“Did you tell anyone? Complain?”
He shook his head with a sad smile. “So I could return to the group home, Becca? That place was worse than hell. I spent all my time trying not to get beat up, forced into a gang, or worse. At least at Mrs. Keen’s place, she ignored me most of the time. There was one meal a day. If you were lucky enough to be around when the food went on the table, you grabbed what you could. If not, you waited until next time. I forgot what it was like to have decent clothes and sleep in a bed. Usually, I slept on the floor. Everyone ignored me there and overlooked me at school. I was basically invisible.”
My chest ached at his words. The way his voice shook at times, trying to conceal his emotions as he spoke. I wanted to erase his pain, but I knew it was impossible. All I could do was hold his hand and listen.
“One day, I was so hungry I wandered into the neighbor’s garden. It was overgrown and full of weeds, but things were still growing. There was a long row of carrots. I dug some out and ate them.” He chuckled without humor at the memory. “I hardly wiped the dirt off of them. Then I found some potatoes and ate those too, before the neighbor found me in his yard.”
“Oh no! What did he do?”
“Rodney Matthews was his name. He was a gruff old man. Huge. Used two canes to walk. He yelled at me about trespassing, asked me where I lived. When I pointed out the Keen place, he sort of growled under his breath about her. He told me rather than get me in trouble with the old cow that he was going to let me work off the food.”
“How?”
“I had to weed the garden. He sat and watched me, yelling if I tried to pull the wrong thing. I think he would have scared most people, but I found his yelling almost comforting—because he saw me. He watched me. I wasn’t invisible. It took me all day, but I got it done. He had me pick more vegetables, and I had to carry them inside for him.” A glimmer of a smile crossed his face. “That was the day my life changed.”
I rubbed my thumb back and forth on his hand.
“He lived alone—his wife had died over twenty years prior. His house was small, but compared to where I lived it was a palace. He had his entire living room filled with computers. Working ones, dead ones, parts, pieces—and he had a massive table that he called his workstation. I had never seen anything like it.”
“Is that what he did? Fix computers?”
He shot me grin. “That was his hobby. He was captivated by them. He knew everything there was to know about computers—how to build them, run them, and anything else to do with them. He did online work for computer companies, like a help desk. That was his day job anyway. His other job was much more interesting.”
“He was a hacker?”
“Yes, he was.”
I pursed my lips. “I see.”
Reid chuckled. “That gruff, cantankerous old man became the reason I am where I am today. For some reason, he liked me. He let me hang around. He’d feed me. He showed me his computers. I was interested, so he let me mess around with some of his spare parts, and I built myself my first computer.” He laughed lightly. “It was shit, but I did it.”
“How?” I asked.
“He had lots of books, and he let me read them. My teachers never thought much of me, but I loved to learn. They overlooked me a lot, so I read and taught myself—and I absorbed. Rodney’s books fascinated me. What he did fascinated me. I watched and learned. The next computer I built was better. So was the one after. He started to teach me how to use them.” Reid sighed. “I was in love. All I thought about was computers. I couldn’t get enough. I spent so much time at his place you would think I lived there.”
“Your foster place didn’t question it?”
He laughed again, a bitter sound. “Not even once. It was one less mouth to feed, one less kid to take up room. As long as I was around on inspection day, she didn’t care. I made sure I was present, said exactly what the caseworker wanted to hear, then I was gone.”
He grew quiet for a minute. “Rodney’s health was failing. I started doing more of his work—taking over things. He started paying me for my jobs. I stopped showing up for inspection day. I stopped going to school. He spent hours teaching me, showing me everything he knew.” Reid shook his head. “I’ll never forget the day he looked at me and said I had surpassed him. There was nothing more he could teach me.”
“How old were you?”
“Seventeen.” He lifted his shoulders and rolled his eyes. “A very cocky seventeen. I thought I knew everything. Rodney yelled at me all the time to watch my attitude.”
