Chapter 3: Playground or prison?
Keep following Tori Daniels as she learns more about Incognito, and continues to uncover upsetting information about Andy and other key characters...
Being held in an interrogation room without any windows for over eight hours, totally alone, was exhausting.
The longer I sat on that cold metal chair underneath flickering fluorescent lighting straight out of a cheesy horror movie not actually being interrogated, the more my mind started playing tricks on me… when it wasn’t deviating toward more mundane topics like grocery lists and meeting calendars out of sheer boredom.
At times it was like everything I thought I knew was melting into a hazy hoax I would never be able to follow or understand let alone explain.
At one point, my mind was being stretched so wide and thin in that room that I almost convinced myself I had actually done what they accused me of doing. Almost. Which was its own form of torture, I assure you— to doubt everything you think you know about yourself, what you have done, and what you’re capable of doing, without intervention.
The mind can be its own playground or prison, sometimes both, depending on one’s temporary perspective or circumstance. And mine was precarious at best upon my arrest.
As I sat there all alone, hour after hour, I intermittently reviewed every minor detail of the exact moment I had discovered Andy’s body sprawled across the threshold of her massive walk-in closet. Rapidly combing through everything I remembered seeing, smelling, feeling, even thinking, at that precise traumatic moment. Over and over and over again in my mind. Starting to second-guess myself and everything I believed I had perceived that day, along with all the days that followed it.
Had I actually touched Andy’s bare skin to check for a pulse?
Shaken her shoulder to see if she would respond?
Hovered my ear over her mouth to check for signs of breathing?
Maybe I had stepped in a pool of Andy’s blood and tracked it all around the Lynch residence but couldn’t remember the specifics or details?
If so, it’s no surprise that my DNA could have been found all over Andy’s body and other areas of the Lynch residence. My hair had been loose and not tied up that day, from what I recall. And I never had a reason to wipe away any of my fingerprints or clean up any blood, if there had been blood. Had there been blood? Maybe not. No, definitely not. Not from what I can recall. Which is still hazy at best.
Either way, I had had nothing to hide then, with respect to what I had witnessed and done that day, did I?
And I have nothing to hide now, with respect to what happened that day, do I?
No, of course not. Not really.
I was just in shock and having trouble remembering every little detail from that day. That’s all. Though it’s much more likely that that’s just what they wanted me to believe as I sat there stewing in the misery of my own mind. Even though I may never know for sure what they wanted.
The arresting officers never told me specifically what they had on me. They just let me sit in that room for hours and hours alone to analyze and ruminate, to sweat. And I think it might have worked, at least a little, because the longer I sat there going over every loose fact or image swimming around my head, the more I started to second-guess whether I had actually killed her, Andy— my beloved Andy, everyone’s beloved Andy.
It was preposterous! Though not as scary or surprising as it should have been.
Truth be told, I probably had more motive and opportunity than anyone else to kill Andy Lynch-Baezas that day. But I’d never admit that aloud to anyone, especially not the police, who would have surely mentioned something had they known anything at all about me or Andy and our intertwined histories.
Then again, my recurring sleep-deprived nightmarish flashbacks weren’t helping matters any, as they were starting to blur with another trauma from my past, so vividly that it was getting more and more difficult to distinguish what was real and what was not.
Discovering Andy’s dead body had unequivocally triggered the trauma of finding my own mother splayed at the bottom of the basement stairs when I was barely fourteen.
My mother had consumed enough drugs to kill a small animal the night of her death, according to filed police reports. Which had been what caused her ‘accidental’ fate, according to those same reports— as well as one of the bloodiest and most disorienting scenes of my life. To this day, I still question whether any of it ever really happened at all from time to time, even though everything that’s happened in my life since certainly suggests that it did.
I was lucky the arresting officers never came into the interrogation room when I was at my weakest, weariest, and most confused. Otherwise, I might have confessed to a crime I didn’t actually commit, if only to escape the recurring nightmarish detention of my mind. Was that their aim all along, if they ever even had one? Which was getting harder and harder to believe at this point, based on what happened.
After escorting me to the windowless interrogation room, the older officer with a ruddy nose pointed to a metal chair sitting next to a metal table, then asked me to have a seat. As soon as I did, the younger, leaner officer came into the room and set a disposable cup of water down on the metal table in front of me. Neither officer sat across from me. Both stood on either side of a two-way mirror on the other side of the room instead.
The older officer then proceeded to tell me that they had found my DNA on and around Andy’s body, without offering any specifics, before asking a few logistical questions about the day of her death. I answered his questions as best I could, then both officers promptly left the interrogation room without saying another word to me. The entire interaction lasted fewer than five minutes and I never saw either officer again.
Long after my mind had started its cycle of reeling then partially composing itself for the hundredth time, a tall woman officer with bright red hair came into the room and politely told me that I was free to go. She even smiled at me. Like I hadn’t just been detained for hours without a real explanation or verifiable evidence provided, or a bathroom break.
