by Skye Jordan
“Sure.”
“This app is exactly the same, only I’m gathering different information from the targets.”
“Targets?” Lexi frowned at the screen. “I don’t think I like the sound of that. How is the NSA going to use this?”
“I can’t say. That’s why it’s called Secret Squirrel.”
Lexi heaved a sigh as fatigue settled in. This day had been almost twenty hours long. “Fine.”
“For testing purposes, the prototype simply collects cell phone numbers. So just start the app and scan the area. Where there is a cell phone, the number will register on your screen.
“Then, just call the numbers by tapping on them to make sure the person possessing the phone on your screen is the person who answers that phone in reality. That’s it.”
“But, what am I going to say? I can’t just hang up on them. They’ll have my number, they’ll call me back—”
“Your number is both blocked and encrypted. Their numbers have no identifying information attached, so unless you were to go to crazy lengths to get it, their privacy is retained. I don’t need any lawsuits. If you get confused about who you’ve contacted, you can assign tags to their numbers. That way you’re not contacting one person multiple times by accident.”
“Still…that’s kind of uncomfortable.”
“You never made crank calls as a kid, did you?”
“We didn’t have a phone when I was a kid.”
Or a car. Or air-conditioning. Or, often, food. Heat and water had been sketchy too. Medical and dental had been covered through welfare. Lexi had told Rubi she’d grown up poor but no more. That was another one of their opposite traits—Rubi’s father was a multibillionaire, and Rubi was a millionaire in her own right. She’d made her share of the money modeling, but far more from her IT consulting as a programmer and these crazy apps she created. Lexi had funneled all her modeling income into LaCroix Designs—her real passion and the only reason she’d modeled to begin with.
“Can I text them instead?” she asked.
“As long as you can be sure the number you see on the screen corresponds to the person holding the phone, that’s fine. The data is transmitted to me through the app, and I’ll analyze it on my end to make sure the program is pulling in what I need, the way I need it from the radio signals being used. All I want to do right now is test the app under different circumstances and make sure it’s targeting accurately.”
Lexi glanced around the terminal at the unsuspecting travelers whose privacy she was about to breach. With the app open, she lifted the phone toward the lobby. Several people sitting nearby appeared on the screen. Within half a second, phone numbers popped into view above their heads like thought bubbles.
“This is kinda creepy,” Lexi said.
“This is our national security at work.”
“That makes it even creepier. I like your other apps better. The ones that do frivolous everyday tasks or create games to reach a goal or—”
Biker Boy strolled around the corner, an open magazine in one hand, a large coffee cup from one of the restaurants nearby in the other. He had his duffle slung over one wide shoulder.
Lexi’s breath caught.
“Look at it this way, Lex,” Rubi said. “If NSA buys this, you will have aided our national security. If they don’t, we’ll do something frivolous and fun with it. Deal?”
When Lexi looked down at her screen, Biker Boy appeared in the viewfinder. And, pop, pop, so did two little white bubbles above his head, both with local phone numbers.
Holy shit.
Lexi laughed, the sound rolling out of her so unexpectedly she covered her mouth. “Sure,” she said. “Sounds good. Hey, Rubi? If I get two phone numbers for one person, does that mean they’re carrying two phones?”
“Yes. Any last questions? I’ve got a very hot boy waiting for me.”
So do I. He just doesn’t know it yet.
“You’re absolutely sure none of these people can get my phone number or my name or any other information about me, right? ’Cause that could be incredibly…awkward, not to mention difficult to explain.”
“Positive, Lex.”
Lexi disconnected, watching Biker Boy from the corner of her eye. She kept her head down and maintained rapt interest in her phone. He glanced around the lobby, and she could swear his gaze paused on her, but surely he couldn’t recognize her from the car. Not with her hair up, the hat hiding her face.
When his gaze drifted past her, Lexi let out a breath—of both relief and disappointment.
Damn those reporters. If they weren’t here, she might just be desperate enough to do something impulsive—like be the one to initiate a conversation.
