Hard Love (Hacker #5)(72)
Author: Meredith Wild

“I miss you so much. When can I come visit you?”

He was silent for a long time. “I’d rather you didn’t,” he finally said.

“What do you mean?”

“I don’t want you here, okay? I miss you. Jesus . . .” He released a shaky breath. “I miss you more than you can possibly imagine, but I don’t want you to set foot in this place. Do you understand me?”

I sat up in bed as fresh worry sobered me. “Is everything okay? You’re scaring me, Blake.”

“I’m fine. It’s nothing to worry about. Being here . . . you seeing me this way . . . That isn’t a memory I want for either of us.”

“But what if—”

“How are Mom and Dad?”

What if you can’t come home? was the question neither of us wanted to contemplate. I took an unsteady breath, decided to respect his wish, and mercifully changed the subject.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

BLAKE

“What the fuck is this?” I sifted through the stack of papers Evans had dropped in front of me.

“Looks like it’s a detailed analysis of the code.”

Evans was on the other side of one of the small round tables reserved for inmates and their visitors. I’d secretly hoped for another visitor, but I was glad that Erica had respected my wishes and not come. I wanted to see her, if only for a few minutes. I wanted the chance to comfort her in any way that I could, even if it was on the other side of a piece of glass, but I also didn’t want her to see me this way.

Max had been right about one thing. I’d never paid much attention to my looks, at least not the way he did. I had a decent collection of vintage T-shirts that I could easily replace with a closet full of three-piece suits to wear to work every day, but I didn’t care about putting on airs the way others did. I never had. I knew who I was, and I didn’t need glamour to back up the wealth I’d accumulated or the success I’d earned without all that superficial crap.

Still, with the wealth, I’d grown used to the finer things. Spending my days in a concrete box with access to only the bare necessities was a far cry from my real life. Real life, or old life? Damn, I’d fallen too far, and I didn’t want Erica to know it.

I looked like hell, and I felt even worse. I couldn’t protect my family from in here. I couldn’t take care of everything and everyone who needed me. And I sure as hell wasn’t winning any beauty contests.

I shoved away those thoughts and tried to concentrate on the details annotated between the lines of code, some of which I recognized as my own. Some was clearly not. What it amounted to was a fairly solid evaluation that I had not, in fact, written the entirety of the code used to manipulate the votes.

I slid the papers back to Evans. “Took your techies long enough to put that together.”

“They didn’t.”

I lifted an eyebrow.

“Someone ‘anonymously’ sent it in. Any ideas?”

I shrugged. “You’re the experts. You tell me.”

“You’re in jail and you’re on your way to doing some time, so why don’t we cut the shit. Who’s Trevor Cooper?”

I stared. I assumed the notes I’d just skimmed through were enough to convince the police that I wasn’t guilty, but I could tell Evans wasn’t giving up the fight that easily. I was going to have to draw this out with crayon for him to believe I wasn’t at the center of this.

He went on. “Gove is telling us he’s some sort of cyber-rival of yours? From where I stand, it seems like you coordinated this effort with someone else and now you’re trying to toss the blame onto him.”

I let out a dry laugh but otherwise held my silence.

“Damnit, Blake, start talking.”

“I can’t get a word in edgewise. And why bother when you think you’ve got it all figured out already? I’d hate to burst your bubble by filling you in on the details, otherwise known as the truth.”

He sat back in his chair and worked his jaw. “I don’t like you, Landon.”

“The feeling is mutual.”

“I don’t underestimate your intelligence, however.”

“I can’t say the same about you.”

He grimaced, and I knew his patience was wearing thin.

Now was the time. I wasn’t holding on to any hope that Evans would hear reason, but at least he was asking questions. Dean had told him about Trevor, and there was enough proof distinguishing his code from mine in front of me that Evans might have to follow some new leads if he had any chance of making a case out of this.

Beyond all that, things couldn’t get much worse. Every day I spent in jail was a day without Erica, and I wasn’t ready to martyr myself for Brian’s kid brother, no matter what had happened in the past.