Chapter 7: Chapter 7

Elnora

Elnora Watton hated confrontations.

Or anything outside the confines of her comfort zone. It was why she opted for computer science and followed the programming route: tucked away in the backend, where the world’s chaos couldn’t reach her. To regular folks, she was just another grotesque hacker peering into people’s secrets on the underground web. But she wasn’t, not by a long shot.

She was far worse, and Neon Cybersecurity was the perfect cover.

With her ear pressed against the door, she strained to catch bits of Mason’s conversation. Mason was involved in something criminal, and if she wasn’t sure before, the man with the scar confirmed it. What was his business with Antonio? That dude worked for the mafia; everyone knew that. Her more than most.

Octavia, the bead of the Organised Crime Bureau in Berkton had recruited Neon to do reconnaissance on Antonio once. She knew exactly what skeletons were buried in his closets, and also knew the mafia had him so protected the bureau couldn’t touch him. But she found it odd that Mason’s name or alias never showed up in all of her recon. She would remember someone who looked like him.

The sound of approaching footsteps jolted her from her thoughts. She plopped onto the bench at the foot of the bed, trying to look nonchalant.

Mason entered with a deep frown, clutching a bulky folder in his hand. He closed the door and his piercing green eyes watched her for a moment.

“Tell me, what is it you do again?” he asked, his tone deceptively calm.

Elnora crossed her legs and flashed a smile. “See, I asked you that question first, and you didn’t respond.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Touché. But now I’m asking you. What do you do, Elnora? Ladies first.” His tone was brittle, devoid of any tease or sweetness, and it made her nervous.

“Why? What does it matter?” She sighed, leaning back a bit.

He slammed the folder down beside her and shoved his hands into his pockets. The sound echoed in the room, and she froze, staring at him in shock. She hadn’t a clue what was happening right now, and it boggled her mind.

“I’ll make this quick, Elnora Watton. When I ask a question, you answer. Now, what the hell do you do?” He glared at her, waiting for an answer.

Elnora felt her heart pounding in her chest as she thought about what to say. Then she grabbed the folder and flipped through all the pictures of her, her mom, Marcy, and Joe. A shiver shot through her at the evidence of his extensive background check. Her hands trembled as she flipped through the pages, each image tightening the knot of fear in her stomach. She looked up at him, her eyes wide with anger and dread, struggling to find her voice.

“Why ask me anything if you already have this?” She shot up to her feet, temper flaring. “And how dare you run a background check on me?” Why did he even need to do that?

Mason’s eyes dimmed before he walked closer, leaning in until their noses were almost touching. She swallowed a sharp breath, her heart pounding in her chest. His expression was cold. Those beautiful green eyes of his narrowed in a way that made her shiver. His jaw was clenched tightly, a muscle ticking in his cheek as he stared her down. Each second of silence felt like an eternity.

“Do you work for Octavia?” His voice was cold and demanding. “Answer me!”

With a gasp, she dropped back onto the bench. Scarier than the completely different person he’d become was his mention of Octavia. Was he suspicious that she was spying on him? Why was he so paranoid? She had to find out what he was hiding.

“Elnora, you are working my nerve. You need to give me answers, not shake like a leaf. Are you with the bureau or not?”

“I’m not with the bureau,” she stammered, her voice barely above a whisper. “I don’t even know what you’re talking about. I work with data. Mostly cybersecurity. Neon Cybersecurity, ever heard of it?”

“I got pics of you meeting with Octavia! What’s up with that? Did she put you up to this, huh?” he growled.

Elnora shot back up with a sigh. “In that case, it would be stupid of me to get caught by surveillance if I worked for her, wouldn’t it?” She frowned at him, glaring at him. “Octavia is a client who hired my firm to install an electronic beamer on Antonio and conduct reconnaissance on him.”

He stared at her for a moment, his eyes narrowing. “What the heck is that? The beamer?” He snapped his fingers at her impatiently.