But not with Justin James from the Independent sitting a couple of rows away. The reporter had been at Lexi’s studio just two weeks before for a joint interview with Lexi and her client Bailey Simmons, daughter of Hollywood director Charles Simmons. James had been fascinated with Bailey’s thirty-thousand-dollar haute couture gown, which included one-of-a-kind fabric from France, pearls, and Swarovski crystals sewn over the entire bodice, and a thirty-foot train with embroidered cutouts.
Those were the kind of clients who ran background checks on Lexi before they dropped big money on a dress for one day in their life—or their daughter’s life. The kind of clients who brought bodyguards to their fittings. The kind of clients who made Lexi sign confidentiality agreements.
And those clients made up the bulk of Lexi’s income. Over the last two years, she’d become the most expensive, most in-demand couture wedding dress designer in Southern California. Any significant smear on her image or reputation would cost her big business—the kind of business that paid her rent and put food in her mouth.
The rich and famous in LA were well connected and knew all the other rich and famous in LA. That was how her client list had grown so quickly. And it was also how her client list could tank just as fast.
Biker Boy chose a seat on the opposite side of the waiting area, where he leaned forward, forearms on thighs, gaze on his open magazine. His duffle and coffee sat on the floor at his feet.
Just seeing him, that thick, dark hair, the wide shoulders stretching that hot leather jacket, the biker boots, rekindled the yearning he’d created with that one long look into her eyes earlier.
This was the kind of man she craved—a rough-around-the-edges, blue-collar, hard-loving man. A few tattoos, a dark background, confidence in the bedroom…or the bed of a truck…or on the back of a motorcycle…
The very kind of man she’d spent too much time with in her youth. A place she would absolutely not revisit. And she’d learned far too well a few years ago just how quickly the wrong man could trash all her decades of achievement.
But that had been a relationship, wide-open and public, which had been a huge element in his leverage against her. Lexi hadn’t made that mistake since. Couldn’t imagine ever making it again. Besides, she didn’t have the room or the desire for that level of commitment to a man in her life.
What she could easily imagine right now was Biker Boy pulling her up against his hard body, tasting her with his hot mouth, dragging off her clothes, pushing deep inside her…
The thrill of it pulsed in her blood. Pumped heat between her legs. Shot need low into her belly, where it gnawed into an unbearable ache.
Lexi bit her lip, her mind racing. She could use Rubi’s app to text him. A little harmless anonymous flirting would allow her to get to know him better. Then if he played along, and if she liked him, she could look for a more opportune moment—sans reporters—to introduce herself.
Lexi tested the texting feature out on a couple of other innocent bystanders first. When it worked perfectly—each target picking up their phone and looking at the display immediately after she’d texted them—she sent Rubi a one-word text: smooth, and reevaluated her own “target.”
She zeroed in on him with her phone, and those two numbers popped up in the bubble alongside his dark
head again. Two phones. That piqued her curiosity. She’d known businessmen to carry two phones—one for personal use, one for company use. But this guy was the furthest thing she could picture from a businessman. Which made him the perfect sexual fantasy.
Now…she just needed some clever way to open the conversation.
As she watched him on her phone’s screen, something flew into the picture and bounced on the floor near Biker Boy. Lexi glanced up without lifting her head, keeping her face in the shadow of her cap’s brim. A little kid, maybe five, argued with his mom several chairs down from her target. The kid, his face scrunched in a scowl, threw one of his toy trucks at his mother and stomped off in search of the other projectile.
“Kevin, get back here.” The mother’s scolding kick-started the boy into a run. “Kevin, don’t run.”
Biker Boy ignored the argument, lazily turning the page of his magazine.
The mom slapped down whatever she’d been reading and huffed, clearly short on patience. “Kevin, watch where you’re go—”
The kid looked back over his shoulder toward his mother and slammed right into Biker Boy. The coffee flew onto its side. The lid spit off and liquid shot out, splashing the duffle sitting alongside him.
Lexi gasped and covered her mouth.
Biker Boy dropped his magazine and caught the kid by both arms just before he took a nosedive into the carpet.
