okay.” I put my bag down, and Axel gives me a chaste kiss. The guys exchange a look. “I hope I’m not interrupting your party.”

  “Not at all,” Jeremy says with a silly grin at Axel.

  “Grow up, all of you,” Axel snaps. “This is my girlfriend, Mia.” He looks at me with his eyes wide, like he’s just realized what he said.

  “Hi, Mia,” the boys all say in unison.

  The bell rings again, and this time it is the pizza guy. Axel takes care of it while I stow my things out of the way.

  We sit down and enjoy our dinner. The guys talk about practice. “Jeremy hasn’t thrown a fastball slower than a hundred and nine miles an hour in days,” Crispin complains. “That sucker’s a bitch to hit. I’ve tried.”

  “Yeah, that’s because you’re too slow,” Jake teases.

  I stifle a snort. These guys crack me up.

  “What do you do, Mia?” Jeremy asks.

  “I have two companies,” I tell them. “One is a data-mining company and I also just started a dating app.”

  “What does a data-mining company do?” Jake asks.

  “We collect information for our clients and help them decipher it. It can be as simple as what their competitors are doing or where they show up on the internet, or it can be the data that helps them as they develop new products.”

  “People pay for that?” Crispin says.

  “Quite a bit actually.” I chuckle. Diamond Analytics made over a trillion dollars last year.

  “I bet I could do that for them much cheaper than a big company.” Jake narrows his eyes, probably thinking about how easy it would be.

  “It’s a little more than just a query in a search engine. In fact, I could set up a data mine to determine how many times Jeremy was mentioned in the first twenty-four hours after he broke Nolan Ryan’s record.”

  “Show us,” Crispin says.

  “I need a computer or laptop.”

  Axel stands and disappears a moment before returning with a laptop.

  I log on to Diamond Analytics and pull up the search engine. After setting up a query with the right parameters, I sit back. “This will take a few minutes.”

  We finish off the pizza, and eventually the guys go back to their video game. Axel pulls me into his kitchen and gives me a kiss so hot that it curls my toes and leaves me breathless.

  “I sort of wish these guys would go home, so I could ravage you.”

  “We have all night.” I hear a ping on the computer.

  I go back to the living room. “All right…” I look over the raw data and get the guys’ attention. “In the hour after the game, there were seven-hundred-fifty-two-thousand-and-change mentions of Jeremy’s record. There were over a million hits on an article about the record-breaking game on ESPN’s website, and over four hundred comments. There were over two million positive chirps. On television, radio, and podcasts, he had over six-hundred-thousand mentions.”

  I stand and look at the guys. Their mouths are open wide. “I have sixteen more data points, but that’s only within an hour following the event. The computer will tabulate them and break them out into highly positive, positive, neutral, negative, and extremely negative. It will break them down by source, so we can tell if Chirp is all negative, but ESPN is all positive and so forth. But for general purposes, it looks like ninety-four-point-three percent were all positive or mostly positive.”

  When I look up, Jeremy is a deep shade of crimson.

  “Crispin, do you still think you could tabulate all of that cheaper and faster? Pulling it isn’t the hard part. That’s a simple algorithm. It’s interpreting it that makes a difference.”

  “No thanks,” Crispin mutters.

  There’s a knock at the door, and when Axel goes to answer it, Bash and Jim from Clear Security walk in. My blood pressure spikes.

  A look of shock flashes in Jim’s eyes when he sees me. “Jeremy, can we talk?” he asks.

  Chapter 12

  Axel

  There goes my night. Jim and some guy who looks like he plays tackle for the San Francisco Goldminers step into my condo.

  Jake and Crispin turn the video game off and look at me expectantly. I feel Mia’s fingers lacing through mine.

  SoBe nudges my leg to let me know he’s here to support me. I turn to Jake and Crispin. “Do you guys think you can take SoBe for a walk?”

  “Sure, no problem,” Jake says, and they both nod.

  “I should probably go,” Mia says as she stands to leave.

  “Do you mind staying?” Jim asks. “I think we may need your help.”

  I’m shocked, but Mia seems cool as a cucumber.

 
“Of course,” she says.

  She and I sit on either side of Jeremy, and she takes his hand.

  We all look up at Jim.

  “This is the head of my security team, Bash Pontius,” he tells us.

  “Are you the pilot in all of this?” Jeremy asks.

  I don’t follow, but Bash lights up. “That’s a good one. I haven’t heard that before.”

  I must look confused. “It’s a Pontius Pilate reference,” Bash says.

  I roll my eyes at my own stupidity. “Sorry. Late to the party again.”

  The joke adds some much-needed levity until Jim clears his throat and becomes very serious.

  “There was a break-in at your apartment tonight,” he tells Jeremy. “We found a woman inside waiting for you, provocatively dressed. She had a vial on her that contained several doses of GHB. She claims to be your fiancée.”

  Every hair on my body stands at attention, and my stomach ties into a knot.

  Jeremy’s head snaps up. “I don’t have a fiancée, or even a girlfriend, for that matter.”

  Jim’s posture softens from being a hardcore Marine and Raider to a little less imposing. “We know,” he says. “She’s sixteen and a runaway from Nevada. We think she may be the person who sent the letter to team management at the ballpark.”

  A feather right now could knock me over. I’ve been in the business for many years, but I’ve never had as big a star as Jeremy. I know we’re both looking at a new reality right now.

  “What did she want?” Jeremy is completely bewildered, his innocence glowing.

  “She was hoping to become your girlfriend,” Jim says. “And honestly, she probably wants your money.”

  Jeremy releases Mia’s hand and clasps his together. He looks back down at the parquet floor. “Oh.”

  “Since you broke the record, you’ve been getting a lot of fan mail, and while most of it is just words of congratulations, some of it is a little off putting. But it isn’t because of anything you’ve done to lead anyone on or encourage them. I’ve spoken to Nate Lancaster, and we would like to put a full-time bodyguard with you. He could be someone who just blends in. He’ll look like one of your teammates, but he’ll be skilled in multiple martial arts and carry a firearm.”