“It’s a device we use to track his movements. Octavia hired us to keep an eye on him. You can call it a digital GPS.” She shrugged, trying to appear nonchalant with the pounding of her heart.

“You’re a hacker?” He said with a slight pique. “Answer me quickly, El.”

Her eyes flashed with outrage. “I prefer the term cybersecurity expert,” she corrected him sharply. “Hacker implies something illegal, and I assure you, my work is entirely above board. I specialize in tracking people.” He stared at her for a moment, then nodded, satisfied.

Mason’s eyes roved across her face. “Is that how you know the priest?”

A flicker of fear crossed Elnora’s face. She bit her lip, struggling to maintain her poise. “The priest?” she echoed, her voice trembling slightly. Where did Mason learn about that no-good scam artist? Is that what this was about?

His eyes darkened as he watched her closely. His jaw tightened even more, as he leaned in, his breath hot and threatening. “Don’t play dumb with me, Elnora. Tell me everything you know about the priest.”

“I don’t know him. The man tried to steal the code for my encrypted telecom program, but I shredded it before he could get his hands on it.” Elnora looked away, refusing to meet Mason’s gaze. She knew if she lied, he would know. He just had that look in his eyes.

That snivelling bun once attempted to hack her and stole a program no one should have known about. The program was a breakthrough in secure communication technology, capable of preventing even the most sophisticated cyberattacks. It had the potential to revolutionize sensitive information transmission. Losing it to a malicious actor would have had catastrophic consequences.

Mason stepped closer, placing his hands on her shoulders. She froze, inhaling sharply as her wide eyes met his. He guided her back to sit on the bench, his grip firm but oddly comforting.

“You mean the network is yours?” he asked.

“What network?”

“The Priest sold a secured private network to some of my associates,” Mason revealed.

“Oh.” She eyed him warily. “It’s not secure. As a safety precaution, I embedded a bug in the code in case someone else tried to dub it. The bug will activate a self-destruct sequence if anyone tries to tamper with or duplicate the code,” she explained. “It will wipe all data on the hard drive and send an alert to my secure server.”

Nodding, he rose and began pacing in front of her. “Oh, El,” he groaned, tucking his hands in his pockets as if he’d figured something out. He gave her a thoughtful look before turning away. “That’s brilliant.”

Calling her brilliant wouldn’t make up for scaring her shitless. Maybe it was time to get the hell out of here and call it a night.

She shook her head. “I really should get out of here before whatever this is gets way more out of hand.”

“Hmm.” He groaned with a sly smile before lowering himself to sit beside her. “Here’s the thing, El. The Priest set this date up, and I understand why now. He must have figured out the bug in your code and needs you to fix it. This elaborate ruse that lured you down to l’Eclipse and mistakenly into my… world was exactly for that reason.”

She hissed in disbelief. “Marcy set this date up.”

No one on the dark web knew who she was, including the Priest. It was impossible to find her because she was nameless, faceless, and untraceable. Although now that she thought about it, piecing together the implications of what Mason was saying, it would explain how the address was rerouted to a completely different place. She had to take another look at that text message and try to figure it out.

“I’m not so sure about this Marcy friend of yours, tesoro. If you hadn’t come here with me, you’d be on your way to the Priest.” Mason held her chin gently and pulled her to look at him, his eyes softening.

Marcy was the only person she trusted implicitly. The thought of her being involved in something so sinister was unsettling. But Mason’s words made sense. The whole setup had been too perfect, too orchestrated.

The green of his eyes twinkled at her, but it was nowhere near as torrid as his hand on her face. She pulled away from him. No, Marcy would never put her in harm’s way.

“I don’t know who the priest is, never cared to know, but I know it is definitely not Marcy.” She glared at him, her frustration mounting.

“Who else knew you were working on this telecom program?” he asked her.

“It’s not Marcy!” She shot to her feet and stepped away from him. Marcy couldn’t even write the most basic code. She couldn’t be the priest. There was no way she would have missed that. A patsy, maybe, but it wasn’t Marcy.