“Holy shit,” Lexi murmured. Biker Boy had some quick moves.
Kevin stared up at the man. The boy’s eyes were wide, his face lax in shock. Biker Boy said something to the kid. Kevin nodded. The man’s mouth turned up on one side in a grin, and Lexi’s stomach released a gymnastics team of butterflies.
That grin turned him from fun-to-fantasize-about-sexy to positively magnetic.
He pulled something from his pocket and held it out to Kevin. When the boy reached for it, Biker Boy pulled it back and said something else. The boy nodded again and received what looked like a toy.
Kevin dropped to his knees and pushed a small car back toward his mom. After the woman had offered apologies, Biker Boy evaluated the spill damage. Judging by the look on his face and the frustrated way he shoved clothes around, the result hadn’t been good.
Lexi remembered the words of his friend at the truck: “It’s not a good time for him.” Then of their long flight ahead and how Biker Boy would have to suffer with that smell, then find a place to wash his clothes. Lexi felt bad for the guy. And he’d been nice to the kid.
When he sat back, staring at his bag with a mixture of irritation and resignation, Lexi chose one of his numbers and texted him using her speech-to-text app.
“If you’re on the flight to New York,” she said into her microphone, the words appearing on her phone’s screen as she spoke, “you’re in luck. I just read a survey that women in that city are most turned on by the scent of coffee.” It was actually true, so she added, “No joke.”
She grinned, hoping the note would at least cheer him up a little.
That was her excuse, and she was sticking to it.
Lexi said, “Send.”
Then pulled out her sketch pad.
Four
Jax’s day was going downhill fast—and it wasn’t even one a.m.
Now he’d have to arrange getting his clothes and bag cleaned when he got to the hotel before he went out to the set. He stared down at his coffee-soaked bag with thoughts of Veronica, the Bond contract, each one of his five stunt guys, his nonstop schedule for the last month…and sighed.
He definitely needed to change something in his life. But when he felt like this, it was hard. All he wanted to do was fall into his old habits. Especially when the woman he’d spotted in Hudson News was sitting nearby.
He’d smelled her first. He’d been reaching for a motocross magazine when her scent—light, floral, sensuous—stirred the air…
Jax’s groin tightened in memory. He wanted to go sit next to her, just to breathe her in. But he knew himself. It wouldn’t stop there. And he was choosing her based solely on his assessment of how she’d filled out her jeans. She was slim, tall, perfectly proportioned. And that ass… If he’d thought Veronica’s backside was perfect, this woman lifted perfection to a new level. Her hips had flared from an ultraslim waist, her ass cheeks high and round beneath sparkling pockets sporting big, jeweled buttons. That was all he’d seen of her, with her back turned toward him, her hair and face hidden by one of those military-style caps with the wide brim that were in style. But it was all he’d had to see to know.
She was showy. She wanted that ass noticed. Which figured. She was the type of woman he’d always gone for—flashy, gorgeous. Just like the passenger in that Ferrari. His heart hammered one extra hard beat. Damn, she had been a serious knockout. Those eyes, so blue. And the way they’d held his, never once leaving his face for Wes’s…as so many women’s did.
His phone chimed with a text message. Jax pulled out of his head and dragged his phone from his jacket pocket while using the few napkins that had survived the spill to wipe at the coffee residue on his boots.
When he sat back and glanced at the message, he frowned.
UNKNOWN: You’re in luck. I just read a survey that women in New York are most turned on by the scent of coffee. No joke.
Jax stared at the message, confused. Then at the identification, showing ‘blocked number’, even more confused. It was really late—or early, depending on how he looked at it—and he’d desperately needed that coffee. His mind spun but couldn’t find traction. His cell number was unlisted. Only his family, his Renegades, his friends, and the women he’d dated had it. Everything related to work went through a separate cell or the office phone. No one who had his phone number had a blocked identity, but those bastards he worked with could hack, rig, and wing anything they got their grimy hands on.
Had to be one of them fucking with him. So typical.
Jax returned a text to unknown.
