Page 106 of Moonlighter
“I know. But that’s why I snuck in here to do this. ‘Cause I was saving that one up. And you haven’t fired me.”
“Yet,” she laughs. “But it’s early in the day.”
“True.”
We’re both smiling at each other like crazy people when I hear a knock on the door.
Alex looks down at her bathrobe. “Can you get that? I need real clothes.”
“Sure.” I’m still in my boxers, but as usual I don’t give a crap. So we part ways, and I walk to the front door and open it.
My brother blinks back at me with a sour expression. “Seriously? Again?”
I shrug. “Is there something you need?”
“I need Alex.” He holds up her phone—the one that was hacked yesterday. “She and I need to talk.”
28
Alex
Even if Eric Bayerhas just treated me to a twelve-hour break from reality, his brother’s appearance does the opposite. First, he searches my apartment for a second time just to make sure there aren’t any bugs or other detection devices.
That alone is enough to freak me out. But now he wants to talk.
After I make myself presentable, I sit down on the sofa beside Eric, who reaches for my knee to give it a comforting squeeze. “What did you learn?” I ask.
“First things first.” Max sets a shiny K-Tech phone down on the table.
I eye it the same way you’d watch a venomous snake. “Is that mine?”
“It is now. It’s a new one, Alex. Nate’s team didn’t have time to entirely reverse engineer the hack. So—just to be safe—Nate kept your old one and sent you this one. The passcode is 911, but you should change it immediately.”
“Thanks.” I take the phone with a sigh. “I want to catch this asshole.”
“Trust me, we will. And there’s some good news, okay? Nate’s operating system has some unadvertised security functions. And when the hacking software began copying all your files, it got spooked and locked the phone.”
“Wait. I thought thehackerlocked me out.”
Max shakes his head. “No, that was a safety mechanism. These guys only got about twenty percent of the data on your phone.”
My heart leaps. “Do we knowwhichtwenty percent?”
“Mostly recent emails from your ECM account.”
I groan.
“But no texts were compromised before the shutdown,” Max says. “So that’s something.”
“Who did this, Max? Could it be Jared Tatum?”
“We’ll rule him out today,” Max says. “But my suspicions lie in another direction.” He sits back in his chair, absently tapping one knee. “I’m working on an espionage theory.”
“Oh goody. How much danger am I in?” My hand is already rubbing my belly. I’m already apologizing to my baby and she isn’t even here yet.
“The good news is that nobody wants you dead. Probably.”
“Max,” barks Eric as a chill runs through me.