“I need to get out of here,” she slurred, feeling the room spin slightly.

Mason laughed and walked to the quaint parlour beside the window, his movements smooth and controlled. He beckoned her to join him, with a look in his eyes that said it wasn’t a request.

She went, dread weaving its way up her back, and lowered herself onto the couch beside him, holding her hands together in her lap.

“Here’s the thing. You can’t leave. You are mine. I didn’t just pick you up at a bar, and I didn’t mistake you for a blind date either. I bought you,” Mason said in a way that implied there was nothing she could do about it. “You belong to me. If you try to leave, there will be consequences.”

His words chilled her to her bones, and for a moment she froze as they echoed in her head. Bought her? As if she were one of his ridiculous DB4s? Had he lost his mind?

The way he crossed his legs was calm and intimidating at the same time. “That club Marcy sent you to is common ground for the mafia and cartel, some good biker gangs too. The women who sit at table eleven are dames of Marcello, auctioned off to the highest bidder.”

Even though she couldn’t believe what she was hearing, she knew the underground from her RECON on Antonio and Enrico. It was the infamous crime ‘nowhere’ she knew about because of her less than legal prowess on the deep web. That meant Mason was part of the Mafia. It sure explained his relationship with Antonio.

“Still think Marcy’s not the Priest?” His eyes danced over her, and she pulled the bottom of her shirt to conceal herself some more.

She knew she should say something, but the words wouldn’t come out. She just kept staring at him, feeling completely overwhelmed.

With a wry smile, Mason rose. “Relax, tesoro, I don’t intend to ravish you yet.”

So that was still on the agenda? Elnora shook her head to clear it of her deviant thoughts. It was hardly the time to think of making the sex, having the love… argh!

He bought her. Was she his slave and he her master? Her eyes raised to his as he smiled down at her.

“When can I leave?” she asked.

“I haven’t decided on that yet.” She had expected a different answer—never—or was he just toying with her by making her feel that she could? “What do you need?” Mason asked in a businesslike tone that reminded her of who he was. But she knew nothing about him, nothing at all, and she needed to correct that.

Shaking her head, she looked away. It had been too good to be true. It’s no surprise she ended up underground and her beau was a criminal.

“What do I need for what?” she asked him with a sigh.

He smirked and replied, “To find the Priest. You need to know if it is Marcy.”

Elnora laughed. “You don’t care about any of that. You only want his network.”

“Why would I when I have you?” he said, and her eyes went straight to his. “Build me one, and you can leave.”

What? Rewriting that program from scratch would take months. She watched him with a thoughtful brow. Could she really trust him to let her go once she completed the network?

“And I would no longer belong to you?”

His eyes narrowed slightly, but a flicker of amusement danced in them. “Your freedom will be your own, ~tesoro~,” he said smoothly, though there was an edge to his voice that made her question the sincerity of his promise.

“Couldn’t I just buy myself back from you?”

Mason laughed, and that alone answered her question. “I doubt you can afford you, El.” He tucked his hands in his pockets again, and her eyes raked him.

Elnora exhaled a deep sigh; she didn’t trust him. She didn’t trust him before, and now with the knowledge of who he was, she didn’t trust him at all. It would take her at least six months to put it together. She couldn’t be stuck here for that long. Besides, why did he assume she couldn’t buy herself back? It’s possible he thought crime was more rewarding than what she did. Elnora smirked, knowing she could buy herself back with interest, but she wanted to see how this would play out first. Then she leaned back in her chair, her eyes narrowing, watching him, intent on finding out who he really was. She was going to let him take advantage of her until she could unleash Icarus.

“I haven’t got all night, Elnora. Do we have a deal?” he said.

She arched a brow. “Do I have any other choice?”

“No.”

She figured that out already. “So why do you disguise it like I do?”

His eyes narrowed, and for a moment those green orbs just watched her. “Come, I’ll show you to the guest room.” With that, he started toward the door.

Elnora took a deep breath and pulled herself up, following him out of the room.