Chapter 4 4

Hart's fingers lingered on the spine of the book, trapping Camisha's hand against the hard cover. His gray eyes drilled into hers, searching for a crack in her armor.

"Since when do you have insomnia?" he asked.

"Since I started sleeping in a house with a man who threatened to send me to prison," she shot back, pulling her hand away. The loss of contact made her skin tingle.

"Don't go into the safe again," Hart said, his voice dropping an octave. "The next time the alarm triggers, it calls the police automatically. I won't stop them."

"I was just looking for a book," she lied again.

"Go to bed."

The next morning, the breakfast room was flooded with sunlight. It felt like an interrogation room.

Isadora was there. Of course she was. She sat at the table as if she had been born there, pouring coffee. Her presence was a necessary evil, a constant reminder of the fragile alliance between the Whitney and Roth families as they finalized a merger.

"Good morning," Isadora chirped. "I brought a little gift for the boy."

She pushed a gold-wrapped box across the table toward Leo, who was sitting in a high chair Camisha had found in the attic.

"It's Swiss chocolate," Isadora smiled. "Hazelnut and peanut brittle. Very expensive."

Leo reached for the shiny box.

"No!" Camisha lunged. She slapped the box out of Leo's hand. It flew across the room, hitting the wall with a crack. Chocolates scattered across the floor.

Silence.

Isadora gasped, clutching her pearls. "My god! You savage."

"He has allergies!" Camisha was breathing hard. Her chest heaved. "Severe allergies. Are you trying to kill him?"

Hart looked up from his newspaper. He frowned. "Peanut allergy?"

"Yes," Camisha snapped. She grabbed a napkin and wiped Leo's hand, even though he hadn't touched it.

Hart stared at the boy. He had a severe peanut allergy. He carried an EpiPen everywhere. But he had never told anyone. Not even Isadora. Only his doctor and... Camisha knew. His mind raced, connecting another dot. The gray eyes. The age. Now, this. It was too much to be a coincidence. He watched Camisha, her panic real and fierce, and his suspicion hardened into a cold certainty. She was hiding something monumental. He would play along, for now.

"That's unfortunate," Hart said slowly, his voice carefully neutral. "Is it genetic?"

Camisha froze. She realized her mistake. "No. Just... bad luck."

Isadora stood up, wiping imaginary dust from her skirt. "Well, I was just trying to be nice. Hart, since Camisha is clearly overwhelmed, why don't I take the boy to the gardens? My nanny is outside."

"No," Camisha said.

"Actually," Hart stood up. "That's a good idea. Camisha, you're coming with me to the office. We have the press conference prep."

"I'm not leaving him with her," Camisha said.

"Alfred will watch him," Hart said, signaling the butler. "Isadora, you can supervise. Camisha, car. Now."

An hour later, Camisha was sitting at a small, cramped desk in the corner of the executive floor at Whitney Enterprises. It was humiliating. Former employees walked by, whispering.

"Hey, isn't that the ex-wife?"

"She looks tired."

Hart was in his glass office, yelling at someone on the phone.

Suddenly, the hum of the office changed. Groans erupted from the bullpen.

"What's happening?"

"My screen is red!"

"Mine too!"

Hart stormed out of his office. "Why are the trading algorithms down?"

The IT Director, a sweaty man named Steve, ran over. "It's a hack, Mr. Whitney. A DDoS attack. They found a backdoor in the firewall. We're locked out. We're losing a million dollars a minute."

Hart slammed his hand on a desk. "Fix it!"

"We can't! The code is... it's ancient. We don't know this architecture."

Camisha sat in her corner. She recognized the red skull flashing on the screens. It was a vulnerability she had identified three years ago in a memo no one read. During her three years on the run, she hadn't just been hiding; she'd been honing her skills, taking on high-risk freelance financial modeling and cybersecurity jobs that paid for Leo's treatments. This old code was child's play.

She looked at Hart. He was panicking. If the stock crashed today, the takeover would happen. Leo's trust fund-the one she needed for his medical bills-would be worthless.

She sighed. She pulled a bottle of nail polish out of her purse. She opened it. Then, with her other hand, she slid the keyboard of the abandoned terminal closer.

While pretending to paint her pinky nail, her right hand flew across the keys.

CMD + SHIFT + R.

Override Protocol Alpha.

Patch Loophole 7.

She hit Enter.

Instantly, the red skulls vanished. The screens flickered back to blue. The trading numbers started moving again.

"We're back up!" Steve shouted. "Holy cow. Someone patched it. Who did that?"

Hart looked around the room. He saw his team of twenty frantic engineers. Then he looked at the corner.

Camisha was blowing on her wet fingernails, looking bored.

Hart's phone buzzed. An anonymous email.

Subject: You're welcome.

Body: Your security is like Swiss cheese. Fix the port on Server 4.

Hart stared at the email. The tone. The snark. It reminded him of the person who saved him during the blackout. The person who had remotely patched the system's critical vulnerability before someone else had to physically enter the server room to destroy the compromised hardware during the ensuing fire.

Isadora walked off the elevator, carrying a tray of sushi. "Lunch time, Hart!"

Hart looked at Isadora. "Isadora, what's a DDoS attack?"

Isadora blinked. "Is that... a new designer bag? Did I miss a launch?"

Hart narrowed his eyes. He looked back at Camisha. She was staring out the window, looking invisible.

But for the first time, Hart saw her.