beyond the building.
“If you say so.”
“I’ll just be going up to the lab. Oh, and Max, nobody’s been here tonight looking for me, right?”
He gave her a confused look. “Looking for you? Why would somebody be looking for you?”
“Oh, nothing . . . Anyway, just wanted to make sure I’m not disturbed while I’m working,” she waffled.
“No problem.”
Relieved, she walked toward the elevator and stepped inside. By the time she reached the door to her lab a few minutes later, she felt better already. Max would make sure nobody could enter the building. Even if Aiden walked through the walls out of view of the lobby, in order to get to her lab, he would have to pass by several security cameras. Max would spot him on the monitors and activate the intruder alarm. The police would be summoned instantly. For tonight, she would be safe. She could sleep on the old couch in her little office just off the lab.
She reached for the keys in her handbag, grateful that she’d had the presence of mind to grab it when she’d had to flee from her burning apartment. Instinctively, her hand went to the pocket of her jeans where her pendant made a small bulge. Her research was safe. That was all that mattered. She pulled the necklace from her pocket and put it around her neck. When she felt the pendant against her skin again, a sense of relief flooded her.
As soon as she’d unlocked the door, she slipped into the dark lab. Only when she let the door snap in behind her, did she reach for the light switch, flipping it. The room was instantly bathed in the harsh tones of fluorescent light.
She took a step farther into the room and glanced around. Her gaze fell onto her work bench where her laptop lay—the lid was open. She was sure she’d closed it before leaving earlier that night.
With an odd sense of foreboding in her gut, she approached the bench and looked at the monitor. On a black screen the curser flashed ominously. All it said was ‘c:/’.
Her heart sank.
“Oh God, no!” she whispered to herself, knowing all too well what the flashing curser meant. But she didn’t want to believe it.
She hit the enter key, but all the computer did was spit out another ‘c:/’. And another. Sliding onto her chair, her fingers flew over the keyboard, entering all commands she was familiar with to try to reboot the system. Nothing worked.
It confirmed her suspicion: somebody had tried to access the data on her encrypted laptop, and the security system on it had initiate the self-destruct sequence and wiped the hard drive clean. Not a single byte of data was left on it.
She couldn’t help but suspect that this incident was connected to the events earlier in the evening: the car, which had nearly swiped her, her burning apartment, the kidnapping. Somebody was trying to get at her research. There was no other explanation for it.
Had Aiden been sent by a rival pharmaceutical company to steal her data? Was that what this was all about?
She had to have certainty about it. Shooting up from her chair, she ran toward her office. If somebody had tinkered with her safe, then she would know for sure that this was what they were after, whoever they were.
“Demons, my ass,” she mumbled. “More like industry spies!”
Leila threw the door to her office open and turned to her left, where her safe was built into the wall. She stopped in her tracks. The door to the safe was wide open.
She took a tentative step toward it. It didn’t look as if anybody had broken the locking device or used explosives, no, the safe had simply been opened. And the only other person who could do that was Patten, her boss.
Why?
Had he been paid off by somebody to steal her data for another company? She shook her head, trying to shake off the disappointment that rose inside her. Her hand reached toward the safe as she took another step. Her foot stepped on something, making her move back instinctively.
She lowered her gaze and stared at the floor.
At her feet, a thumb lay in a small pool of blood, discarded like a useless tool.
Her mouth opened for a scream, but it never left her throat, as a hand clamped over her lips to prevent her from giving voice to her panic.
THIRTEEN
Aiden held his palm over Leila’s mouth, making sure she wouldn’t scream. His other