Heart-Shaped Hack (15 page)

She returned home a little before ten. Shivering, she pulled on the flannel snowflake pajamas Ian had given her. She wrapped herself in a blanket and sat down in the comfy, oversized chair near the window, looking down at the empty street below as the snow continued to fall.

At first she thought it was a dream. She heard a scraping noise, but in her half-asleep state, she was unable to process what was making the sound. She’d fallen asleep in the chair, and as she awakened further, she realized someone was trying to put a key in the lock. A quick glance at her phone showed the time as 5:53 a.m. Approximately forty-eight hours after he’d kissed her good-bye, it seemed that Ian was back. Kate sprang from the chair.

He’d managed to get the door open, and she flinched when she saw his condition. His hair looked as if he hadn’t run anything but his fingers through it since he’d left, and his skin was pale, bordering on gray. The whites of his eyes were streaked with clusters of red. How long had he been staring at a computer screen? Had he slept at all? He wasn’t wearing a coat, and his shirt was untucked and wrinkled.

He reached for her, his expression weary and unfocused. “I’m sorry I didn’t text back.”

“It’s okay,” she said, gently taking the key ring from his freezing hand and easing the laptop-bag strap from his shoulder and setting it down on her kitchen table. Hoping he hadn’t driven, she led him by the hand into the bedroom.

He sat down heavily on the bed, reaching for the buttons on his shirt. His fingers wouldn’t cooperate, and if it hadn’t been for the complete lack of the smell of alcohol, Kate would have sworn he was drunk.

“Here, let me do it,” Kate said, brushing his hands away.

“I’m sorry,” he said again.

She gave him a quick kiss. “I know. We’ll talk about it later.” She took off his glasses and set them on the nightstand.

He seemed to fall asleep as she was undressing him, but then his eyes opened suddenly and he looked disoriented, as if he wasn’t sure where he was.

“Don’t worry. You’re home,” Kate said soothingly. When she had him down to his underwear, she pulled back the covers on his side of the bed and managed to slide him underneath, which was difficult because he was deadweight and almost incapable of helping her.

“My phone…” He was fading fast, the words trailing off.

Kate stroked his head. “I’ll take care of your phone. You go to sleep.” It was as if she’d flicked a switch. One moment he was with her, and the next he was out.

She found a few crumpled twenties, his company credit card, and his phone and charger in the front pocket of his jeans. The phone was exactly like hers and down to two percent battery. She plugged in the phone and placed it on the nightstand. Then she went into the kitchen and returned with a glass of water in case he woke up and needed a drink.

He was so still. She thought about sliding in next to him, wanting to put her arms around him and hold him, but she was wide-awake. She pressed a kiss to his lips, closed the bedroom door, and went into the kitchen to make coffee.

He woke up fourteen hours later. She was on her way to Ginger Hop to pick up an order of pad Thai and General Tsing’s chicken when she received his text.

Ian:
I’m awake. I don’t remember coming home.

Kate:
You were pretty out of it. You must be starving. I’ll be back soon with dinner.

Ian:
Starving and still tired. I’m going to take a shower. I missed you.

Kate:
I missed you too.

When she walked in the door, he took the carryout bag from her, set it down on the floor, and slid his hand under her hair, gripping her by the back of her neck and pressing her face to his chest.

“Thanks for taking such good care of me,” he said, raising her chin for a kiss. He tightened his hold on her, and she hugged him back.

“Anytime.”

His eyes were still red, but they weren’t nearly the road map they’d been when he’d come home.

“Please tell me you didn’t drive here.”

“I took a cab from the airport.”

“Good.”

“You’re probably wondering what I was doing.”

“I have a few questions, but let’s have dinner first. We’ll talk after.”

He nodded. “Okay.”

They dished up the food and brought their plates into the living room. Ian ate ravenously, finishing his meal and polishing off the rest of hers too. She waited until he set his empty plate on the coffee table before she asked her first question.

