Total pages in book: 97
Estimated words: 91002 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 455(@200wpm)___ 364(@250wpm)___ 303(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 91002 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 455(@200wpm)___ 364(@250wpm)___ 303(@300wpm)
My annoyance with their attitudes was on a high simmer.
Still, they weren’t outright telling him “no.” They were giving him a chance to prove himself. I’d held my frustration in check solely for that reason, though I wasn’t far from calling them idiots to their faces. When the shoe fit…
When I entered the bar, Niamh was nowhere to be found, but Fred sat at the end corner, still in her yellow suit. Her laptop was open in front of her, and a tablet sat beside it with the stylus resting on top. She didn’t glance up as I sat kitty-corner to her.
The bartender stopped in front of me. “Hi there. Do you need to see a menu?”
“No. Can I have a Cosmo, please? Thanks.” I ran my hand down my face, probably smearing what was left of my makeup.
“Oh, hey!” Fred glanced up at the sound of my voice and beamed. “How was the meeting? Tired, huh? You look tired.”
“Very, yes. Where’s Niamh?”
“Her room. I weaseled my way through a hard-to-crack firewall and got a bunch of info about that Momar dude. His current operations, more specifically. She said she couldn’t think with the chippy bartender always smiling at her, so she went back to hide out for a while. She does that, I’ve noticed.”
She had these last couple months, it was true. Niamh had been on her porch a lot more lately, pondering, working things out. Then she might disappear for a couple days, wanting to take care of something in person. Mr. Tom said it was how pucas worked when they were dialed in and that I should leave her to it. He was pleased that she was finally being useful rather than wasting bread for dry sandwiches and drinking the town dry.
Given I had so much to do myself, and I had to trust my team to do their part, I left her to it. She’d been on this earth a lot longer than I had, and her whole existence up until O’Briens had been dedicated to an elaborate game of chess. Or so I’d been told. She had experience that would hopefully benefit us all.
I nodded and thanked the bartender when he brought me my drink.
“Do you need anything?” I asked Fred.
She looked around at her setup. “Oh. Um…yes. I didn’t realize my drink was gone. Just a coffee, please. Three sugars. Thanks.” With that, she bent back to her computer, and her fingers danced across the keyboard.
I nodded to the bartender and pulled up a game on my phone.
“Did you know about these things?” Fred indicated the electronic notepad before writing something. “I didn’t. They’re the best freaking thing on this earth, I’m tellin’ ya. I mean, I knew they existed—I don’t live under a rock—but I’ve never tried one until now. I’ve been missing out.”
She finished her note and went back to her computer. Her silence resumed. The soft murmur of conversation ebbed and flowed around us, interrupted by the click of keys. After a while, her typing stopped, and she leaned forward, closer to the screen. She made another note, then shook her head and started to shake, slowly bubbling into laughter.
“I have a crush, bro!” She leaned back again, hands back at the keyboard. “If the Captain had more coding knowledge, she’d be unstoppable. Her tactics are so fresh. Her evasive maneuvers are ingenious.”
“The Captain…” My heart skipped. “You mean Nessa?”
“Yeah. Get this: she has this shack in the middle of nowhere. I thought she’d mostly gone off the grid, using that shack of equipment at odd times. But no! It was a decoy. She installed a program to seem like it’s active, but it really just messes around on the dark web a bit and doesn’t cover much ground. No, she’s out using random IP addresses and different accounts and aliases.” Fred held up her hand. “But she’s checked into her other accounts here and there. She didn’t hide her breadcrumbs well enough. I’m on her trail.”
“You know where she is?”
“I’m nearly positive, yeah, and I’m double-checking now. Once I’m sure, we can figure out what they’re up to.” Her smile broadened. “This is so fun. I feel like I’m rupturing something, it’s so fun! It’s like this enormous, complex puzzle, and we only get hints at a time. This Momar person seems like a spider. We’re just in the outer web now, but he skitters here and there, then hides out of sight. He’ll be a tricky one.”
She continued muttering to herself as she worked her keyboard, her focus zeroing in again on her screen. I let her be as her coffee arrived and paid the tab.
“Just…save your receipts, okay?” I told her, only finishing half my drink before pushing it away. There was no point in my being here if Niamh wasn’t. Besides, I’d gotten enough information from Fred for the time being. They were still working on things, and we didn’t have anything concrete yet. “We’ll reimburse your expenses.”