Exploited (Zero Day #1)

by A. Meredith Walters

  Not anymore.

  “No, Mason. Not later in the week.”

  I could barely breathe.

  I couldn’t do this.

  I needed him.

  He needed me.

  That was the problem.

  “What’s wrong? Is Charlotte okay?” Mason asked, instantly sounding concerned. I loved how that was the first thing he asked. I loved that he accepted Charlotte as an integral part of my life.

  This was going to hurt.

  A lot.

  “No, Char’s fine.”

  “Good. Maybe we can go see her this week. We could bring cheeseburgers this time. She mentioned she liked them,” he suggested.

  “Stop it, Mason,” I said softly.

  This was it.

  I ached for him. He had burrowed under my skin. There would be blood and tears, but I would remove him. I had to. For both our sakes.

  Toxicwrath was right.

  “Stop what?” He was confused. He had no idea why I was acting this way.

  He couldn’t ever know.

  “I think we need to take a break,” I let out quickly before I lost my nerve.

  Mason was quiet. So, so quiet.

  “A break,” he said evenly.

  “Yes. I have a lot on my plate right now with Charlotte and work….I just don’t have time for a relationship.” It was the lamest breakup excuse ever. He would never buy it.

  “You don’t have time for a relationship.” He was parroting me. It was unnerving.

  I expected him to argue. To plead, maybe. He wasn’t giving me any of that. I wanted it. I needed it to be messy. My guilt required it.

  “I’m sorry, Mason.”

  There was a deep, impenetrable silence that seemed to go on and on forever.

  “No you’re not,” he said after a while, finally sounding angry.

  “Yes I am.”

  I was so, so sorry.

  “I don’t know why you’re doing this, but it has absolutely nothing to do with me. This is all about you. So no, you’re not sorry. Not at all.” His anger was mixed with something else. Resignation? Sadness?

  “I don’t want to hurt you, Mason, and that’s exactly what will happen if I let this continue—”

  Mason let out a short bark of laughter. “You act as if I have no say in this. That you’re letting this happen. That it’s all your decision. Well, fuck that, Hannah.”

  “Mason, it’s for the best.”

  “No it’s not. Because the best would involve us together. I make you happy. You make me happy. How is there anything wrong with that?”

  He was hurting. I hated myself for it. But it was necessary. This had gone on too long. Gone too far. I had gotten from him what I needed. Information.

  Feelings were involved now.

  Freedom Overdrive demanded I end this now.

  And I felt like total shit.

  “I care about you, Mason. Just give me some time.” What was I doing?

  Why was I leaving the door open to him?

  “I’ll give you all the time in the world. Just don’t shut me out, Hannah. Please don’t.”

  “Goodbye, Mason.”

  I hung up before I could renege completely. That wasn’t how I intended the breakup to go.

  Could that even be construed as a breakup?

  My email pinged and I had to put all thoughts of Mason from my mind.

  It was time.

  Chapter 25

  Mason

  I hung up the phone feeling dead inside.

  Had Hannah really just broken up with me?

  My desk phone rang. I thought about ignoring it. About slipping out of the office before anyone noticed so I could go to the bar and drink away my pain.

  I answered it.

  Because I was Agent Kohler and that’s what I did.

  “Mason, you need to bring your laptop down to IT immediately,” Jacob Stout, the head of the IT department, said in an urgent voice.

  “I was just getting ready to leave for the day—”

  “You have a bug on your computer. I picked it up with the new scanning software we just had installed. I noticed it when you emailed this morning. I did a deeper scan and there’s a root kit embedded in your hard drive. You need to get it down to me now.”

  I immediately unplugged my computer. “I’m on my way.”

  —

  “This is a serious problem,” Jacob muttered, looking at my computer screen.

  “What’s going on?” I demanded.

  Jacob scratched at the bald spot on top of his head and looked nervous. “Someone has installed a root kit onto your hard drive and has been sending all of your files, all of your information, to another device.”

  My stomach dropped. “How does this happen? I know not to click on any sketchy emails, and our filters keep most of those phishing scams out, or so I thought.”

  Jacob nodded. “They should. I think…” He clicked on the mouse and tapped at the keyboard. “Maybe this was installed manually.” Jacob looked up at me. “Do you take your laptop off-site?”

  I shook my head. “Never. I leave it on my desk. So how does this happen? And how the hell can you tell if it was installed manually and not remotely?”

  Jacob waved me over and I leaned over his shoulder as he pointed to a line of code on the screen. “This is a time stamp of when it was uploaded on your computer. There’s no other external IP attached to this. It was most likely put on here using a drive of some sort. Has anyone had access to your computer?”

  I started to say no, then stopped.

  No. That can’t be.

  How the hell could I be so damned blind?

  “I have to go,” I said, turning to leave Jacob’s office.

  “I have to report this to Agent Sanders,” he called out to me as I left. I didn’t respond.

  I hurried back to the third floor and found Madison in the break room. She was alone.