I was obviously relieved to be released from police custody without much else happening. But my head was still spinning when I left the police station.
My arrest made no sense, and not only because I hadn’t actually killed Andy.
(You can breathe easier now because that’s the truth: I did not kill Andy. I promise.)
It made no sense because, as far as I knew, there had never been an active crime scene set up the day Andy’s body was found, or shortly thereafter.
And while the family’s public statement— which I had generated and released myself, remember? — labeled Andy’s death as a ‘tragic accident’ caused by an ‘unintended overuse of prescribed narcotics,’ I had never actually seen an official coroner’s report. I had simply reused the verbiage relayed to me by the coroner’s assistant over the phone instead of using their report. A rookie mistake, I’m realizing now. But still, why wouldn’t I have believed what they told me? Why wouldn’t I have taken what they told me as being factual information that I could use for the statement I was working on? Unless I thought they were lying, which I had absolutely no reason to believe they were at the time.
So, why did the officer mention my DNA being found on and around Andy’s body if it was probably never even collected by a forensics team or mentioned by the coroner’s office? And then proceed to hold me in an interrogation room without ever actually interrogating me?
It didn’t make any sense. None of it.
I’ll have to push my exhaustion and confusion to the side for a little while longer, however. I have other, more pressing things to do and worry about at present, believe it or not.
My phone buzzes in my purse again but I don’t bother looking at it. I already know my time is running out.
I have no idea whose brownstone I’m standing in front of right now but it’s impressive and intimidating, discreetly situated in the middle of a quiet neighborhood, mere blocks from the cemetery at which Andy Lynch-Baezas will be laid to rest tomorrow.
The stone steps leading up to the front stoop are menacing yet inviting, beckoning me to go knock on the front door while simultaneously telling me to beware of trespassing.
As you can probably guess, I really don’t want to be here but decided to come anyway.
When I turned on my phone to open an app to request a ride after I was released from custody, I saw a text from an unknown number. It had an address in Park Slope with instructions to arrive at the address by nine-thirty, which gave me less than an hour to get here, and no time whatsoever to debate whether I should come.
Still, after my unsettling yet ultimately lackluster encounter with the police, grouped with my growing impatience with An0nymoUS1 and whatever games they were clearly playing, I am desperate for answers, any answers.
I take a deep breath, climb a few steps, then pause halfway up the stairs, finally taking a second to weigh the potential dangers of being here. I was in such a rush to get here that I hadn’t really thought about them until now, minutes away from the deadline I was given.
Is there an axe-murderer behind that door? A psychopath? A pathetic incel with lewd wet dreams that will never come to life? A confused neighbor placed inside the crosshairs of some hacker kid playing a prank? A terrorist?
I’m scared, sure, but my curiosity is keeping my heart rate stable, as the questions rattling around my brain drive away most of the fears that surface.
I need to know what the hell is going on more than I need to feel safe, in other words.
I have no idea who sent the text with this address or if it’s the same person who sent me the encrypted files last night. And if it is the same person, I have no way of knowing what their real intentions are or what role they expect me to play in whatever plans they have. I have no real way of knowing if our interests will align either, unless I learn more, which is the main reason I’m here, more than a little creeped out, unable to shake the feeling that my every move is being watched, recorded, and manipulated.
As I get lost in the chaos of my mind yet again, the front door swings open to reveal a shirtless Lucas Brady. He’s covered in sweat and has a perplexed look on his face.
“Tori, what are you doing here?” he asks, which sounds more like an accusation than a question.
“What are you doing here?” I parrot, defensively crossing my arms in front of my chest.
He crinkles his brow and looks at me like I’ve completely lost it.
“I live here,” he deadpans.
But before I can process what he said, Lucas surveys the empty street behind me, meets me in the middle of the stairs, grabs my forearm, then pulls me inside the brownstone in one swift chain of movements.
Once we’re inside, he slams the door closed behind us and locks it.
He didn’t hurt me, not exactly, but his abrupt physical contact startles me.
I don’t even realize I’m absentmindedly rubbing the forearm he grabbed until I hear him say, “Sorry, I didn’t mean to hurt you,” though his voice sounds like it’s under water because I’m too busy taking in the ornate banister to my right, along with all the family photos hanging on the wall above it.
In one of the photos, Moira Jackson and another woman are on either side of who I am assuming is a younger Lucas in a polka-dotted bowtie. They all have wide smiles and are sitting on the stoop of what must be the brownstone I’m inside of now. In front of them is a felt letterboard that reads: Lucas Brady Jackson. Over 3600 Days in Foster Care. Adopted Today. Forever Loved.
“You live here?”
I whispered the question as I continued to look at the photo of young Lucas with his parents.
“Sort of. I mean, I did. It’s my parents’ house. I lived here when I was a kid. I’m just keeping an eye on things while my mom’s out of town. She decided a couple hours ago to head out to the cabin for the weekend, maybe longer.” He pauses. “Why are you here, Tori?”
I vaguely register his annoyance, too caught up in trying to make sense of everything that’s happening, unfit to give him a straight answer.