“Do you work for the FBI?” Kate had read everything she could get her hands on about hacking after Ian explained the difference between white and black hats. The subject fascinated her, and they’d had several in-depth follow-up discussions about certain aspects of the culture. She remembered from her reading that the FBI had a number of task forces dedicated to fighting cybercrime. If Ian was as good as he said he was, it made sense that he might be involved in something like that.

“I work
with
the FBI. But they have priority over my other clients. Always.”

“Do they often whisk you away on airplanes without notice?”

“Only when absolutely necessary, and only if it’s something that can’t be handled out of the field office.”

“What exactly are you involved in?”

“Remember that day at breakfast when I told you about the cyberthieves who steal credit card numbers and then sell them to people called carders?”

“You said they make new cards and use them to buy things. Then they return the merchandise for cash or sell it.”

He nodded. “The credit card information is traded on a forum. It’s basically an online black market for cyberthieves. Attacks against retailers and consumers have increased, which means more of this information is being bought and sold now than ever before. The FBI created a team whose sole purpose is to dismantle one of the biggest carding rings.”

“The FBI hired you to help them with this?”

“It’s not uncommon. They simply don’t have the technical skills to do it themselves. Sometimes it takes a hacker to catch a hacker.”

“So you’re an informant?”

“More like a special consultant.”

“Does the FBI have something against letting you sleep?”

“No, but one of the team members logged on to the forum from his government IP address, which prompted accusations that it had been infiltrated by the FBI. Most cybercrime rings have been, so the paranoia is rampant and, in this case, justified. The leader of the task force summoned the team to headquarters to do damage control. My phone started blowing up after I got the call, and the plane was already waiting for me on the tarmac when I arrived. They brought in food, and we could take a quick break to stand under a cold shower in the locker room, but no one slept. We’ve spent over two years earning the trust of the forum’s key members, and we stayed online around the clock until we’d convinced them it had been a false alarm and they had nothing to worry about. Then I got back on the plane and came home.”

It wasn’t that Kate didn’t know the FBI utilized civilian assistance because she did. And she could understand how anyone working in that capacity would need to maintain a certain amount of anonymity. But it was a little disconcerting to discover that the man she was falling for actually
was
a superhero who spent at least part of his time fighting cybercrime and that she’d had no idea.

“You ask me about my day, and I tell you about the people I’ve helped. But when I ask you about your day not once have you ever said, ‘The team and I made some good progress toward bringing down a ring of cyberthieves.’”

“I wasn’t intentionally withholding it. When things are running smoothly I don’t think much about it. The FBI is just another one of my clients, and I sometimes forget it’s a bit out of the ordinary for most people.”

“How long have they been one of your clients?”

“A little over ten years.”

“What kinds of things have you worked on with them?”

“High-tech crime, exploitation, cyberterrorism, fraud. Some assignments are short. Some, like the carding ring, are much longer.”

“Is that the reason you move so much?” He could downplay it all he wanted, but if relocation was necessary, it meant that the duplicitous nature of his work carried a certain amount of risk.

“Yes. The days of simply tracking an IP address are over, and there are dozens of ways to remain anonymous online. But if someone is patient, if they’re technically savvy, which these hackers are, there are ways to obtain my personal information, including my identity and location.”

“And they’re trying to do that to you?”

“Hopefully not at the moment, but they’d like to. Hackers protect their identities at all costs, so doxing one—especially if he’s working with any kind of law-enforcement agency—is considered a badge of honor. We’re trying to gather enough evidence to send these people to prison. That’s a pretty big motivator for them to try to find me.”

Occasionally
I find myself in a bit of hot water, which I prefer to keep other people out of.

“What would happen if they found you?”

“There would be threats, highly disturbing but mostly empty. It wouldn’t matter, because I’d be long gone before anyone knocked on my door.”

Kate was silent. She’d chalked up his frequent changes of address to wanderlust and the fact that he could live anywhere he chose for as long as he wanted before moving on to the next city. But wanting to stay and needing to leave were two very different things.

