Off the Grid Christmas Read online

  He was right.

  She knew it.

  She still didn’t want to leave Sebastian.

  “Arden?” He touched her cheek, and she found herself looking into his eyes. Found herself thinking about all the ways he and his parents could be hurt if she was caught.

  She loved Sebastian, but he’d be fine without her for a few days.

  “Okay.”

  He smiled, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear, his fingers lingering for a moment. She could still feel their warmth after he stepped away, after they walked outside, after they climbed into the back seat of Silas’s vehicle.

  That should have bothered her.

  It should have made her nervous. It should have set off alarms and warning bells, made her toss up walls and create boundaries.

  Should have, but all it really did was make her wonder why she’d spent so much time with Randy when he’d never ever made her feel what Kane did.

  “Where to?” Silas asked as he started the engine and pulled away from the house.

  She hadn’t thought about it. Not much. She’d been too busy thinking about decrypting the files, escaping GeoArray, outwitting the FBI.

  Now, though, she’d accomplished her first goal. She knew what GeoArray planned. She also knew exactly what she needed to do to stop it.

  “Boston,” she answered. “We need to get into GeoArray’s offices and take down its network before the system prototype is transferred in two days.”

  * * *

  “No way.” Kane didn’t hesitate. He didn’t think it through. He didn’t need to. There was no way he was bringing Arden anywhere near GeoArray.

  “Hear me out, Kane,” she said calmly.

  “I’m listening.” But listening didn’t mean he was going along with her plan.

  “The day after tomorrow, GeoArray is getting paid to deliver the weapons control system. Once that’s leaked, our own weapons systems can be used against us and our allies. We need to take down GeoArray’s network system to prevent that from happening.”

  “Then remotely log onto the network and take it down. You hacked in before, you can do it again.”

  “I can’t. Once I took the files from their network, they knew it had been breached. They took their system off the net. It’s completely inaccessible to anyone outside their facility.”

  “So we’ll take the information to the FBI and let them handle it.”

  “They may not be able to get a search warrant quickly enough to give them time to stop this from going down,” she argued. “Plus, we know Emory has the FBI’s ear. Someone could tip him off. By the time they get into the GeoArray systems, the information could be out, and our national defense will be compromised.”

  “They’ll move quickly. They’ll have to. We take the evidence to Grayson, he’ll know who to trust,” Kane said grimly.

  “Even then, the government doesn’t always move quickly,” Silas said. “I’m going to have to take Arden’s side on this. We should move in now while there’s still time. Take GeoArray by surprise.”

  “I disagree,” Kane argued. “There has to be another way.”

  “There isn’t. If I’d had time to leave a worm while I accessed their system, I could have wiped out their network. Unfortunately, their network monitoring system found me too quickly. There is absolutely no way to wipe out that system except from the inside. We go in, or we allow the country’s entire defense system to be vulnerable.”

  “Then you tell us how to do it. Silas and I will go in. You call the shots via phone.”

  “Statistically speaking, there’s more chance of a meteorite falling on GeoArray and taking out the system than there is of that plan succeeding.”

  “Ouch!” Silas said. “You don’t have much confidence in us.”

  “I have plenty of confidence in you, but this will only succeed if we work together. If you go it alone, you’ll be in enemy territory, talking to me over a phone, trying to do something it took years for me to learn. All I need you to do is get me in the building. I can do the rest.”

  She had a point.

  Kane didn’t want to admit it.

  But they’d need to get in and get out quickly and silently. Stay under the radar. That would be hard to do while trying to communicate with someone on the outside.

  “Fine. You win.”

  “I do?” She sounded shocked.

  “Why are you surprised?”

  “Because I haven’t won a debate with you yet.”

  “There’s a first for everything.”

  She smiled and leaned her head back against the seat, sighing.

  “Tired?”

  “No. Just enjoying the victory.” She met his eyes, and he found himself smiling right back at her, because she was Arden. She loved cats and Christmas and her country. She was smart, quick-minded and honest as they come, and he liked that. He liked her, and he was starting to think he could feel a lot more than that if he let himself.

  “No one should be claiming victory yet. Not until we’ve gotten in and out of GeoArray without getting ourselves killed,” Silas muttered, merging onto the highway.

  “You have a point,” Arden agreed. “We can’t just waltz in the front door and demand access to the server.”

  “Once we get to Boston, we may be able to track down the blueprint of the building and get an idea of what access we can use.” Kane could think of a dozen areas that were probably weak in security: upper level windows, ventilation systems, delivery bays.

  One of his company’s specialties was identifying physical security weaknesses for clients and shoring them up. Most companies didn’t bother hiring outside experts, though. Most thought their security could never be breached.

  Most were wrong.

  “We can probably do that now.” Arden tugged at the strap of her backpack. Kane hadn’t removed it when he’d gotten in Silas’s SUV. He’d been in too much of a hurry to bother. “Hand me my laptop. I can take a look through city records and see what I can find. I’m sure there’s a digital file of it somewhere.”