“I was supposed to meet your mom this afternoon,” I mumble, staring at Moira in the photo on the wall, wondering if her likeness can offer me some sort of clue.
“I know. You didn’t show up.”
The sudden bitterness in Lucas’s voice grasps my full attention.
Yep, based on his facial expression, he’s definitely not happy with me. Which also means it’s probably unlikely he was the one who told me to come here.
“Tori, if you’re here to apologize, I—”
“You don’t know I was arrested, do you?”
I thought for sure my arrest would have made headlines by now. It’s not every day an employee of one of the most prolific media conglomerates in the world is arrested for murdering a billionaire heiress philanthropist who was once believed to have been a real-life saint, or philanderer, depending on whose narrative you were buying. But I had been so preoccupied getting here that I hadn’t bothered to look.
Lucas’s face softens with genuine concern, then his entire body relaxes. An unexpected yet welcome response to what I just admitted.
“Tori, what are you talking about?”
He takes a step closer then looks at me like I just claimed that I discovered the wheel, or something else equally ludicrous.
So, he doesn’t actually believe me. He just thinks I’m crazy. Great.
“I was arrested for murdering Andy this afternoon.”
Lucas is still looking at me like I have a screw loose. Eyebrows furrowed. Head tilted to the side. Retracted lips sloped downward and to the left.
“How is it not a huge story already?” I pull out my phone to check all the notifications that came in while I was in custody. There are dozens of innocuous first-day work emails. A few headlines about federal troops being dispatched to our nation’s capital and other major cities across the nation. Memes related to a famous pop star getting engaged to a famous football player. But absolutely nothing about my arrest.
“I was arrested this afternoon when I was with Charlie, not long after I saw you at the office.”
I keep scrolling, still finding nothing, starting to feel frantic.
“That’s why I couldn’t meet your mother. I was literally being detained.”
The longer I search through my phone, unable to find anything related to my arrest, the more anxious I become.
Sure, it would probably be better for Lucas to not think of me as a potential murderer as I take up space in the entranceway to his family home staring at my phone like a lunatic. But I can’t help it. All of a sudden nothing is more important than proving to him that I am not completely insane.
I mean, if my arrest isn’t a huge story all over the news and social media by now, did it ever really even happen?
I keep scrolling, tapping, swiping.
There has to be at least one story out there about my arrest.
There just has to be.
I know it.
Why wouldn’t there be? Unless…
Have I actually gone crazy?
Has all the sleep-deprivation and secret-keeping finally caught up to me?
“Tori?” There’s concern etched in Lucas’s voice, but I don’t look at him. I’m still frantically searching through my phone.
“This doesn’t make any sense,” I say under my breath. “Why aren’t there any stories about it? I was arrested hours ago, which is like a month in media time. Every single outlet on the planet should already know about it and be all over it by now. I knew it was kinda weird when the press wasn’t waiting for me as I left the station, but I thought they just got bored or distracted by something else because I was there for so long. Either way, Sebastian is going to expect me to get ahead of them and whatever their story angles will be. That is, if he doesn’t fire me first. But I —”
“Tori?!”
Lucas grabs me by the shoulders to get my complete attention. His grip is firm yet gentle.
When I finally look up at him, my whole body goes limp because I can tell he knows something I don’t. It’s written all over his face.
He may not know why I’m here or even want me here. But the look on his face is no longer confused or annoyed. Instead, it betrays how he must have had some sort of epiphany.
“We need to talk,” he says matter-of-factly, releasing my shoulders, then starts walking toward the back of the house.
Seriously, what is it with men thinking I’ll just follow them when they start walking away?
Lucas is halfway down the hall before he registers that I haven’t budged.
He turns his head to the side and says, “Come on, I’ll pour you a drink,” like I’m an old friend.
I’m too tired and worked up to refuse, and honestly, a drink might do me some good right now, so I relent.
“Fine.”
I look down at my phone to turn it off and put it back in my purse. There are four new texts from an unknown number.
The missing part of the story awaits you.
Trust him. No one else. For now.
We trust you. Delete texts ASAP.
0987654321
I guffaw to myself, half exasperated, half amused. Of course these texts would come through now.
They’re claiming to trust me, but I’m not so sure about trusting them, whoever it is they are. So far, I’m leaning more toward not trusting them because their antics up to this point have made me feel nothing but exhausted and unhinged.
I shove the phone into my purse then take a sip of the drink Lucas hands me when I enter the study, appreciating the way it burns my throat and instantly relaxes my mind and body.
“Are you hungry? I can make you something to eat.”
Another kind offer I wasn’t expecting.
“I’m okay for now, thanks.”
Lucas watches me as I take a moment to survey the room, and it’s a little off-putting. Earlier today he barely looked at me when we were in my office, but now he can’t seem to look at anything else?
I freeze when I see a familiar-looking jump drive sticking out of an open and familiar-looking computer that’s sitting on the desk in the center of the room.
“Is that my computer?” I point at it like it’s possible that it could be a figment of my imagination.
