Ezra had done an enormous heist years ago, when banks were just switching to the digital age. He said that SSL was total shit, whatever that meant. Ezra had more than enough money, but he did a few jobs once in a while...if he was interested enough.
"You want to hack into the FBI?"
"Yup. I got a card."
Andreas winced just a little when he saw Ezra's eyes light up. He recognized that he was basically taunting a cocaine addict with a hit. Ezra was a hacker who was mostly retired, but it was his core. Ezra loved the game.
Andreas would have to keep an eye on the card if he didn't want Ezra to accidentally swipe it. It wasn't that he didn't trust him, exactly, but the ID was Mr. Kaine's. If it ended up in the wrong hand, it could definitely cause him some unnecessary problems.
"I'll leave you to do your work."
Ezra ignored him and typed quickly into his computer. Andreas looked at the keys. They weren't in the standard QWERTY layout, either. What was it with hackers and weird keyboards? Did they build them themselves?
Andreas went to the counter of Chip's. He saw a little blackboard near the register.
"You offer hazelnut, vanilla, caramel, and mocha syrups now?"
"Yup. Fifty cents extra for a flavor shot."
"How about two cups of coffee? One vanilla and the other caramel. That should be enough." Andreas handed over a Chip's gift card, which was basically Monopoly money. When he remembered to use it, the Agency covered his coffee. If he got caught up in the lie that Chip's was actually a coffee shop, then he'd actually pay, but the cost of coffee was negligible considering the kind of contracts he did.
The barista poured out two cups of coffee and pumped a flavor shot into each one. He put on cup covers and coffee collars.
"Here you are."
Andreas held both of them in his hands and brought them back to the table where Ezra was waiting.
"They have flavor shots now."
"I don't want Chip's coffee. I've had it before."
Andreas smiled. Anybody who'd been here and had even one sip would know better than to try it out again.
Andreas drank slowly from the two cups while he waited for Ezra to do his thing. The sugar did masked some of the burnt bitterness that characterized Chip's coffee. Apparently, the Agency sourced fair trade coffee which was roasted and ground somewhere in Africa. He was glad that they cared enough to handle it, but the coffee was also extremely foul. He drank coffee black, which meant that he would always taste the coffee exactly as it was: bitter swill.
He looked at his watch. Harold had been in their hands for too long already.
He hoped that Harold would hold on. He would be there as fast as he could possibly get there. He had a promise to keep.
Ezra turned his computer around.
"We're in. You need to move now before the next system sweep catches us in TS files."
Andreas didn't know much about government acronyms. "TS?"
Ezra rolled his eyes. "Top secret. Don't you watch movies?"
Andreas shook his head. "Nope."
"Speed it up. You don't have much time. The window is pretty small here."
Andreas clicked and typed his away around the files concerning the engineering company, the bank in the Caymans, anything he could find about Odhran Garin, and everything else. He used his phone to take pictures of the computer screen. He knew that Ezra had opened up a remote connection to the computers at the FBI, so he couldn't take any files and save them. He didn't have time to learn how to do it without having the FBI knocking on their door, anyway. Finally, he'd gone through everything that he could think of.
"I'm done. You're good."
Andreas watched as Ezra turned the computer back and began to type at a rapid-fire pace. It seemed that Ezra had been waiting for a chance to hack the FBI's files for a while; he knew what he was doing in there. Ezra had pushed him to get a little more time, but Ezra also knew about the security measures that the FBI used, which meant that he'd done his own recon before getting this job.
Andreas drank the slightly improved version of Chip's coffee while he flipped through the photos on his phone, scanning documents as he waited for Ezra to finish up and give back the card.
Finally, Ezra clicked something and closed his computer.
"That's it. Right now is the next sweep. They'll catch any connections are open right now."
"Card, please."
Ezra pulled the security card out of the computer and handed it to Andreas. "Do you have any idea how much something like that would cost on the open market? Enough to set you up for life."
"Not worth it," Andreas said. "Thanks for coming by."
"Thanks for the chance, man. Nothing to get your blood pumping like getting a sneak peek behind closed doors. I could FOIA all this, but it includes detailed security checks..."
"And nobody wants those."
"Right."
He slapped Ezra's shoulder. "Gotta go."
36
Codes
Andreas
Andreas tossed the slightly less foul coffee into the trashcans by the door. He needed to go back to Chung's. He got into his car and drove back, his mind racing. He needed a second opinion on what he'd found.
Finally, he was back at Chung's. He parked and went inside.
Chung was cutting flank steak into small cubes.
"Need your eyes," Andreas said.
"Oye, Federico," he called to one of his kitchen staff. He pointed at the meat and Federico picked up the knife and finished up the job.
Chung wiped his hands on a blue towel. ”How can I help you?"
"I want you to look over what I found when I got into the database."
"Sounds good. Let's go to my office." Chung threw the towel over his shoulder. He was dressed in a chef's whites, which were a nice shade of grey. You could tell the difference between novices and professionals at a glance. Real chefs got a little dirty.
