Page 3 of Face

“It was in the cupholder of the treadmill I was just on. I got here earlier and saw it in there, put it in my pocket, and was gonna hand it into the front desk. But then I seen you look just like the photo there,” he drawled, pointing to the ID.

What in the hell… why was my driver’s license in the cupholder?

I shoved it into my pocket. “Well, thanks. Yes. I must have left it here.”

“No problem, man.” He walked away, wiping a towel over his head and face.

Continuing to run, I racked my brain, trying to figure out why my ID had been in the cupholder. Then I remembered that the last time I was here, a few days ago, I’d had to show my ID to get into the gym, as I couldn’t get their glitchy app to pull up the barcode on my phone to get me into the gym. They’d had to look me up manually in the system. I’d set the license into the cupholder at the time and had obviously forgotten about it. Good thing I hadn’t been pulled over driving here on my bike. I watched the guy walk away. Even though he’d taken my favorite treadmill, the guy wasn’t a douche. That title belonged to me for being so careless.

I used the showers after my workout and headed to the tanning area in the back. Thankful for the 24-hour automated spray tan booth, I put my credit card in, stripped down to nothing, then stepped inside and let the jets do their thing. Being a vampire sucked enough as it was, and I wasn’t ready to embrace the pale yet. One day I was sure I’d stop but for now, it gave me a sense of normalcy, a dash of humanity, and maybe a little control since nothing in my life was as it used to be. When they took notice, I’d told my club brothers this was for my mental health, and they stopped razzing me about it.

Chapter 2

Hell’s Angel

I walked into the clubhouse feeling much better and less annoyed. The treadmill gave me time to brainstorm about my current problem, and I decided the first thing I had to do was come clean with Viper, the club’s president.

I popped my head into his office, where he sat behind the computer, looking frustrated as usual. “Hey, boss. Got a sec?”

He peered around his monitor and waved me in. “Come on in.”

I took a seat and said, “How are things going? Any computer issues?”

“No,” he replied. “How was your tan?”

Chuckling, I asked, “Is it that obvious?”

He wrinkled his nose. “No, I can smell it.”

“Yeah, it smells pretty gross. Thankfully, it fades in a few hours. Should have brought some cologne with me.”

“What’s on your mind, Face?” He folded his hands on his desk.

“I wanted to let you know about a little problem I’m having with the system. I keep encountering malware, and I believe that it’s coming from an outside source. I’ve put on countless patches, and updated the firewalls and virus software, but I can’t seem to get rid of the spyware completely. And when I manage to, it worms its way back into our comms.”

“In English?” Viper deadpanned.

I frequently had to remind myself how old my club brothers were. Most of them had been already very old by the time computers and most of modern technology had been invented. They didn’t grow up with it like I had. Smiling, I said, “We have a computer virus that I can’t get rid of. I think someone is trying to hack into our systems.”

He frowned. “For what purpose?”

“That’s what we’re trying to figure out, but I thought it only fair that I let you know.”

He shifted in his seat and leaned back. “What exactly is this spyware doing? I mean, from the name of it I assume it’s spying on stuff on our system?”

I shrugged. “Sort of. I can’t nail down the type of spyware it is exactly, but it does seem to be a type of bug that mostly spies on what we’re doing. It hasn’t really infected anything like a virus would. It’s more like watching what we do rather than stealing information… I believe.”

“That’s not good. How long has it been happening?” he asked.

“About five days, give or take.” I sighed.

He nodded. “I see. Do you need to call in some outside help? Humans good with computers? I’ll pay whatever it costs.”

“I will consider that next; however, Jemini has an old colleague she’s going to call. She promised to be discreet.”

“Very well. In the meantime, is there anything you need from me or anyone in the club?”

“Yes, can you call church soon? I need to brief everyone on what they need to be aware of with their tablets and phones.”

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