Trust him.
“It is. And that’s the encrypted drive I found in your top desk drawer. I started running its files through my decryption software before I went downstairs to get in a workout.”
Trust him.
It’s almost comical how casual he is when he says that, like stealing mysterious encrypted files from my locked desk drawer is completely normal— and on the day I started a new high-pressure interim position and got arrested for murdering my most beloved mentor no less.
Trust him.
I’m not sure whether to lunge for the drive to protect it from potential interlopers like him, or to hug him for his overall relaxed demeanor and transparency.
Trust him.
“Tori, why are you here? I’ll fill you in on what little I know, but I need to know why you’re here first.”
Trust him.
Before I talk myself out of it, I show Lucas all the texts I received since my arrest, which he immediately deletes.
“Hey! What if I wanted to trace those texts?”
“They were sent from a burner phone. Doing that won’t yield much.”
He scrolls through my other texts and messages as I keep staring on in disbelief. Thank god I didn’t have anything risqué in there, that I can recall anyway.
“Are those the only messages you’ve received like that?”
Who is he? Some kind of fancy spy villain or incognito agent? It really wouldn’t shock me all that much.
Right now, I might believe pretty much anything. That’s how undetached I’m becoming from reality and all the things happening to me.
Lucas Brady is a spy. Why not? Why wouldn’t I believe that right now?
The past non-stop, adrenaline-producing, sleep-deprived twenty-four hours are making me feel like I’m on the set of an intense thriller film, where I was once a background extra but now, for some unknown reason, am expected to know all the lead character’s lines and who their perceived enemies are, without warning or any kind of instruction or script.
Is any of this actually real, or really happening to me? Is he for real?
Lucas hands back my phone and looks at me expectantly, waiting for a response.
“Texts, yes,” I reply with a lump in my throat.
I am suddenly starkly aware of his half-naked body, and how his skin is glistening in the lamp light. And that yes, he could easily be James Bond himself, with those shoulders and abs and—
“Tori, have you received any other messages from unknown sources recently?”
I look up at his face, which is full of annoyance again, painfully aware of how aware he is of my ogling.
My cheeks flush. How awkward and inappropriate can I be at a time like this? Geesus.
Lucas Brady is my… coworker? As well as a thieving, probable secret operative, who is also, for most intents and purposes, a total stranger, who just so happens to be hot as hell and could do so many things with his—
Pull yourself together, Victoria Daniels. Right. Now.
Bringing my inner monologue to a close, I show Lucas the picture I took of the first and only self-destruct message An0nymoUS1 sent me last night.
He deletes the picture without saying a word.
I don’t bother putting up a protest this time because it’s dawning on me that Lucas Brady probably knows what he’s doing. He’s so calm. So focused. So…
“Okay, that helps, thanks,” he says as he grabs a t-shirt hanging off the back of a chair. He puts the shirt on then goes over to the desk.
“Wait,” I command, before he’s able to take a seat.
“I showed you mine. Now show me yours.”
I resist the urge to clamp a hand over my mouth. I can’t believe I just said that out loud.
“Sure.” His lips curve up just enough for me to see the dimple in his left cheek, which I’m trying very hard not to notice, or at least make sure he doesn’t notice me noticing.
“Come over here and I’ll show you,” he says without a hint of flirtation, to my unfortunate dismay.
Seriously, what’s wrong with me right now? Other than the fact that I desperately need a nap.
When Lucas takes a seat behind the desk, he moves the computer screen so it’s easier for me to see it when I stand next to him.
“It will take a while to decrypt everything on the drive, but it looks like there are a few file folders ready to open.”
He looks up at me. “Are you ready to see what’s in them?”
I don’t know, am I?
In my gut I know that whatever is on this drive will be much harder to handle than being arrested for murder then released without ever being properly interrogated or the press catching wind of it.
It’s all becoming too much too soon.
So, with limited options, I stall.
“Shouldn’t we wait until all of the files are ready?”
“We could, but that might take hours. And who knows how time-sensitive some of the stuff on here is?”
“Then why don’t we use the password we were so generously gifted, to open them faster?”
Lucas breezes past my sarcasm.
“I don’t want to risk corrupting the files at this stage.”
His hands were hovering over the laptop ready to get to work, but now they’re resting on the arms of the desk chair he’s sitting in.
“That wasn’t really a password you were sent,” he explains. “It was more of an anonymous signature, a calling card.”
His calm, spy-like demeanor. His field of expertise. His resources. His candor. His efficiency. How he hasn’t hesitated and seems to know exactly what to do. It’s all starting to add up.
I manage to squeak out, “You know who Anonymous is, don’t you?”
“Not exactly. But I know that they work with Incognito.”
He remains silent as I absorb what he said.
“Incognito? As in the underground cybercriminal network they’re trying to link to Andy and Lynch Global?”
He nods, then adds, “Most operatives in the network go by variations of the anonymous username you just showed me.”
“How do you know that?”
