Also when the first serious hacking occurred.

He dismissed Craig and dialed Jeremy’s cell number. “Jeremy, it’s Marc. I need you to hack into something for me.”

“Hey, hey, hey,” Jeremy said with a laugh. “First, we never call it hacking. Second, we never talk about it on a phone where anyone could listen in. And third, I have a legitimate business now. I’m done with that lifestyle.”

“Someone’s on the wrong side of your firewall and I think I found him. I need proof to give Jake. Tell me what this guy is up to.”

“Are you sure? It should have been airtight. Hang on, I can get remote access.” There was a rustling noise, then a clatter of Jeremy’s cell phone falling and being picked back up. “Who is it?” he growled.

“Jim Whitman,” Marc said.

“I don’t know him, but I will in about two minutes. Just using my password generator.” A few seconds later Jeremy said, “And I’m in.”

“What did you find?”

“Give me a minute. Getting in is easy. Wading through the crap in most people’s email is the pain. Wait. He has an encrypted folder on his desktop. That’s so cute. It’s like putting a tiny safe in your backyard and thinking it’ll protect your jewelry. It screams, ‘Open me.’”

“So, open it.”

“Done.”

Marc paced as Jeremy typed.

“The good news is this is no Einstein. We’re talking about basic coding and simplistic encryption. Eesh, he doesn’t even have sophisticated taste in porn. You should see what this guy spends his lunch looking at.”

“Is there anything in that folder that suggests someone is paying him?”

“No.”

“Keep looking. Can you see if he’s accessed anyone’s mail or a department he’s not supposed to?”

“I can try. Most would know to cover their tracks. Oh, look, he didn’t. This little weasel has been all over the server.”

“We’ve been experiencing coding glitches. Could he be uploading them . . . or whatever you do to get them in a program?”

“You don’t know much about computers, do you?”

“No, but I’m a dead shot from a thousand yards with a sniper rifle.”

“Point taken. Okay, so this guy is definitely gathering information for someone. I don’t think he’s the reason for the computer problem, but I’d say he knows who is. Give me a minute. I miss doing this.”

After a series of guttural noises, some revealing his displeasure with what he found, Jeremy said, “Do you want the good news, the bad news, or the who-didn’t-see-this-one-coming?”

“Just spit it out.”

“I know what Jim was up to, and he’s not a threat to your software. In fact, he’s tracking whoever is.”

“And the bad news?”

“He traced some code errors back to Stephan Andrade’s IP address.”

“Shit.”

“Seriously, that’s fucked up. I thought that guy was over whatever happened between him and Dominic.”

“I thought so, too.” This just keeps getting worse. “Was there anything else?”

“Yes, Jim sent out an email right after he found a connection to Stephan.”

“Who? Who did he contact?” He knew the answer, but he hoped he was wrong.

“Alethea,” Jeremy said, sounding more than a little put out. “I can’t believe she replaced me with an idiot who doesn’t even know to encrypt or erase his email. He thought deleting it was enough.”

Alethea. What am I going to do with you? “Thanks, Jeremy. Can you do one more thing for me before you go?”

“Sure.”

“I need a little something to help ensure Jim stays gone after we kick him out. Don’t stop digging until you find something we can hold over him.”

“My pleasure,” Jeremy said, and started furiously typing again. As he searched, he said, “I’ll also retrace his tracks and see if I can find anything he missed. Just a quick piece of advice: If Alethea thinks Lil and Abby are in danger because of this, she won’t stop until she takes down Stephan, along with anyone who stands between her and that objective—even if it gets her killed.”

Marc said with conviction, “That’s not going to happen.”

“Good luck, man,” Jeremy said. “I have a feeling you’re going to need it.”

Marc hung up the phone and dialed Jake Walton’s number. “Jake, we need to meet this morning, but I have to pick up a package first.”

“You found something?”

“Oh, yes.”

“Good, where do you want to meet?”

“I’ll come to you.”

After hanging up, Marc charged out of his office and down to his car. He called Alethea, but it went through to her voice mail. Trusting his gut, he headed toward Stephan Andrade’s main office.

He ordered his team to set up a surveillance perimeter around the building. If she made it there before him, he wanted to know. He parked in front of the building and glanced into the main foyer, even though he had no expectation of seeing her there. It wasn’t her style.

He stopped mid step when he spotted a drop-dead gorgeous woman in ridiculously high heels, a hot red dress, and telltale auburn locks, standing at the reception desk of Stephan’s office.

Although he’d never been one to believe in destiny, he felt that he was meant to find her.

Stop her.