I could picture him—young, brash, with a chip on his shoulder.
“Mrs. Keen kicked me out. I was old enough I didn’t need social services, and I was on my own. I stayed with Rodney, sleeping on the couch, doing his errands, and helping him. His one rule was that I had to finish school. I was so far ahead of my class, it was easy, and I did it online.” He exhaled. “That was when it started.”
“When you got into trouble, you mean?”
“Yeah. I was looking for a job, but with no experience, plus my age, I wasn’t finding much. Fast food places, that sort of thing. I thought I was better than that. Rodney told me to get an attitude adjustment and it would teach me some humility flipping burgers. But with his health issues, he convinced his employer to hire me, so I worked with him. He wanted me to get some experience and find a job in the real world. He warned me often enough not to fall into the trap of becoming a hermit like him.”
He was quiet as he stared past my shoulder out the window, a frown on his face.
“What happened, Reid?”
“It started simple enough. Rodney was having trouble with his bank. Online banking was becoming mainstream, and he used it since he had so much trouble getting around. But every month, it seemed there were issues. I decided to check into it, and I hacked into their system.”
“That’s illegal.”
He swung his legs over the sofa, stood and began to pace again. “I know. I hacked in to everything I could, Becca. I never did anything. I liked to see if I could do it—it was a never-ending challenge to me. Usually, the answer was yes. Then I would leave. I didn’t steal or try to change things. I was just”—he shrugged—“arrogant and stupid.”
“I see.”
“But what I saw in the banking system that Rodney used was scary. Their security was lax. I found the issue that caused Rodney’s problem in three days of digging. I spent weeks writing the proper code to fix it and make sure it never happened again. During that time, Rodney became very ill. Ill enough he had to go into the hospital.” Reid swallowed and shut his eyes. “He died.”
“Reid,” I murmured, “I’m so sorry.”
He wiped his face, turning away from me. “He had a daughter, but they were estranged and had been since before his wife died. His daughter had nothing to do with him. He told me there was bad blood between them, and she refused to mend fences. She never came to see him and every letter he sent her, she returned unopened. But once he died, she was there.” He clenched his fists. “She kicked me out of his house, tossed all of his stuff into the garbage, and put his house up for sale. I watched it happen. I had been there for months and months, his only friend, and I had no say. All she wanted was the money. She had no interest in the man or what he did for me. She called me a user and a squatter, then had the cops remove me from the house.”
His voice was pain-filled. I could feel his intense sorrow for the loss of the one man who had cared enough to help him. He cleared his throat and kept talking.
“I found a little room. It wasn’t much, but it had a door with a lock and a place I could sleep. I had the money I had been earning and some Rodney had given me for his, ah, other work. The night I saw the dumpster delivered, I went back to Rodney’s and broke in through the back door. I spent all night taking his books and notes. I made sure I had his favorite computer and tools. The stupid picture we had taken one day of us working together on a computer. Things that meant something to him—I
stole them. I’m not proud of it, but I couldn’t let her trash things I knew he loved, things that meant something to us both.”
“It wasn’t stealing,” I soothed. “I’m sure he would have wanted you to have them.”
He shrugged and was silent. He tugged a hand through his hair and wiped at his face again. I wanted to reach out and hug him, but I could tell he didn’t want that right now. He had been in denial when he said the rest of his story was only history. It had shaped and affected him more than he realized. He started speaking again.
“Without Rodney, I was alone all the time, and I made some bad decisions. I tried the right channels. I went to the bank and spoke with the manager about their online system and the problems I found. He laughed at me. I mean, I don’t blame him, really. I was a punk kid with an attitude, telling him his banking security system was flawed. He told me to go back to chasing girls, and doing whatever else kids my age did, and not to worry about the glitches—the experts would solve them. He even refused to look at what I brought with me to show him for proof. I was angry and pissed at the world. He made me feel about two inches tall.” Reid’s voice dropped, becoming angry yet saturated in sadness.
