Center of Gravity (Marauders Book 3) (7 page)

He hurried around the corner to the clubhouse to see if he could catch someone trying to breach their security. He wasn’t too worried they’d manage, to be honest, but they needed to be on top of shit like that, and he sat down in front of the computers and logged on.

“How does it look?” Mech asked when he walked into the office twenty minutes later.

“Pathetic, and he’s still connected,” Mitch answered without taking his eyes off the screen. “Think my dad could’ve made a better attempt than this.”

“I’m not convinced Brick even knows how to turn a computer on,” Mech chuckled as he sat down next to him. “But they’re not even close to breaking through? Is he isolated?”

Mitch just gave him an eye. Obviously he’d isolated the guy to keep him from even accidentally stumbling into the important stuff. He wasn’t a fucking idiot. Mech just chuckled.

“I’ll start going through everything,” he mumbled. “Keep an eye on him.”

Mitch kept watching the intruder, who couldn’t be much of a fucking hacker if he didn’t even keep an eye on who else was connected to the system he was exploring. If he had, he would’ve immediately seen that he wasn’t alone, and it didn’t take a genius to figure out you were being watched. This was by no means an elite hacker; he probably wasn’t even a fucking script kid, because in order to miss the sysop in the system, he had to be a complete newbie.

It would’ve been easy for Mitch to just kick him out, but that was stupid. It was always better to observe than to interfere. They wanted to catch the fucker, and that was easier if they kept an eye on him, and this way they could control his access and see what he was doing at the same time. Also, just by watching him, Mitch would learn his technique and his skill. And this was an idiot. He was checking ports like a drunk in dorm hall banging on every fucking door he could see. No matter what fucking exit script he had to delete the log files when he left their system, there was no way in hell he’d be able to undo what he’d done.

Mitch sighed. “Look at this.” He pointed towards the screen.

Mech rolled over his chair to sit next to him and stared at the screen for a few minutes.

“What the fuck? He’s a fucking moron.”

“Either way, we’re gonna have to go through everything to make sure he didn’t leave some shit behind.”

“I’ll call Lynn,” Mech sighed.

Lynn was his wife, the high school sweetheart. Mitch still found it pretty fucking unbelievable that the two of them were still in love, but Mech claimed they were. He was never sweet to her on the phone, or anything like that, but he never cheated on her either. And he always called her when he needed to stay late at the clubhouse or had other work to do.

“Keep an eye on him until I come back. I’m putting on some coffee,” Mitch said as he stood up. “We’re gonna need it.

-o0o-

Mitch sighed a little when Eliza came walking towards him in the hallway at his dad’s house. She looked angry, and he knew why.

“Sorry, buttercup,” he mumbled when she stopped in front of him and crossed her arms over her chest.

“I called you all night,” she mumbled.

“I know. I’ve been working.” She opened her mouth, but he interrupted her before she could say anything. “And it really was work. You know I pick up if it’s you even if there’s a girl there.”

“Work?”

“Club work,” he said, and leaned forward to kiss her forehead. “None of your business.”

Eliza was a lot like him. Not really thinking about things, a lot of energy, a brain that was all over the place going a thousand miles an hour, but with that lovely dash of teenage girl hormones. She’d been a monster for a while, but the last year she’d calmed down. Mitch found it hard to think about the fact that she was fourteen. He’d gone after more than one fourteen-year-old. It had been a while since then, and he hadn’t been much older than fourteen when he did it. Which didn’t change the fact that it was quite possible that someone, at that very moment, was planning on how to get into his baby sister’s panties. That was some disturbing shit.

Soon enough, the noise and all the people got to him, and he sneaked outside for a smoke. When the door opened behind him, he assumed it was Mac, but it wasn’t. It was Lisa.

“Give me your phone,” she said. He didn’t know what it was about, but he gave it to her. She pushed some buttons and then nailed him down with her eyes. “You have to be so fucking careful—I kid you not! Super careful, she’s… Careful!”

She’d given him Anna’s number! Things where looking up.

“I get it.”

“And really pay attention to her reactions and… Fuck! Just,
really
careful, okay?”

“Okay?” He didn’t fully get that but didn’t get the chance to ask her, since she just kept up with her ramblings.

“And if you make her fall madly in love with you, or say anything she can think means—”

“I get it!” he exclaimed, but Lisa wasn’t done.

“—I’ll rip your balls off.”

“Lisa. I get it.”

He took the phone and saw that Lisa’d programmed Anna as ‘Anna Dobronravov’. He was a bit impressed Lisa hadn’t just remembered her last name, but also knew how to spell it—assuming it was spelled correctly. He stared at the name for a while.

“So who is she?” his dad asked when he came outside a few minutes later.

“What?”

“Only time you have a smile like that is when you’ve got fresh booty in sight.”

“Maybe.” He looked at his dad and decided to go inside to give her a call. “Dinner tomorrow?”

“Always welcome, son. You know that.” He was about to go back inside when he turned around. “Any idea how someone got ahold of your user name?”

“No, but it’s not hard to guess, and no alarms go off until someone tries to log on with a username that’s correct.”

“So you didn’t give it to some booty?”

“Dad, I don’t need to give girls inside info to get a blow job.”

“Shouldn’t you be trying to figure who hacked our system?”

“Okay, they didn’t
hack
our system, they tried, and I am tracking them.”

“While you’re here?”

“Do you want me to describe exactly how I’m doing it, or are you gonna take my word for it?”

“Smart ass,” Brick said and gave him a hug. “See you tomorrow.”

Mitch went through the house, said bye to everyone, and then stopped once he was out at to the driveway. He pressed ‘dial.’

“Anna.”

“Hi, it’s Mitch. Lisa gave me your number.”