  I closed the door behind me, closing us in. Alone. It was more than a little uncomfortable. Madison glanced at me in surprise.

  “What are you doing?” she demanded.

  “Why did you think Hannah was messing with my computer?” I asked her, hating the way my voice shook. In anger?

  In fear?

  Madison raised her eyebrows. “Excuse me?”

  “That day you accused her of doing something to my computer. What did you see?” I was feeling panicky. This had to be a crazy coincidence.

  There had been a lot of those lately, hadn’t there?

  Madison pursed her lips. “It doesn’t matter. You made it clear you didn’t want to hear what I had to say.” She started to walk past me. I reached out and grabbed her wrist. Not hard. Just enough to stop her from moving. She looked down at my hand, then back up to my face.

  “Please, Madison. What did you see?”

  Madison sighed, pulling her arm free of my grip. “I was watching her, all right? I knew it was the woman you were seeing. I’m not stupid. And maybe I was curious about her.” She seemed embarrassed to admit that and I didn’t comment, so she went on. “After you walked over to Perry’s desk, I saw her pull something off her key chain. She looked around and then put it in the back of your computer. I’m not making it up.”

  “I believe you,” I said quietly.

  Madison frowned. “You do?”

  I ran my hand over my face. I felt sick. Why would Hannah put a root kit on my computer? Why was she reading my files? What was she after?

  “Thanks, Madison,” I said, turning to leave.

  “Mason,” Madison called out and I stopped. “Whatever’s going on, be careful, okay?”

  I nodded and left. I pulled out my phone and tried to call Hannah. It went straight to voicemail.

  The voice was screaming at me again. This time I knew I should listen.

  I pulled out my car keys and hurried out the door.

  It was time for some answers.

  Chapter 26

  Hannah

  Everythin
g was going to plan. Using the hash attack, we had been able to secure over five million passwords. Toxicwrath had picked up on his end and was in the process of putting them up for sale on a secure online site. Far away from the prying eyes of the authorities.

  I had isolated the vulnerabilities on the Virtuant network. The data breach was ready to go forward as planned. My palms tingled. I was high on the adrenaline.

  19:02 Start slowly. A large suction of data will set off the alarm bells.

  I tried not to get annoyed at my partner’s insistence on telling me how to conduct an exploit.

  19:03 This ain’t my first rodeo.

  I was excited. I always felt that way during an attack. The hashing had been almost too easy. We slipped in like a knife through warm butter, slicing through their security.

  20:15 For a tech company, their security is abysmal.

  20:16 Douglas is notoriously arrogant. He probably thinks it’s the best security out there.

  20:17 He should fire his whole department and hire us.

  I laughed to myself. Toxicwrath clearly wasn’t into jokes. He never responded.

  20:22 Are you ready? I hope distractions don’t get in the way.

  I gritted my teeth. I didn’t want to think about Mason. If I did, I’d feel like crap all over again.

  My heart hurt at pushing him away, but it was necessary.

  I didn’t have a choice.

  Not when my very existence was threatened.

  20:24 Distractions have been eliminated.

  This was our weird method of chitchat. Talking in code and short, concise text.

  Sometimes I wished I had someone to talk to about normal things like guy problems.

  But what would I say?

  So, I just broke up with this great guy because he’s the FBI agent assigned to track down my online alter ego and I was worried that I was getting too close. I worried I’d slip up and he’d figure me out.

  There was nothing about that situation that was normal.

  20:25 Good.

  There was no more discussion about distractions. We were completely focused on the task at hand.

  My fingers flew over the keyboard. I entered the input string into the entry point.

  The SQL injection would give me complete access to their data. I’d be able to siphon off everything I needed quickly. I was appalled at the lack of encoding and validation on the Virtuant network. It made me wonder if such an ignorant tech company had anything worth stealing. Who, in this day and age, left themselves open to such vulnerabilities?

  But Toxicwrath was adamant that this program was important. That it belonged to him.

  And this corrupt CEO needed to go down. He had destroyed lives. He had ruined careers. That couldn’t go unpunished.

  I watched my computer with satisfaction as the data came in. Only minutes. That’s all it would take. And then we’d flood the system with malware, shutting it down completely. Sure, they’d get it back up and running, but it would take some time.

  Toxicwrath had gone quiet as he tended to the hash attack and procured the passwords.

  Why in that instant did I think of Mason?

  I wished I were a better person. I wished I were the sort of woman who could accept what he offered without strings. Without baggage. Without the weight of a secret, overwhelming life.

  He deserved better.

  My breaking things off was best for everyone.

  My screen was a mass of numbers and letters. I waited. I knew what file to look for.

  Then I saw it.

  I clicked on it and read the code. Went through the script one line at a time.

  Wait a minute.

  What was this?

  I traced the code with my finger, going through it in my head.

  This was tracker software.

  A complex, downright ingenious IP tracker unlike anything I’d ever seen.

