Chapter Twenty-Four

Even in the last of the day’s light, X-Tech Towers looked a lot more impressive from the front than it did from behind a dumpster. Meg eyed it from her position across the street, hands on her hips, hair caught and tossed by the wind that had picked up over the last hour.

Was Jack Richards in there? It was late evening. That was purported to be when he arrived. But then, he hadn’t been here this time last week, had he? Last week…Meg shivered. How could it have been just a week ago since she’d snuck her way inside? It felt like it had been an awful lot longer. It was hard to believe that she’d met a man, ended up in bed with him, and was thinking about doing it on the regular, in so short a time.

Chance… Would Jack know who he was? Could he, in fact, be the person who had hired Chance in the first place? Meg had given it a lot of thought in the time it had taken to leave the coffee store, update Kate on what had happened, and head home to change. She’d messaged Chance several times over the course of the afternoon. He hadn’t answered a single one of her messages. Probably he was too busy hunting down whoever had left the stop sign calling card.

The thief.

Her thief.

Chance knew who he or she was, and she was betting that Jack Richards did, too. It was the only thing that made any kind of sense, and Meg marveled that she hadn’t realized it before. It was the only reason Chance had for keeping her in the dark. That, or he was the thief, and Meg highly doubted that was the case.

Jack Richards…the man she had wanted to confront from the very beginning. Did he suspect that someone in his company was stealing from other developers? Had he hired Chance to track them down, probably giving Chance all the information he needed to do just that? Was that why Chance was so tight-lipped? Because his order came right from the top? Meg was going to find out. She was sick of all the lies. She was sick of the game. She wanted answers, and she wanted them now.

She strode across to X-Tech, fists now clenched tight. The doors opened automatically for her, calling out a greeting. Meg shot them a filthy look. The lobby was deserted. It was close to seven o’clock. What time did the staff leave? Meg had no idea. Jimmy hadn’t been sure, seeing as he tended to spend most of his time in the bowels of the place.

One woman was behind the desk that ran the width of the building. She was so tiny that Meg only just saw her. She made a beeline for her, plastering a smile on her face as she walked. It was an effort to do so. Meg did not feel like smiling. She was confused. She was frustrated. Mostly, she was angry.

Angry at X-Tech.

Angry at Chance.

Angry at Jack-fucking-Richards.

“Can I help you?”

The woman looked vaguely familiar. Was it from a geek meet? A convention? Or something else entirely? Meg frantically scrambled through her memories. It wouldn’t be a bad thing at all if she did know this woman.

“Do I know you from somewhere?” Meg asked.

“I don’t know,” the woman said. “You do look familiar. Are you part of the Magic: The Gathering group?”

Meg shook her head. “No. Not my thing.”

“Manga Madness?”

“Yesssss,” Meg said, drawing the word out. “Sailor Moon?”

“Absolutely.”

They shared a grin. Meg’s cheeks hurt.

“I’m here to see Jack Richards,” she said.

The woman actually laughed. “Sure, you are.”

“I really am,” Meg said.

The woman arched a brow. Meg only just saw it beneath her huge afro. “Do you have an appointment?”

“No.”

“I didn’t think so,” she said. “Jack never has appointments. Not with anyone. He probably isn’t even in yet. He doesn’t generally tend to turn up until later in the evening. I won’t even know when he does. He has his own private elevator.”

“I can wait,” Meg said.

“You’ll probably be waiting forever,” the woman said. “Seriously, forever. He doesn’t see visitors. And, even if he did, I can’t call up to let him know you’re here. He doesn’t have an assistant, and he almost never answers his phone.”

“How do you get ahold of him if you need him, then?” Meg asked.

“I don’t,” the receptionist said. “No one does.”

“What if there’s an emergency?”

“What sort of emergency are we talking about?”

“Critical,” Meg said.

The receptionist shrugged. “We call Gabe.”

Gabe Mahon… He was Jack’s right-hand man. Meg had read up on him in the early days of her investigation. There was plenty to read. Gabe gave all the X-Tech interviews and unveilings. He was widely regarded as the face of the company. Meg had emailed him weeks ago with her complaints. He’d never replied.

“Gabe is in,” the other woman added.

“I’ll speak with him, then,” Meg said.

The receptionist sighed. “Gabe doesn’t generally meet people if they don’t have an appointment, either.” She sighed again. “You could be anyone. We get a lot of fan-geeks here, obviously. But we get a lot of protesters as well.”

“Protestors?”

“Anti-tech groups. Anti-data, that sort of thing. They’ve been a bit more vocal than usual lately. Too many high-profile data breaches.” She scowled. “Not that any of them were ours.”

“I’m not a fan-geek,” Meg said. “Not a protestor, either. But believe me, I do need to speak to Gabe, and he will come down to see me. If I didn’t think so, I’d have just snuck in again.”

The receptionists started. “Snuck in?”

“He’s Jack’s best friend,” Meg said slowly, almost to herself. “I read that. They started X-Tech together. Almost like me and Kate. If Jack hired Chance, then surely he’d have told Gabe? The only reason he wouldn’t is if…” She trailed off. There was only one possible reason.

