Lie in the Moment Read online

  He’d had Hoover find out everything he could about Maura O’Halloran. What she liked to do, if she was dating anyone, what food she liked, where she went on weekends, what her niece liked to do. Roland had used the information to hack the password to her email, but she rarely used it. She also didn’t have any social media, no Facebook, no Twitter. It was like her life had frozen when Robert O’Halloran and his wife had been killed and she hadn’t picked it back up.

  Roland took the turn that would take him east to Watertown, his foot pressing a little harder on the gas. “Really? Why? She’s homicide.”

  “Seems the kid witnessed a murder while he was making mincemeat of your software.”

  “A murder,” Roland mused thoughtfully. “They say where?”

  The voice on the other end of the line grew gruff. “I didn’t ask, but you’re going to have a hard time getting to talk to the kid if O’Halloran is involved.”

  “I’ll get to talk to him,” Roland said with certainty. He had no doubt about that. “Thanks, Hoover. I’ll give you a call later.”

  With a grunt, the man hung up the phone.

  Roland drove with careful precision to the police station downtown. He’d been there many times growing up and knew the way without engaging the navigation system. He did, however, make several other calls along the way, including a call to the captain at the downtown district to make sure that he’d be able to talk to the kid.

  Last year, after Keenan had managed to hack into Accendo’s systems and steal part of the new antiterrorist security software he’d developed, a program called MOMENT, Roland had pushed for even tighter security for both Accendo’s systems and their clients. MOMENT used algorithms to analyze nonverbal body language, reading the expressions worn by people and identifying those who were about to commit some kind of mass murder, like a bombing. Combined with additional background information, the algorithms they’d created had already correctly identified two men who’d been about to detonate several pounds of C-4 in a restaurant in South Boston.

  Roland had decided that rather than trying to stop any potential hackers who might be attempting to access the program, he’d set traps instead. If they were working for Keenan, then he was one step closer to finding his cousin. If they weren’t, then sometimes he recruited them to work for his company as developers. This particular hacker—@Redbreast—had been contacted by several organizations Keenan had worked for in the past, mostly terrorists, mobsters, and corrupt governments, but had never taken on any assignments for them.

  Accendo’s clients hadn’t called the police because they’d actually been hacked or lost data, they’d called them because Roland had asked them to. He’d wanted to make sure he had leverage against anyone he managed to trap with the new system, just one more reason he’d decided to fund the cyber unit. But he hadn’t expected Maura O’Halloran to be involved. That was the problem with traps; sometimes you caught prey you weren’t expecting.

  SOMEONE NEEDS TO get this kid a sandwich, Maura thought with a scowl. Justin Robbins sat hunched in front of them, his collarbones clearly defined under his too-big shirt. His dark black hair was greasy and hung limply in front of his face, and there were scabs on the knuckles of both hands. The kid still managed to be handsome, though, in a teenage hooligan kind of way.

  “Come on, kid.” Bert sighed. “Just tell us what you saw on the camera. We have your laptop; we’ll find the photographs you’re talking about anyway.”

  With a firm shake of his head, Justin managed a small smirk that would have been convincing if his eyes weren’t wide and a little terrified. He seemed to hunch even farther in on himself, crossing his matchstick arms over his chest.

  “Good luck with that. I’m not talking until I’ve gotten a deal. I’m not going to jail if I help you people.”

  Clucking his tongue in fatherly disapproval, Bert shifted his bulk back in his chair. “I already told you—they’ve got you hacking into two government buildings, a bank, and now a chemical manufacturing building. Best we can do, my partner and I—”

  “Is make me a deal,” Justin finished, lifting his chin defiantly.

  Maura couldn’t help but like the kid, just a little. He wasn’t a whiner, and he was trying hard to be tough. Fourteen years old and they still hadn’t been able to track down his parents. She wanted to make him a deal, if only to give him a chance rather than have him thrown in jail, where he would be brutalized by bigger kids. Odds were he’d come out ten times worse than when he’d gone in.

  “Listen, Justin.” Maura leaned forward and made her tone soft and unthreatening. “Why don’t we get you something to eat and we can just talk. A cheeseburger? Maybe a Coke?”