JAX: Then I’ll finally be more popular at Kiss N Fly than you are. Don’t hide in the shadows, you prick. Come keep me company.
He couldn’t think of any reason his guys would be flying in or out of town. Renegades didn’t have any jobs scheduled outside LA this week other than the one Jax was handling in New York. Wes wouldn’t be coming out for another few days.
UNKNOWN: I do hear the women at Kiss N Fly go both ways, but I don’t, so I’m sure you’d be far more popular at the bar than I would.
“Sir?”
Jax lifted his frown from the phone. A young woman stood in front of him holding a coffee cup. She wore a green apron from the restaurant where he’d gotten his coffee earlier, the coffee that now resided in his clothes.
“I was asked to deliver this to you.”
The text and the coffee clicked at the same time. Not one of his guys. Ooops. “Who asked you to deliver it?”
“I don’t know, sir. It was called in.” She glanced at his soaked duffle and smiled. “I guess you had an accident here and someone wanted to replace it.”
Jax glanced over at Kevin and his mother. The boy was still sliding the car around on the carpet at her feet. His mother read Jax’s silent question and shook her head. He took the offered coffee and thanked the girl from the restaurant, reaching for his wallet.
“Oh no, sir. It’s been taken care of.”
He paused with his wallet in his hand. “Let me at least give you something for bringing it over.”
She grinned. “That’s been covered too, but thank you.”
And she walked away. His phone chimed again.
UNKNOWN: And while I do love coffee—both the scent…and the taste—I have no doubt I’d prefer the scent…and the taste…of something…more personal.
Jax stared down at the message. Heat gathered low in his gut. “Whoa.”
He glanced up and around the terminal, where the space was filling with more passengers. But no one particularly interested in him, which was good. He took red-eyes as often as possible to avo
id what little recognition he occasionally still received. But now he didn’t want to get caught up with one of his exes. Didn’t want to start something inappropriate with one of his friends.
JAX: I’m guessing I should thank you for the coffee?
UNKNOWN: No need. We all can use a little pick-me-up now and then. It was nice for me to be able to do it. Hope this turns your day around.
Jax took a sip. The fresh, hot brew filled his mouth, and his shoulders relaxed. He finally asked:
JAX: Who is this? Your number is showing up blocked.
The tension returned as he waited for the answer.
UNKNOWN: We don’t know each other.
Jax frowned. His mind darted.
JAX: How’d you get my number?
UNKNOWN: Just a little harmless hacking. Don’t worry, I won’t bother you or share it. I just wanted to tell you how great you were with the kid and how I’m drooling over your jacket.
He laughed. The hacking part didn’t bother him overly much. Any of his guys could have surely done the same. And he appreciated ingenuity. If she became a problem, he’d just block her.
At the moment, he could use a frivolous diversion. And since he had no idea who he was talking to, this could be considered focusing on the inside of a woman, right?
And…she had bought him coffee.
JAX: Wait. My…jacket?
UNKNOWN: You know that jacket is totally hot.
JAX: But you’re missing the fact that what’s *inside* the jacket makes it hot.
UNKNOWN: Mmm, no. I can assure you I haven’t missed any of that goodness. You do a lot for fine leather. Did you get it in Italy? Do you favor Brutale bikes?
Jax’s eyebrows rose.
JAX: You know your bikes. Yes, I picked it up in Italy and I’m impressed with Brutales. Why don’t you come over and chat with me until the plane loads?
UNKNOWN: No, but thanks for asking. Tell me, do you always carry toys in your pockets? What else have you got in there?
He laughed at her toy innuendo, but puzzled over her refusal to meet him. Curious. Without moving his head, he simply lifted his eyes to watch the lobby for busy fingers and noticed several women using their phones, but it was nearly impossible to figure out who was doing what. Unfortunately—or not—the woman from Hudson News had a sketchbook out and a pencil in her hand moving lightly over the page. On the upside, all the women in the area appeared relatively attractive. A couple of them were quite pretty. And whoever it was had to be close enough to have witnessed the incident with Kevin.
