A Father's Sacrifice

Mintz gave her a quick rundown of the house’s layout. He pointed to the front doors. “That’s north. The staff quarters are on the east. The kitchen, the patio and Ben’s play area are that way.” He pointed southward. “And the west door goes to the family quarters. Your suite is in there, next to Ben’s.”

As he finished, a metallic thumping echoed in her ears.

“Alfred!” A toddler ran in from the kitchen area.

“This is Ben.” Mintz’s controlled drill-sergeant face creased in a smile.

Natasha’s heart twisted in compassion as the little boy ran clumsily toward Mintz. The metallic thumps were caused by bright silver braces that crisscrossed his little legs like an erector set. Beneath the clanking of the braces, she heard the almost silent whirr of a motor.

“Alfred!” Ben shouted. “Where’s my daddy?”

He was the image of his father—black hair, blue eyes. He didn’t seem to notice the braces that encumbered him.

The tabloid stories held a kernel of truth, but they were totally wrong about the child. Ben wasn’t pathetically crippled. He was bright and energetic. Still, a horrific vision haunted her—a crumpled, crushed vehicle with a baby trapped inside, crying for his mother.

She shuddered and her breath hitched.

“Agent Rudolph, are you all right?”

She forced herself to breathe evenly. “Of course.”

Ben tugged on Mintz’s hand. “Is Daddy coming?”

“Pardner, why aren’t you in bed?” Mintz said in a surprisingly gentle voice.

“I’m waiting for my daddy.”

“Where’s Miss Charlene?” Mintz inclined his head toward Natasha. “Ben’s physical therapist.”

Ben’s face began to crumple. “Not Charlene. Daddy. He can take me outside to see the moon.” Tears shimmered on his long lashes.

As Natasha watched in astonishment, the grizzled security chief lifted Ben. The boy wrapped his arms around Mintz’s neck and tucked his face into his collar.

“Your daddy’s working tonight. I want you to meet someone.”

Ben turned his head so that one dark blue eye was visible. “No.” He hid his face again. “I want my daddy.”

“This is Natasha. Can you say Natasha?”

Ben shook his head, but curiosity got the better of him and he peeked sideways at her. “Tasha?”

His little voice saying the nickname she hadn’t heard since childhood caused her to smile, even as it cut into her heart.

“Hi, Ben.” She’d never been around kids, so the ache in her chest and the tightness in her throat surprised her. He was so sweet and so vulnerable and brave. And he’d transformed Stryker’s gruff, rigid security chief into a doting grandfather.

“Come on, Ben. Let’s get you tucked in.”

Ben still peered at her sidelong, from the folds of Mintz’s shirt. “Tasha come, too?”

“Oh, no. I don’t—”

“Sure Natasha can come, too,” Mintz said. “And later, your daddy’ll come in to say good-night.”

Ben shifted and sat up straight, confident in Mintz’s protective embrace.

“Go this way, Tasha.” He pointed as Mintz headed for the west hall. He watched her over Mintz’s shoulder.

What should she say? She had no clue how to talk to a kid. “How old are you, Ben?”

He held up three pudgy fingers. “Three and a half.”

Of course. A pang of sadness hit her square in the chest. The car crash had occurred this time of year—September—three years ago. Ben had been six months old, too young to remember the crash or the pain or the sound of his mother dying. Thank God.

They entered Ben’s room to find a young woman with shiny brown hair folding back the covers on his bed.

“This is Charlene Dufrayne,” Mintz said. “Charlene, Special Agent Natasha Rudolph.”

“Oh, the computer expert.” Charlene gave Natasha a wary nod as she took Ben from Mintz. “We’ve all heard about you.”

Natasha rapidly cataloged the other woman’s appearance. Medium height, late twenties, pretty. In good shape. She’d be good for Ben.

She glanced around the child’s room. It was painted a bright blue, and filled with every toy a little boy could want. But something about it sent an eerie shiver through her.

“Okay, cowboy, let’s get you ready for bed,” Charlene said, setting him on his bed.

“I stay awake ’til Daddy comes.”

“Daddy may not come tonight. He’s very busy.”

As Ben’s eager face fell, Natasha’s heart ached. Charlene began to unlock the braces.

