Hacking Mr. CEO (Billionaire Heists #3) by Anna Hackett

Remi raised a brow.

“Disgruntled employee,” Mav said. “He was fired recently.”

“He has a mental illness, and he’s not taking his meds,” Ruben said.

“Tisdale believes my phones are secretly embedding microchips in people’s fingers. So I can control the world,” Mav said, deadpan.

Remi bit her lip. “You do look like an evil mastermind.”

He wanted to kiss her and swat her butt, but he managed to restrain himself.

“You gave him enough chances, Mav,” Ruben said. “The lawyers are going to press charges this time.”

Mav sighed. “Fine.”

They reached a large door that was marked Comp Lab 15.

“If you need anything, let me know. I’ll be in my office.”

“Thanks, Ruben.”

The man nodded his head at Remi. “Nice to meet you, Remi.”

“You, too.”

Mav pressed a hand to a scanner beside the door and it beeped. The door slid open, and he led her inside.

She gasped. “Oh. My. God.”

It was his own little space. He led her past the line of servers to the heart of the lab.

“This is my private lab.” He felt a funny sensation. He spent a lot of time here, when he could escape the city and the meetings.

She turned in a circle—taking in the computer screens, the large digital board, the workbenches covered in tools and half-built prototypes.

She met his gaze. “This is awesome.”

He smiled, chest filled with…something.

“Can I see your system now?” She fluttered her lashes.

“You have to buy me dinner first,” he said.

“How about a bite of cookie?” She held up what was left of her cookie.

Mav bit it, purposely letting his tongue touch her fingers.

She bit her lip, watching his mouth.

As he chewed on his mouthful of cookie, he waved at the chair in front of the main screens. “All yours, angel.”

She moved fast, and scrambled into the chair. He figured he should be insulted that she was so desperate to test out his computer, almost forgetting about him in the process.

Except, he realized that she was looking at it much the same way she’d looked at his mouth. His gut clenched.

“Nice.” She tapped, zooming through his system. Her eyebrows winged up. “When you said more computer power, I didn’t expect this!”

Mav sat beside her. “I wanted the best, most powerful system in the world.”

“Of course, you did.” She cracked her knuckles. “Now, let’s get to work.”

Mav tapped the keyboard, and pulled up his tracker and all the info.

“One of these dots is The Shadow.” She tapped her nails on the desk. “We need to use a few parameters to track him down.”

“We can’t assume that he’s in New York.”

She swiveled. “You don’t think so?”

“He could be in a foreign nation, or an international terrorist organization.”

She shuddered. “I really hope not. Okay, let’s see if I can narrow down some dates and times. Maybe link it to that bogus Gmail email account.”

Her fingers flew.

Soon, she was absorbed. He really liked watching her work.

The computer pinged. It was an internal Rivera Tech chat window and he opened it. Rollo’s face and disheveled hair appeared.

“Mav-man. Didn’t know you were coming out here today.”

“Hey, Rollo.” He waved at Remi to stay out of sight. “I’m working on a special project.”

The man’s eyebrows winged up. “Need help?”

“No, thanks.”

Rollo tossed him a salute. “Just give a shout if you do.” The man stuck his hand in a bag of chips. “I’m just down the hall.”

The screen went black.

“How’s it going?” Mav asked her.

Her brow creased. “It’s taking longer than I’d hoped.”

He leaned closer. “I have another algorithm I’ve been working on. It might speed things up.”

“Show me.”

They worked together. He liked how her brain tackled problems. Mav was more linear and direct in his thinking, but Remi’s brain seemed to toss out a bunch of different ideas all at once.

“Okay. Search parameters are in.” He hit a key.

“Wow, that algorithm rocks.” She smiled at him and pressed a quick kiss to his cheek.

It was just a casual, fleeting kiss, but he felt it to his toes.

“I think you might be a genius, Rivera.”

“Time magazine said I was.”

She grinned. “Show off.”

She flicked the search up on the screen and he saw the progress bar at 3%. It ticked to 4%.

“It’s still going to take a while.” Her fingernails tapped on the desk.

“But it will be far less than before. You just need a little patience.”

“That’s one virtue I can’t claim.” She eyed him, something changing in her gaze. “Do you have any cameras in here?”

He frowned. “No, just outside the door in the hall.”

“Good.” She rose, and closed the gap between them.

“Why?” he asked slowly.

She dropped to her knees. “Because I thought of something pleasurable we could do to pass the time.”