He remains silent as he casually interlaces his fingers in front of his chest.
“Are you one of them?”
I take a step back, warily searching his face.
He takes a deep breath, then releases it.
“I used to be. But not anymore. Not really.”
“What do you mean, not really?”
“It’s kind of a long story.”
I stare at him in a way that demonstrates just how unsatisfactory I find his answer, so he elaborates. Sorta.
“Incognito is kind of like the mob.”
My eyebrows arch involuntarily at this, which practically makes my eyes bulge out of my skull.
Lucas ignores my reaction but keeps talking, indicating he might actually tell me some of his ‘long story.’
“They’re nerdier, techier, and far less barbaric, obviously.”
Was this obvious?
“But like the mob, once you’re part of the Incognito family, you never really stop being part of the Incognito family. Unless you die. Maybe then?” He pauses to contemplate this.
“Anyway, once you’re in, it’s hard to get out. You can stop participating in their family activities over time without being perceived as a genuine threat or liability, as long as you never need anything from them or create any kind of problems for them.”
What Lucas said might explain a few things, like his confident demeanor and irregular skillset. But he’s still being obnoxiously evasive, not telling me all that much about his ‘long story’ after all.
“Did you steal the drive from my desk for them?” I blurt.
My tone is full of accusations and annoyance, but he remains even-keeled, relaxed even.
“For them? No. Because of them? Yes.”
“Explain,” I demand.
I go to pour myself another drink without asking permission because at the rate we’re going, getting any useful information out of him is going to take all night. Maybe days.
Lucas pushes himself back from the desk, then swivels the chair he’s sitting in to face me as I take a seat on the sofa with my fresh drink in hand.
A few seconds later, he leans forward and rests his elbows on his thighs.
“Sebastian asked me to put spyware on your laptop. And while I was—”
“He what?!”
When I flinch, I nearly spill the full drink I’m holding all over the floral area rug in front of the sofa.
Lucas just shrugs and says, “It’s pretty standard for Sebastian to request that spyware be installed on upper managements’ devices, as well as those who regularly interact with the public, public officials, and the press. He has trust issues, which makes sense given who his father is, and who his family is.”
Is it now?
“So that makes it okay to spy on people for him then?” I scoff. “Seriously, who doesn’t have trust issues nowadays?”
I’m starting to feel a bit tipsy. Whether it’s due to sleep deprivation, an empty stomach, or the precarious nature of the current predicament I’m in is becoming irrelevant. All the liquor I’m consuming is going straight to my head and, for better or worse, making me more and more brazen, potentially reckless. But I don’t care. My gloves are officially coming off.
“Of course it doesn’t make it okay,” he admits, narrowing his eyes at me like I’m centimeters away from stepping over some imaginary line of propriety.
I take a sip of my drink.
“You do understand how hypocritical that is, right? How Sebastian’s directives to spy on people he doesn’t know he can trust actually makes him untrustworthy.”
“Oh, I get it. All too well.” Lucas leans back and lets out a deep sigh.
“Then why do you help him spy on people?”
He looks at me dead on, clearly affronted.
“I said he requested spyware, Tori, not that I ever install it. Others who work for him probably have, but I haven’t.”
“Right.” I scoff again. “You only break into locked desk drawers and steal encrypted flash drives for him. My mistake.”
Lucas stands up and walks toward me in one swift motion, stopping abruptly when he is less than a few feet away, his navel now just above eye level.
His voice remains calm and steady when he looks down at me to say what he says next.
“I thought I was doing the right thing, Tori.”
His expression and tone betray hints of what could be an apology, possibly regret, which doesn’t make sense if he didn’t actually do what he’s being accused of doing.
Might as well try to keep him talking to see if I can find out more.
“How so?” I try to seem nonchalant when I set my glass down on the table next to the sofa and straighten my spine.
He faintly touches my knees on his way to sit on the other end of the sofa. When he’s seated, he turns his body to face mine, commanding my full attention.
“As I was saying,” he clears his throat, “while I was reconfiguring your computer—”
“To not spy on me?” I am full of snark, unable to keep it to myself. I take another sip of my drink, lean back, and cross my legs, not caring how annoyed I look.
Lucas carries on as if I hadn’t said anything, but I can tell my indignant attitude is starting to get to him. Good.
“— I came across traces of some files you downloaded that looked … high-risk. So, as head of cyber security, I had to go looking for their source to see—” thankfully he stops himself from emitting a bunch of technobabble I won’t understand, “— anyway, that’s basically how I found them.”
“You mean, that’s how you ended up breaking into my locked desk drawer to steal the jump drive?”
He doesn’t deny my accusation but makes a reasonable redirection, which only annoys me more.
“Tori, I don’t spy on people for my own amusement, or for my boss’ amusement. What I did is part of my job— a job I get paid to do, that I’m obligated to do. It’s my responsibility to make sure there isn’t anything nefarious going on that could compromise the organization or any of its networks, at all times.”
