Page 10 of Daddies’ Dark Desires (Forbidden Fantasies #19)

OLIVER

H arper is up to something.

If I hadn’t planted the upgraded tracker in her favorite bag, I wouldn’t know because she left her phone locked in her desk. Since she knows that can be tracked, I can only imagine what she’s getting into.

What would she think if she knew I’d bugged more of her things than she could fathom? That trip into her house when her and her mother weren’t home allowed for some generally creative plants for spying on her.

And I will keep tabs. Watch every move she makes.

The new views and easy access has made me more obsessive than before, spending my nights watching her sleep and my mornings watching her brush her teeth and make coffee.

I’ve followed her into the stacks twice, even though Grant caught her there before, I don’t mention it. Whatever she thinks is in there isn’t, or we’d know already. But if it keeps her occupied and not digging herself into danger, I’ll keep it to myself.

Harper has gotten sneakier though. Excusing herself to the bathroom then sneaking off to search.

Yesterday, she spent her lunch break with the files, going through five file boxes before she put everything back and slipped back to her desk. Her precision in leaving things the exact way she found them is impressive.

If she wasn’t an intern, I’d tell Grant and Trent to prepare her to go undercover. She’s too good at this. I shouldn’t have expected anything less from Ryan’s daughter.

How long until she figures out that she has to look somewhere else?

Not very if my instincts and her change in habits is any indication.

Her detours keep anyone from interrupting her, but even I can see the suspicion on Sunny’s face when she returns.

They typically spend lunch together with a few of the other interns, and as much as I appreciate the girl’s savviness on the computer—she rivals my skills at her age—the way she talks at hyper speed has me zoning out to Harper’s expressions.

After a week of odd behavior, I follow her more closely in the office than I would normally.

As much as I should call her out for snooping, I won’t. I want her to find what she’s looking for before I intervene. She thinks differently than we do. She might do what we haven’t been able to.

Her exasperation turns her to my system this afternoon. And she’s not using her own computer. Not that it makes it any harder to follow her movements.

It might have had I not made a front row seat for myself. One that gets a three-quarter shot of her from the waist up. That shirt is loose around her collar, flapping open to give me a side view of her breast and lilac lace bra.

I watched her put it on this morning. I’ll watch her peel it off tonight.

Worse, I ache to have them in my hands.

She’s in my system, and I’m surprised by her skill. She logs on with someone else’s credentials—ones that I don’t recognize. Could she have created one on her own? Did she badger Leonard for access or trick him into revealing someone’s information that she shouldn’t have access to?

This is why I should watch her constantly. In the office or not.

Sure, she’s always on my monitors, but with my other work, I can’t keep my eyes on her as much as I would like.

Let’s face it, when I’m not watching, I’m thinking about it.

I bring up a mirror of her keystrokes and screen on the monitor beside my view of her bent over the keyboard.

She must have copied a code because she’s piggybacking off someone else’s clearance. Or did I leave that open without meaning to?

Her path clears, and cold drenches my back, sitting me up straighter.

La Sangre Nueva.

No, she shouldn’t be able to get into this.

My security program for this part of the system pings. And I’m both proud and concerned that she’s gained access to this. Someone has had to help her.

Sunny?

They haven’t talked about it. Texted about it. They don’t meet after work, and they wouldn’t talk about it at lunch with all the potential to be overheard.

I haven’t heard a thing. I would.

Who else does she have that could help her do this?

And if she wanted in my system badly enough, why didn’t she come ask me?

Grumbling at myself, I know why.

I’m not warm. Friendly.

More than that, she has something to prove, and too often that means taking on too much herself.

But it’s the path she’s following that has me more concerned, the deep search of files that she’s too easily accessed, even if she had someone telling her what to look for.

It’s taking her far past where other agents have access. My program beeps and buzzes, warning me of the breach. I quiet it, riveted in my seat.

Dread numbs my chest as I watch the data fly by.

That directory…she didn’t find that on her own.

Harper’s following a trail that someone else carved first .

I pull up the trail on another monitor, catching up with her, comparing strings of code, timestamps, cross-referencing access logs or echo-code tags embedded in those protected files, and I make it to the information she’s searching at the same time she does.

Someone beat her here—someone breached my security, and I had no idea.

What the fuck?

My traps didn’t flag it. Not even the ghost decoys. Which means…

Whoever hacked in first knew my system.

It’s too late to do anything about it now. I could stop the download Harper has in progress, but I don’t. Whatever information she’s gaining is already out there.

Besides, the files are encrypted.

It’s my only saving grace. Both Harper and whoever accessed them before would need a special code. Those take time or knowledge of whoever set them.

Ryan’s skill at keeping secrets is legendary, so there’s still a chance that whatever is in those files is safe. For the time being.

I leave the trail open, setting up traps on everything connected to it or around it in case whoever invaded before comes back. It’s not likely, but I’m taking every precaution to find this fucker. Just in case.

I initiate silent countermeasures: setting up a ghost trace, deploying pingbacks, rerouting Harper’s activity through a proxy to hide her from whoever else might be watching.

The failure of the invasion has me on edge. Burns me with indignation. How did I let this happen?

But it’s Harper’s movements on screen that keep me present. Keep me focused.

Maybe I’m paranoid, but I trust no one.

Especially not when I find a second presence lurking in my system.

There’s a second ping, going out this time. Alerting someone else. Someone who now knows what Harper has discovered.

It takes too many keystrokes to boot them, to wall them in, trap them, search for some link, tack a tracker on them as they slip out of my grasp.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

On screen, Harper’s hands are shaking, her eyes wide and glassy with unshed tears. “Dad? Is this what got you killed?”

Fuck.

It has to be, and now, they know she’s found it. That she’s taking the same steps her father did, and it’s going to get her killed along with him.

She’s still a target.