The two men walked into Chung's office.
"Now, what do you have?"
"I have some images from things that I found when I reached into the Bureau's information."
"Illegal."
"Do I look like I give a fuck?" Andreas took in a deep breath. "Sorry, man. I'm just on edge."
"Let me take a look." Chung ignored Andreas' outburst like it hadn't happened at all. He took the phone from Andreas' hand. He sat back in his chair and frowned as he flicked through all of the images.
Andreas fought the urge to squirm in his seat. Every moment that it took him to figure out how to get Mr. Kaine out of there was a moment when Mr. Kaine would be tortured or worse.
"There's a lot of redacted stuff."
"I'm aware, yeah. I looked through it already."
"So, the FBI recovered this weapon and confiscated it, then they moved it around."
"It didn't just sit in an evidence warehouse. I think that they understood just how potentially damaging it could be in the hands of terrorists."
"There are some codes here."
Andreas had only scanned the documents. "Codes? What kind of codes?"
"The fibbies got access to Odhran's surveillance system a long time ago."
"Yeah? Do we know if they're still active?"
"They might be." Chung squinted at the image. He zoomed in on the document. "Well, it looks like this document was updated by some agent just a month ago, so these codes should still be valid."
Andreas smiled for the first time since he'd left Chip's.
"Good to know. That's very helpful."
"The system in question has a remote access feature."
"If they're smart, they would have turned it off."
"Not all criminals are very smart."
"Some are." They shared a grin.
"Some aren't." Chung tapped around on his computer. "He didn't close it off."
"Seriously?"
"Yeah, I just got in." Chung swung the monitor sideways so that both he and Andreas could see it.
"Nobody
's at home."
Chung went through all of the cameras, but there wasn't motion on any of them.
"I'll look through your documents again to see if there could be more surveillance codes, maybe another system."
Chung's face had a look of intense concentration as he looked through the documents on Andreas' phone. Andreas could read at a normal speed, but Chung's ability to scan information and process it very quickly put him to shame.
"There aren't any more."
Andreas felt his smile melt away.
"What am I going to tell my wife?"
"Don't tell her anything yet. We'll keep looking. There has to be a way that we can extract him."
Andreas didn't want to ask, but he had to say, "What if he's already dead?"
"That old man is as tough as nails. He wouldn't give up that easily. Odhran really wants that weapon; I don't think that he'd kill his only connection to it."
Andreas got to his feet. He didn't want to be cooped up in Chung's office anymore. "Your sister is still with Phoebe?"
"Yup."
"I'm going to head over and check on her."
"I'm going to pull the images from your phone and put them on my computer so that I can take a closer look."
"Thanks, man."
Andreas gave a nod to Chung before walking out the door and finding Phoebe in the cozy room where he had left her. She was sitting in a lounge chair with a cup of steaming tea, wrapped up in a soft pink blanket while watching a movie.
She had a look on her face that said that she wasn't paying too much attention to what was going on.
He felt like a failure for not keeping his promise to her, though it wasn't from a lack of trying. He wanted to walk in and take her into his arms, but he didn't want to disturb the moment of peace that they had carved out for themselves.
He backed out of the room without talking to his wife and went back to Chung's office. Maybe Chung could see another way of making progress through a different locations. Andreas would take anything at this point.
When he walked into Chung's office, Chung was still looking through the documents.
"Any luck?"
"Not yet."
Andreas whipped out his phone and went through the images another time. He was missing something. Maybe there was something there that would help them get Harold Kaine back, safe and sound.
Odhran owned a number of companies which were fronts for his criminal empire under a number of names, but he needed to find the most probable spot to stash Harold Kaine. Andreas got the impression that they weren't holding him where they'd held Phoebe. Phoebe didn't require maximum security. He loved her, and she was a smart woman, but she wasn't trained to resist cages.
Harold Kaine was. They'd probably buried him so far underground that it would be nearly impossible to find and rescue him.
37
Calling Home
Phoebe
Phoebe wasn't paying attention to the movie, but she noticed when Atana got to her feet.
"I feel a little bit cramped. I'm going to go hang out in the kitchen. You okay here by yourself?"
"Yeah." Phoebe appreciated Atana's company. "I'm fine."
"Be back in a bit."
Phoebe nodded and then watched her leave.
Phoebe pulled her phone out of her pocket. She needed to find the courage to call her mother. She hadn't done it yet, not wanting to tell her what exactly had happened to her father.
But what if something really bad happened? Her mother would never forgive her for keeping her in the dark, even if they were powerless. Her heart pounded as she tapped on her mother's contact info.
Ring. Ring. Ring.
Phoebe's shoulders relaxed when the machine picked up. She was much more relieved than she should be. She hung up. She knew better than to leave a message for her mother; she listened to them once a year, if that.
