“I’m guessing that means you’re a Victoria fan?” I prod.
Alexis nods. “Absolutely. She’s done wonders for him. He’s more passionate, eager to go home at quitting time, which feeds his muse. Plus, I love the girl. She’s like a little sister to me. I couldn’t be happier that he found her.”
“What feeds your muse?” I ask, knowing there be dragons in such a question.
She grins, flicks her gaze over her shoulder, focusing her pretty eyes on me. “Hot, meaningless sex.” Did she learn anything from our chat? Anything at all?
Before I can respond, Bo stands up and juts his hands out in a T shape. “I offer myself as tribute for the cause.”
Royce and I both howl with laughter, but it’s Roy who responds through his guffaws. “Sit yo’ ass down, man. She doesn’t want you.”
Alexis turns fully in her chair and sizes Bo up, from his shitkickers and faded, tight-fitting jeans to his ever-present leather jacket. “Oh, I didn’t say that.” She picks up a lock of her hair and twirls it around her finger. “I usually prefer the chase, not my prey served up on a silver platter.” She licks her lips and cocks an eyebrow. “But”—she gestures toward me—“since this hunk of beef won’t play, I could be persuaded to go for something a little more willing.”
Bo blows Alexis a kiss from across the room. “I’m all in, sugar plum. Tonight, we dance.”
“Good Lord, help us all.” I rub at my temples, a new headache stirring. One thing I learned from my wading into Royce’s deal with Rochelle is not to. Therefore, I’m not going to say shit about anything involving Alexis and Bo. They want to bone the rest of the time we’re here, so be it. At least she’s finally gotten the hint that I’m not going down that rabbit hole with her.
Alexis goes back to the coding and frowns.
“What is it?” I lean a hip on the edge of her desk.
She shakes her head. “The coding looks like Kidd’s, but there’s something off. I’m going to need some more time with it in order to put my finger on what’s missing.”
“All right, we’ll leave you to it. I have two more staff interviews. Wendy has her leads and is working the coding to see if she can find anything that connects the leaks with the viruses. Royce, if you want to go back to the hotel and work on our other cases for a while . . .”
“Yeah, man, I really do. We’ve got a prospect in London who is bidding now, not to mention I’ve got to review Sophie’s end-of-quarter financials.”
Sophie.
Shit. With all of this going on between me and Sky, I haven’t checked in on her and the new development Wendy mentioned about Gabriel potentially popping the question. By now, he may have already, but I’d like to think she’d call and give me a heads-up.
Pushing thoughts of my friend to another recess of my mind, I point to Bo. “Bo, you’re up. Bring out your brand of crazy at the tech application meeting and see if we can shake any wack-jobs loose.”
Bo grins, shakes his jacket out, and smirks. “Crazy is my middle name.”
9
“Explain to me what you found that has Alexis poring over her keyboard.” I pinch the bridge of my nose and lean back in the office chair. I took a chance and came down to the coding area after hours and found Wendy and Bo shooting the shit discussing the case, or rather bickering about it. Everyone else besides the three of us and Alexis had gone home.
It’s been two more days on this case with very little to go on. Royce is flying home tomorrow, his part of the case complete. Bo has made the coders and tech team jump around to create the most impossible application under the sun. Every single thing you shouldn’t do with an application, he’s asked them to do. Which means everyone here hates him. Everyone aside from Alexis. Apparently that situation has worked itself out. Once Bo went home with her, she made a complete three-sixty over wanting me. Now she’s up Bo’s ass and begging for more. Guess she likes his brand of crazy in the sack too.
“We do not agree.” Wendy gives Bo the evil eye.
Bo sighs and rests his chin on the back of the computer chair. He’s straddling the thing backward, his big legs dwarfing the chair.
“What’s the problem?” I lift my feet onto the desk in front of me. A blast of muscle relief ripples down my legs in the process.
“I believe Kidd is the leak,” Wendy states emphatically. “And that’s based on the new code he wrote today. He left some serious holes, ones so huge any hacker worth their salt could easily exploit them to steal every single thing in this place and make it their own.”
