Killer Colton Christmas Read online

  “I appreciate the offer.” Shifting in his chair, he reached for his monitor and turned it so she could see the display, though it remained blank. “Unfortunately, I feel it’s best for you and the company if we keep you far away from this particular situation.”

  “Pardon me?” Please don’t kick me to the curb so close to Christmas.

  “Our cybersecurity protocols folded almost instantly,” he said, clearly disgusted. “Though we’re chasing down the breach, the FBI will soon take over. We’ve switched our efforts to covering everyone who’s been compromised with identity theft monitoring and protection.”

  “Good. You’ve seen the latest blogger headlines?” Her voice sounded weak and she straightened her shoulders. Social media and online trends were only a small aspect of her role. If Colton, Incorporated, wanted to manage the rumors and innuendo and keep customers content, they needed her analysis and assistance with the strategy to overcome this crisis.

  Zane scowled. “Yes. It’s ridiculous, though it’s likely to get worse before it’s over.” He paused, taking a deep breath. “I’m sorry, Marie.” He tapped something on his keyboard and more data from the piracy site flooded the monitor. Names and personal records scrolled through in alphabetical order, much as it had on the screens in the conference room.

  When it reached the Ms, the scrolling slowed, rocking a little as the information came to a stop. The process reminded her of a jackpot on a slot machine. Her name on the left. Her social security number dead center, her bank account and balance on the right. In bold red lettering, centered under those pertinent details, her job title was listed along with her salary and a call to action with a link.

  Data mining is dangerous! Stop the snooping, CDO!

  Okay, that was rough. She didn’t appreciate her information being spotlighted by the Cohort simply because her job involved data mining to make customer interaction more engaging and valuable. Yes, the process was controversial, but unlike the hacktivists, she never publicly shared or broadcast the details she gathered. She performed her job with pride using the highest standard of security.

  Leaning forward, she tried to make sense of the implications. It boggled her mind. “Where does that link lead?”

  He clicked it, revealing a rant on the dangers of data mining ending with an input box. “I’m hoping the FBI can tell us what this is. My primary concern is for your safety.”

  Surely she would be safe if she stayed here until the FBI shut down that page and the links. “The breach and mitigating the effect on our employees should be our primary concern.”

  “Your loyalty is refreshing,” Zane said with a half smile. “And valued. I want you to be the CDO here for years to come.”

  That was the first comforting thing she’d heard. “I’m not trying to be difficult, but what exactly are you saying?”

  “This reads like a personal threat against you. Your information isn’t in the auction—it’s already been broadcast. I fear the Cohort has targeted you for some specific action.”

  Meaning what? She couldn’t wrap her head around his assessment. Groups like the Cohort didn’t go after people in person. They struck from the safe side of their probing computers, exposing and embarrassing their targets to promote the agenda du jour.

  “I don’t know anything about Livia Colton,” she said, recalling the Cohort radio broadcast. Only what she’d read in the press or heard from her coworkers. “My only tie to the Colton family is my employment.” Unless the Cohort knew something she didn’t. She clasped her hands in her lap to keep from rubbing that tiny burn behind her sternum. Not again, not now. Calm, blissful years had flowed by without that annoying flicker of hope that she might eventually learn her father’s name. How frustrating it was to discover no amount of crushing disappointment would extinguish it permanently.

  “Regardless, the Cohort changed tactics. By definition, your job fundamentally offends the Cohort. Until we sort it out, I feel it’s best if you take a leave of absence.”

  Those last three words reverberated in her head. She wondered where she could go and how she might fill her time. Zane explained the cybersecurity team’s instructions for managing the identity breach issues. Password changes and notifications to her bank, credit cards, landlord and the IRS topped the list. Just when she wished she’d brought in a notepad, he slid a short stack of paperwork across the desk to her. “This is the packet going out to all employees by noon today.”

  Fast work, she thought, flipping through the comprehensive guide. “With all due respect, I’d prefer to stay and help.”

  Her coworkers were bound to be worried and the cybersecurity department would be flooded with calls and questions. Not to mention what they needed to do as a company to reassure customers that their data was safe. When she added up the tasks and the personnel, she knew they needed her here.

  Zane leaned back in his chair and rubbed his forehead, debating something. “Handle the notifications,” he said, “then come back to the conference room.”

  “Thank—”

  He interrupted her gratitude. “I’ll let you stay on one condition. You’ll cooperate with the FBI’s assessment of your safety. Whatever they decide, no arguments.”

  “Yes, sir.” She hurried out of the office before he changed his mind.

  As she walked to her office at the other end of the hall, she flipped through the guide, squirming at the long list of things she would now need to keep in mind. At least she didn’t have a spouse or children to worry about. In her situation, not even extended family was a concern, since she’d been a ward of the state of Texas since her birth.

  Marie’s lips twisted and her throat went dry as those old questions tried to rear up from her past. Wouldn’t it be ironic if the Cohort had discovered who her father was or even where her mother had gone after she’d abandoned her newborn with nothing more than a name?

  Distracted, her head down as she passed the elevator, the doors parted, and she found herself tangled in the group entering the hallway.