There had been some nights when Phoebe grew up when her father didn't come home at night, and Sally Kaine would cry herself to sleep on those nights. They both knew that her father took all the precautions he could, but he faced off with dangerous criminals all the time. There could easily be a day when he didn't come home for good.
That day could be today. Phoebe wasn't looking forward to telling her mother that she had left her father to be beaten, tortured, and possibly killed. She didnt' imagine that the conversation would go particularly well.
Maybe Andreas would find him and save him. He said that he would. He also said not to lose faith in him.
Faith. Trust. Those were two things that were part of the foundation of any good marriage. He had broken hers when he'd hidden so much of himself away. She didn't even know what his job was, only that it involved guns and fake passports.
She was warm enough to fall asleep. Her pregnancy was making her sleep what felt like a hundred hours a week.
38
Lips
Andreas
Andreas stepped into the room to check on Phoebe. She was curled up in a little ball in the lounge chair that she'd been sitting in when he checked on her before. He clenched his inner muscles to walk quietly into the room. He traced the beautiful curve of her lips, her lush inky lashes touching her cheeks. The center of his chest ached while he watched her. She was his wife.
She had pushed him away as if he were some kind of stranger. She was loyal, he knew that, but he had deceived her for a long time. She never would have married him if she had known the truth. She would've run away like she did when she found his box of passports, money, and everything else that went along with his career.
He hadn't wanted her to find out that way. He had planned on telling her...maybe at some point in the distant future, when it was necessary, maybe after Mr. Kaine accepted him into the family.
It was one of the hazards of his job. He couldn't exactly meet her in that little coffee shop and tell her, "Hey, I'm a mercenary!" That's not how it worked. Everything was on a need-to-know basis, and Phoebe hadn't needed to know.
Until she did and she left because she'd found everything on her own. He was a fool for not covering his tracks better. It was convenient but stupid to keep his safe room in his own home. He should've rented a nondescript room or apartment somewhere else. He honestly didn't know what he would do if he lost Phoebe permanently. When she'd been kidnapped, he felt as if his heart were ripped from his chest and there'd been a big gaping hole left right in his center.
But when he had saved her, she'd fought him and hated him. And now she was staying here in Chung's, where she was safe.
Where would she go when the worst of the danger passed? She couldn't stay here forever. She could stay here for a long time, it was true. They had showers and everything. But eventually she'd want to leave.
Would she leave him for a second time? Harold Kaine was more than capable of keeping her safe from now on. Andreas knew that he didn't need to worry about that much.
He needed her. He'd never admitted it to himself, but she was the core of his being. She kept him on an even keel. Without her in his life, he knew that he was a stone-cold killer and not much more. He had planned for the short and medium term, but he hadn't had a long-term future before he met the beautiful woman who had changed his entire life.
It was funny that it wasn't his life that endangered hers; it had been her father's work that had inspired Phoebe's kidnapping. Nonetheless, Andreas knew that Harold Kaine was counting on him to keep his daughter safe, and Andreas would do the best he could to first get Mr. Kaine out of Odhran's hands and later keep Phoebe safe.
He pulled the blanket a little upwards to cover Phoebe a little better. She shifted in her sleep. Andreas had to turn away before he did something stupid and stole a kiss from his wife. He missed her.
Checking his watch, he walked out of the room. Chung might have more information now.
He walked into Chung's office.
"Anything?"
Chung just shook his head. Andreas gritted his teeth.
"Gonna g
o to the gym."
"I'll hit you if anything comes up."
Andreas went to the gym to hit the punching bags. He had a clock ticking in the back of his mind for all of this. He was out of resources. He had tried everything that he had. He was fighting to keep his hope alive, but it was a losing battle. He wondered what the conversation with Phoebe would be like if Odhran killed Mr. Kaine. She would definitely leave him then. Andreas had always been at the top of his field with the Agency. He could always find a way, even if the hit was on someone who had seemingly impenetrable defenses. He took to his training like a duck to water when he'd first started, getting good marksmanship scores the first time that he tried shooting.
Why was he messing up now?
Emotions.
He'd never had a case before that directly involved the love of his life. He had never had his cover blown. He had never had all of his fake identities discovered before.
But he wasn't fake. He punched the bag, relishing the thud and the swing of the bag, which nearly hit the ceiling.
He had been a mercenary before he ever met her, but he regretted making that decision. There was no way that he could turn back from the life that he’d chosen; it was an irreversible choice because of the contractual clauses.
Shit.
He didn’t want Phoebe to hate him. She meant too much for him to just walk away now that she knew the truth. He had to make her understand why he’d done what he did. He never meant to make a fool of her; it was the exact opposite of his intentions. He wanted to put together a foundation for them to have a little family, the kind of family he’d never had as an orphan.
He had another job after this one, but after that…he could leave this life behind.
If she would just stay married to him.
39
Crying
Andreas
Andreas took a very quick shower and used some of the clothes that he stashed at Chung’s. He went upstairs to check on his wife again.
The Hitman's Pregnant Bride: A Baby Romance Page 9