Mintz opened a connecting door and gestured for Natasha to precede him into the next room.

She stepped through the door, her gaze still lingering on Ben’s room. As Mintz turned on the lights and she looked around the starkly decorated room, it hit her what was bothering her.

“These rooms don’t have any windows,” she croaked. Her throat constricted.

“This is the only level of the house aboveground. That makes it vulnerable. Windows would greatly increase that vulnerability.”

Her pulse jumped as she pushed away the panic and forced herself to nod. “Vulnerability. Of course. That…makes sense.”

As an FBI agent, she understood, but no amount of rational thinking stilled her knee-jerk response to the vaultlike rooms. This was why she’d scrimped and saved until she could afford a top-floor condo in Washington, D.C., where all her walls were glass, and the sun streamed in every day.

She couldn’t get Ben’s sweet little face out of her mind. It horrified her to think he’d lived his whole life locked inside these walls.

“Is there a problem, Agent Rudolph?” Mintz’s voice was edged with ice.

She quoted her mantra for dealing with panic. Quiet and safe. Plenty of fresh air. Breathe. Breathe. Breathe.

“No, sir. I realize safety is your primary concern. It’s just that Ben is—” She swallowed. “He’s a growing boy. He needs sunshine and—” she faltered when Mintz glowered at her “—fresh air.”

“Ben’s needs are not your purview.”

She lifted her chin. “So far, apparently nothing is my purview. You’ve vetoed every suggestion I’ve made. I must say, your trust in me is underwhelming.”

“Not just you,” he muttered, his face grim. “Anyone.” He faced her. “Understand this, Agent Rudolph. As far as the public knows, Ben died in the car crash that killed his mother. Dylan has gone to superhuman lengths to keep the boy here with him.”

She searched his face. “You don’t approve.”

The lines in his face deepened. “I built this place to withstand an explosion the magnitude of Oklahoma City. But nobody can guard against human ingenuity. All it’ll take is one person breaching the walls, or hacking into the computers. NSA wants Dylan and his interface safe. They’ve offered to place him and Ben in a secure government location.”

“And you want that, too.” No matter how protected the estate was, the child could still be in danger. Still, now that she’d met Ben, she understood why his father refused to let him out of his sight. After only a few minutes, his innocent, angelic face had already made a dent in her heart.

“What I want is not relevant. Ben is Dylan’s son. He would give up everything for him, even his own life.”

“I get the feeling you’d do the same for either of them.”

Mintz averted his gaze as he dug in his pocket and handed her a small digital device. He cleared his throat. “Your fingerprints are already in the security system. This is your pass code generator. You’ll want to keep it on your person at all times. The code changes every forty-five seconds. Your print on the keypad plus the entry of this code will unlock any door on the estate. There will not be any security issues, understood?”

Natasha stiffened. “Understood, sir.” She took the device.

“I’ll be back in an hour to take you down to the lab.”

“I can find my way—” she started, but he’d turned on his heel and left. The door closed silently behind him.

She sat down on the bed and closed her eyes, thankful to be alone for a few moments. Her neck and shoulders ached from maintaining her composure. Now, as she flexed them, her entire body began to tremble.

Underground laboratory. Windowless rooms. No wonder Decker had worried about her ability to handle this assignment. She felt the weight of the house and the closeness of the impenetrable walls. Her lungs sucked in air greedily.

After twenty-two years, she’d thought she’d conquered her worst personal demon, until Bobby Lee Hutchins had buried her alive.

Horror slithered along her nerve endings as she recalled the endless dark. She’d been certain her life was over.

But her partner Storm hadn’t given up. He’d stayed there while the workers cleared away boards and drywall and dirt. He’d kept calling out to her even though she didn’t have enough breath to answer him.

When they got her to the hospital she had four cracked ribs, a collapsed lung and a broken leg, none of which bothered her as much as the hours of terror she’d spent buried under the debris.

She’d experienced the worst. This job should be a piece of cake. All she had to do was keep her cool for a few days until they caught the hacker.

She took a deep breath of artificially cooled air and reminded herself that she wasn’t buried. She was on the top level—aboveground. The air smelled fresh and the room was large and clean. There was no reason to feel claustrophobic.

