Third Hour

by Lisa Phillips

  “Mason?”

  Victoria shushed her. She leaned over to see. “Hit screen record.”

  “Hello?” Talia couldn’t hear anything, but the video was live. Who was on the other end? “What’s going on?”

  A man spoke, his face never coming into view. She stared at Mason’s bloody face, his head tipped to the side—out cold, while the man told her what he wanted.

  . . .

  Mason’s head felt like it was about to explode. He could hear the guy talking. Could make out a tall dark figure in front of him through the blur. Lord, don’t let there be permanent damage.

  “…access.”

  He heard a few more words but couldn’t make sense of them. He’d walked into his kitchen and been attacked. Now? Mason tried to move. His arms were tied to the chair, behind his hips, one on each side of his body. His feet felt like they’d been tied as well.

  A moan escaped his lips.

  The man looked over. Mason heard, “…or he dies.”

  Then the guy touched the screen of the phone or whatever it was he held in his hand. He walked over and moved so his face was right in Mason’s. No problem focusing now.

  “You.” It was him, the bank robber.

  The man chuckled.

  “Sarah Palmer.”

  “That’s what you wanna talk about?” The man moved behind him and snipped the ties holding Mason’s arms to the sides of the chair.

  Finding his hands suddenly free, Mason pulled them to the front. A sharp pain at his neck stopped him.

  The man said, “Easy, or you overdose like that secretary did.”

  “She was an executive assistant.” Why that came out of his mouth at a time like this, Mason wasn’t sure. There was so much roiling through him. Anxiety. Fear. He wasn’t sure what to do with it all, so he was talking nonsense.

  This was about Talia, wasn’t it? She’d been targeted. He’d been worried she would continue to be targeted, but it turned out it was him that was the weak link in all this. The one who became the victim of whoever this guy was.

  The man tied his hands together in front, then cut Mason’s feet free.

  “We’re going somewhere?” His head was a little clearer now, but not much. He was still at home.

  “Walk.” He hauled Mason to his feet.

  “So you can kill me elsewhere?”

  “I could kill you right now. Doesn’t make much difference to me, she’ll still access the Secret Service’s computer system and get what’s needed.”

  “So I’m leverage?” He wasn’t sure if that was better, or worse, than being the weak link. His brain couldn’t quite process the whole thing well enough to figure out an answer. What he needed to do was make a plan to get free from this guy.

  The man pulled a gun. He pointed it at Mason, out of reach. Mason would get shot if he even tried to fight the guy. “Walk. Fast.”

  Mason took two steps down the hallway. Whatever happened, Rayna would be told he’d died. That thought almost gave him the will to ignore the risk and bat away that gun with his bound hands, before he then launched himself at the guy. His reactions were way too slow though. He’d get shot just for trying.

  The gun jabbed in his back. Mason was walked to his own car, and the bank robber said, “Pop the back open.”

  It was an SUV. His SUV. Mason grabbed the handle on the back door and pulled it open. Was he going to get shot in his own car? “Why are you doing this to Talia?”

  The man smirked. “You think I’m going to tell you?” He paused for half a second. “Get in.” He leaned close. “Now.”

  They were in a hurry? That meant the longer he could stall this guy, the greater the chance of rescue…or getting shot. Or taken as a hostage.

  Mason sat on the back bumper and started to scoot back using his hips. He held up his hands in front of him, as though being bound made the rest of him basically useless. He could play it like he wasn’t thinking straight. “Give me a second.”

  “In a second you’re gonna be dead.”

  “Then tell me what you want with Talia.” His thoughts were clearing now.

  But the gunman didn’t say anything. He lifted that weapon and aimed it at Mason’s chest. No. Rayna. Talia. Yes, in that split second he thought of those two women. His daughter, and a lady he’d met only today. One he’d wanted to help, and get to know better.

  Mason sucked in a breath as those thoughts raced through his head.

  The bank robber pulled the trigger.

  A flash exploded in front of his face and Mason fell back inside his SUV.

  The door slammed shut.

  . . .

  “Get out of my way!” Talia screamed in their faces.

  Two Secret Service agents blocked her. One younger, maybe a rookie, the other middle aged—guys working late on their case. And neither wanted to let her through. Well, they might have guns, but she had attitude.

  “He’ll be dead before we get there!” She screamed the words in their faces. Appealing to their concern for a fellow agent could work. Assuming they looked past her being up in their space.

  The younger one flinched, but neither moved.

  “Ms. Matrice.” Stanton kept calling her that. She wasn’t sure he actually had anything to say. Maybe he would just keep saying that until Mason was dead. He stood behind her. If he touched her, they would learn what crazy looked like. Mason had been kidnapped. Tied to a chair. If she didn’t do something, that bank robber was going to kill him. Didn’t they understand that?

  “Talia.” Victoria’s voice was all schoolmarm. “Take a step back.”

  She swung around to face her boss. Before she could scream something else at all of them, Victoria lifted one finger. “No.”

  Talia closed her mouth. Then she took a breath. “He’s going to die.”