  I minimized the window and started pulling up Douglas Howard’s other personal files. His emails.

  I could see the date stamps on the application. This had been created within the Virtuant network over the last year and a half. A lot of work had gone into the application. Was Toxicwrath a Virtuant employee?

  The more I looked, the more shocked I became.

  This software was being developed through a government grant. It was a sophisticated application that would enable law enforcement and government authorities to trace source IPs with almost 99 percent accuracy. I could see the testing environments, and it worked.

  I was filled with dread. A program like that would make anonymity impossible. It was a huge step forward in tracking hackers and crackers. In finding criminals through their Internet use.

  20:51 This program is dangerous for us. We should destroy it.

  20:51 You were supposed to send me the files. Send them now.

  I didn’t respond. I stared at the screen. I didn’t feel comfortable giving Toxicwrath the program. I didn’t know what to do with it myself. But I knew that in the wrong hands this could do a lot of damage.

  20:53 Do you work for Virtuant?

  20:53 Send me the file.

  My email started blowing up with messages from Toxicwrath demanding the program. He wasn’t even trying to be subtle.

  20:56 What are you planning to do with it?

  20:57 You need to think bigger. Think about the revenue stream this sort of application can generate. Sell source IP locations to the highest bidder. Everyone would be vulnerable. Except for us. We could rule them all.

  This was about money. This was about power. There was a line that was being crossed that I was not okay with. What we did was criminal; what Toxicwrath was suggesting was downright evil. Selling people’s locations to those who would do them harm. The possibility of that type of information getting into the wrong hands, into dangerous hands, was terrifying.

  20:59 Fuck the money. Fuck your pride. This shit is dangerous. I do not want a program of this magnitude exploited.

  My doorbell rang and I jumped in my chair.

  All the lights were off in the house; it would look like I wasn’t there. I quietly got up and sneaked toward the front door. I looked through the peephole.

  What was Mason doing here?

  He started pounding on the door.

  “Your car’s out front, Hannah! I know you’re in there!”

  I pressed myself against the wall. I couldn’t answer the door. Not with the exploit in full swing. Not with the incriminating files all over my hard drive.

  He rang the doorbell again. “Why did you put a root kit on my computer? Damn it! What are you up to, Hannah?”

  I felt light-headed. How had he found out? I had been so careful.

  Except for that woman who claimed to have seen me.

  Shit.

  He stood on my stoop pounding on the door. He wasn’t going away. I could hear my email ping in the kitchen. Over and over again.

  “Who the hell are you, Hannah? What’s going on? Open the fucking door!”

  Go away….

  He was close to knowing everything. I should have known he’d figure it all out.

  “This wasn’t all an act, was it, Hannah?” He sounded broken. So, so sad.

  I had done that.

  “What were you looking for?” I heard a thud and imagined him pressing his palms against the door, his head bent low, his shoulders stooped as the weight of my deception dragged him down.

  Another ping from my computer. I had to figure out what I was going to do with the tracker software. I had to deal with Toxicwrath.

  But Mason…

  I stood by the front door for almost fifteen minutes. He rang the doorbell a few more times. Part of me wanted to go to him. To open the door and explain everything. To tell him the truth. To free
myself of this horrible, horrible guilt.

  I didn’t want him to leave. I didn’t want to hurt him.

  I thought of the tracker program. Of how I had been duped by my shadow partner.

  I was such a fucking idiot.

  Toxicwrath had been using me all along. He needed me to do the dirty work.

  And my ego had made that very, very easy.

  I had been the mark all along.

  “Hannah!” Mason shouted, banging on the door harder. He wiggled the doorknob, but it was locked. “Please open up!” he pleaded. “I just want to know!”

  I walked slowly to the door, pressing my hands against the wood. The urge to go to him was overwhelming.

  I realized that the instinct to turn to him now that my world had imploded was strong. Because I trusted Mason to make me feel better.

  Because I cared about Mason.

  No. This went deeper than that.

  “Mason,” I whispered, covering my face with my hands as he pounded on the door, my name a curse on his lips.

  But I never opened the door. I couldn’t.

  And when he finally drove away, I felt like curling into a ball on the floor and never getting up again.

  We were officially over.

  There was no coming back from it.

  I had to find a way to be okay with that.

  But I wasn’t.

  Not even a little bit.

  I screamed into my hands, the sound muffled and distressed.

  I took a deep breath, scrubbed the tears from my cheeks, and squared my shoulders.

  Falling apart wasn’t an option.

  Not when I had other things to deal with first.

  Then I’d deal with Mason.

  I’ll make him see….

  See what?

  Was I ready to tell him everything?

  The thought chilled my blood. And warmed my heart.

  I trudged back to the kitchen. I noticed that Toxicwrath had left the IRC chat.

  I opened my email and saw eighteen messages from the last twenty minutes, each one more agitated than the next. I was withholding his property. He wanted the program. That was the deal. I was breaking our contract.