She closed her eyes, but it didn’t help. Her demon was back. The walls were closing in.

THE HACKER grinned as his fingers flew over the keyboard. Just a few more keystrokes and he’d have his first look at Dr. Dylan Stryker’s neural interface operating software.

He’d been working toward this moment for three years, since the botched kidnapping of Stryker’s wife and son. He’d learned a lot from the extremists who had run the neurosurgeon’s wife and baby son off the road.

Idiots. Their blind devotion to their cause came in handy, but only if they had a leader to guide them. He was in control this time. There would be no mistakes.

There was nothing more satisfying than to beat the government at their own game. He’d waited a long time for another chance to prove his superiority.

Eight years ago, he’d not only cracked the FBI’s domestic terrorist database, he’d framed a young hacker for the breach. He’d needed to get rid of her—she’d been too good.

By planting subtle but identifiable clues inside the FBI’s computer program, he’d led lead investigators to the computer lab at the college she attended. Once they’d identified the computer, it was simple to trace her ID and find the evidence he’d so carefully planted.

His brilliant frame-up had made him famous in the hacking world. And now he was back. The National Security Agency had designed Stryker’s firewall, and it was impressive. But so were his skills.

Alert to any sign of detection, he typed a few lines of code, nudging the protective barrier around the software that could make the fabled computer-enhanced supersoldier a reality.

A sense of omnipotence streaked through him. His fingertips tingled and a visceral exhilaration sizzled in his groin. Nobody except another hacker could understand the feeling.

All he needed was a few seconds to gain entrance to the ultrasecure area where Stryker’s files and programs on the neural interface were stored.

He was typing the last bit of code when his cell phone rang.

He jumped. “Son of a—” He jabbed the talk button. “What? I’m in the middle of something.”

“The computer expert is here.”

Excitement spread through him like electricity. At last, a challenge. “When?”

“An hour or so ago. She’s an FBI agent—Natasha something.”

“Natasha?” His fingers went numb with shock. “Are you sure?” He stood, propelling the computer chair backward. “What does she look like?”

“Tall. Long blond hair. Do you know her?”

Natasha. “Of course not.” Sweat prickled his neck and armpits. He glanced at his computer screen. “Is she online?”

“No. She’s in her room.”

“Did she have a laptop?”

“Nope. Mintz won’t allow wireless in here.”

“I want to know the instant she puts her fingers on the keyboard.”

“I’ll try. You know how hard it is to call out. How much longer until—”

“Don’t start with me. I’ve got to think. You just make sure you’re ready.”

“Are you sure I’ll be safe?”

“God, just do your job and give me a break.” He jabbed the disconnect button.

Tall. Blonde. Rage burned through him.

That was his luck. Of course they would send Natasha. His nemesis. The only hacker he’d ever known who could even approach his talent. He’d realized her worth the first time he’d ever met her.

He sat and pulled the keyboard toward him. He cracked his knuckles and flexed his fingers, then arched his neck. A slow smile spread over his features. In a way it was like a karmic balance.

He’d almost destroyed her once because she refused to follow his lead, but fate in the guise of the FBI had intervened. They’d trained her and hired her instead of sending her to prison. At the time the irony had eaten a hole in his gut.

Now he understood. His patience, his efforts to distance himself from the radical group who’d caused the death of Stryker’s wife, were paying off in a way he’d never dreamed.

Stryker’s interface and the software that operated it were worth billions. Several foreign leaders were waiting, cash in hand, for the technology that had the potential to create a real supersoldier.

Yes, he wanted the money, but that wasn’t why he was doing this.

He finally had a chance to prove once and for all that he was the best. He was pitted against Natasha Rudolph again.

He held the advantage because he knew her greatest fear. Before this was over, she’d pay for dodging prison eight years ago. And her punishment this time would be worse—so much worse.

He put on his telephone headset and hit a preset number on his cell. He had to make sure everything was in place for his first destructive attack on Stryker’s estate.

As he waited he placed his fingertips on the keyboard. A thrill, almost sexual, shot through him, all the way to his groin. Natasha was on the other end of his computer.

