3. Jax #2
“Both.” He grabs a pack of gum off his desk and pops a piece into his mouth.
“It’s defense because he’s obviously expecting people to try and break in so they can snoop around, but it’s also offense because there’s a fuck ton of traps to catch his expected snoopers and destroy not just their days, but their entire systems. Bro’s creative and damn good at what he does, and that can be a lethal combo for us mere mortals.
The only reason he hasn’t been able to backtrace me is that Carter built me a custom cloaking system specific to his signatures.
Without that, he would have made me ten times over by now. ”
I let that tumble around in my mind for a few beats. “But this is also the same guy who literally handed you a way to hack him.”
Jace nods and blows a bubble. “Yup. He practically rolled out the red carpet when he put that backdoor in his code.”
“How does that even make sense?” I ask. “Do you still think it was a taunt?”
“Yes and no.” He snaps his gum loudly. “I’m not in the guy’s head, so I might be off my rocker here, but I’m guessing he didn’t think I’d be good enough to actually use it.
And now that I have, I’m starting to think your he’s trying to get caught theory from a few weeks ago is the more probable answer. ”
“You do?” I sit up straighter. “Why? What changed?”
“He got an email from Jacob Fisher last night. Or at least someone using his email account since Jacob’s dead and all.”
“And what did it say?” I press when he blows another bubble with his gum.
“That his debt hasn’t been paid in full yet, and he should expect to be contacted again.”
“Really?” I ask flatly. “You didn’t think this was important enough to lead with?”
“Oh, I did.” He grins. “I just wanted to add a little flair to your life and build it up a bit first.”
Now it’s my turn to give him a “go ahead” gesture. “Anything else you need to tell me now that I’m all flaired up?”
Jace snickers. “Sounds like you need to see the school doc, bro.”
“You want to practice knife catching?” I ask. “Because I’m about five seconds from throwing one at your face.”
“Don’t threaten me with a good time.” He shoots me a cheesy grin.
“The email,” I remind him.
“Right! I was able to trace the IP address, which was actually ridiculously easy, and it came from King House.”
“Not surprising since he worked there,” I point out.
“Nope, just surprising because he’s supposed to be dead, and dead dudes don’t write emails.
” He blows a bubble with his gum. “What do you think they mean by his debt? I’ve found a shit ton of evidence that the kid was blackmailed into helping with the whole offing Felix thing, but no evidence of what they have on him. ”
“I don’t know. I haven’t been able to find anything in my deep dives.” I lean back on my hands and stretch my legs out. “I can’t even find a connection between him and the Kings other than Boone House being in their territory.”
“Yeah.” Jace taps his fingers against the arm of his chair. “I’m not finding anything on that front either. I pulled the school swipe logs and looked at his card history, and he’s never been in either of the King houses or any of the buildings associated with them.”
“I don’t get him,” I tell my brother. “Nothing about him makes sense. He’s this genius hacker, but he literally handed you a way to hack him.
He has incredible situational awareness and knows I’m following him, but he hasn’t bothered to alter his routes or even close his curtains.
He’s rich as fuck, but he reads books about Marx and socialism and used his skills to take down a fake charity.
” I shake my head. “He’s a walking contradiction. ”
“That he is,” Jace agrees. “And this will really bend your noodle, but the charity job isn’t the only thing he’s done.”
“You’ve found more?”
He nods. “It took some digging, but it looks like our boy retired his old hacker name just before he started here at Silvercrest. The charity job is the most high-profile one I’ve found, and so far it looks like that’s the only time he’s teamed up with others to do a job, but there’s evidence of hacks going back almost five years. ”
“Five years, like he was thirteen when he started?”
“Yup. The first few years were mostly random things like hacking public address systems and playing creepy music over them or changing the messages on electronic signage on highways and on the side of the road with silly slogans or middle fingers.”
“Sounds familiar.”
Jace grins. “We all gotta cut our teeth somehow. Public mischief is a rite of passage for us hackers. The interesting thing about our boy is that, as far as I can tell, he went right into white-hat hacks after he was done playing around and fucking with people.” He snaps his gum loudly.
“Like what kind of white-hat jobs?”
“Like erasing school lunch debt for tens, if not hundreds of thousands of kids around the country. He also doxed dozens of sex offenders who were considered at high risk to re-offend but were released anyway. And he doxed a shit ton of cops who were fired from other precincts for things like assault, sex crimes, wrongful deaths, all sorts of nasty shit, and hired at new ones.”
“And you didn’t find any evidence of him using his abilities to hurt anyone who didn’t deserve it?”
Jace shakes his head.
“This kid is a walking contradiction,” I say again. “Nothing about him makes sense.”
“Good thing you like puzzles,” Jace muses and pulls his knife out of his pocket again. “So what are you going to do?” He flips open the knife, then snaps it shut a few times in a blur of glinting metal.
“Keep watching him until I know what his deal is.” I blow out a frustrated breath. “But I think it’s time for some more intensive surveillance. We need to figure out what’s going on before we can decide what to do about him. And we really don’t have any time to waste with the break coming up.”
He grins and pulls open his desk drawer. “I thought you might be going in that direction, so I took the liberty of getting this for you.” He digs out a small box that looks like it’s for jewelry and holds it up.
“Gee, thanks,” I say dryly. “You shouldn’t have.”
He throws the box at me. “Open it before you sass me, asswipe.”
I catch it with one hand and flip up the top. “Oh,” I say when I see the tiny camera nestled in the cushioned interior. I recognize the model, and it’s one of the best ones out there.
“That’s what I thought.” He smirks.
“Thanks.” I snap the box closed and put it on the bed next to me. “Do I want to know where you got this?”
He grins. “Depends. Do you want plausible deniability?”
I snort-laugh. “Do I ever?”
“I may or may not have intercepted a couple of packages that were supposed to be delivered to King House.”
“Tampering with mail is a felony,” I say with a teasing smirk.
“So is half the shit I did before lunch today.” He shrugs. “Felonies are like Pokémon at this point, and I gotta catch them all.”
I laugh. “You’re well on your way to a full set.”
“Like you aren’t.” He huffs out a laugh. “But if anything, it’s the Kings’ fault. I wouldn’t have had to break the law if they didn’t order tech they can’t be trusted with. Not my fault I have to babysit them.”
“It’s almost like they want you to fuck with them and their mail.”
“Right?” He slips his closed knife into his hoodie pocket. “They just can’t help themselves.”
“Have you had dinner?” I ask.
He shakes his head, not at all fazed by my abrupt topic change. “Want me to text Killer and Felix and see if they’ve eaten while you take a shower?”
I nod and stand.
“And bro?” he says as I grab the camera box.
“Yeah?”
“You’re getting emotionally involved,” he says, all traces of joking and teasing gone. “Either rein it back in or be prepared for everything that comes with it.”
“I’m fine,” I insist. “It’s just a job.”
He shoots me a dubious look and picks up his phone. “Whatever you say, bro.”
I bite back my retort and put the camera box in my nightstand for safekeeping. He’s wrong, but there’s no point arguing with him.
I just need to finish the job and figure out what the hell we’re going to do about Myles, and that will be the end of it.