Page 62 of Hacking His Code

“What does she want now?”

“Some old program called ScrptX. I found remnants of it, but it’s inaccessible and I wouldn’t give it to them anyway. When I left yesterday, it was to meet up with a friend at the FBI. That didn’t pan out how I had hoped, though.”

I think back to my brunch with Ernestine and the surprising turn of our conversation. She wasn’t a sister mourning her twin. Nor was she riddled with guilt. She was positive that I would find no answers to her sister’s disappearance, and now I can’t help but wonder if there’s a reason for that. Perhaps Lucy is still alive.

But I can’t ignore the darker logic in Ernestine’s confidence, which provokes the question: what if Ernestine or Rand had a hand in Lucy’s disappearance?

It’s hard to believe a woman like Ernestine could be capable of something so dark, but if she and her family were threatened, it’s hard to say how she would react.

But the logic doesn’t check out. If they were somehow involved, they would have done a better job of cleaning up after themselves. The information found in Lucy’s apartment forever cast a shadow on the Davies’ empire as it’s never good having your technology sold to the highest bidder and even enemies of your nation.

“How did you find me?” I demand, deciding it’s finally time I knew.

“You know how my parents have had ‘round the clock security on me since my aunt disappeared?”

“Yeah.”

“About three years ago, an FBI guy started working for us part-time. We did some traveling together, chit chatted, and he told me about the cases he’d investigated. He was assigned to your case, and I swear, when he talked about you, he was filled with such admiration. He couldn’t believe that some girl attending private school on a hardship scholarship spent her free time hunting the world’s worst predators instead of finding ways to pad your family’s income. He’s a man that’s seen the worst in society, and he said that you restored his faith in humanity.”

My jaw drops in shock. “No…”

“I actually went to see him yesterday, but I guess he received an injury a year ago and has been medically retired.”

The FBI was the absolute worst, treating me like I was a hardened criminal. I’d been yelled at, lectured, and told that I had ruined their case. Never praised.

“Wait-wait-wait—all that time, they admired me?”

“Uh-huh,” Hunter says, nodding his head.

“But they yelled at me…”

“Have you ever heard of the term ‘scared straight’?”

Tears well in my eyes as heat floods my cheeks. “Oh my God…all this time I thought I was despised—loathed.”

Hunter hands me a napkin to dab my tears with. “Not even close. They wanted to approach you with a job right out of high school, but it’s standard to wait until someone has completed college. I wouldn’t have contacted you at all, except some huge twist of fate had you wandering around the dark web, and I had an alarm set to trigger if you made such ventures. You see, Davies could use smart minds like yours, and I was going to make a competing offer when the time was right.”

“You’re serious? I’ll really be offered a job with the FBI?”

“If the plan hasn’t changed, yes.”

All I can do is stare back at him, slack-jawed and confused. For so long, I felt I was adrift on a raft, waiting for someone to save me, but I was never alone. People I didn’t even know of were silently cheering me on.

Hunter takes a step towards me, his eyes locked on mine. “I hope this means you will stay on and continue to help me dig.”

As intriguing as the whole situation is, I can’t bring myself to work under such torture, and by torture, I mean so close to a man that has completely and utterly broken through all my defenses.

“I can’t.”

He snickers, turning away. “I should have known. Women are all the same. They can’t be trusted.”

“Excuse me?”

“You found out your tuition was paid, and now you’re hightailing it out of here.”

I wince at his words. “That’s not it at all.”

“Oh, really?” he says, his voice thick with sarcasm.