It would double his pleasure to know she would die along with Stryker.

Chapter Two

By midnight, Natasha was certain of two things. Someone had definitely targeted Dylan’s computer, and she needed much more powerful equipment if she was going to build an effective firewall.

She stretched and arched her neck to loosen the tight muscles, then glanced toward the ceiling. If she had to be down here much longer, she’d go crazy. Sure the lab was brilliantly lit and air-conditioned, but that didn’t change the fact that it was buried under twelve feet of dirt, steel and wood.

A movement across the hall caught her eye. Dylan Stryker leaned back in his chair and rubbed his face. He’d appeared in the glass-walled room across from hers a couple of hours before, freshly showered and dressed in neat khaki slacks and a navy polo shirt that left his long, muscled arms bare.

Even though she’d been concentrating on the patterns in screen after screen of code, a part of her had remained acutely aware of his presence.

Mintz had told her he was working on a computerized surgical simulation program. It had only taken a few seconds’ observation for her to figure out that he was using a stylus like a surgical tool to practice attaching microscopic nerves to microscopic wires. The neural interface.

She’d read the basics of the device in a classified NSA memo. It was a rectangular box about the size of a USB plug, maybe a centimeter long. The 3-D computer-generated mock-up looked like a millipede with thousands of hairlike microfibers covering its surface. Once the device was surgically implanted into a human being, and each microfiber was attached to the proper neural sheath, the interface would feed impulses to and from nerves too damaged to receive proper signals from the brain.

No wonder the government wanted it. The possible uses were astounding. The supersoldier of fiction, with computer-enhanced reflexes, sharpened vision and hearing, perfectly timed response and accuracy, could become a reality. The thought of that technology falling into the hands of terrorists was horrifying.

Abruptly, Dylan pushed back from his workstation and stood. He pushed his hands through his hair and started to pace.

Campbell, sitting at the other workstation, yawned and said something. Dylan shook his head and shrugged his shoulders, as if trying to work the tension from his body.

His movements were spare and graceful. As he rubbed his neck, his biceps flexed and he arched his back, emphasizing the seductive curve at the base of his spine and his strong, well-shaped buttocks.

He turned toward her. Embarrassed, she dropped her gaze to the flat-screen monitor. Studying his physical attributes wasn’t getting her any closer to the hacker.

She reexamined the section of code that had grabbed her attention earlier, and suddenly the jumble of numbers and letters coalesced into a pattern.

“Why you clever little—” she whispered to the unknown hacker as she advanced to the next screen, searching for the same telltale string of numbers she’d just spotted.

Whoever he was, he was good. As she’d told Mintz, they always left something behind, but this guy’s tag was almost undetectable.

It was also vaguely familiar. She frowned at the tiny string of code. She’d seen that pattern before. A nauseating dread began to build in her stomach. Could it be Tom?

No. That would be too weird a coincidence. Although…he had always been fascinated with the fringe groups who would do anything to bring down the government. Not because he had anything against the U.S.

He loved being in control, and he’d always said the zealots who would die for their cause were ridiculously easy to manipulate.

Her heart jackhammered in her throat. If it was Tom, did he know she was here? Eight years ago he’d framed her for hacking into the FBI’s domestic terrorist database. But eight years ago she’d been naive and trusting. She was smarter now. Of course, Tom probably was, too.

Her peripheral vision picked up a movement to her left. She stiffened and casually dropped her hand to the fanny pack where she kept her weapon.

“What’s so interesting on that screen?”

It was Dylan. She glanced up at him, then through the glass toward the lab. She’d been caught off guard. Something that never happened to her.

“No,” he said, his eyes twinkling. “I can’t walk through walls. Alfred believes in triple redundancy. There are doors all over the place.” A ghost of a smile flickered about his mouth, making him look younger and achingly handsome.

“Triple redundancy is a good thing.” Having plenty of doors was even better—excellent in fact. She hoped they all led upstairs.

Dylan studied the young woman the FBI claimed was the best hacker-tracker they had. She was young, but computer expertise didn’t depend on years of training. The best hackers were often under twenty-five.

He put his hand on the back of her chair and leaned over, studying her screen. “Find something?”

