DONOVAN (Gray Wolf Security, #1)(146)

“No. I think you’re right. I don’t think that Jacob has anything to do with what’s going on.”

“Who do you think it is, then?”

My dad glanced at me even as he again moved around a slower moving car. “What do you think of this Montgomery fellow?”

I shrugged. “He’s a good guy trying to do a good thing for people.”

He gripped the steering wheel, twisting his hands on it for a minute. He seemed agitated, and I didn’t understand why. He glanced at me again, really looked at me, like he wanted to say something but he wasn’t sure how I would take it. I knew that look, too.

“What is it?”

He shook his head. “There’s some things about the emails that just ain’t right, mija.”

“Like what?”

“Like the way they were routed through different IP addresses. The IP addresses that were chosen. The way it was made to look like the brother did it.”

“Someone’s trying to set Jacob up.”

“But why? He’s got just as much to lose if this theft happens as the Montgomery fellow, right?”

“Yeah, I suppose so.”

“Then why try so hard to make it look like he did it?”

“I don’t know.”

“And why now? The device has been in development for, what, five years?”

“Something like that.”

“Why wait until the week before the patent is supposed to come through, a week before they’re free to go public with it, to try to steal it?”

“You don’t think whoever’s doing this is really after the device?”

He shook his head. “No, I don’t.”

“But what could they be after?”

“Maybe somebody’s just trying to f*ck with this Montgomery’s head. Or maybe he’s trying to f*ck with us.”

I shook my head. “This isn’t Lucien’s doing.”

“How do you know? I’ve seen it before. Executives who want to create drama before releasing a new product. Or executives with mental issues who want attention.”

“That’s not Lucien. If he were like that, I think I would know.”

My dad looked at me, his eyes narrowing as he stared so hard at my face that I had to look away.

“Tell me you aren’t getting too deeply involved, mija.”

“Of course not. But I’ve just spent the last forty-eight hours with him. If there were something off about him, I think I would have noticed by now.”

My dad just nodded. “You talk to Robert. You understand more about this computer stuff than I do.”

“I will.”




It seemed like everyone was in the office. But, again, everyone was often in the office around the clock, especially when we had a big case going on. And this was a big case.

Robert was upstairs in what we liked to call his bat cave. It was a dark room at the back of the building where he had his collection of computers. There were laptops, desktops, motherboards, and all kinds of cannibalized parts all over the room. It was organized chaos that only Robert really understood.

He didn’t even look up when I tapped on the door and walked in.

“Did your father tell you that we tracked those emails back to the client’s computer?”

“No,” I said, cold fingers beginning to dance around my heart.

“Yeah. The computer at his office.”

“How did you do that?”

He touched a finger to one of the monitors. I leaned forward and read the code. I knew quite a bit, but I wasn’t nearly as proficient in computer code as Robert. But I could see the bouncing IP addresses as clear as day.

“That’s Lucien’s computer?”

“Yeah.”

“And it doesn’t go anywhere else after that? I thought you were convinced the emails originated at his brother’s computer.”

“That’s what they wanted us to think. But I found the tracks they tried to hide.”

I just nodded, totally aware that contradicting Robert wouldn’t get me anywhere. Besides, he knew what he was doing.

And I was screwed.

“Is it possible someone used his computer to do this? Someone other than him?”

“Sure,” Robert said.

“Is there any way to prove that?”

He shrugged. “No. Not really.”

“So we still don’t know for sure who we’re dealing with.”

“Pretty much.”

I groaned, leaning forward and burying my face in my hands. Robert reached over and patted the back of my head.

“You look different in those clothes.”

“Gee, thanks.”

He was grinning when I looked up. “You almost look like a princess.”

I inclined my head slightly to acknowledge him. “Keep working on it, Robert. I really need to know who wrote those emails.”

“I will.”

I went downstairs to my office, my thoughts playing with the puzzle that Robert had just presented. Could someone have gotten to Lucien’s computer and sent the emails from there? If so, who? His personal assistant seemed like an obvious choice, but that made her a bad choice simply because it was so obvious. But who else?