  They’d had to tell the Secret Service about the video. No other choice on that part. But the fact she was part of the bargain to save his life? No.

  A man had beaten and tied up Mason. That was the priority here. Life.

  So they hadn’t told the Secret Service why Mason was targeted. Neither had they told them why she’d been the one who received the video. Their focus had to be Mason. Hers was going to be damage control.

  But if it saved a man’s life, who cared?

  “Your job right now is to get that hacker out of my system,” Stanton told her.

  Oh, so now he needed her help? She was mad, but that actually helped her sound more convincing. Not like she was purposely stalling. “Is it more important than someone’s life?”

  “It is equally as much of a threat.” Stanton folded his arms. “Unless you’re prepared for the firestorm that will come after I file a report that says you did nothing about a breach in my system.”

  Talia hadn’t exactly done nothing, considering she was the one who’d let the hacker in the system in the first place.

  It was that, or let Mason die.

  “I need to be there. To make sure he’s okay.” She sounded as scared as she felt. So at least she was being honest. Still, they were right that she had to get the bank robber out of their system. Or help their techs do exactly that.

  She had to get the timing right, though. Allow him enough time in their system to do what he wanted, while also getting the agents to go to Mason as quickly as possible. As in, before the bank robber could kill him.

  “Alvarez is at Mason’s house.” Victoria looked up from her phone. “He’ll get Mason back in one piece.”

  A sick feeling rolled through her stomach like the rinse cycle. Even though she was in the middle of a huddle of four people, their closeness didn’t help. Maybe even made it worse.

  Victoria’s expression didn’t change. “Right now they need your help.”

  This was what they had to do…she had to stall to give the bank robber enough time. No matter that it felt like betrayal, it was the best play they could come up with. Fast enough to actually give them a shot at minimizing his access and getting Mason back.


  “Talia.”

  She’d let him into their system, and now she had to get him out. This was how they’d arranged it. She lifted her chin. “Fine.”

  Just like the bank. Would she end up like Sarah Palmer, dead in her bathroom?

  It had to look like she was a disgruntled employee. Victoria had been right there and heard every word of the threat against Mason’s life—every word of what Talia was supposed to do for the hacker. About how she was supposed to get him access to the Secret Service’s network, a secure, unhackable system. He hadn’t said anything about her not keeping tabs on everything he did.

  Now the Secret Service had to believe Victoria was the one who could keep Talia in check. That the director was their ally with the team. It was a delicate balance, a power play Talia didn’t like, but to be honest—everything was about politics. Even the federal government was about who you had on your side, bringing the weight of their influence to the table.

  She walked back to where her tablet sat on the conference table. Checked to make sure it was still recording the path he took through their system.

  “We need him out of there.” Stanton stood behind her, though she didn’t think he spoke to her this time. It appeared the whole group had followed her back to the conference room.

  She held her tablet to her front and squeezed through them, not willing to make eye contact even with Victoria as she moved out of the room. She wanted to know Mason was all right.

  She wanted to know she hadn’t just let a hacker into a secure federal network for no reason.

  Victoria hadn’t even batted an eye about essentially negotiating with a terrorist, or giving in to their demands. Not when a life was at stake. They were on the same page about that, at least. She’d told Talia to do it on the way to the door, where she’d yelled for Welvern. And then she’d sent him to go get Mason.

  Alvarez was there.

  The team was on their way.

  Talia got to the closest computer and sat down. She bypassed the whole login screen and went straight to the command window.

  Lines of green text scrolled up the screen.

  Talia typed. She pushed away all the worry and fear and looked for a brute force way to simply eject him from the system.

  He’d bested her before.

  Don’t think about that right now.

  Victoria’s phone rang. Her voice was quiet when she said, “Bramlyn.” A pause, then she sighed. “Copy that. Keep me posted.”

  Talia turned, her hands still tapping keys. She could go for a short time not looking, but eventually she’d mistype something.

  Victoria saw her. “Alvarez got to the house. Mason was held there, but he’s gone now. So is his SUV.”

  Assistant Director Stanton pulled out his phone. “This is an abduction. I’ll have to notify the FBI.”

  “Welvern probably already called them.”

  “Still…” Stanton stepped away, on his phone.

  “Get him out, Talia.”

  She turned back to the computer. “I’m trying.”

  Where was Mason?

  Chapter 10

  Up in the computer lab it took an hour for Talia to manage to evict him from their system. A hard shutdown that was unavoidable. They’d rebooted their entire network and, as it had come back up, she uploaded a program that denied him access. But was it too much, or not enough? She could have used a different method. Would it have worked better? They were on the clock. If he’d gotten what he wanted from the Secret Service’s system, did that mean he was now going to have Mason killed?

  She couldn’t help doubting herself.

  Talia didn’t know if the abductor was the hacker or not. She did know he was the bank robber. She’d heard his voice and saw his face on the video.

  Her fingers drifted toward her tablet. She pulled her arm back. Watching that video again wasn’t going to do her any good. She needed to focus on their network.