“Oh! I didn’t think...”
There was a long silence.
“Hi.”

“Wanna go out for a beer?”

“A beer?”

He was starting to wonder exactly what Lisa’d said to Anna because she sounded extremely confused. And something else, too, he just couldn’t put his finger on it at the moment.

“Yeah, thought I’d pick you up with my bike.”

“I don’t think I can go on a bike.”

“Nothing to it. I’ll teach you.”

“No, more that I’m not sure how to bring the cane.”

“Shit. Didn’t think about that.” He wasn’t sure what to suggest instead, and he was still wondering why she sounded like… a deer in headlights, whatever those sounded like.

“You could just come here. I have beer and wine, but I’m guessing you don’t drink wine. Probably something else to drink, too.”

“Okay.” He was starting to suspect that there was something he was really missing, she seemed very nervous, but he could go to her place. It beat taking her to his place by miles, since it was easer to leave than to throw someone out, if that seemed necessary once he was done. “Sure, uh, just give me your address, and I’ll be there soon.”

“87 Oak Street, fourth floor.”

“I’ll see you there,” he said and hung up.

He was still trying to figure out what was going on when he stepped out of the elevator in her house. This was one of the nice neighborhoods in Greenville, and he knew the house only had really big apartments, so he briefly wondered how the hell she was paying for that, since she couldn’t dance anymore. From what he remembered, ballerinas didn’t make that much money to begin with. The door opened, and Anna gave him a bothered smile. She was wearing a simple, black dress, something he really hoped was thigh-highs or stockings, and a white knitted shawl was draped over her shoulders.

“Hi,” she said and gave him a shy smile. “Come in.”

He walked inside and saw a long hallway ending up in what he assumed was the living room, but he wasn’t sure because the apartment was too fucking big for him to see the end of it. He walked farther and to a big opening on the right leading to the kitchen, the very modern kitchen, he noted.

“So this is your place?”

She laughed. “No. It’s my aunt’s place—my aunt on my father’s side—their parents bought this place in the forties. We all lived here together before my parents moved abroad.”

That would explain it. Not that Greenville was the most expensive place, but even here apartments like this cost a lot of money. And she was really cute when she was rambling out of nervousness.

“It’s nice. Better than any bar I had in mind.”

“I’m just not comfortable with bars.” She held up her cane. “Or more that I’m not comfortable with walking around with this when I’m drunk.”

“I can see why that would be a problem.”

She walked past him into the kitchen and opened the fridge.

“Beer okay?”

“Perfect.”

He took it and watcher her as she walked over to a glass of wine she had standing on the counter. After a few impressively deep gulps, she put it down and looked at him again.

“What did Lisa say to you?” she said once she’d turned her eyes down on the floor.

“Not much. She gave me your number.”

With half a smile and a lifted eyebrow she looked up. “Don’t think that’s the full story.”

“No, but we didn’t talk much, she gave it to me at a family dinner.”

“You have family dinners?”

“Often.”

He was trying to figure out what the hell was really going on. Lisa was... well, Lisa. He knew how she talked to her friends about him. When she’d set him up with her friends before, it had been clear what was going on. This felt strange. Anna looked insanely nervous, and if she hadn’t been twenty-five he’d have considered her being a virgin.

“Are you okay?” he finally asked.

“Sure,” she answered and emptied her wine. She put the glass down and shook her head. “No. I can’t... do this. Feels like I’m... I don’t know, buying a prostitute or something.”

“Wow!” He laughed. “Should I feel offended?”

“No! God no!” She seemed mortified. “Just... she’s... I’m not sure what she told you, but she... Shit. I just... I can’t do this. It’s too weird. And I really appreciate that you’re prepared to do this, but it really feels a bit too much as if I’m paying you, and I can’t.”

Mitch was starting to feel even more confused, and Anna looked so ashamed.

“How is this like you paying me if I asked for your number?”

“You asked for my number?”

“Yeah, a few weeks ago.” He put the beer on the counter and walked up to her. “She didn’t tell you?”

“No. She...” Anna hid her face in her hands. “This is so embarrassing.”

“Babe,” he chuckled and removed her hands from her face. “I’m a pretty non-judgmental guy, so try me.”

“A while ago I admitted I hadn’t had sex in a while, and in a very drunk state I admitted that I found you… attractive.” She looked up at him. He’d kind of figured she did, since Lisa’d given him her number, but it was still nice to hear. “So she convinced me to do this. I somehow managed to convince myself that it was a good idea since…”

“…It’s been a while since you had sex,” he finished her sentence with a smile.

“Yes. And she
did
said you were a non-judgmental guy, so you wouldn’t mind my leg.”

“Your leg?” He was standing close to her, and she smelled nice and was so very beautiful. “What about your leg?”

“It’s pretty bad.”

“Okay.” He shrugged to show her it didn’t matter, but if he was honest with himself it kind of sucked. He’d had some great ideas on positions, but he’d go easy on her. “Just make sure to tell me if I hurt you.”

“What?” She seemed to realize how close he was and moved her blue eyes from his chest to his face before pointing it out. “You are very close.”

“I’m planning on trying to get a lot closer,” he mumbled. “So, what’s the problem with the leg?”

“It’s covered in scars,” and she was mumbling as well, suddenly very focused on his mouth. He reached out and put his hand on her cheek, stroking her lower lip with his thumb. Like scars on her leg would make any fucking difference. She was hot with or without them. “I don’t even like looking at it myself.”

A while
since she had sex and not looking at the leg made it click. She hadn’t had sex since before the accident, which had been a pretty fucking long time ago. No wonder Lisa felt that her home girl needed some and was prepared to throw Anna his way. He moved his other hand up and caressed her face, leaning closer.