  He shrugged out of the pack and pulled out the computer.

  Seconds later, she had it open, booted up and connected to the internet through her wireless network card.

  They bounced over a rut in the road, but she didn’t seem to notice. She also didn’t seem to notice the landscape changing, the lights of the city shining in the distance, time passing. She was completely engrossed in what she was doing, and he let her be.

  He had things to do, too. Plans to make.

  They’d go into GeoArray together. They’d come out together.

  That was the goal, but anything could happen.

  The company had money, resources and a lot to lose if they were unable to deliver the information in those files. If something were to happen that prevented Arden from taking down the server, GeoArray would successfully pass on information vital to national security.

  Kane couldn’t let that happen. He couldn’t take a chance that they’d fail and that the secrets they’d discovered would be kept. And of course he wanted to clear Arden’s name. Give her life back to her and have her home in time to enjoy Christmas with her family.

  He had every reason to succeed and he had no intention of dying before he completed the mission. He had no intention of allowing Arden or Silas to die, either. But he’d be foolish if he let them walk into GeoArray without a backup plan.

  He couldn’t call in the local authorities. They’d stop the operation before it began. He couldn’t contact the FBI for the same reason.

  He could contact Grayson, though. But not yet. Not until right before they went in. He’d need to convince Arden to email him the files, too. That was the only way to be sure the information would get into the hands of someone who would know wha
t to do with it if the mission went south.

  THIRTEEN

  They reached Boston in less than two hours. Gray morning light filtered through thick clouds and between tall buildings as they crawled through rush hour traffic.

  Arden had spent every minute of the drive searching the internet for the blueprints of GeoArray’s building. She’d finally hacked into City Hall’s database and was searching through a disorganized mess of file folders.

  Her eyes were gritty with fatigue, her mind numb. She’d been on the go for days, running on adrenaline and not much else. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d closed her eyes. Aside from the breakfast sandwich Kane had made her, she couldn’t recall eating anything in the past forty-eight hours.

  Yeah. She was a mess.

  A mess who had to take down GeoArray’s server system in a few hours. She scowled, scrolling through the City Hall files. Her neck felt stiff from too many hours hunched over the computer, and she rubbed the knotted muscles.

  “It’s got to be here,” she muttered, annoyed with the amount of time the search was taking. Usually, she was fast. Then again, usually she wasn’t working on no sleep.

  “Why don’t you take a break, Arden?” Kane asked, turning in his seat to look at her. She looked up, met his warm brown eyes and for a moment was lost in the depth of them. “Arden?” he prodded, and she finally registered the question. She blinked back the exhaustion.

  “I’ve almost got it.”

  “I’m pretty certain you said that thirty minutes ago,” Silas said.

  “Studies show that optimists live longer, healthier lives,” she responded.

  “They also show that people who go into enemy territory blind die.” Silas pulled into a public parking garage, grabbed a ticket from the kiosk and tucked it into the glove compartment.

  “Aren’t you just a stream of warm sunshine on a dreary winter day?”

  Kane laughed.

  “She’s got you pegged, Silas,” he said.

  “I’m a realist,” Silas muttered. “There’s nothing wrong with that. I’m thinking we ditch the floor plan idea and do some covert reconnaissance. One of us can do a perimeter search of the building. We might be able to locate an access point that way.”

  “Just give me another minute,” Arden said. She scrolled through the files on another page, and her heart jumped when she finally found GeoArray’s name.

  She clicked the file, smiling as the blueprint popped up on the screen.

  “Got it!” she nearly shouted.

  “Can I take a look?” Kane reached through the center console, pulled the computer from her lap. He studied the blueprint for several minutes, and she studied him.

  She didn’t mean to.

  It just happened.

  He was looking at the computer. She was looking at him.

  He had a tiny scar above his left eyebrow and a larger one at the corner of his mouth. Both were faded white with time. Next thing she knew, she was noticing the thin white line that ran across the top of his right hand and the deep purplish mark on the side of his neck near his hairline.

  He turned in his seat, caught her staring, and she was suddenly looking into his handsome face, his dark eyes. “Everything okay?” he asked.

  She nodded, her cheeks hot. “Fine. I’m just tired. A habitual sleep pattern of seven to eight hours a night is thought to be best for peak cognitive performance. Of course, the amount can vary based on an individual’s basal sleep need and sleep debt, as well as age. There’s also a small percent of people that are their best with only six hours of sleep. It’s been scientifically proven. When they exposed rats to high levels of stress and little sleep, they found they were less able to perform tasks.”

  “That’s an interesting data point,” he said without rolling his eyes, laughing or otherwise treating her like she was an idiot. She wasn’t used to that. Aside from her family and Juniper, there weren’t many people who didn’t at least smirk when she went off on one of her tangents.