“So, invading others’ privacy and a little light theft is perfectly fine as long as you think it’s part of your perceived obligations for Lynch? Got it.” I readjust, recrossing my legs in the other direction so that they’re facing away from him now.
“Tori, come on. You’re only upset because you know deep down that you would have done the exact same thing I did if you were in my position.”
Of course I would have if I actually knew anything about computers and their networks or cybersecurity, but that is not the point. The point is: I don’t like the idea of Lucas Brady knowing things about me that I don’t know about him.
“Don’t talk to me like you know me, Brady,” I retort, accidentally calling him by his nickname. In my periphery, I can see his expression soften a bit, so I add, “You don’t know anything about me. And what you did is blatantly wrong. How am I supposed to trust anything you say or do now?”
“You’re right,” he says simply, “but I still need you to hear me out.”
I uncross my legs to face him again, then quickly and firmly place a palm by each thigh to prevent myself from teetering off the sofa. Yep, I’m officially buzzed.
“Do you honestly think I would intentionally do something to compromise Lynch?” I frown as both my body and vision balance themselves again.
I would definitely compromise Lynch, but not right now. There are still a few things I need to do first. But that’s not what matters at the moment. What matters at the moment is whether Lucas Brady believes I would intentionally do something to compromise Lynch.
“Honestly?”
I nod, really wanting to know his answer.
His eyes dart from me to the wall behind the desk then back to me.
“Tori, your promotion kind of came out of nowhere, so I wasn’t sure what to think. A lot of people still aren’t. Especially after that article your pal Ezra Greene wrote came out. Except maybe Sebastian? But he can be a little random sometimes, so there’s no telling what his true motives ever are.”
I can’t argue with anything Lucas has said so far. Though I’m really not liking that he knows about my friendship with Ezra, who is a known enemy combatant, for lack of a better title, across Parrot Media. As far as I was aware, no one knew how close Ezra and I really were. If they did, it would probably end my career at Parrot, maybe even outside Parrot. Yes, that is how much Parrot, namely Aster Lynch and his posse, despise Ezra Greene and everything he does and represents, without exception.
My buzzed mind is not letting me stay mad at Lucas, which is frustrating. Sure, he betrayed my trust before by taking the drive without asking me. But he’s also trying to gain my trust with his annoying logic and openness now. He could have continued to lie about the drive and how he took it, but he didn’t, even though I wouldn’t have known any better.
I’m also frustrated that I made such a rookie mistake.
Why hadn’t I been more skeptical of Sebastian’s eagerness to make me head of PR?
Seriously, what was in it for him— especially if there was a real chance he already knew about, or knows about, how close Ezra and I are, or were, seeing as how I’m not actually planning on talking to Ezra any time soon. Though we’ll have to see how long that continues. The last time I gave Ezra the silent treatment it barely lasted a week. But to be fair, that was for something far more innocuous than —
Lucas interrupts my buzzed and rambling thoughts.
“Listen, when I finally looked at those encrypted files on the drive, I had a strong hunch where they came from once I took a closer look at their metadata. I knew how much havoc they could potentially wreak but decided to decrypt them before I jumped to any conclusions about what was on them, or why you had them. I wasn’t really in a rush at first, but after you didn’t show up to the meeting with my mom—” he cuts himself off, exhales, then continues, “— the next thing I know, she’s heading out of town like she’s being chased. Then you randomly show up on my doorstep late at night, clearly out of it, telling me some anonymous message you received instructed you to come here right after you were arrested for murder, and …”
“And, what?” I’m indignant.
“I guess I’m still trying to figure things out, okay?”
His dark and gorgeous, unassuming eyes meet mine and my breath starts to even out. It feels like he’s injecting a tranquilizer directly into my veins. Or maybe that’s just the effects of the booze? Either way, I instantly feel calmer.
“That’s fair,” I say softly then add, “same here.”
I lean forward and pretend to hand him the rest of my drink as a mock gesture of goodwill, not actually thinking he’ll take it.
“I don’t usually drink,” he says, then takes the glass out of my hand, downing its contents anyway.
“Same,” I reiterate with a laugh.
He sets the empty glass down on the side table to his left, then makes eye contact again.
“At first, I didn’t know if you were working with them or not.” He seems relieved to have finally admitted this.
“Them, as in Incognito?” I try so hard to stifle the sarcasm in my voice. “Um, don’t you have that a bit backward?”
He just told me that he was previously involved with Incognito, did he not?
Lucas nods. “Yeah, I can see that now. Still, when you didn’t show up to the meeting with my mom, my mind started going in a different direction.”
“What direction?”
He sighs again.
“Incognito isn’t our biggest concern at this point,” he says, “The encrypted files Anonymous sent you are.”
Mental note: He just said ‘our.’
“So, you don’t think Anonymous is part of Incognito?”
“No, I’m ninety-nine percent sure that they are.”
“Okay…”
Now I’m officially confused.
“In the last several years, after its last founder went M.I.A., Incognito has gone in a direction I don’t fully agree with, so I haven’t been as active in their missions, particularly when those missions directly conflict with my current livelihood.” Our knees gently bump together when he scoots closer to me. “But this time, what they’re doing is different.”