Save her.

Chapter Nine

The problem with knocking is that you give people the chance to slam the door in your face.

“Do you have an appointment?” the older secretary at the main desk asked her.

Squaring her shoulders, Alethea said, “No, but I need to speak with Stephan Andrade.”

The secretary looked her over and said, “You know he’s engaged, right? That outfit would be completely wasted on him.”

Alethea let out a calming breath. She doesn’t matter. This conversation doesn’t matter. Don’t give her a reason to refuse you. “Can you just call to see if he’s available?”

“Hon, he’s not available. Men like him never are. If you’d like to leave your name with me, I’ll forward it to his secretary. That’s the best I can do.”

Unprofessional. Rude. And there is no way she’s a natural blonde. Again, all unimportant. “He must have a list of who you allow to go straight up. I know him personally.”

The woman looked down at her desk, then back up without saying anything.

“My name is Alethea Niarchos. Check the list.”

The woman scanned a paper on a clipboard, then some side notes. She looked up and her face went a bit red. “Hang on a moment,” she said, before bending to speak softly into a microphone.

Two security men approached from across the hall. Alethea rolled her eyes. “You’ve got to be kidding me. Seriously? I’m on that list? Fine, I’ll just call him myself to tell him I’m here.”

She dug her phone out of her purse but, before she could input anything, the phone was snatched out of her hands from behind. Alethea spun, prepared to show her assailant why she excelled at kickboxing, then froze when she saw who had taken her phone.

“I’ll handle this,” Marc said smoothly to the approaching security men and to the stunned secretary. He gave them his card. His name alone was now big in his business.

The secretary let out an audible sigh of pleasure as she looked him over.

He dropped Alethea’s phone into his pants pocket and took Alethea by the arm, guiding her rather forcibly toward the office building’s front door.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Alethea raged.

“Saving you from yourself,” Marc said calmly, and stepped out of the building with her, still holding her arm.

She planted her feet—not easy to do, considering her heels—and refused to budge. “Take your hands off me or I’ll do it for you.”

He stopped and smiled down at her. “You could try.”

She cocked one knee in preparation of doing just that, then stopped. With her heart beating wildly in her chest, she admitted to herself that it was good to see him again. Right. Wrong. It didn’t matter. He’d come for her and that felt pretty damn good. Her eyes homed in on his lips, those wonderfully stern and kissable lips.

He pulled her flush against him and growled down into her ear, “The only choice you get is how you’re getting in my car. Are you coming peacefully and willingly, or would you like to see exactly which pressure point causes temporary paralysis?”

If possible, his threat made him even more attractive. She squirmed against him, more out of the need to rub against him, than to get away, but he didn’t know that. He held her tighter, and the feel of his body hardening sent a shot of fire straight through her. She should be angry with him. He was standing between her and what she had to do, and she felt confused as to why she wasn’t fighting him.

She shifted her tush against his erection and reveled in his quick intake of air. Oh, yeah— that.

His breath was hot on her neck as he said, “I’ll take you up on that offer, just not now.”

His confidence served as a splash of sanity. She raised a foot to plant one of her heels into the toe of his shoe, but he twisted her body just enough to keep her off balance and take away the leverage she needed. She changed her approach and softened her stance in his grip. Widening her eyes and turning her head to look into his, she said, “I have information about what is going on at Corisi Enterprises.”

“Great. You can tell me when your adorable ass is in the passenger seat of my car—and it will be there in less than two minutes, one way or another.”

She almost smiled at his reference to her derriere, but instead put her chin out defiantly. “Your Neanderthal tactics don’t impress me.”

He growled in her ear and said, “Liar. Aren’t you imagining what we’d be doing if we weren’t in a public place? If I could rip that dress off you and end the pretense that we’re both not hot for each other?” He moved a hand up to the back of her neck and said, “I’ll carry you to the car if I have to. I don’t even mind if you struggle. You’re rubbing all the right places. But you know that, don’t you?”

“Okay, okay,” she said, her voice husky from a passion she was fighting to deny. “I’ll get in your car. Now get your hands off me.”

He released her a bit but retained a grip on one of her arms. Opening the door, he guided her into the passenger seat. “Bolt and I’ll put you in the trunk next time.”

“As if you’d do that,” she scoffed, glaring at him, but she didn’t move from where he’d put her. He was the only man she knew who might succeed at doing it.

He checked her seat belt, then secured his own and pulled into traffic.

“I could have you arrested for abduction.”

“You’re too smart to involve the law when you know you’d lose. Imagine what I could counter your claims with.”