Page 33 of Heart of Danger
“We’re here,” Mac said. “She’shere. So what is it that couldn’t wait?”
“I set up a bot, boss,” the blond one said. He looked like a surfer who killed. Sun streaked hair, colorful Hawaiian shirt with golden parrots and acid green palm trees and a shoulder holster. “On principal. Just a little program set to notify me if anything of interest happened at 27 Sunset Lane. Set it up last night.”
Catherine gasped. “That’s my address!”
“Yes it is.” Mac nodded at the surfer. “So?”
“Yeah, well Dr. Young here doesn’t believe in security apparently.” He shot her a disapproving look, blue green eyes narrowed in disapproval. “Not one vidcam, not one. And your lock is crap.”
She was being criticized! Catherine drew in an outraged breath. “First of all, the house isn’t mine, it’s a rental, so elaborate security systems would be a waste of money. And that lock isn’t crap! I had it changed when I moved in! And I’ll have you know it’s top of the line.”
The surfer looked at Mac. “A Stor lock.”
Mac made a disgusted sound in his throat.
Surfer Dude continued. “So though the good doctor here lives in trust of her fellow man, it’s a good thing her neighbors don’t. There are vidcams both in the house across the street and the house across the back yard. I hacked them and fiddled with the settings so we had front and back views and set up another bot to send a signal if there was movement at number 27 and sure enough, here’s what I have recorded for ten minutes ago.” He flicked two fingers and a hologram appeared in front of her.
The three men turned to the image that appeared in front of her.
Her sharp intake of breath sounded loud in the room. The images were silent but eloquent.
A bald man, not tall but broad-shouldered, dressed in black, leading two other men up the small walkway to her front door. They buzzed once, twice. Waited.
“You know them?” Mac asked quietly behind her.
“The man ringing my doorbell is Cal Baring. He’s head of security for Millon. I’ve seen the other two around, but I don’t know their names.”
Baring made the researchers’ lives almost impossible with his constant demands for security. All in-house phone conversations were recorded which made communication dull and stilted. The protocol for entering and leaving the research labs was so tedious no one left the premises during work hours, ever.
Catherine had worked in Boston which had a miserable climate compared to Palo Alto, and researchers often stepped out into the company park for a breath of fresh air and a break. Not at Millon. At times she felt like a prisoner.
Baring himself was a humorless thug.
He moved his head a few inches left and right, his hands worked at waist level and…her front door opened. To anyone not paying attention, it would look exactly as if he’d opened it up with a key.
Baring and his goons walked in, bold as you please.
“Hey!” Catherine reached forward, her hand passing through the hologram. It was so clear and perfect she’d forgotten for a second she was watching something far away.
She had no idea how far away because she had no idea where she was.
“So much for top of the line locks,” Nick said and the blond man clucked his tongue and shook his head. Clearly at her insanity.
“That was ten minutes ago,” the blond said. “Now I’d really like to know what they’re doing in there.”
“So would I,” Catherine said heatedly. “But unfortunately, if I didn’t surround myself with paranoid security outside, I sure don’t have a surveillance system inside my own home.”
Surfer Dude cocked his head. “Hmm, I don’t know about that. What’s your email?”
She looked at the blond. “What?”
“Your email,” he repeated patiently. “Because I have a little trick up my sleeve. But it has to be your personal email, not the company one.”
“Cdotyoungatgmaildotcom. Spell out ‘dot’.”
“Do you use a desktop or a laptop at home?”
“Both, actually. A desktop in the guest bedroom which is my study and a laptop in the bedroom. We’re not allowed to take our work laptops home. For security reasons.” She steamed at the thought of Baring enforcing that rule while waltzing into her own home.
