“You’re not warning me against anything I don’t always want.”

“My vagina needs a minute to recuperate after the workout you gave her this morning.” Yeah, I might have pounded her a little rough while I had her blindfolded and tied to the bed.

“Don’t worry, your pretty pussy is safe for a little while longer. I’m getting work done.”

She laughs, seeing through me, and goes back to icing the already-cooled cookies. “Speaking of Thanksgiving, are we doing it here or going to Boston? My mom has already informed me she’s going on a solo cruise, which I think is fantastic.”

“Boston,” I tell her, watching as Alfie tries to pull some shit with the bogus financials I gave him access to. “Probably Zax’s, though it might be Asher’s since he’s not playing on Thanksgiving. Fallon was saying she might be on call, so she didn’t want to do it at her and Grey’s warehouse.” Which is where we had it last year, though Fallon wasn’t back in the picture yet.

“When do you want to tell Grey and Zax?”

“I was thinking somewhere between the turkey and pumpkin pie, but only after they’ve had the vat of expensive bourbon I plan to bring them,” I answer distractedly as I hit the command then wait, watching carefully to see if Alfie notices that I just disabled his antivirus. The thing with hackers is that you can’t just penetrate their systems the way you would a standard person. We have alarms and are constantly checking for things like that. Paranoia over getting doxxed is real, not to mention hackers love to go up against other hackers.

I feel Georgia move in beside me, and I lean back in my chair so she can climb on my lap. “What is all that?”

I wrap my arms around her, still waiting, still watching, a silent mouse hiding in the wall, not yet ready to sneak out and go searching around for crumbs.

“That is Alfie.” I point over to the window on the right of my computer. “He’s trying to fuck with my banking.”

Georgia gasps, and I kiss her neck reassuringly.

“It’s not my real banking. I set up a completely fake computer and phone system that he believes is my real one that he’s gained access to. He’s been weeding through work emails and banking and other nonsense but keeps getting locked out of doing much with it, which I can tell is frustrating hm by the frequency that he returns. And this”—I point to the other window—“is Alfie’s computer. I’ve had access to it since he ‘hacked me.’” I put air quotes around that since he only hacked what I allowed him to. “But I just enacted my first command since setting up a rootkit on his computer last week. I was letting him grow comfortable in my system, but now I’m done letting him feel comfortable.”

“Rootkit?”

“It basically means I have the highest privilege in his system. I can do anything I want with it.”

“Will he know it’s you?”

“No.” I trail kisses up and down her neck. “He thinks I’m as dumb as a sack of bricks, and everything I’ve shown him has increased that belief. He’s gotten an eyeful of my bogus searches. Everything from workouts to protein shakes to sports podcasts to tattoo groups and forums. I even threw in some basic porn.”

She laughs. “Really? Porn?”

“Georgia, I think it’s something like over ninety percent of males, regardless of their sexual preference or desires, search for some form of porn at least once a month.”

“I believe it.” She leans back against me, and I take a deep inhale of her. She smells even more like cookies than she normally does, and I can’t help my body as it stirs against her.

“What will you do now that you’re in his world?”

“Depends on what I find. I turned off his anti-virus, and I will do something with that, but I’d like to look around first. Discover his true demons. Alfie doesn’t strike me as the sort to give up, but he also has a very public image and job he wants to protect. He’s the CEO, making plenty of money, and truthfully, he wasn’t going to get access to your shares or money. His sniveling, rodent of a son was ,and now that Ezra has been arrested and some of his skeletons have been brought to the light of day, Alfie needs to save face and not do anything stupid.”

“Like stalk and threaten the chairwoman of the board.”

“Like that.”

“You mentioned the other day that they’re no longer trying to have the validity of our marriage called into question, right?”

“No. Their attorney told them they have no case.”

“Do you think this is all behind us? I mean, do you think they’ll officially let it all go?”

“I don’t know, Georgie. I’d love to tell you yes, but in my experience, men like them don’t like to lose at any cost. But where their egos and pride lead their charge, it’s ultimately their biggest weakness and what we can use to our advantage.”

I get an elbow jab for calling her Georgie, which makes me chuckle, and then I nip at her bare shoulder that’s slipped out of the side of my oversized shirt she’s wearing.

“I haven’t heard a peep from them since Ezra got arrested. Not one. The board meeting is the week after Thanksgiving. Maybe they’re waiting for that, but I honestly can’t think of anything else they can do at this point. They have no legs to stand on. It’s why I married you.” She pivots on my lap and gives me a cheeky smirk and wink.

“I’m not saying they’re going to try to get you to marry Ezra anymore. But I don’t trust that their fight is over. Alfie is poking around your stuff too.”