smiled.
A fucking stallion.
He just needed to keep the reins tight.
15
SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA
Fung stood at his workstation in his private glass-walled fourth-floor office, a perk of the job and a nod to his exalted status in the organization. His oversized monitor faced away from the door.
The rest of the team had gone to lunch at a new Asian fusion pho joint a few blocks away. Fung passed, citing work deadlines and a weak stomach, both of which were true. More than three hundred e-mails sat unopened in his inbox, and his irritable bowel syndrome was boiling his guts. Why in the hell did he agree to do this? An extra twenty-five thousand wouldn’t mean jack shit if he was rotting away in a federal supermax somewhere.
His eyes scanned the open work floor again. Most of the desks were empty. The programmers that remained were midwits scrambling to finish a project for a northeastern grocery chain.
Losers.
Fung’s fingers hovered over the keys to his computer. A few keystrokes and he could once again invisibly slip into the National Reconnaissance Office desktop that linked to a CIA comms satellite. Fung was able to mirror one particular NRO machine without the operator knowing it or alerting the security algorithms monitoring workstation activity. It was a clandestine version of Apple tech support screen-sharing with a customer and manipulating the computer during a service call.
In fact, any action Fung took was automatically hidden from the NRO station logs as well, so that any digital footprints he theoretically might have left were never recorded.
But even knowing he couldn’t be caught and with six figures riding on the transaction, Fung still hesitated. His boss wasn’t stupid. She was a worthy opponent. What if she had uploaded some new security package overnight and he was walking into a trap?
“Larry? I thought you’d be at lunch.”
Fung nearly jumped out of his skin. Amanda Watson, his immediate supervisor at CloudServe, stood in his doorway.
“Oh! Amanda. Hi.” He tapped a function key that pulled up a fake desktop image.
Watson frowned with concern. “You okay? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“Sorry. Not feeling one hundred percent.” Fung felt beads of sweat forming on his forehead.
“You look sick. Maybe you better get home and take care of yourself. I can’t afford to lose my number two.”
“I’m fine, really. I just need to grab some aspirin.”
“I’ve got some in my desk. You want me to get it?”
“Uh, yeah. Sure. If you don’t mind. That would be great.”
Watson smiled. “Glad to. Be right back with that aspirin and a Fiji.”
“Thank you.”
Fung watched her march toward the break room to fetch a bottled water.
Damn, that was close.
But Fung suddenly had to fight the urge to laugh.
The stupid bitch didn’t realize how close she was to the man who had hacked her “unhackable” cloud. She knew the system’s vulnerabilities and had given those to her Red Team, which included Fung. She had suggested multiple lines of attack, and the strategies to exploit them, over the last year. What she didn’t realize was that Fung had managed to find the single crack in the system, and to break through it just over a month ago. The resulting dopamine rush was pure ecstasy. He had beaten the system, which meant he had beaten her. His first urge that day was to rush into her office and rub her face in it and show her who really was the smartest person in the building.
But he didn’t.
Why tell her? It was his perfect, delicious secret. Gloating over her would have given him temporary satisfaction. But hiding the golden key from her and everyone else? That was more than satisfying. It made him feel absolutely dominant.
And when CHIBI came calling again and again, asking if he could find something for him for big bucks? And never getting caught?
Better than sex.
But Watson had been acting suspiciously lately. Hovering over him, always seeming to keep her eyes glued to him. Did she know? No, it wasn’t possible. He’d already be in jail. But did she suspect something? Maybe.
Fung checked the original Seth Thomas mid-century sunburst clock on his wall. Time was running out. His assignment was time-specific. But he also knew that Watson would be leaving for the gym shortly. She was as regular as a metronome when it came to her Pilates class. He could afford to wait a few more minutes and enjoy a few sips of cool Fiji water in the meantime.
Watson returned, handing Fung a bottle of water and a packet