Page 74 of Hacking the Holidays
My heart stopped.
This wasn’t possible.
How was Sam guarding his desktop computer while simultaneously hacking my laptop? He couldn’t be doing both.
There was no way?—
SECURITY PROTOCOL INITIATED.YOUR FILES AND CONTACTS HAVE BEEN COPIED.YOUR COMPUTER WILL SELF-DESTRUCT IN 60 SECONDS.
The words punched the air from my lungs.
This was a joke, right?
A countdown timer appeared.
00:60, 00:59, 00:58 ...
This isn’t real.
This can’t be real.
But what if it were?
My fingers flew across the keyboard—escape, control-alt-delete, tap, click, tap, click. I tried everything I could think of.
Nothing worked.
00:50, 00:49, 00:48 ...
“You look a little tense again,” Sam said in an amused tone.
My heart nearly stopped.
I jerked my head up.
He was watching me with that maddeningly relaxed expression, one eyebrow raised.
“Never been better,” I managed, but my voice came out strangled.
00:40, 00:39, 00:38 ...
“I find that hard to believe.” He tilted his head. “What’s going on? Did you get into a little trouble? Maybe I can help.”
“I’m not in trouble!” I practically yelled.
“Ithink you are.”
00:30, 00:29, 00:28 ...
My mind raced. What had he copied? My browsing history? My files? The encrypted folders with names like “cookie_recipes” that were actually surveillance logs?
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said.
I tried another keyboard command.
It failed again.
“The truth shall set you free,” Sam said.
