“Like fucking hell we will.” Ace balled his fists as if he could fight a virtual enemy the way he did the physical ones that often surrounded them.
“I wanted to be sure about what I was seeing before I brought this up to Jordan or JRad. It happened so fast.” Ruby pinched the bridge of her nose as her security protocols seemed to engage and her mouse steadied. She’d never been so disturbed in her entire life.
“What did you uncover?” Liam wondered.
“This shouldn’t be possible,” Ruby muttered below her breath as she did as much damage-control as possible, disconnecting the rest of the Shields’ servers and isolating her workstation from the rest of the network. Still, she couldn’t help but probe deeper in case all traces of what she’d seen vanished. Which was when she realized it wasn’t one independent fluke. There was a systematic change taking place across multiple blocks in the chain. “Someone is scamming the system. These aren’t real sequences. It’s like they’re printing fake money. Billions and billions of dollars’ worth. If this came out, it would undermine every cryptocurrency and the entire market could collapse. It would be a global disaster.”
She’d barely choked out the confession when the hackers attacking the system breached her temporary reinforcements. They were back, taking control of her computer once more.
Ruby’s spine went ramrod straight and a zing of electricity traveled through her.
An animated mask appeared across all twelve of her monitors, speaking in an eerie, distorted voice. “You’re going to leave now. And consider yourself lucky that all we’ve taken for bothering us is your life savings. Next, we come for you. Don’t think those assholes you work with can protect you either. We see everything. We know everything. And we’ll be watching you even more closely now.”
After displaying her crypto wallet with a zero balance, the screen went black. Her processor overclocked and acrid wisps rose from the fried equipment, threatening to set off their smoke detectors.
Ruby recoiled, drawing her feet onto the seat of her gaming chair. Unable to hold the weight of her throbbing head, her neck bowed until her forehead met her knees. She buried her face in the gap between her thighs and her chest as if that could hide the fact that she was sobbing from Liam or Ace.
“Enough!” Liam scooped her from the chair and bundled her in his mammoth arms, crushing her to his chest as if he could do one damn thing to protect her. To defend all of them, now that she’d drawn the wrath of whoever-the-fuck was powerful enough and evil enough to do what she’d witnessed.
“Where are we going?” Ace flanked them instinctively, watching their backs as Liam carried her toward the elevators.
“Upstairs. Our place.” Liam barked. “Notify Jordan. Get him to lock this place down.”
Ace had his phone out and was talking to their boss in a matter of moments. “We’ve got a problem. Code Red. Gather the team at our place. It’s not safe to talk in the command center. Bring your weapons.”
Ruby clutched Liam’s shoulders as they rose in the elevator to their floor. She wished the ringing alarms, the slam of the metal shutters over all their exterior windows, and the unconventional army assembling in the hallways would be of any use against the kind of enemy they’d never faced before.
This time brawn wasn’t going to cut it. They needed brains. And quick.