“Does your face hurt?” Kyle asked.
“Why? Are you going to make a joke about it killing you?”
“Not funny,” Kyle stuttered.
“You’re right. Yes, it hurts, but nothing is broken, aside from a few of my ribs.”
“I’m so stupid. I thought I could find GigaByte, become a hero, and walk away with some cash.”
“Did you really find her?”
“I think so. I couldn’t find her electronically. She did too well in covering her information, but I found a thread where someone said she had blue hair. On a whim, I ran through city cams and listed blue hair as a filter. I came across a few old women, but eventually found some under the age of forty. I didn’t want to single a person out, especially if it wasn’t her, so instead, I created a fake document. It gave a physical description, based on what I’d read, along with some other rumors. I took all the files and combined them into one alias. The address I gave them is not where any of the women lived or worked, but they are all in the Austin area. If he finds out the intel is wrong, I’ll just admit that she’d hidden herself too well.”
“And you think he’s going to just open the front door and let us leave?”
“No, not anymore, but I did leave a message for GigaByte. I’m hoping she can send her protection guys to us.”
“And how would she know where to find us?”
“I gave her my phone number so she could trace our location.”
“That was smart.”
“Not smart enough. The guys took it from me halfway here and tossed it out. But at least she has a direction to start from.”
“True.”
“Now what do we do?”
How would Hunter know? He wasn’t an escape artist. He’d changed all his entrances to keypads because he kept losing the key to the front door.
But Kyle needed reassurance. He needed to trust his big brother to get them out of this. Only, his big brother hadn’t a clue how to do that. Their only saving grace was Kyle’s forethought to warn GigaByte. With any luck, she would escape capture and possibly be willing to send her men to come to their rescue.
He couldn’t believe he was resting his future on someone named after data storage. He’d feel more confident if it was a Bruce or Buster or even a Jack to save them, not some fictional person, most likely a teenager herself.
CHAPTERTWELVE
“She’s late, and she’s never late,” Seven said to Ivy and Aria.
He was telling the truth… Byte was never late. Even when she was on a job, she’d give them enough warning, letting them know she was still working on the assignment. So for her not to either be there nor contact them, Ivy was getting worried.
“Maybe she’s knee-deep in her research and lost track of time,” Aria suggested.
“Maybe so,” Ivy said as she pressed Byte’s icon on her phone.
After ringing for five times and a generic message telling the caller that a voicemail box had never been set up, Ivy disconnected the call.
“What now? I can go up and get her,” Aria offered, which Seven and Ivy agreed to.
Minutes later, Aria entered the room carrying Byte’s laptop and a stack of papers.
“We may have a problem,” Aria said as she placed the papers down in front of Ivy. “She’s tracking an ATF agent, but not the one we are talking to.”
“What?” Seven moved closer so he could read the documents at the same time Ivy was. Aria had been right. There was an entire dossier on the federal agent.
“I don’t understand why she’d have this, unless it relates to Skylar,” Ivy reasoned.
“I’m not so sure. Her laptop screen hasn’t gone into sleep mode, so she’s not been gone that long. I refreshed it so it would stay on. Look at the message she received.”