  She nearly bumped into the man in the lead and he steadied her with a light touch at her elbow. The dark suits and serious expressions identified them as FBI, even without the badges they wore in plain view.

  “Excuse us,” the first man said, his touch sliding away.

  “No, pardon me.” She offered a tight smile and stepped aside. In her heels, she wasn’t quite eye level with him, though he wasn’t the tallest of the group. With dark brown hair, straight eyebrows over deep-set brown eyes and a stern mouth framed by a trim beard, he radiated authority and he gave her a long study that put heat in her cheeks as he passed by.

  What did he see? she wondered, striding away. Did he think he knew her? She couldn’t shake the strange sensation that he had come to some immediate conclusion about her with only a light touch and one long look.

  * * *

  Special Agent Emiliano Ortega recognized Marie Meyers as he steadied her when she brushed by them. Her picture and résumé were in the initial briefing documents he’d skimmed when his boss called him to Dallas early this morning.

  The FBI had assembled the fast-response task force Emiliano served on to investigate cyberattacks all over the country. They could even reach destinations overseas at a moment’s notice to protect US interests. Reporting to Dallas meant a particularly short commute in this case, getting them on scene quickly and reducing the window of time in which the hacktivists could erase their tracks.

  He hadn’t had much time to delve deep into the file but he knew the key points on the top executives at Colton, Incorporated. Thirty, never married, Miss Meyers had earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in computer science and minored in psychology. No debts beyond a minuscule credit-card balance.

  Everything about her appearance, from her glossy dark brown hair curling softly around her shoulders to the pricey desi
gner high heels, shouted that this woman valued order and discipline.

  He glanced back down the hallway, but she was gone. Why wasn’t the CDO headed to the conference room? A cyberattack of this magnitude usually brought all hands on deck.

  When his team reached the conference room with the obligatory massive table, monitors and floor-to-ceiling windows, the introductions were swift. Everyone seemed eager to hand over investigative control to the FBI. A typical reaction with attacks as aggressive as this one seemed to be.

  He kept glancing to the door, waiting for Miss Meyers to join them as he and the team listened to the rapid-fire updates from the technicians and executives on hand.

  The Cohort had claimed responsibility immediately: not the first time Emiliano and his team had encountered that strategy. Another stroke of luck, as the verification was swift and put them on the right track immediately.

  As he and the team systematically peeled back the first layers of the breach, Emiliano soon realized the Cohort had employed a brand-new tactic. The trail of links from Marie Meyers’s information led to a private message board called Campus Martius, where Cohort Principes were encouraged to share ideas on how best to make an example of her.

  “We have a problem,” Emiliano said as he kept digging. He shared his display on the presentation screen and conversation around the room halted in stunned shock.

  He spotted Zane Colton standing with his family near the wall of windows. “Where is Miss Meyers?”

  Zane started to answer and stopped short. “Right here.”

  * * *

  The notifications took longer than Marie expected, so she wasn’t surprised to discover the FBI team had turned the conference room to crisis central by the time she returned.

  Seeing her name and face plastered across the big presentation screen—that unnerved her all over again and she hesitated at the doorway.

  Zane motioned her closer. “Marie Meyers, our CDO,” he stated. “This is the FBI’s National Cyber Investigative Joint Task Force.” He gestured to the presentation screen. “They just drilled through the rhetoric to this direct death threat against you.”

  Despite the shock rattling through her system, she forced herself to stride forward.

  The man with the dark eyes who’d studied her so intently in the hallway extended a hand in greeting. “Special Agent Emiliano Ortega.”

  She grasped his hand, momentarily distracted by the calluses on his palm. “A pleasure to meet you.” She kept her eyes on him, rather than the presentation screen. His square jaw offered a much better view anyway.

  His mouth tilted in a skeptical half smile before he introduced the three other members of their task force as Special Agent in Charge Selene Dashwood, Special Agent Finn Townsend and malware analyst Tristan Staller.

  Despite the suits and no-nonsense attitudes, the task force was a study in contrasts, from the sleek Dashwood, tall and lean with flawless ebony skin and no accessories beyond her wedding band, to the not-quite-rumpled Staller, who seemed reluctant to tear his gaze from his monitor. She knew his type well. In between were Townsend with his curling light brown hair and friendly smile and Ortega, who watched her closely.

  “We’re aware this isn’t a good day,” Ortega said.

  Not her worst, either, though she kept the thought to herself. “How can I help?”

  As Dashwood resumed her conversation with Fowler and T.C., Agent Ortega planted his hands on his lean waist. “Sometimes attacks like this one resemble battering rams. This attack, while large in scope, had some precision elements.” He pointed to the screen. “As you know, they took everything in order to inflict the most chaos and damage to the company as a whole.”

  “Obviously,” she agreed.

  “Underneath the obvious, we believe the strategy was meant to blur their particular focus on you.”

  She bit back the rash of protests. It wouldn’t help to point out she wasn’t a Colton, had no connection to Livia or the horrible crimes she’d inflicted. Pressing a hand to her lips, she stifled an inappropriate and untimely laugh. This was absurd. Didn’t the Cohort see the double standard of wrecking her career and threatening her life in their quest to safeguard privacy with criminal actions?

