Chapter 2 #2
“I’m here,” she said, and this time she meant it.
Focus. Work. Then leave.
That was the plan.
She just had to survive long enough to execute it.
She looked to Dante, a handsome guy with an easygoing manner who probably wouldn’t mind her request. “Is it possible to get two more monitors for my workstation? I’m used to sprawling out.”
While she did prefer more workspace, she really wanted to hide behind the monitors.
“Sure thing.” Dante got up to respond to her request.
Sophie settled at a station and opened several strings of code she was trying to decipher. She ran a finger under one line and looked to Elin. “I think this portion has something to do with what you and I worked on before you came here.”
“Oh?” She studied the text.
“The power plant I had you look into…”
“You mean hack into.” Elin shot her a wry glance.
Sophie chuckled. “It’s all for good.”
“If it wasn’t, I wouldn’t be here.” Early in her career, she’d vowed that her skills would never be used for evil and that anything she did would be for the right side.
While they dug deeper into the puzzle, Dante set up two more monitors for her. When he finished, he hovered behind her and Sophie, listening to their discussion.
Sophie’s voice was steady as she outlined the situation. “Two nights ago, the Midwest grid flickered offline. No one can trace what happened. For a thirty-second window backup protocols failed, and when they came back up, half the diagnostics were scrubbed.”
“Same as a breach in California,” Dante added. “No traceable entry point in the system.”
Elin’s pulse ticked faster. She could see the map in her head of how the terrorist known as Cipher had entered in the firmware.
Before she could stop herself, the words slipped out. “He didn’t breach the power plants. He went through the load governors, piggybacking on maintenance traffic.”
Both heads turned.
Dante’s brows knit. “That wasn’t in any of our reports. How do you know that? It’s all classified.”
Damn. Elin had learned long ago to censor herself when it came to revealing what she knew or how she knew it. But her head wasn’t in the game because she was distracted as hell by the fact that the lover she believed dead for the past two years was alive and in this house.
She met Dante’s flat stare.
“You got into my system.”
Sophie studied Elin, looking more thoughtful than accusing.
She nodded.
“She does have security clearance,” Sophie said.
“Not that level. That’s above her paygrade.” Dante pulled out a chair and dropped to the seat. “Just how deep did you go, Elin?”
“Deep enough.”
He shook his head. “Two days ago, I was stuck at a firewall I couldn’t break through. Then I took a break. When I came back, everything just fell into place and I got into the Midwest system.”
Elin felt heat streaking up her throat. Damn the fair genes that made her blush so easily. She started to turn back to her own station, but Dante stopped her.
He opened his mouth to fire off questions.
“I thought we were trying to prevent a nationwide catastrophe,” she reminded him.
“She’s right, Dante,” Sophie jumped in. “Does it matter how she knows these things? Fact is, Elin has CIA and FBI clearance to help us stop the upcoming outage.”
And she was trying to prevent her heart from getting caved in again.
Dante rocked back in his seat. “How did you find her, Sophie?”
“I needed a high-level hacker. She was recommended to me.”
“By who?”
Elin forced herself not to squirm or to walk away from the whole job. She didn’t need the money—she had enough of that. And she’d done what she set out to do, which was to prove that Liam was alive.
But there was still a psycho out there trying to burn down the world.
The terrorist known as Cipher was responsible for a lot of deaths and destruction already, from bombings to assassinations, with many innocent people caught in the fallout.
She couldn’t just let him get away with whatever he planned with this power outage—not if her skills could make a difference.
She had to tell Dante and Sophie everything if they were going to get anything done.
“I only hack for the good.”
They stopped at her announcement.
“I wouldn’t do anything to set you back or sabotage your efforts. But I did…” she met Sophie’s wide eyes, “place myself in your path. So you’d find out I could help you.”
Sophie shook her head slowly as if trying to make sense of what Elin was saying. “What made you interested in us?”
She swallowed hard. “I knew Liam Mason…before.”
“Before he became Blackout.” Sophie’s whisper was rough.
Dante’s expression blanked to a mask and he said nothing.
She barreled on. “I saw a news report. The lights blinked out on a subway train, and when they came back on, a man was dead.”
Two sets of eyes drilled into her.
The words bled out faster. “Something clicked in my memory.”
“What clicked?” Dante’s tone came with a gritty edge of command.
“It reminded me of how Liam used to operate on his former SEAL team.” Her fingers were shaking, and she gripped the arms of her chair to steady them.
Her stomach wobbled, but Sophie placed a hand on her arm that reminded her that she wasn’t under investigation.
“Instead of ignoring that pattern I saw, I asked myself, if Liam were alive, what would he be doing? Liam’s a knife guy. There was a blackout, a surge of people and noise, then a terrorist was dead. That felt like Liam’s signature.”
“Christ.” Dante looked like he might throw up.
“I dug through flight records and learned a military aircraft landed where Liam was last seen. It made me question if he really could be alive, but had gone underground.”
“Blackout.” Sophie’s murmur sent ripples up and down Elin’s arms.
She nodded and then met Dante’s gaze. He looked even greener. “I assure you everything is locked down. There are absolutely no breaches in your system.”
She looked to Sophie. “And I assure you that I only put myself in your path because I might be the only person who has the skills to stop this.” She waved at a countdown clock on the wall.
Dante raked his fingers through his hair. “I don’t know if I should be impressed or terrified.”
“Both.” Elin attempted a smile that felt weak at best. “Be both.”
Sophie squeezed her arm. “We need you. Whatever your reasons for being here, we need your skills.”
“Then let’s get to work.” Elin turned back to her monitors, relieved that they didn’t question her further about her relationship with Liam.
A new set of boots echoed in the hallway. Heavier and deliberate. The cadence she’d memorized without ever meaning to.
Liam.
She ducked lower behind her monitors, angling her chair so the screens blocked her from view of the doorway. Her hands flew across the keyboard as she attempted to appear completely absorbed in her work.
But her pulse was hammering against her ribs like it was trying to escape. Her breath came shorter, shallower, and she had to force herself to keep typing, keep moving. To look like she wasn’t falling apart at the mere sound of his footsteps.
The boots paused outside the door.
Her fingers froze over the keys.
Then the steps moved on, fading down the hallway toward wherever he was going.
Elin’s breath trickled out slowly, and she willed her heart to calm down.
Three days, she told herself. She just had to survive three days.