“It hit me that I didn’t matter, that I would never matter. The only person who cared about me was dead, and I wasn’t even allowed to say goodbye. His daughter didn’t have a funeral for him. She didn’t stay around long enough to bother. He was cremated, his ashes buried, and I never found out where until later. I fumed and stewed for days, then I decided I was going to show the people at the bank I knew more than they did.”
He walked around the room, his steps fast. “I hacked in to their system again, and I took fifteen million dollars. I hid it in another account elsewhere.”
I gaped at him. “You stole fifteen million dollars?”
“No, I borrowed it. I didn’t intend to keep it. I simply wanted to show them how flawed their system was. I was stupid and arrogant enough to think that once they saw what I could do, they would want to meet me and would finally listen. Once they heard what I had to say, they would give me a job—a real, respectable job.”
“That’s not what happened, though.”
He laughed, the sound loud and bitter. “No. I left a huge trail behind. I didn’t try to hide what I did because I wanted them to come to me. They did—with handcuffs and a warrant. My public defender was useless, they refused to listen, and in the end, I went to jail.”
I couldn’t take the distance between us anymore. I stood and wrapped my arms around him, pressing my chest to his back. He started at my touch, then his body sagged in relief. He wrapped his hands around mine, and spoke quietly.
“When BAM gave me my first bonus, I had a headstone made for Rodney and had it placed on his grave. He deserved a permanent marker for his life. I go and sit there a lot and talk to him.”
I squeezed his hands. “I’m sure he hears you.”
He shrugged then inhaled deeply, slowly letting out the air in a long sigh.
“I made a lot of mistakes, Becca. But I’m not a bad person.”
“No, you’re not.”
“Rodney would have kicked my ass for pulling that stunt. He was a hacker too, but companies hired him to lock down people like me. I should have listened to him. I should have done things differently.”
“I think you paid the price.”
He ran his fingers along the top of my hands, and he spoke quietly. “Will I continue to pay, Becca? Does my past mean you can’t be part of my future?”
I heard the edge to his voice, the one that expected me to tell him to leave. But I couldn’t. Reid Matthews had more than paid for his error in judgment. His entire life, people had cast him aside and looked down on him.
I wasn’t going to be one of them.
I tightened my arms. “No, Reid. I want to be part of your future.”
He said nothing. I felt the long tremor that ran down his spine, the splash of a tear that fell on my hands.
I pressed my forehead onto his back. “I’m here, Reid.”
He turned, wrapping his arms around me. I knew he was about to snap. I tightened my grip on him, letting him know I was right there and ready to catch him.
Reid
Becca went to the kitchen to make us something to eat. I was sure she was allowing me some time to collect myself, which I appreciated. I had never broken down in front of another person the way I did with Becca. She made me feel safe enough to allow it to happen. I had never divulged the details of my story to anyone the way I had to her.
Aiden, Maddox, and Bentley knew most of it, but I had told them in bits and pieces as we got to know each other. They had become my family, allowing me to be part of their brotherhood. They trusted me the same way I trusted them—with an unwavering conviction. They teased and called me kid, but it was done in a way I didn’t find offensive. It was how they worked as a unit, using laughter to show they cared. Aiden had a nickname for everyone he cared for, so it cemented my bond with them.
I passed a weary hand over my face and stood. I began to gather all the pieces of equipment that went flying when I vaulted over the counter to get to Becca. I heard her laughter and glanced up. She was sliding a plate across the counter.
“You know you could have gone around the corner and saved yourself all that work.”
I shook my head with a grin. “That would have taken too long. I needed to get to you.”
“Mission accomplished.” She winked. “Come and eat.”
I sat on a stool, waiting until she joined me. We munched on the sandwiches, sitting so close our thighs pressed together.
“Is it a coincidence your name is Reid Matthews?” she asked.
