Page 39 of Steal My Breath Away

“I can’t be in your house,” Ace said. “I can’t be in the kitchen and not hear your dad’s voice.”

“I don’t like it there either. It’s lonely. That’s why I wasn’t coming home from school.” I looked up at him. “You should come in today. Mom isn’t getting home until late, and we’ve run out of community dinners. Matt said he would try to make chicken Parm.”

Ace snorted a laugh. “Matt can’t cook.”

“I know. I need you to be there to call the ambulance when I get food poisoning.”

Ace laughed, a reluctant bark that came from his throat like he wasn’t expecting it. The sound made me giggle and I felt lighter than I had in months.

“I’d better come and help him,” Ace said. “Chicken can be dangerous if you don’t know what you’re doing. I’ll bet he hasn’t even defrosted it.”

“Maybe we should just have spaghetti.”

“I can do spaghetti.” He squeezed my hand. “I learned from the best.”

CHAPTER 19Ace

Two days of “vacation” was two days too many. Mav had taken Haley home after our night together, and I spent the rest of the day beating myself up for taking her to the hotel at all.

Was it amazing? Yes. Was it something I’d always fantasized about? Yes. Did I want to do it again? In a heartbeat. I’d had sex with a lot of women, but I’d never had the kind of connection with them that I had with Haley. We had a history, shared experiences, and she understood me in a way no one else did. Haley could make me laugh and draw me out of the darkness like no one else. She was wild and uninhibited and free and could make the most ordinary activity exciting and new. Sex with her had been out of this world.

It had also been wrong on so many levels. I’d pretty much ignored every rule in the bodyguard handbook. I’d also dishonored my fallen best friend and broken my promise to his father. I was supposed to be her protector, and I’d taken advantage of that duty.

The more I thought about it, the worse I felt, and after only half a day alone, I found myself back in the basement with Chad and Theo, trying to assuage my guilt by teaming up with them in their online game. Chad, especially, was easy to get along with, and he and Theo had no issues with me secretly hanging out with them while Mav roamed around upstairs. It was almost like I was back in Riverstone with Matt and Rafael, shooting bad guys and yelling at the screen. It was almost like I had friends.

“I got a lead on that incident on Michigan Avenue,” Theo said, his thumbs flying over the controller as he pumped the “boss”full of lead. “I’ve got a hacker friend who can get into the CCTV database. Everything that happened on that corner of Michigan Avenue from fifteen minutes before the attack until fifteen minutes after is gone.”

“What do you mean gone? I thought there were fifty thousand cameras in Chicago. Not only that, the head of our Chicago office said that local businesses can feed their surveillance into the system as well, doubling the coverage area.”

Theo brought down the low-level boss without any assistance and pumped a virtual fist. “It’s been erased, dude.”

“By who? The police? Maybe it was just a glitch.” It didn’t make any sense. The police would have checked for the footage. Wouldn’t they have noticed it was missing?

“Maybe, but it’s a specific blackout period, which makes me think it was deliberate and done by someone with serious hacking skills. I almost didn’t catch it but the time stamp was off, too.”

“What about surveillance footage from nearby businesses?”

Theo shook his head in time to his shooting. “She was on the park side. Business surveillance cameras were too far away to catch anything.”

“But people must have videoed it on their phones,” Chad protested.

“Haley’s mother talked to the detective in charge and he said there weren’t many people around and it happened so fast that the ones who did see it didn’t have time to film it.”

Chad rolled his character down a hill and then leaped over a bridge. “I think something bigger is at play—something political and connected to Haley’s mom. I’ve been looking into her work over the last year and she’s spearheading three very controversial bills, but what I think is most interesting is the rumor that she is being considered as a candidate for vice president. If John Ellison wins the nomination and partners with her, they would be a powerful ticket. Maybe someone doesn’t want him to have that edge in the next election.”

“Or maybe someone wants her place in the Senate,” I said. “But why go after Haley and her stepfather?” I shot a legion of bad guys to clear Chad’s path. I hadn’t played video games much after Matt died, and I’d missed it for both the camaraderie and the catharsis.

“To scare her out of the Senate race.” Chad ran to catch up with us and switched out his weapon for something with more power. “Ellison won’t appoint her as VP if she’s not a senator, and if it’s about the bills, they won’t go through if she’s gone. Threatening her family is much more effective than threatening her directly.”

“You know your politics.” I took a header off a cliff and waited to respawn.

Chad grinned. “I need to know all this stuff if I want to be a news anchor. I’m not going to be the guy who just reads the news. I’m going to offer commentary, and for that I need to understand what goes on behind closed doors.”

“I’ll talk to her mother again,” I said. “My boss isn’t supportive of an investigation. Our job is to protect people; not catch the bad guys.”

“Theo and I are still on the case.” Chad covered me when I reentered the game. “I even got approval from my journalism prof to use this as my investigative journalism credit for the year if I dig up some good dirt, so I’ve got an incentive to keep going. Theo just likes the challenge of getting into systems he’s not supposed to see.”

Theo was entirely focused on the game but nodded in agreement. “Gonna hack the Chicago PD next. Should be fun.”

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