Page 16 of The Fortunate Ones
“His work line was clean, but we only verified his personal wasn’t on anymore. My team is swamped here.” And this wasn’t a priority for him. I got it, though it should be. What would it do to his company if it came out that there’d been a security breach and personnel files had been leaked?
I knew I should’ve been more worried than I was. In the wrong hands, that was . . . bad. I had carefully hidden my identity from my enemies for decades now, and this could notonly put me in danger, but Riley and Beckett and my entire family here. But my gut agreed with Deshaun, and whatever Ramirez wanted, he wasn’t trying to sell me out to the highest bidder.
“Hey, angel?” I called, not bothering to raise my voice because I knew they were listening.
The door opened, and four sheepish faces appeared. It seemed only Beckett didn’t snoop. Diego cleared his throat before answering, not quite meeting my eyes. I smiled softly at him, showing him I wasn’t angry.
“Can you get phone records for a line that’s been shut off?”
He blinked at me. “Yes?”
“Deshaun, can you send everything over to us? My boyfriend is going to look into it.”
“You’re going to handle it?” He sounded relieved.
“Yes, but if it turns out to be bigger than we think and there’s a breach?—”
Deshaun cursed quietly under his breath. “If it’s a breach, we’ll take over. I just, Ramirez is a good guy, Wes. If he’s doing this, he has to have a good reason.”
I believed him. Deshaun’s instincts about people were always spot on. It was what made him so good at his job.
“I’m inclined to believe you. I’ll text you a secure contact. Send me everything, and if you find out anything else, let me know?”
“I will, and can I expect the same from you?”
“Most likely.” I didn’t want to get into it, but I was pissed at him for this. Shit happened, but we went through great lengths to make sure our personal information wasn’t leaked.
My gaze flicked over to my boys, who were watching with concern. Deshaun made an irritated sound but didn’t push it. “Be careful, Hayes.”
“I will. I’ll update you when I can.”
Deshaun hung up then, and I was left with racing thoughts and a ton of questions.
“Wes?” Diego’s voice was filled with worry. I forced a smile, then my eyes cut meaningfully to Riley, Matty, and Beckett. I didn’t want to get into it in front of them. There was no reason to worry them when I still had no idea what was happening.
Unfortunately, Riley was my kid and way too observant for his own good. He huffed in annoyance. “Yeah, whatever just happened, you’re not keeping it from us. Unless it’s some top-secret shit, though I doubt you’d answer that call in the hallway.”
I pressed my lips together, trying not to laugh. “It’s not top secret. I just don’t want to worry you.”
“We’re going to worry anyway,” Matty added. They’d all spilled out of the room now and were crowding the hall, including Beckett, who was standing protectively behind Riley, his arms wrapped around his middle.
I sighed. They should probably know anyway. There was a chance that, depending on what Ramirez was after and what he found, the boys could be in danger. Actually . . . I quickly pulled my phone back up and texted Leo, asking him to put a couple people on their apartment building. Just to be safe.
“Okay, but there’s no reason to panic. There was a small breach at my old company and some of my personal information may have been accessed.”
The was a collective beat of silence as they all processed, finally broken by Brooks. “Excuse me, but what the fuck? A small breach? That sounds pretty fucking big.”
“It would be, but we know who accessed it.”
I briefly explained the situation to them, but it didn’t seem to settle them at all. “What if he’s being forced? Like, someone snatched him and made him steal your information under duress?”
There wasn’t a zero chance of that, but still. “Deshaun believes it’s unlikely.”
Beckett frowned. “But not impossible?”
“No,” I admitted, “Not impossible. But that’s why we’re going to be careful. I’m going to follow you back to your apartment and have someone watch it until we get to the bottom of this. We’ll increase the security here as well. I promise we will all be fine.”
Brooks fiddled with his cuff, eyes worried. Diego was already on his phone, a frown on his face.