“What do you mean?”
“For one, they’re communicating with someone inside Lynch, you, instead of just hacking into Lynch’s systems and wreaking havoc right away with little to no warning, which is their typical M.O. Incognito is notorious for blitz cyber attacks, not sustained cyber infiltration operations with ongoing communications.”
“I wouldn’t exactly call what’s happening ongoing communication. Isn’t communication supposed to be a two-way street?”
“Maybe. Either way, they’re doing something different with you. Beyond sharing general warnings that put their targets on notice, they don’t typically contact individuals inside an organization that they want to attack or are getting ready to attack. Which is my second point. I’m pretty sure the person sending you these communications is doing so from inside Lynch’s network somehow. But I still need to verify that.”
“Are you telling me that some corporate mole is harassing me?” I snigger because what kind of boring-ass spy film am I living in now?
“Not exactly.” Lucas glares at me.
His voice is thick and deep when he speaks again. “Tori, Incognito’s efforts have proved devastating in the past, even deadly. Whatever they’re up to is nothing to laugh at.”
His eyes temper a little when I compress my lips, but he remains dead serious.
“What they’re doing with you is signaling that they could be changing their M.O., and that what they’re planning to do next is bigger than anything they have ever done before.”
Anxiety of the unknown always fuels my insatiable curiosity and diminishes my fears, for better and worse— which was one of Ezra’s primary arguments for why I needed to go into journalism. So, no matter how grave Lucas sounds, I can’t stop this growing need to keep digging for more answers.
“Okay, if that’s the case, then why me, Brady?”
“I don’t know. Yet.”
“What do you think they’re trying to do?”
“I don’t know. Yet.”
“If they haven’t hurt me or threatened me in some way, are they trying to help me in some way? To do what? Save the world? And from what? Them?”
Lucas considers my questions earnestly despite my poorly veiled sarcasm.
“I don’t think they want to help you per se, but it looks like they want you to do something, and that they don’t perceive you as a target to destroy. Yet.”
Lucas’s militaristic reference, about me being a potential target to destroy, weighs on my shoulders heavily. More than that, it makes this entire situation even more terrifying, and enraging.
Fear makes people do and feel all sorts of things. This time, it’s setting my whole body on fire.
I never actually agreed to participate in a clandestine mission carried out by some cyber criminal network I know next to nothing about. Or do anything else that would make me someone else’s, let alone an entire network’s, target to destroy. Because even if Incognito and their anonymous operators don’t see me as a target to destroy, whatever that’s even supposed to mean, their enemies certainly will see me as a target to destroy, if I help Incognito carry out their mission, whatever that mission even is.
If I wasn’t already feeling buzzed, I’d probably pour myself another tall drink to cool the rage now pumping through my veins.
As if reading my mind, Lucas says, “Tori, I’m not sure what they want you to do, or why. Yet. If I were you, I’d be unsettled too.” He looks over at the computer that’s whirring on the desk. “But I do know that the files they gave you, for whatever reason, hold some of the answers you’re looking for, that we’re looking for.”
Before my liquid courage fades into something else, I stand straight up and agree to something I have a feeling I’ll end up regretting. “You’re probably right. Let’s see what’s decrypted so far.”
Without hesitation, Lucas stands and makes his way toward the desk, as I try to ignore how his hip lightly grazes past mine when he does.
Everything on the computer screen looks like coding gibberish at first, though I’m eventually able to make out some of what I’m looking at when Lucas pulls up a window with what looks like file folder names on it. But there is no rhyme or reason to the file folder names. In fact, most of them look like they could have been haphazardly saved on any random person’s personal computer: BDays, Advocacy, COVID, Holidays, Poems, Notes, Stories, Letters, Daily Drafts, To Publish, Family, Travel, Work, Health …
“Are you sure these came from that drive?”
Lucas assures me they did as he continues to scan the screen in front of him.
“They just look so normal, so ordinary, like they could be from anyone’s personal computer. Why would anyone from some clandestine cyber organization want me to have files like these?” I sigh, somewhat disappointed after all the excitement and fuss.
Lucas doesn’t respond. He’s too busy scanning everything on the screen, over and over and over again, as he painstakingly scrolls through the files.
I lean forward to get a closer look, so I can join him in reviewing their titles again and again and again.
“Wait, stop!”
I barely register Lucas drawing back a few inches when I yell directly in his ear because I’m pretty sure I found something.
I point at the screen. “Open the Philanthropy folder.”
He tugs at his earlobe, then does as I ask.
Inside the Philanthropy folder there are dozens of other folders.
I ask him to sort the files by the dates in their filenames so we can see which folder is most recent or at least titled and organized as being most recent. Since we don’t have any metadata in front of us, not that I would even know how to read it or what to do with it, this is the only thing I can think of doing at the moment.
Lucas must agree, or is at least humoring me, because he, again, does as I ask.