  Longing crossed his face—strongly enough that Maura nearly winced in sympathy—but then he was scowling again, distrust written in every line of his face. “I watch cop shows on TV. I know that cop trick. Get me to drink a lot and then refuse to let me go to the bathroom until I talk. Well, I’m not hungry.”

  Maura looked at her partner. “You heard of that trick?”

  Bert shrugged. “Nope. Wouldn’t do it, either. I have kids. I’ve seen enough accidents to last me a lifetime.”

  Maura turned back to Justin. “The ACLU would have our ass if we refused to give you access to a bathroom, kid. If you’re hungry, I’ll get you some food.”

  “If I talk, right?” He shook his head.

  Maura smacked her hand down on the table. “I’m bringing you some food and you’ll eat. After that, we’ll talk. You don’t want to tell us anything, fine, but we won’t be able to help you out here if you don’t give us something.”

  He stared at her silently, not believing one damn word out of her mouth.

  With a huff of irritation, Maura stood, the leather of her holster creaking. “I’ll be right back. Bert, you want anything?”

  “Sure, I’ll have a cheeseburger. And fries,” he added with a guilty look at his cell phone.

  “Great,” Maura muttered and opened the door to the interrogation room, ready to hunt down someone to run out for cheeseburgers and fries. Two steps from the door and she ran into the one person guaranteed to put her in a worse mood than she was already—Roland fucking Chandler. He was standing next to one of the detectives who had caught the kid hacking into the system at the DAVIENS chemical plant, dressed in a camel-colored wool coat and jeans that looked rich enough to take her out to dinner. His dark hair seemed slightly mussed for once and a faint stubble shadowed his jaw. He was beautiful. Tragically, throw-yourself-in-front-of-a-train beautiful.

  The detective next to him, a skinny, sandy-haired detective with a face that looked like he’d been pulled nose-first through a funnel, was talking in a high, excited voice, hero worship evident in every line of his body. She remembered he had one of those last names that was a first name, Richard or James or something.

  “He managed to get as far as the controls that run the security cameras when we were able to pinpoint his location. We had uniforms there in less than ten minutes.”

  Roland didn’t take his eyes off Maura. His were blue, bright deadly blue.

  The skinny detective finally realized that Roland wasn’t paying attention to him and he turned to Maura. “Well, have you gotten him to talk yet?”

  Maura didn’t care for the impatient tone or the dismissive attitude. “He wants a deal on paper. No jail in exchange for telling us what he knows about the murder.”

  Detective—Maybe Curtis? No, it’s Charles. Detective Charles—grimaced at her sourly. “No deal. That kid can’t be left free to hack anyone he wants.”

  Maura tilted her head at Roland. “Kids making you look bad to your customers, so you’re going to have his ass thrown in jail?” She didn’t know why she was surprised. Or disappointed. He could fuck, that was for sure, but that didn’t mean he was a good person.

  He raised an eyebrow. “Why do you assume it’s me?” Cool as a cucumber salad.

  Because he made her uncomfortable. It was easier to fi
nd fault with him than admit, even in her own head, that she found him very, very attractive. And she was annoyed by his obvious wealth. No one should have billions of dollars, not while kids like Justin nearly wept at the idea of a cheeseburger. And because she was worried about finding the letters. They had to be in the file. They just had to.

  With an irritated grimace, she turned away. “I’m getting the kid some food. We’ll talk to him some more once he’s eaten.”

  Twenty minutes later, she returned—cheeseburgers in hand—only to be stopped by yet another detective. Roland Chandler was sitting with Justin in the interrogation room, while Bert and Detective Charles watched through the two-way mirror in the room next door.

  “What the hell, Bert?” she snapped as she came in the observation room, slinging the bags of food onto a small table.

  “Sorry, Maur, they—”

  “He’s not a cop; we can’t just let him interrogate a minor.”

  “He’s not interrogating him.” Pointy-faced Charles sounded a little put out, waving one bony arm toward the two in the small room through the window.

