Page 54 of Perfect Order
“Life sucks. Beg hard,” I tell Sam right before I hang up, and an insidious thought pops into my head.What if whomever killed Kylie wasn’t after her but after Leanne?Pulling out my sat phone, I send that quickly to Caleb.
Seconds later, it rings. “Talk.”
I repeat to him the information Sam told me. “Caleb, you know as well as I do that means government contracts. That means domestic and international terrorists. That means—”
“You’re doing your job,” he cuts me off quietly. “Leanne has had us so focused on her sister’s life, spouting off about things that were hidden from the press about Kylie, we’ve barely had the chance to skim the surface about her own past. And trust me, I’m not a fool. I’m well aware of the mind in that woman. There’s way more there than what she presents to the world than a former world-class hacker turned government contractor. The question is, how did you connect A to Z so fast?”
I inform him with great relish, “She hacked Hudson last night.”
His frustration is palpable. “Again? What did she access this time?”
“How the hell am I supposed to know? Iknowshe sent me an email from an address that didn’t read an external sender.” The cursing on the other end of the line would be amusing if I didn’t have to admit, “She sent me pictures of her and her sister. At first I thought it was because she was telling me I was a jackass.” I leave off the rest of the email about which I’ll discuss with Leanne when our day of reckoning comes. I have to find out how she knows about Gene, but that’s between me and her.
“You are a jackass, but you’re one that might save her life,” Caleb candidly agrees.
“Thanks,” I grumble.
“Let me call Carys. We’re going to have to refocus the investigation entirely. I was getting ready to tell her we’d hit a brick wall, but you might have just shone a new light on this.” He hangs up.
I pull up the email once Caleb hangs up, and I reread the words Leanne sent me for the millionth time.I hope you know, that you believe down to your soul, there was likely nothing you could do to have changed the outcome of his death. You made the only call you could.
And more than any words of comfort my family has tried to drill into me, than fellow soldiers, her short message causes the first pinprick in the bubble of guilt I’ve been living with since I had to pull the trigger to stop my childhood friend from selling military secrets in the war-torn mountains of Azerbaijan after he’d shot and killed two other members of our unit. “For more money than you can wrap your mind around. It will set me, Brit, and Maddie up for life.” Gene tried to convince me as his hand held the small drive containing the specs of our warfighter out to the foreign agent.
That’s when I heard the snap of the twig behind me. And without hesitation, Gene lifted his service revolver from where it was resting at his thigh and pulled the trigger twice. It wasn’t until after I pulled the trigger once, twice, ensuring the operative dropped, that I whirled around to see Adams had hit the ground. Right next to him lay Baldy. I whirled back to find Gene’s barrel trained directly on my head.
A perfect shot. A kill shot.
One to be delivered by my best friend because of fucking money. Greed—inexhaustible in its need to be satisfied, including the need to be fed by blood and tears. Gene certainly had both of mine to pay the price for his deeds. My finger was just a little bit faster, but I damn well know he would have pulled the trigger to have ended my life. The wetness on my cheeks mingled with the blood that flowed down his face as I cradled his limp body in the wet snow until a chopper arrived to evacuate us all. And inside, I felt as dead as the three other bodies surrounding me.
That is until I bumped into the woman I assumed was Kylie Miles on the street.
Now, as I clutch my phone in my hand, the words of a practical stranger send a strange ripple of peace through me. The dam I’ve kept around my heart bursts, and I feel a geyser of emotion rush back so fast I’m worried I might drown. As the painful pounding settles down, an insidious thought works its way into my mind.
Was it Kylie I crashed into that long-ago afternoon I was following Beckett in those early days from Carys’s office?
Or was it Leanne?
JANUARY
Kane
Saratoga Springs, N.Y.Cybersecurity attacks can happen anywhere! Even e-readers can be hacked by just opening a single e-book infected with malicious content, according to research published at Defcon. #defcon29
— Castor Newsroom
A few days later, we’ve flown back to New York amid a million and one protests from Beckett. I’ve never been so grateful to have dumped him with Mitch so I can get some peace and quiet in the office, poring over paperwork just so I can escape from Beckett’s persistent black mood.
Once I’ve completed the normal assortment of reports, expenses, and documentation of Beckett’s antics, I begin tackling some of the legwork Caleb assigned to me regarding Leanne Miles. Since this work is still code worded, Caleb had Sam grant me access to Keene’s office on the executive floor while he works from our Norwalk office.
It’s well after hours, so no one is around to disturb me while I dive into Leanne Miles’s business ventures. I’m recovering from the shock that anyone her age could have built an empire so complex as I keep running into dead ends, shell corporations, and enough government contracts that make me grateful that someone else handled all this nonsense when I was in the military.
I’m in the middle of reviewing a contract between Castor and a friendly government when a message from an unknown sender pops up on my screen.Contracts are so boring. That one was particularly more awful than most others to negotiate. Don’t you have anything better to do with your time, Kane?
Heart pounding, my gut tells me this is Leanne. I bank everything on being right and type back,Aren’t you supposed to be practicing things—like learning to sing?
It’s not the singing part that’s the problem. We’ve been able to do that since we could talk. It’s the part where I have to do so in front of an audience of people who believe I’mher.
Bingo.I focus on the small text box, and my fingers tap out to trust but verify,How do I know this is you?