“No. I changed it legally when I got out of prison. They called me Johnny Dee my whole life—a spin on John Doe since they had no idea what my mother might have named me, if anything. I hated it. I wanted a name that meant something. So I took the name of the only two people who ever tried to make a difference in my life—who made me less than invisible. I was determined to make them proud.”
She leaned closer. “I know they would be. That was a lovely tribute to them.”
“I try to live up to it every day.”
“Do you have a birth certificate?”
“One was issued by the province. They gave me a birthdate of the first of December. I had it all changed—” I winked at her “—legally.”
“Really?”
I chuckled as I took a bite, chewing then swallowing. “It was very complex, and I won’t get into all the details, but yes, it is legal.”
“Did you ever try to find your mother?”
“Rodney and I did, yes. The parameters were massive, though. I didn’t even have a birth date to go on or a province to start with. Even checking all baby boys born in all of Canada around the date they guessed I was born was overwhelming. Their date was only a guess. I could have been three weeks old or ten days. They had no idea.” I wiped my mouth. “In the end, I decided it wasn’t worth it. She abandoned me. It was more a passing interest than a need to know. I decided to leave it in the past where it belonged.”
She sipped her iced tea with a sad smile, but she didn’t push it. She asked about the money. I told her the same thing I told Maddox, explaining how I sent money every month to someone who needed it.
“How do you find them?”
I looked at her, my eyebrows raised. “I use my skills.”
“Oh.”
She worried her lip. “How did you meet Aiden and get hired with BAM?”
“I took a lot of courses while I was in prison. I read everything I could, including the daily newspapers. Anything to keep my mind active and up to date. There was a picture one day of the three of them—Bentley, Aiden, and Maddox—and I read the article about their friendship and company. It—they—intrigued me. I wondered what it would be like to have that sort of connection. I started following them online, reading different articles about them. One day I saw an ad for an IT jo
b at the company, and I went for it.” I finished my sandwich and pushed her plate toward her. “Eat up.”
As she ate, I told her my story of meeting Aiden and Maddox and my temper. She listened with wide eyes as I confided in her the story of Emmy’s kidnapping, the stalking incident with Cami, and Maddox’s hit-and-run.
“You helped with all of that?”
“Yes.” I tilted my head. “I only hack and use my talent when asked, Becca. And only for good. I learned my lesson, and I follow Rodney’s legacy. I promise you, you have nothing to worry about in regard to my career or being in trouble with the law.”
“I believe you.” She went into the kitchen and returned with coffee and a plate of her peanut butter cookies. I ate two in rapid succession, groaning with enjoyment.
“You make the best cookies ever.”
She smiled. “Maddox might have told me peanut butter was your favorite.”
“They are.”
“Could I ask you, ah, something?”
“You can ask me anything.”
She drew in a deep breath and blew it out. “You were in prison for how long?”
“Four years.”
She played with a plate in front of her, turning it around several times. “Were you, ah, safe?”
I covered her hand. “It wasn’t a fun place, Becca. But it wasn’t a maximum-security prison. My cellmate was an old guy who had been there off and on for years. One of the career criminals your dad warned you about. But he was decent, and he protected me, I guess you could say. He said I reminded him of his kid. So, if you’re asking what I think you are, no, I was never raped. I was okay.”
“Oh, good,” she breathed out. “Okay.”
“Prison wasn’t fun, and I saw a lot of things I wish I had never had witnessed. I was scared for four years,” I admitted. “I will never forget those feelings, or everything I witnessed. No matter the level of security, I was still in prison. It was a long four years paying for my crime. I had no family or friends, no one to come see me on visitor day. I never made a call unless it was to my public defender asking about something or checking on my next opportunity for early release. The same with mail. I never had a card or letter unless it was related to my case.” I stroked the edge of the counter with my finger, repeatedly tracing a trail on the granite. “I was lonely.”
Vested Interest Box Set Books 4-7 Page 8