“If what of what?”

Meg snapped her fingers. “Call him up and tell him that Chance’s friend is down here. Tell him that she needs to speak to him right now about the Ant Optimization Algorithm.”

“Who is Chance?” the receptionist asked. “What have ants got to do with anything?”

“Good questions,” Meg said. “Gabe might be able to answer them. Please make the call.”

“He won’t come down,” the receptionist said.

“He will if you repeat what I just said.”

“And who shall I even say it is?”

“Dr. Marlowe.”

The other woman shook her head, clearly thinking Meg was crazy—and at this point Meg was inclined to agree with her—but the receptionist pressed some keys on her laptop and put a call through. Meg stepped away from the desk, her mind racing, her heart thumping. It stayed like that for the next five minutes, until the doors opposite opened and Gabe Mahon, along with several minions, strode through.

Meg had Googled the head of development more than once. Unlike Jack Richards, there were numerous pictures and videos of him online. He was devilishly attractive. He was also frowning.

“Can I help you, Dr. Marlowe?” he asked, even as he gestured to a room off to the side.

It was what a place like X-Tech called a “breakout space.” There were motivational slogans on the wall. Meg gave them the evil eye.

“I hope so,” Meg said. “I wanted to see Jack but he’s not here, so you’ll have to do.”

Gabe’s frown turned into a smile at that. He gestured to the minions who had not followed them inside. One of them closed the door, leaving the two of them alone. Gabe took a seat, elbows on his thighs.

“I don’t mind subbing.” He tilted his head. The gesture was oddly appealing. Meg suspected it was practiced. She’d seen him doing it in more than one online vid. “We haven’t met before?”

“Nope.”

“I’ve heard of you, though,” he said.

Meg’s stomach clenched at that. “From Chance?”

“From your work with Dr. Andrews.”

“You know about that?”

“Something to do with ants,” Gabe said. “I remember reading an article on it. I had it in mind to give you a call and ask you in. We have a team working on the problem, though, and they assure me they’re close.”

“If they are, it’s not by their own doing,” Meg snapped as she took the seat opposite him.

That removed his smile. “You’re going to need to elaborate on that.”

“I’m about to,” Meg said. “First though, do you know Chance?”

“Of course, I do,” Gabe said slowly. “I’m intrigued to know how you do, though.”

“It’s a long story.”

“You want to tell it to me?”

“No,” Meg said. “I’m going to tell you another story instead.”

And so, she did. She told him about the email she’d received inviting her to the competition. She told him about the work that she’d pitched. She told him that she’d never heard from X-Tech after that. Then about the post she’d found on the obscure forum. The leak…how it matched her own work…how it was her work.

“Seems we’re in a bit of a pickle,” Gabe eventually said.

“A pickle?”

“One of many.” He sighed. “I know where the leak came from. I dealt with that member of staff earlier today.”

“He stole my work?” Meg said quickly.

“No. He’s just not very good at keeping company secrets. Too young and too dumb, despite his huge IQ.”

“Then…”

“I have no idea who has stolen your work, Dr. Marlowe,” Gabe said. “But if someone from this company has, if we can prove that, they will be dealt with, and all your research returned.”

It was what Meg had wanted to hear for so long, and from the second-in-command, no less. All those weeks of investigation, the plan to sneak into the tower…all of it was for this. And yet…Meg did not feel at all like she imagined she would feel. There was no satisfaction. No sudden triumph. Her head ached. Her heart was still thumping harder than it should have been—she didn’t even want to look at her fitness tracker.

It was all because of Chance.

She knew that.

Because whatever the hell was happening between them was tangled up in this mess, and Meg did not know how they were going to untangle it. What she did know was that she did want to untangle it. No matter what happened here in X-Tech Towers, no matter where the tangle led, Meg wanted Chance to remain in her life. She wanted to play PS4 with him, eat Japanese food together, even go for those awful runs. And it wasn’t just because of the intense attraction; it was because she liked him. She had from the very first.

“What I want to know now, though, is how the hell does Chance fit into all of this?” Gabe asked.

Meg didn’t even know where to start. “Well, I—”

The door behind them opened. Meg turned, expecting it to be the receptionist.

“Ah, seems he’s here to answer that question himself,” Gabe said as he stood. His smile was different now, genuine, and it was directed at the shocked-looking man in the doorway. “I wondered when I’d be seeing you, Jack.”

“Jack?”

Meg had completely forgotten that was his first name. He’d told her in KIT, the first time they’d properly met, but she’d forgotten. He was Chance to her. He had been all week long.

And yet…she stood up and looked at him. He was looking back at her, eyes wide, lips parted under the shadow of his baseball cap…and he was wearing a gray sweater. That was when it clicked. The thing that had been teasing the edges of her consciousness for days. The thought that was always on the tip of her tongue. The piece of the puzzle that she hadn’t even known she was missing. It finally clicked into place, and the moment it did, Meg gasped.

“Blue—” he began, but Meg could only shake her head.

“Jack Richards,” she said, and she couldn’t even believe that she was saying the words. “We meet at last.”