Page 96 of The Black Trilogy

Nick ignored the question. “What are your thoughts on the ransom?”

“They wanted £250,000 plus the source code for my company’s new product.”

“I know.”

“How?”

Nick shrugged. “Not important. How much is that source code worth?”

“Millions, in the right hands.”

“What does it do?”

“Incorporates the usual firewall and anti-virus software, but the key feature is when it detects a threat, instead of just blocking it, the code I wrote starts tracking it back to its source. Simply put, it turns the tables on malicious hackers. There are a lot of people who don’t want it to see the light of day.”

“So who would steal it? Hackers?”

“Possibly. Or our competitors. It’s light years ahead of anything else on the market at the moment. Some individuals in the industry have dubious morals, and they’d be quite happy to use it as a base for their own software.”

“So hackers, competitors. Who else?”

Luke sighed. “Anyone looking to make a quick buck. They wouldn’t have to use the product themselves—buyers would be lining up for it. If the program gets out, my reputation will be trashed. What kind of cyber security expert lets his code get stolen? Plus my company will end up in the toilet. We’ve sunk a lot of resources into that program.”

“Who knows about its existence?”

“Everyone who reads the industry press. I’ve been doing interviews about it for months.”

“So the person who took it wouldn’t necessarily need to be a techie then? Not if they could simply sell it on?” Dan asked.

“No, although I spent a few hours modifying the code so it didn’t quite work. Nothing too obvious, though, in case they noticed and took it out on Tia. A good programmer could probably fix the changes in a couple of months.”

Dan stood to pour herself another coffee.

“Top up?” she asked Nick.

He nodded and handed his cup over. Luke felt too sick to drink his. How could they stay so relaxed? When Dan sat down again, Luke averted his eyes as her skirt rode up so high it was almost indecent.

She didn’t seem to notice. “This guy you gave the ransom to, what do you remember about him?”

Luke fought through the sludge in his head. “Not much. Things are coming back in bits and pieces, but I’m still not sure what happened.”

“Talk us through what you do recall.”

“The message gave me coordinates for a clearing in the woods. I was supposed to leave the bag there.” Insane, now he thought about it. But desperate men did stupid things. “Except when I arrived, I saw a man on the far side, watching me.”

“You’re sure it was a male?” Nick asked.

“I didn’t get a good look at his face, but when he punched me, it really hurt. I doubt a woman would have such a vicious right hook.”

Nick laughed at that. “You’d be surprised.”

“It wasn’t funny.” Luke’s jaw still ached from the hit.

Nick grew serious again. “Sorry. Wind back a bit. What happened when you saw the guy?”

“I walked towards him, but he held a hand up, so I stopped. He came to me instead.”

“Then what?”

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