Her pale blond hair tickled his nose, and the scent of springtime and wild strawberries filled his nostrils. He took a deep breath, faintly shocked at his reaction. He had a sudden urge to run his fingers through her silky hair, to nuzzle the graceful curve of her neck.

What the hell was he thinking?

She cleared her throat and pulled slightly away from him. “I’ve found traces of the hacker.”

He squeezed his eyes shut for an instant, trying to throw off his body’s instantaneous response to her closeness. He straightened.

“You told Alfred the hacker couldn’t have gotten out clean.”

She shook her head. “That’s right. Everything that’s done on a computer leaves a trace. This guy is very good, but—”

“You found him.” Dylan leaned in close to the monitor again, curious about what she’d seen. At that moment she turned her head. Her brilliant green eyes were only a couple of inches away from his, her mouth so close he felt her breath.

Her eyes widened and she turned her head back to the screen.

“In less than three hours.”

“I—I haven’t found him, just his trail.”

She nervously moistened her lips and a spear of lust streaked through him.

As if she knew the effect she was having on him, she leaned farther back in her chair and took a deep breath. “Is this your first hacking attempt?”

For his own sake, he straightened and stepped away from her. He crossed his arms. “We get reports of failed attempts—maybe once or twice a month. But two days ago Campbell received an alert. It wasn’t just a knock at the door. It was unauthorized access.”

“Well, either Campbell made another mistake or this is a different hacker, because this guy’s been accessing the vulnerable areas of your system for at least two years.”

Dylan stared at her. “Two years?” He shook his head in disbelief. “That’s impossible!”

She sent him a sharp look.

“Okay. Two years.” His insides twisted in horror. He ran his hand across the back of his neck, massaging the tight muscles there. Two years. Ben!

“What kind of damage has he done?”

“He’s accessed your document files, household calendars and schedules, financial records, buying habits.”

Dylan’s jaw clenched and a cold fear engulfed him. “Buying habits. Household calendars.” He cursed vividly. “Then he knows Ben is alive. What else does he know?”

“Anything that came in or went out via e-mail.”

“Even to or from NSA?”

“That’s right.”

“Damn it!” He whirled and slammed his palm into the door facing.

Natasha jumped.

“Sorry,” he said, glancing at her sheepishly. He rubbed his hand. “So he knows about the interface. Knows how close I am to perfecting it.” Fear and rage swirled through him.

“What the hell good is a firewall then? What’s the point of all the damned computer security if—?”

She held up a hand. “He hasn’t cracked the encryption that protects your neural interface. Not yet anyway.”

He blew out a breath. “Thank God for that. But why hasn’t my software detected him? It was developed by NSA.”

Natasha smiled without humor. “That’s why he hasn’t gotten what he wants. But whoever he is, he’s that good. Firewalls are built by people. People can crack them.”

The confidence in her voice intrigued him. Dylan eyed her. She could pass for a college kid. Too young, too innocent, to be so sure of herself. He asked her a question he already knew the answer to. “Could you have gotten into my system?”

Natasha stared into Dylan’s eyes, into the lake of blue fire that burned so intensely. She resisted the urge to look away. “Yes.”

He nodded as he studied her thoughtfully. “So are you a hacker?”

She swallowed. “No.” Not anymore.

His gaze searched her face. Did he believe her?

“Okay then, who is this guy?” he asked.

The sixty-four-thousand-dollar question. She looked at the screen and didn’t quite lie this time. “I’m pretty sure I’ve seen him before. Since I’ve been with the FBI, I’ve run across a lot of very good hackers. This is almost certainly one of them. But to catch him, I’m going to need much better equipment.”

“Fine. I’ll contact NSA.”

“No need. My boss can have it here sometime early tomorrow by jet courier.”

“Good. Do it.”

She began to breathe easier. He’d been satisfied with her answer about the hacker’s ID. There was no way she was going to tell anyone of her suspicion that the hacker was Tom. Not until she was sure, and maybe not even then. She told herself no one needed to know she’d been so desperate for money to pay for college that she’d performed hacking jobs for the same man who might be attacking Dylan’s system—who might even be responsible for the death of his wife and the crippling of his young son.