I frown. “How so?”
She points to the computer. I get up and peer at the numbers and letters as if they can tell me what she’s seeing. Unfortunately my degree is in business, not computer information systems. “Minxy, you’ll have to give me more than a screen filled with the alphabet.”
“I’m telling you, Wendy. Kidd. Didn’t. Do. It. The sooner you start believing my instincts and looking elsewhere, the sooner we’ll find out who did.” Bo flaps his hand down against the back of the chair. “What did you say, that weird chick, the coder El-something . . .”
“Eloise,” I supply for him.
He snaps his fingers and points at me. “Yeah, her.”
Wendy groans. “Her coding looks totally different.”
“Just hear me out. I get that her coding is different, but what about this. She dated him in the past. Right?”
She sighs and flips back to her computer and types away. “Yeah. I’m listening.”
“You’re not looking at me,” Bo notes dryly.
Her demeanor changes to annoyance. “I’m multitasking. Get on with what you were going to say.”
Bo twists his lips and taps his fingers on the back of the chair. “Here’s the thing I can’t stop thinking about. Alexis said she told Kidd to break it off with Eloise back in the day. He did. Maybe this whole time she’s been pining away for him. Then you, Park, told her that he’s marrying his current girlfriend, one you already told us she didn’t like, and she responded the other day by fleeing the interview room, needing to get out fast.”
I frown. “I’m following. What does that have to do with anything?”
He tugs at his goatee. “You know how there’s something about a woman scorned? Maybe Eloise is still holding a torch for this guy.”
“If what you say is true, she wouldn’t be telling us about his mistakes.” I toss the figurative ball back to him.
“And she wasn’t beforehand. Up until we came to town and she needed to cover her own ass. Alexis wasn’t told anything about what was going on with Kidd and his supposed mistakes. Does he seem like the type of guy to make these errors she’s claiming he made?”
Wendy turns back around. “Not really, no. He’s extremely focused and super passionate about this company. And he loves his sister. I don’t see him giving anything but a hundred percent, but it doesn’t change that the coding looks like it’s his.”
My mind is humming with possibilities, but I can’t seem to cling to any of them. It’s as if the answer is right there but it’s slipping through my fingers. All I can focus on is my need to get to New York City and confront Skyler about her time with Johan.
Wendy’s phone rings while we’re sitting here thinking out loud. She puts it on speaker. “Parker, Bo, and I are on. Find anything?” Wendy questions the caller.
Alexis’s voice comes through the speaker. “Yeah, a lot actually. The coding does look like Kidd’s but not exactly like his. There’s a subtle difference, a little flair that I have never seen in his work before. It’s really small, but it’s still there. I think someone is making it look like he’s the one creating these errors.”
“Tink, send a chunk of Eloise’s coding to her so she can do some comparisons,” Bo requests.
“On it!” Her fingers speed across the keyboard once more.
“Don’t. Even. Bother. You twit!” A low, deadly voice comes from the doorway.
The three of us turn around to see Eloise just
inside the door. Her arms are out straight in front of her, and a big black gun is between her palms, her fingers wrapped around the trigger. She shoots at one of the servers, and the thing splits into pieces. “Stand up, all of you!” she screeches.
The three of us hustle to stand. I start to move around the desks to get in front of Wendy.
“Don’t you fucking move!”
I stop where I stand, my heart pumping as adrenaline dumps into my nervous system. “I’m sorry, Eloise. I meant no offense.”
“You!” She points the gun at me.
Wendy cries out, “No!”
Eloise waves the gun back at Wendy. “Shut up!”
“Hey there, darlin’, no need to point the gun at us,” Bo says in his most charming voice.
Eloise’s eyes bulge, and her face reddens from what I can only assume is anger. Without even sparing a second, she points the gun at Wendy and fires.
“No!” A yell blows through my system and out my mouth so furiously it’s like a tornado touching down on dry land.
