The Billionaire's Impulsive Lover (The Sisterhood) (2 page)

“I went to the police. They shrugged it off like Gary had just found another girlfriend. They wouldn’t believe me when I explained that I knew something was wrong.”

Darcy heard the tone in Claire’s voice and knew there was more to the story than what Claire was saying. “And? What happened next?”

Claire sighed. “He hit on me. Asked me out to dinner and said he’d be happy to take Gary’s place.”

Darcy laughed but Claire didn’t think it was very funny. “You’re laughing, but you don’t like it either when men think you’re easy. And I can’t even describe the irritating leer the police office gave me as he leaned over the counter to get a closer look down my sweater. He actually thought I was too stupid to realize what he was doing!”

“I’m always amazed at how men underestimate you as well. And I’m with ya on the irritating men hitting on women side of things too,” she agreed and sobered quickly. “But it’s just comical the way men are around you. It’s like you’re some sort of honey and all the bees are flocking to you.”

“That’s silly. Especially coming from you. You always have a man on your arm when you hit the clubs.”

“That’s all advertising and contracts. The men I’m with have paid to be on my arm.”

That stunned her. “Really?”

“Sure,” Darcy confirmed. “My agent suggested it about a year ago. She explained that some men just wanted their names attached to mine, exactly like the night clubs. So she said we should get paid for that as well.”

“Isn’t that dangerous?”

“It’s all choreographed, just like the night club visits. They sign a contract that is pretty tight. Some of the men reject the contract thinking a date with me might get them a chance at more, but that’s their choice. The terms are non-negotiable and I’d rather know up front if a guy is going to be a problem. The contract terms easily weeds out the freaks.”

Claire considered that for a moment. “Interesting,” she thought, wondering if perhaps Titus contracted out help to private contractors.

“Claire, I don’t like the sound of that tone. What are you thinking?” Darcy asked.

Claire was already distracted, her fingers typing in new code for her next visit to a coffee shop. “I’ll get back to you when I have more details,” she said and hung up before Darcy could argue with her. She loved her friend but at times, Darcy was too much of a mother hen, wanting to protect her chicks from non-existent wolves.

Chapter 2

“Another breach, sir,” Jeff Fulton said as he walked into Mitch Sargent’s office. Tossing a report on the man’s desk, he stood in front of it, prepared to answer questions.

Mitch picked up the report, instantly irritated but not showing anything on his hard, experienced face. “Where was it this time and how the hell did someone get through our firewalls again? It’s like this person doesn’t even realize there’s a security wall to breach, they get in to our systems much too easily.”

“Anther coffee shop with pay by the hour internet access. The code is good,” Gary said, letting the information sink in. “Whoever this hacker is, they’re looking for something specific. The same types of files are downloaded each time.”

“What type of files is the hacker getting into?” he demanded, his ice blue eyes quickly skimming through the details of the hacker’s code. Mitch was impressed despite himself. This code was good and fast, going for exactly one type of file with efficiency. “Human resources data?” he guessed.

“Exactly,” Gary confirmed. “None of the stolen data is confidential information but it could be pretty important.”

“We do it ourselves when we need information about certain issues. We do it legally though.” Mitch tossed the report onto his large, polished desk and looked out at the magnificent view from his office window. From here he could see the Shenandoah Mountains which never ceased to amaze him. Their majestic peaks and valleys, old, weathered and beaten but still standing tall in the distance, served as inspiration as well as a challenge and he loved the sight, as much as he loved this company he’d built up on his own from sweat, hard work and intelligence. Titus Securities was known internationally for ensuring corporate data and superior building security, among other things. And this hacker, although only a nuisance, he was getting into information that was none of his business. But until Mitch could figure out what they were going after, he wanted them to keep on digging.

Dismissing Jeff with a curt nod, he rubbed his chin, considering all the options. “I’ll get back to you shortly,” he said and turned to his computer. This wasn’t a normal computer though. This puppy was state of the art with eight screens and connections to some of the world’s most protected information.

His concentration was unswerving as he worked through the details of a program. Mitch didn’t even notice that the daylight had faded and velvety night time was moving deep into the morning hours. When he finally looked up and stretched, he’d been working for twelve hours straight but the program he’d created was perfect. There was a Trojan horse that would be installed whenever someone hacked into one of his computer systems again. If they downloaded information from his company again, they’d also be downloading a virus that would give him the information he needed to catch the bastards.

With another few clicks on his keyboard, he sent it off to his security team with instructions on how to load it up. First thing in the morning, all the databases would be loaded and, when this hacker tried again, he’d have the location of where they were downloading the data within seconds.

Catching the person was another issue, he thought. Going down to the communications control room, he went directly to the map of Washington, DC, ignoring the shocked reactions of the late night analysts who were working on their monitors. It was extremely rare that the CEO of their company showed up in the control room.

Titus Securities was headquartered in Washington, D.C. but he had branches in fifteen other cities of the United States and twelve countries worldwide. All the coffee shops that had sponsored the hacker were located in the Alexandria, Virginia area, a suburb of Washington, D.C. which was a data point in itself. With a red erasable marker, he worked on locating each of the coffee shops. Realizing when he was done that the marks were scattered within a five mile radius of each other. Another interesting point.

As he worked on the details, the night shift shut down and the morning crew came back in, all of them staying quiet as they noticed their big boss working in the control room.

By eight the next morning, Mitch was on his second pot of coffee and Jeff strolled up next to him. Noting his boss’s unshaved appearance and slightly unkempt clothing, which was normally immaculate, he deduced that Mitch hadn’t left the building yet. “Find anything interesting?” he asked as Mitch grimaced on a large swallow of cold coffee. “I got more information last night,” he said and showed Mitch the cross checking he’d done overnight.