  Maura looked through the glass. Roland Chandler was sitting across from Justin; all Maura could see was the back of his well-shaped head. His hair looked shiny and thick, like he had it styled by the same people who shot shampoo commercials.

  In sharp contrast, Justin’s hair looked even lanker; his face was red, cheeks tracked with tears.

  “What the fuck?” She turned around, determined to get the kid away from Roland and the other detectives if she could.

  Bert grabbed her arm. “It’s not like—”

  She shook him off, irritated that he’d allowed this to happen.

  “Maura!”

  She ignored him and stomped out of the room and turned immediately into the interrogation room, shoving the door open hard enough to hit the doorstop on the back wall. Both man and boy looked over at her; Justin instinctively shrinking back. Roland shifted in his seat so that he was blocking the kid, and Maura stopped abruptly, surprised at both the boy’s fear and Roland’s protective gesture.

  She glanced uncertainly past Roland to Justin, meeting the kid’s eyes. “You okay?”

  Justin nodded truculently. “Yeah. Why wouldn’t I be?”

  Maura didn’t want to make an issue of the tear streaks, but she did want to find out what Roland Chandler had done to the kid.

  “What’s going on here?” She pinned Roland with a narrow-eyed glare.

  Roland Chandler smiled faintly. “Do I smell cheeseburgers?”

  At Roland’s mention of the food, Justin’s head lifted and he inhaled deeply. The smell of cheeseburgers and fries seemed to be leeching from the walls. Maura watched him lick his lips and sighed. “Hang on”—she waved a hand—“I’ll get it, but then you’re going to explain what’s going on.”

  Roland just watched her as if she were a small, mildly amusing circus animal.

  When she opened the door to the observation room, the two detectives had already opened the bags of food and were pulling out fries. Maura snatched the bags away with a disgusted noise.

  “Hey, didn’t you get—” Bert began.

  Maura closed the door on her partner’s question and went back into interrogation. Justin was speaking to Roland as she walked in.

  “Thanks, Roland. I promise I won’t let you down.”

  Maura continued in as if she hadn’t heard the words, setting the bags of food down between the man and the boy.

  “Here you go,” Maura said, and pulled a can of Coke out of her pocket. She set it down on the table in front of the boy. “Not the healthiest lunch in the world, but it’ll have to do.”

  The kid eyed her warily, so she took a step back and waved a hand to indicate the bags. “Go for it before it gets cold.”

  With a shrug, the boy began digging into the food, removing cartons dripping with fries and grease-stained, paper-wrapped burgers five inches thick.

  Maura looked at Roland, who was watching her in return. He nodded to Justin, who was already chowing down on his first burger. “As soon as he finishes eating, he’ll tell you everything you want to know about the murder he witnessed.”

  The boy paused in his chewing to nod at her.

  “Really?” she asked, pulling out a chair at the end of the table and sitting down in between them. “Why is that?”

  Roland shrugged. “I explained to the detectives”—he paused—“and the DA that I need talent like Justin’s. He’s going to work for me and perform community service in exchange for probation.”

  Maura stared at him, waiting for further explanation.

  He was silent for a moment, watching her with those enigmatic blue eyes. “He’s just a kid,” he said finally.

  Maura knew that. A hungry kid. She was just surprised that Roland had noticed or cared. Likely he didn’t; probably some angle that he was working. She just couldn’t see what it might be. Still, she was glad Justin was getting a break, and that he’d agreed to tell them what he’d seen in regards to the murder.

  “All right.” She looked at Justin. “You good with this?”

  The boy nodded again and kept eating.

  Maura shook her head. “I don’t know how you got those detectives to agree to probation. I’ve never seen anyone so proud of busting a kid,” she said snidely, looking at the two-way mirror.

  Roland didn’t even glance back at the detectives. “They understood once I explained the situation.”

  Maura turned to look at him again, studying his calm face and trying to determine exactly what went on beneath those cool blue eyes. He’d called the DA. No doubt he had that asshole on speed dial.

  “I’m not as bad as you think,” he said softly, almost too softly for anyone, including the boy next to them, to hear. His eyelids slid to half-mast, and she noticed again that he had ridiculously long, spiky lashes.