Her expression was apprehensive. “Would you tell me before you left?”

“Kate.” He looked hurt, as if he couldn’t believe she’d ask such a thing. “Of course I would tell you.”

How had she let things get this far? She seemed to have forgotten the promise she’d made to herself: that if she reached the point where she had strong feelings for Ian—and the feelings she had for him were growing stronger by the day—he would have to start opening up to her.

“I wasn’t sure. You know everything about me, but there’s so much I don’t know about you. I’ve never been to your place. You could have a wife and kids stashed there, and I wouldn’t have a clue. You know where I am—all the time—because of that phone. But I still don’t know your last name.”

“I don’t have a wife and kids. My last name is Bradshaw.”

It took her a moment to process what he’d said. “You said you were never going to tell me.”

“I was always going to tell you. I’m just very protective of my last name because someday when I actually
have
a wife and kids, I want to share it with them. But if it’s out there or if it’s ever linked to my work, I might not be able to. I had a girlfriend once who didn’t understand my need for discretion, and she talked about what I did and gave my name to anyone who would listen, which caused me nothing but stress. It’s made me a bit gun-shy, and I’m more cautious about when I tell someone than I used to be.”

“I would never say anything, Ian.”

“I know you wouldn’t because I know I can trust you.” He picked up his phone from the coffee table and started typing. When he finished, he said, “Give me your phone.”

She pulled the phone he’d given her from her pocket, unlocked it, and gave it to him.

He started typing, and a few minutes later he handed it back to her. “The only reason I track your phone is so I can wipe it if it gets lost or stolen. I didn’t know it bothered you.”

“It doesn’t bother me. Stuart and I used to track each other if one of us wasn’t answering our phone or was late. But it’s not reciprocal with us.”

“If you open the app and select Ian’s Phone it will give you my location. I should have done it from the beginning. I’m sorry.”

She glanced down at the unnamed plain blue icon. “Special app for a special phone?”

“Developed for my own private use.”

Kate could only guess the functions it was capable of, but she was glad he hadn’t hesitated to make the change. “I’m going to start stalking you now.”

He smiled gently. “I’m afraid you’ll find it very boring. If I’m not at my place, I’m probably here.”

“There’s nothing boring about that at all, at least not to me.” She set the phone on the coffee table. “I really like you, Ian. I think about you all the time, and when you’re not here I miss you. But the longer we’re together, the higher the chances are that you’ll have to leave—maybe without much notice—and I don’t want to get hurt. I’m sure there are things you can’t tell me, but I need to know about anything that might increase your chances of leaving. If you can’t promise me that, I can’t do this.”

A flicker of something crossed his face—surprise, concern, fear?—and then it disappeared.

He reached for her hands and squeezed them. “I promise. I don’t want to lose you. You’re far too special to me.”

“All right,” she said softly. She’d told him what she needed, and he’d promised to give it to her.

“Come here,” he said, pulling her onto his lap.

He kissed her, held her, told her how much he’d missed her.

He promised.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

The next night, when they returned to Kate’s apartment after dinner, Ian said, “Why don’t you pack a bag? We can stay at my place tonight, and I’ll drive you to work in the morning.”

She knew where he lived because they’d driven by his building several times and he’d pointed it out.

“The only reason I haven’t taken you there before now is because I prefer your place. Mine is just where I work.”

Kate packed a bag.

Ian lived across the river in a high-rise apartment downtown. When they arrived, he pushed a button on a key fob that he held up to a sensor and then pulled into a marked stall in the underground parking garage.

“Where do you store the Shelby?”

“At a private storage facility in Bloomington. I miss her. I might have to drop by and take her for a spin every now and then.”

They rode the elevator to the twentieth floor, and she followed Ian down the hallway and into his apartment, waiting as he switched on the lights.

“No wife, no kids,” he said gently.

“I didn’t really think that.”