Mitch was impressed and, with another few keystrokes, he loaded Jeff’s information into his. As the other analysts noticed what was on the main screen, a few of them came over and started brainstorming. Mitch took their ideas, working them into what information they had and by lunch time, he had a plan and a program that would start to close in on the culprit.

“Good work, everyone,” he said to the group of men and women who were the brains of his analytical operation. All of them had higher than average IQs but were a little less socially adept. As long as they could whiz through computer systems, he didn’t care if they dated. They produced results and that was enough for him.

An hour later, he drove home, his sleek grey Jaguar eating up the miles into the mountain side until he came to the tree line that hid the entrance to his house. The large, white modern building was an oasis from the chaos that sometimes erupted in his business. As he walked into the house, he greeted Duke, his German shepherd guard dog and best friend who was already wagging his tale in anticipation of their nightly adventures, stripped off his clothes and walked straight out to the swimming pool. With one clean stroke, he dove into the pool, instantly feeling refreshed. He swam lap after lap for over an hour, tossing the ball to Duke who jumped into the pool after retrieving the ball, happily bringing the ball back to his master. The punishing swim and the enthusiastic antics of his fierce friend quickly cleared his mind of the cobwebs from the previous eighteen hours but he mentally continued to go through the details of his programming and trap to see if there was something else he could do to catch this person. He didn’t like someone trying to hack into his company files and he was damn well going to throw the person into prison for as long as possible. The trick was catching the culprits.

Chapter 3

“We’ve got ‘em!” Jeff called out, walking into Mitch’s office a day later, barely pausing to knock. He wasn’t worried about the invasion, knowing that Mitch would be more interested in catching the person who was hacking into the personnel files than maintaining his personal sanctum. “They’re at this location,” he said, placing a piece of paper onto Mitch’s desk. “Let’s go,” he said and turned around.

Mitch didn’t hesitate. As soon as Jeff said the words, he grabbed his coat and keys, instantly moving out of the office to follow. Normally, Mitch would never be part of an operation. He’d had his share of traipsing through the jungle and desert, capturing bad guys and retrieving whatever information or hardware needed to be retrieved. Now, however, he was a desk guy, working the business, building the company and ensuring its continued success. He left the cloak and dagger stuff to the agents who worked for him but since this was
his
company and the hacker was delving into
his
files, Mitch wanted to be more than personally involved. He wanted to take this sucker down himself.

“We’ll take my car. It’s faster,” he said and slammed out the front door, racing to his car which was parked in the first space. The Jaguar roared to life and Mitch spun the vehicle around, racing down the road towards the address Jeff had given him. In less than fifteen minutes, he was parking in front of the coffee shop. With feigned casualness, he and Jeff stepped out of the car and into the shop. Just because they knew where the hacker was getting in, that didn’t mean they would know which person in the café was the culprit.

The patrons all looked normal, but Mitch knew that criminals didn’t wear a sign over their heads with an arrow indicating that they were “The One”. Inside the internet coffee shop, there were about twenty people in the shop, all sitting in front of a computer screen typing away while sipping expensive coffee. Each one of them looked like they were focusing quite diligently on whatever was on their computer screen, which meant they weren’t simply surfing the internet.

Mitch and Jeff stood in line while at the same time surveying the crowd, assessing the body language of the other people. Mitch skimmed through the crowd, his eyes surreptitiously going over every face, scanning their features, looking for clues that would give them some indication of their intent. Sometimes it was just body language that gave away the criminal. Other times, when someone was a hardened criminal or a sociopathic liar, the body language wasn’t enough.

With an ear piece, he was told by his security team that the hacker had already downloaded the files but was still online. They were trying to get the number of the terminal, but because these shops were a little less technically savvy, they weren’t always numbered well and most of the internet data was brought through one large networked system. A computer numbered fifteen in the system might actually be the first one in the line of physical computer terminals. It was basically a crap shoot at this point and gut instincts were in play.

Mitch looked around and noticed three people logging off. One appeared to be a student who was packing up a stack of books. Another was an elderly man and the third was a blond teenager. Check that, he thought with surprise as she stood up. It wasn’t a teenager, but a woman in her mid twenties. And she was stunningly gorgeous in a bombshell sort of way. She was short, but that was relative since Mitch was six feet three inches tall so everyone was short to him. She had short, curly blond hair that was almost platinum, but he suspected that the hair color was real since her eyebrows were the same soft color and her skin was extremely pale. Her eyes though – they weren’t pale but a shining, chocolate color that were almost offset by her perfect rosebud lips with a “dangerous” sort of deep red lipstick. She looked both adorable and sexy as hell, especially when she walked past and he noticed her black pencil skirt, black tights and red stiletto shoes. She pulled on a light red coat since it was a bit cool outside and he was intrigued when he got only a peek of her perfect derriere.

“Damn!” Gary said, walking up behind him and handing Mitch a cup of coffee. “What a little dynamite,” he whispered. “I wish she were our culprit so I could frisk her,” he chuckled.

Mitch wasn’t sure why, but for some reason, Gary’s comment offended him. A protective instinct he never knew he had reared its ugly head and he glared at the older man.

“Sorry,” Gary said, instantly contrite and looking away from the woman who was now walking down the street, away from the parking lot.

Mitch surveyed the rest of the crowd as he and Gary sat in one of the overstuffed chairs set up by a large fireplace. The shop was very busy with people coming in and going out, all of them grabbing a cup of coffee while some sat down at one of the terminals and sifted through the internet. Patrons could purchase internet usage by the minute, hour or in larger blocks of time so there was no way he and Gary could figure out who was on the system. “Are they still online?” he asked through his microphone?