2025 Rose Gala is at the top of the list.
He clicks on it, then we both start scanning its contents.
Inside the folder is a guest list, a seating chart, vendor contracts, an event program… there it is.
“Click on that,” I say, pointing at the Finances folder, and he does.
Inside the Finances folder are multiple spreadsheets. Lucas clicks on the one that says Silent Auction Comp.
“What is SCA?” I ask, scanning the spreadsheet’s headers.
“I’ve only started seeing that abbreviation at Lynch over the past few months. It’s typically used internally to refer to Supreme Capital Advocates though.” He relays this information calmly as he continues to inspect the spreadsheet. But my mouth nearly drops to the floor.
“The firm Julia, the supposed whistleblower, hired to conduct a third-party investigation at Lynch?”
He nods as he continues scrolling through the columns and rows on the spreadsheet.
“It looks like this is comparing two different revenue projections based on the items being placed up for bid at the upcoming gala’s silent auction, and listing where that revenue will be allocated once earned. One projection is under SCA, and the other one is likely the Foundation’s internal projections, though it isn’t labeled.”
“It’s not uncommon for organizations like the Lynch Foundation to consult outside firms for due diligence, to help manage events like this that have millions of dollars at stake,” I add, not really wanting my original hunch to be correct.
“True,” he agrees, then scrolls to the bottom of the spreadsheet so quickly it makes me nauseous. “But these projections don’t add up in major ways that people who do this kind of thing for a living would miss.” He points at the screen. “Look. There are more tracking numbers for items up for bid in the SCA column. And a lot of the items’ values are noticeably inflated in the SCA column when compared to what they’re listed for in the other untitled column.”
I turn my head to the side, ready to be sick, but it isn’t the alcohol or scrolling screens that make me want to vomit.
How could she?
I was trying to remain as neutral as possible up to this point, to give Andy the benefit of the doubt, but the evidence before me is damning. There’s no denying that this is making her look like the phony Ezra’s article painted her to be.
“Hey, we still haven’t seen enough to get the full context here.”
I feel Lucas’s hand hover over the small of my back, like he wants to offer me some physical comfort too, which only makes me want to vomit more. I take a subtle step back and look at him like he’s spontaneously sprouted a few extra arms out the top of his head. The context seems crystal-clear to me.
“I’ll admit this looks bad.” He grimaces as his eyes flit to the screen then back to me. “But we need to look at everything else on the drive too, before we think we have the whole story.”
There is always more to the story.
Before I’m able to decide whether to push forward, declare defeat, or take a much-needed nap, Lucas pulls up the first window again, the main one with the decrypted file folders listed on it.
“Another folder is ready,” he announces, then with a more somber tone adds, “and it literally has your name on it.”
Tori
Before I can tell him not to, he clicks on it.
Only one file is inside it, a video file with what appears to be an auto-generated filename.
“Ready?” He’s not looking at me, but his fingers hover over the touchpad, waiting for my go-ahead.
“No, but open it anyway.”
Both Lucas and I suck in our breath as Andy appears on the screen before us.
She’s sitting on the chaise lounge in her bedroom at the primary Lynch residence in NYC. There’s a soft beam of sunlight coming in through the window behind her, so it looks like her entire upper body is wrapped in a halo. She’s gorgeous, even with that solemn expression on her face.
“Tori, my darling niece…” She takes a deep breath. “I have been looking out for you for a long time now and deem it one of the best things I’ve ever done. Watching you leverage the opportunities you’ve been given and earned over the years to grow into the young woman you are today makes me so proud.” She takes another deep breath. “I love my children, I do. They have some stellar moments from time to time. But you? You know what it’s like to …” her voice trails off as she stares into the distance with misty eyes. But when her eyes return to the camera a few seconds later, they’re full of renewed vigor.
“Tori, if you’re watching this video, it means that I had to disappear for a little while, or that something happened to me. And it probably means you’re already working with Lucas Brady. I hope you are anyway. You can trust him, Tori. Truly, Brady is probably the only person inside Lynch you can trust right now.”
When Andy gives the camera a lopsided smile, it really feels like she’s looking directly at me, like we’re on a video call in real-time instead.
“Tori, I need you to hang onto these digital files for me for a little while, okay? Can you do that for me please? Most of them may not make sense to you yet, but I promise they will in due time, in one way or another. You also need to know how important it is that you don’t—”
An alarm blares somewhere off-screen.
Andy moves around frantically, only slowing down when she finally has her phone in her hands.
She silences the alarm then whispers, “Oh, shit,” under her breath when she takes a closer look at her phone.
Her expression falls focused and vacant as she punches a few keys on her laptop.
Seconds later, the screen goes black.
I can’t register a single word Lucas is saying because the only thing my brain can compute right now is everything I just noticed in the video: How alive and non-suicidal Andy looked. How worried she sounded. How focused and determined she became after she received a notification of some sort. And how she was wearing the exact same outfit the day I found her body sprawled across the entrance to her closet last week, the day she was declared dead.
TO BE CONTINUED …