Bo jumps toward Wendy to intercept the bullet, but it’s too late—she’s been hit in the right side of her chest. Blood oozes out just above her breasts, painting her yellow blouse crimson from a dark hole in her shirt. Her life source seeps out the hole and down her front. Wendy’s eyes go wide in recognition for a brief second before her body falls harshly against the table and down to the ground in an uncoordinated heap. She lies flat on the ground, her pale hand over her gunshot wound, blood pooling in a giant circle along her chest. Bo scrambles to her side, knees to the concrete floor, where he puts his hand over hers to staunch the blood flow.
“Wendy, baby, no!” Bo cries out, his body hunkered over hers.
I try to go to her too, but another shot rings out, and I stop in my tracks. A blaze of pain races from my shoulder and down my arm.
“Christ!” I grab for my arm and look down at the bloody horizontal slice against the top of my shoulder where the bullet grazed me, taking bits and pieces of my suit coat and shirt and pieces of my flesh with it. I hold the seeping wound, thankful she didn’t get me anywhere more serious.
“I said, don’t you freakin’ move! Why are you not listening to me? Nobody listens to me! First Kidd, then Alexis, and now you three!” She waves the gun around like a lunatic. Well, technically, she is a lunatic, and my next approach needs to be better if I’m going to talk her down.
I lift my hands in a show of surrender and lower my voice even though my entire being wants to see to Wendy.
“Come on, Tink, stay with me . . .” Bo’s voice is a low, agonized rumble. “She needs an ambulance! She’s losing a lot of blood and gasping for air.”
I look down where they are about fifteen feet from me and see pink foam coming from Wendy’s mouth, which scares the living hell out of me.
“I’m listening to you, Eloise,” I answer the woman with a gun.
She laughs, and the sound is eerily devoid of any emotion. “Guess you figured me out, huh.”
I shake my head. “Not really, no. We realized you were involved somehow.”
Her arm goes out toward me again, gun pointed directly at me. “Who are you anyway? How do you all know each other?”
I swallow down the fear for Wendy’s life and try to rush through it. “We work together out of Boston. The three of us. We were called in to investigate the product leaks and bugs in the system.”
“Wow. The head floozy actually called in a team of people. To figure out what little ol’ me has been doing to her system. Go figure. That’s actually a compliment.” She tilts her head back and laughs. I move a couple of feet forward, leaning across the desk closer to her. I have to find some way to get the gun away from her and get Wendy some help.
“Park . . . Wendy’s not doing so hot. We need help!” Bo’s agonized voice rips through the heaviness in the air.
“I. Said. Shut. Up!” Eloise screeches like a banshee and fires off a shot at the desk next to Bo’s head. He ducks, putting his body protectively over Wendy’s prone one.
“Hey, hey, I’m eager to hear what you have to say. Tell me how you did it all. And why.”
Her head jerks back, and her pupils turn a scary shade of black. “Why?” Her tone is scathing. “I’ll tell you why. Revenge.”
“Revenge?” I whisper.
She huffs. “Kidd left me high and dry four years ago. Alexis told him to break up with me, and she moved me to another department to make it easier on her little baby brother. Blech.” She makes a gagging sound and leans the hand holding the gun against the top of the desk nearest her.
“But you didn’t sell the secrets,” I say to keep her talking.
She snorts and looks up at the ceiling. “Why would I do that? I don’t want her money. I want her to lose everything to her competitors. And I wanted to show up Kidd. Show him what he lost. How good I was. What he could still have if he apologized and made it up to me.”
I take another step closer to her while she’s distracted. Wendy makes a gurgling, hacking sound, and I peer over to see blood and froth coming out of her mouth as Bo holds her on her side, letting it spill out on the concrete so she doesn’t choke on it. A hammer pounds against my brain, and sweat breaks out all over my body. My chest feels like it’s taking in air like a marathon runner at the very end of a race. Fast and instinctive.
Eloise continues, “Then you tell me he’s marrying that woman instead of me. We could have been so happy together! We were perfect. And all this time I’ve been waiting for him to remember, to see what it could be again. Us working together and living together. Victoria doesn’t deserve him!”