  “The language is specific, Miss Meyers,” Agent Townsend said. “The complaints target your abuse of privacy expectations and overreaching corporate authority. The Cohort is revved up and motivated against you.”

  She gaped at the FBI agent as she struggled for an appropriate reply. Was he actually accusing her of doing something wrong because she was good at her job? Her gaze drifted to Zane, who was scowling at the back of Townsend’s head.

  “Townsend.” Ortega silenced him with a look. The other man returned his attention to the computer in front of him.

  “Miss Meyers.” Ortega pulled out a chair for her. “We need to walk you through these threats and review your options.”

  Marie sat down and the agent showed her what they’d unraveled. As if broadcasting her personal details and the vicious conversation in the message board weren’t enough, the group had posted a new banner front and center where they were auctioning the stolen data from Colton, Incorporated.

  Reward! Share your plan to end CDO Meyers and take a stand for consumer privacy!

  The message board was exploding with real-time comments. She stared, horrified as the potential consequences drifted around her. Since when did groups like this offer rewards for real-life attacks? With every passing hour this day moved up the list, squeezing into her top five worst of all time. Not an easy feat, considering her rocky path through the foster-care system.

  On the upside, if there was any credibility to the threats from the Cohort, she wouldn’t have much of a future to dwell on it. The gallows humor didn’t erase the icy rivulets of fear trickling down her spine.

  Chapter 2

  Emiliano studied the Colton, Incorporated, CDO, simultaneously impressed by her composure and wondering when the dam would break. No one could hold up indefinitely to the news of being hunted, online and in real life. Whatever had incited this attack, Townsend was right; the Cohort had zeroed in on Miss Meyers and they weren’t letting up.

  Why? During his work on this task force, he hadn’t seen anything quite like the vitriol they were spewing at this particular woman. She seemed nice enough. Polite and competent. Pretty, too, though that was irrelevant. Nothing he’d heard so far gave him any insight as to how she’d landed on the bad side of one of the most dangerous hacktivist groups in existence.

  Yes, the core of her career was at odds with the Cohort mandate on privacy, but why were they determined to incite direct violence?

  She had courage in the face of the clear, physical danger, he’d give her that, and he had to assume integrity and commitment as well, based on how the executive staff treated her. And she was watching him expectantly from those wide, intelligent brown eyes shot with gold and framed with long lashes. He cleared his throat and got on with his job. “You can see the Cohort claimed responsibility immediately,” he began.

  Her gaze held his, serious and steady. “Because they think they can bring Livia Colton to justice? It’s as if they believe hacking our personal records will prove the company is hiding her.”

  He’d expected the outburst, though she’d delivered it with admirable control. “It’s a better reason than hackers usually offer,” he said. “Public opinion will swing their way on this one.”

  Temper flashed in her eyes. “They’ve exploited innocent, hardworking employees. I’d think public opinion would go against them.”

  Across the table, Finn, one of Emiliano’s best friends in the FBI, gave a snort. “Not with Livia Colton alive and on the loose. Do you have any idea—”

  He held up a hand and cut him off again, wondering why Finn was so determined to terrorize Miss Mey
ers. They could cover the basic information without running the risk of sending her into a paralyzing tailspin. Her expertise might prove valuable on this case, assuming she wasn’t in league with the Cohort somehow.

  Her gaze shifted to Finn. “You believe the Cohort has turned the city against me, personally?”

  Finn nodded, looking less than sheepish. Emiliano barely swallowed his aggravation. “Miss Meyers...” He waited until her gaze swung back to him. “Our team can unravel the digital details. We have methods to root out those responsible for the breach here. For your safety, it’s best if you take a leave of absence. We’ll assign a protective detail to keep an eye on you.”

  Her dark eyebrows arched high. She turned to the Colton executives gathered at the other end of the long table. “You’re okay with this?”

  “For the duration of the investigation, yes,” Fowler Colton said. Beside him, Zane nodded emphatically. “This isn’t a typical hack, Marie. Ignoring these threats could be a grave mistake.”

  “Shouldn’t the FBI be keeping the Colton family safe?”

  “We’re taking precautions,” Zane replied. “As you can see, the most immediate threats are aimed directly at you.”

  A fact that made this case more intriguing than any of the others he’d recently handled.

  “You won’t consider another option?” she implored. “I know I can help.”

  Almost in unison the men shook their heads. “We agree it’s best to suspend your normal operations until the investigation is complete,” T.C. said. “Don’t want to give the hacktivists more ammunition.”

  “It’s December, Marie.” Fowler gave her a wan smile. “Get into the Christmas spirit. You haven’t taken a real vacation this year. Take the rest of the month. We look forward to seeing you in January.” He glanced around the room. “Surely she can resume her work by then.”

  Emiliano noticed no one on the task force made that kind of promise. Watching Marie, he caught the flash of panic in her eyes and the quiver in her lip before she dropped her gaze to the table. When she looked up, only a steely calm remained, her lips set in a tense smile.