  “It’s just some silly trivia that I probably read a dozen years ago,” she murmured.

  “It’s very relevant to our current situation,” he corrected. “And being exhausted when we go into GeoArray tonight isn’t a good idea. How about you try to rest for a while?”

  “I’d rather take a walk and scope out GeoArray’s headquarters. I’d like to take a look at the building. See how much security they actually have.”

  “No,” he said.

  “We could at least drive past. We certainly can’t just sit here. We’ll draw attention to ourselves. Plus, it’s a waste of time.”

  “It’s a public garage. And not all of us are going to be sitting here.” Kane handed the computer back.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “I’m going to survey GeoArray. You and Silas are staying here.”

  “What! When was this decided?” Not while she was around to have some input. That much was certain.

  “Now,” he responded.

  “Well, you’re going to have to undecide it, because I’m not sitting in this car—”

  “Sleeping would be a better idea.”

  “I’m not sitting, sleeping or staying in this car while you’re doing reconnaissance.”

  “Sure you are,” Silas said, opening his door and getting out of the SUV. “We’re too close to GeoArray for you to be wandering around. Its people have been looking for you for weeks. You think they’re not going to recognize you if you show up on one of their exterior security cameras?”

  “They may be circulating Kane’s picture by now, too. We know they’ve connected him to the plane.”

  “I’m pretty good at being unobtrusive.” Kane got out of the SUV, too.

  “By pretty good, he means exceptional.” Silas closed his door. Kane did the same.

  And Arden was suddenly sitting in the SUV with nothing but a dog for a companion. She couldn’t make out their conversation, their voices muffled by the closed windows. Admittedly, Kane was probably the best qualified to scout the facility, but that didn’t mean she didn’t have thoughts to contribute to the plan of action.

  She reached for the door handle, freezing when the dog let out a quick, sharp bark.

  “Calm down, Cujo,” she said. “I just want to get out and stretch my legs for a minute.”

  The dog barked again, and Kane’s door opened. He leaned into the SUV, looking her straight in the eye. “You’re supposed to be resting, Arden.”

  “I just wanted to stretch my legs for a minute.” And hear whatever plans you and Silas were making without me, she added silently.

  “There’ll be time for that tonight. Right now, please try to sleep. Assuming we get in undetected, we’ll need you to be at the peak of your cognitive ability,” he said, throwing her words back at her.

  “I guess a little shut-eye couldn’t hurt,” she grumbled. “Do you think you’ll be long?”

  “I’m not sure. But you can rest easy. Silas and Dutch will stay with you until I get back.”

  “How long should we wait before we come looking for you?”

  “Forever,” he said.

  “That’s a long time, Kane.”

  “My point is, I don’t want you to come looking. I’ll be back by lunch time. If I’m not, Silas will know what to do.”

  Be careful, she wanted to say, but he closed the door, stood for a few more minutes talking to Silas, and then walked away, sauntering along like he had all the time in the world.

  * * *

  Getting close to GeoArray wasn’t going to be complicated. Kane had been in more difficult circumstances on more dangerous missions. Compared to those, doing a little recon on a traitorous tech company would be a piece of cake.

  The complicated part would come la
ter, after the sun went down. He’d studied the blueprints; he knew that GeoArray had an intricate ventilation system. The vent cover should be on the western side of the building at—or very close to—ground level. He needed to make certain it was there. Blueprints were great, but they weren’t always accurate.

  He jogged down three flights of stairs, exited the stairwell and walked into the lowest level of the parking garage.

  Although visible from the public parking garage, GeoArray was across a small side street. Kane walked outside, following the sidewalk to the nearest crosswalk. A crowd of people waited there, most of them on phones, several carrying briefcases. Normal people going about their normal business. None of them had any idea how close the country was to disaster. The information GeoArray planned to release threatened the well-being of the entire nation.

  Greed.

  It made smart people do evil things.

  GeoArray towered over the older buildings that stood nearby. Modern and edgy with sleek lines and reflective windows, the place was huge—a discordant note in an otherwise quaint section of the city. They were close to the harbor here, the glint of water just visible to the east. Lots of people. Lots of activity. That made it easy to blend in.

  The light changed, and the crowd swarmed across the street. Adults. Kids. Families. Like DC, Philadelphia and Gettysburg, Boston had enough historical significance to bring crowds of sightseers all year round. He’d come here often as a child, traveling with his grandparents during his breaks from boarding school. Boston had been one of their favorite haunts, his grandfather’s passion for history dictating their travel plans.

  He frowned.

  He didn’t have time for introspection. He sure couldn’t afford to be distracted.

  He stepped onto to the sidewalk with the rest of the crowd, making sure he was in the center of the swarm. There were security cameras near GeoArray’s front door and several more at both corners of the building. He noted those and the guard who stood nonchalantly in front of the building. No firearm that Kane could see, but that didn’t mean much.