I shake my head. “No, you’re right. She doesn’t. As for you, you deserve better. I’m a professional at finding women their mate. I did it in San Francisco right before we came. Right, Bo?”
Bo’s voice is nothing but a scratchy whisper. “Yeah, he’s the best.” Tears fill his eyes.
I look down at Wendy, and she’s unconscious.
“Is she still breathing?” I ask, fear permeating my words.
“Yeah, but barely.” He sounds as if each word is killing him slowly.
“How’s about you and I go find you a mate, eh?” I offer Eloise.
She tilts her head to the side and taps the gun on the table. “That could be fun, and you’re right. Kidd isn’t worthy of me or my talents.” The woman lifts her head in a prissy move while my friend lies bleeding to death on the floor.
As another bout of loathing and panic rushes through me, I note the cavalry has arrived. Behind Eloise there’s a wall with two windows separating the room from the stairwell and hallway. Two police officers skate past, arms out and guns drawn. They sneak up to the door of the coding office.
How the hell did they know we were here? Maybe Alexis heard the gunshots?
I glance over at the phone and note that Wendy never ended the call. Alexis must have heard it all.
While I hold my breath, I try to keep Eloise’s attention on me. “So, what do you say?” I swallow as the door behind Eloise slowly opens. “I’d be happy to set you up. It would be so easy—”
The two cops stand behind Eloise, weapons trained on her. “Put your hands up in the air!” one of them hollers.
Eloise’s eyes are blazing daggers of anger as she turns around, gun pointed up. “No!” she growls. Her hand twitches once before both cops drop her with two bullets apiece.
I crouch low and crawl to where Bo has Wendy in his lap, cradling her. His lips are against her forehead. “Come on, Tink. Don’t leave us!” he cries.
Her body doesn’t move.
The hospital was a madhouse when we were carted into the emergency room, Wendy on a stretcher, nonresponsive but with a shallow pulse.
The paramedics said something about a collapsed lung and the loss of a lot of blood. I called Royce and told him to meet us at the hospital and to call Michael.
Now I’m sitting on a bed while a resident stitches up my flesh wound, telling me I’m in s
hock. I can’t even feel the pain. Everything is numb.
Bo stands to the side of my bed as if he’s standing sentry. An hour has gone by since they rushed Wendy to surgery.
Royce runs into the ER, suit coat flying in the wind like he’s a member of Men in Black and he’s come to save the world.
“Brother.” Roy puts a hand to my other shoulder. His voice is deep, much deeper than normal. “You okay?”
I nod, not capable of saying anything more.
“Flesh wound. The bullet just grazed his shoulder,” Bo answers on my behalf.
Roy nods and then takes in Bo’s attire. He’s bloody from chest to waist, his white T-shirt coated red from Wendy’s blood.
“Jeez-us. Are you hurt too? What the hell happened? Do we know anything more about Wendy?” He fires off what feels like a swarm of questions I can’t even assimilate in my current mental state.
Bo shakes his head. “It’s not my blood. Wendy was taken right into surgery. Collapsed lung, gunshot wound to the chest. You called Mick?” His voice is a shallow husk, nothing like his normal joking, exuberant, loving tone.
Roy nods. “He’ll be here in the next hour or two.” He runs his hand over his bald head. “How could this happen?”
I shrug. “I didn’t see how unstable she was. My head wasn’t in the game. I should have caught the connection. Something—” I start, self-loathing and shame filling my mind with all the things I should have, could have, done better.
Bo puts his hand on my back. “Don’t you dare try to take this one on. All four of us were on this job making the connections, and we had it, we were putting the pieces together when she went loco. This is on that psycho, not on you!” Bo points a finger at me.
“If Wendy dies . . .” My body is trembling so hard even my voice is shaky. Tears fill my eyes and fall unchecked down my checks. “She can’t die,” I whisper.
Bo presses his forehead against my back, and Royce grips my shoulder hard. “Brother, you have to have faith. Have faith in our strong girl. She’ll come back to us, and just think, she’ll have one helluva story to tell.”
Montreal (International Guy Book 6) Page 11