  She leaned back in the chair and watched the network scan, reading the results as they filtered down the page. There were a couple of spots where they could use help closing a vulnerable part of their system. She’d include that in the final report, and their techs could do the work to implement her suggestions. Or they wouldn’t. As hot as everyone was on data security these days, some people just didn’t want to know. Or they couldn’t be bothered to do the work to make things as secure as possible.

  The government should be on the cutting edge. But the truth was, every time a private party invented some new technology or way of doing something, it put the government behind the curve. Always playing catch up.

  “Did it work?”

  She spun to Stanton. “Any word on Mason?”

  He shook his head, standing straight. “Your friend Alvarez is heading the search along with Assistant Director Welvern. They say it won’t take long.”

  “You were right to defer to him.” She had total faith in her teammate. “He’s the best.”

  Stanton didn’t nod. “And the network?”

  “We should know soon enough what he looked at.”

  They’d told the Secret Service that the threat on Mason was a different occurrence than the network breach. Not the truth—that her enemy had leveraged Mason’s life on her giving him access from the inside.

  As far as the Secret Service was concerned, there were two problems in the pipeline right now. That was the truth. They just didn’t know it was Talia who connected them.

  Later, when they knew all of it, she would have to answer to them. As would Victoria. It occurred to her that Victoria could hand her over. Feed her to the wolves, as it were. Talia had reasons why that wouldn’t surprise her, even if the betrayal would sting.

  “Keep me posted.”

  She nodded, and Stanton strode out. He’d done flybys every half hour or so. That was the fourth one she’d endured, as though she wouldn’t alert him right away if they discovered precisely what the hacker had looked at.

  Talia went back to her tablet and took a look at the program she’d set in motion after the hacker entered the system. Sure, the Secret Service network techs were looking at the same information. It would take them hours to comb through it, and they had to get everything else back up and running fully first.

  Her phone buzzed. The sudden noise made her jump, and she almost dropped the tablet. With shaky fingers, she lifted the phone and turned it face up. Then pushed out an exhale. Just her mom.

  Couldn’t sleep. Was urged to pray for you.

  Talia sent a text back.

  Pray for Mason.

  Her mom’s reply came almost as quickly. She was going to pray for both of them, despite having no clue who Mason was. Talia probably should pray as well.

  Why hadn’t she done that right away when the video came in? Then she might’ve gotten a better idea of what to do that didn’t include allowing a hacker into the system. At the time, she hadn’t been able to figure out a way to save Mason’s life. Other than supervising everything the hacker did, and then kicking him out at the first opportunity.

  She scrolled through lines of text on her tablet and fought back tears. Maybe she should just quit her job. Her whole life, even. Get offline, permanently. Too bad this was what she was good at. Too bad the hacker had poisoned everything good in her life—even this. Her work had meant everything to her, and now she didn’t even want to do it because he’d twisted it into something horrible.

  Mason’s life.

  Those girls.

  The one who’d died. Whose identity her friends at the NSA were still attempting to discover.

  Talia swiped a tear from her cheek. The FBI saved the rest when Victoria had saved her. The hacker had tried to sell her, but he hadn’t succeeded. All those middle men had been rounded up. Maybe shot, probably just put in jail though. Shame. People who did that deserved to have the full weight of justice brought down upon them.

  Now this? Mason’s life was in danger. A man with a daughter.

  The thought of
the hacker doing to Mason’s daughter what he’d done to Talia made her want to vomit into the trash can under the desk. She tossed the tablet on the desktop. Reading right now was pointless. She wanted to know Mason was all right.

  “I got something!”

  She turned to see a man with Indian coloring wearing a white lab coat rush over, face flushed.

  “What is it?”

  “I know what he accessed.”

  The half dozen people in the room all stopped what they were doing. She walked with the group to the middle of the lab, where a computer screen stretched across the desktop.

  Talia waved at the screen. “Do you mind?”

  His eyes widened. “It would be my honor.”

  Talia wasn’t sure she would go that far. “Thanks.” She swiped through his results. “You’re right. You did find what he looked at.”

  He beamed.

  It was a classified file.

  “Do any of you have the clearance to get into this folder?”

  They all shook their heads. Talia got her phone, so she could call Stanton back down. He likely had the password to access this file folder. Then they would know what the hacker had looked at.

  Before she’d found his contact, the door whooshed open and Victoria strode in. “Alvarez got him.”

  Talia almost sagged to the floor. Mason was all right. The fear squeezing the life from her loosened and left her with no equilibrium. She knew what to do with terror choking her. Without it, there was nothing to hold onto. She grabbed her tablet, phone, and purse. “I’m coming with you. I want to see him.”

  “But—”

  Talia motioned to all the Secret Service network techs. “These very capable people can hold down the fort here.”

  They all shifted, like a flock of birds fluffing their feathers. Talia strode as fast as she could to the door.

  She wanted to see Mason for herself. If he was hurt, then all this would have been for nothing.

  Again.

  . . .