  Oh, yes you are, Maura thought with a sigh, looking at the fan of those lashes across the flat blades of his cheeks. Manipulative. Brilliant. Dangerous. Sexy as hell. Good thing he was a billionaire. Otherwise she might fall for him.

  ROLAND SUPPOSED HE should have left the station. He’d done what he came to do—talk to Justin and get the kid’s agreement to work for Accendo.

  Instead he stepped inside the dim observation room with the cyber detectives and breathed in the smell of cheeseburgers and Maura’s perfume. Just a hint of it had given him a hard-on that he’d had to hide with his coat.

  “So, you hacked the security system at the chemical plant. What happened after that?” Maura asked Justin patiently. Very patiently. This calm, concerned person was far different from the woman who pushed her way into Blake’s hospital room eleven years ago, her freckles standing out fiercely in a pale face. At the time, Roland was too worried about what Keenan had done to Blake to let some crazed cop question her while she lay in a hospital bed. He hadn’t known at the time that Keenan had killed the crazed cop’s brother.

  Her partner, Detective Bert Boatman, sat next to her, his hands folded over his ample stomach. Roland knew Boatman from Accendo’s charity work with Boston Children’s Hospital. One of his sons, Michael, had a genetic condition that required constant care and multiple surgeries.

  “I was just checking it out when I saw someone else had already hacked the system.” Justin shrugged.

  “How did know there was another hacker?”

  Justin sniffed. “Just noticed something weird in the code. Only he hadn’t hacked directly in like I did, he’d infiltrated the code of the security itself, like a ghost—there, but not there. Genius code, man. Never seen anything like it before.”

  The muscles in the back of Roland’s neck tightened, and he took a step closer to the glass. Detective Charles and his partner did the same, their body language telegraphing apprehension. Roland knew he must look tense as well. Another hacker. Genius code . . .

  “What does that have to do with the murder?”

  The kid shrugged his skinny shoulder
s. “I’m trying to tell you, lady. The hacker was directing the cameras to go out of focus. I wanted to know why, so I refocused them. I saw this blond chick shooting some tattooed guy, and then she and two others started taking stuff, some kind of metal cylinders.”

  “Why didn’t you call the police?”

  He gave her a “Do I look stupid?” sneer. “So I could get arrested?”

  Maura looked pointedly around the room. “Like you are now?”

  He sank a little deeper in his chair. “I don’t know if the other hacker knew I was there. I thought maybe he’d come after me, all right? I just tried to forget I saw anything.”

  “Well, that didn’t work out too well, did it? What can you tell me about the metal cylinders?”

  Justin frowned. “Yellow, maybe.”

  Roland could see surprise and tension in the set of Maura’s shoulders. “You’re sure?”

  “No, not really, but I think so.”

  Maura turned to her partner with a significant look. Boatman nodded and stood up.

  “I’ll be back in a moment,” he said to the kid.

  Maura turned her attention back to Justin. “And you have a copy of that?”

  “Yeah.”

  The door to the observation room opened and Roland turned to look as Boatman came into the room.

  “What the hell?” Boatman asked Detective Charles.

  Charles held up his hands defensively. “Hey, they didn’t mention anything about missing chemicals, just that their system had been hacked and one of their scientists was missing.”

  They neglected to mention it to me as well, Roland thought darkly.

  Boatman looked irritated. “You better get over there and figure out exactly what and how much is missing. And why they hid it.” Boatman slammed the door as he left the room, reappearing moments later back in interrogation with Maura and the kid.

  Roland could guess. Whatever had been stolen was dangerous, extremely dangerous, and they were hoping they’d either be able to locate the missing materials, or hoping they couldn’t be traced back to them. He could and would get into their system and find out, but not until he’d learned more about this hacker. He was going to have to talk to Justin in more detail, preferably today, but it didn’t seem likely that Maura or the other detectives would finish grilling Justin anytime soon. They already had the kid’s laptop, which was unfortunate, but Roland was betting there was a backup somewhere.