In Death 18 - Divided in Death

patted his knee. “It’s Belgian chocolate.”
    “Just because I’m sitting on your lap and eating your candy doesn’t mean you can cop a feel,” she said as she folded into his lap.
    “I’ll just have to live in hope that you’ll change your mind. Which you may when you see what I’ve found for you.”
    “Put up, or shut up.”
    “That’s my line.” He nipped her ear, passed her the candy bar, then inserted a disc. Reaching over, he laid a palm on the console. “Roarke. Open operations.”
    It hummed, more like a powerful animal waking than a machine booting up. Lights flashed on.
    “Upload data.”
    “If you’ve got data on the disc . . .” She swallowed a bite of candy. “. . . Why do you need the unregistered? You’re already on record.”
    “It’s not what I have, but what I intend to do with it. Digging around, I ran into a couple of blocks. Nothing unusual initially. Standard privacy blocks, all very usual and law-abiding. But when I nudged them a bit, I got this. Computer, display last task from disc on screen one.”
    Screen one on. Display up.
    Eve frowned at the snowy-white screen and blurred black letters.
    RESTRICTED DATA
    ACCESS DENIED
    “That’s it? Access denied? You run into a wall and I have to come in here and sit on your lap?”
    “No, you’re sitting on my lap because you wanted my candy.”
    Rather than admit that was true, she took another bite of chocolate. “Why’s the display fuzzy?”
    “Because, fortunately, I engaged filters before digging around. If I hadn’t, I’d have set off an alarm, and my little excavation would have sent up all manner of flags. So, we do it in here. Computer, redo last task.”
    Acknowledged.
    The screen flashed off, then on again, clear.
    Task complete.
    “So?”
    “You have no faith whatsoever. Just for that, sit over there and be quiet.”
    She shrugged, moved off his lap, and onto a chair. She finished off her candy bar, sipped lazily at her wine.
    It wasn’t exactly a hardship to watch him work. She liked the way he rolled his sleeves up to the elbow, tied his hair back—like a man preparing to do some serious physical labor.
    He used both manual and verbal commands, so she could watch his quick fingers fly over keys, hear his voice—more Irish as he concentrated—flow out.
    “Access denied? I’ll show you access denied, bloody wanker.”
    Smiling a little, she closed her eyes, telling herself she was just going to rest them while she walked mentally through the investigation to date.
    The next thing she knew, he was shaking her gently by the shoulder. “Eve.”
    “What!” Her eyes popped open. “I wasn’t sleeping. I was thinking.”
    “Yes, I could hear you thinking.”
    “If that’s some smart-ass way of saying I was snoring, bite me.”
    “I’d be more than happy to bite you later, but I really believe you’ll want to see this.”
    She rubbed her eyes, and focused on his face. “Since you’ve got that big I’m-the-cat’s-ass grin on your face, I guess you got into whatever you wanted to get into.”
    “Have a look.” He gestured toward the screen.
    Reading, Eve got slowly to her feet.
    HOMELAND SECURITY ORGANIZATION
    REDSTAR ACCESS ONLY!
    “Jesus Christ, Roarke, you hacked into the HSO?”
    “I have.” He toasted himself with a brandy. “By God, I have, and it took considerable doing. You were . . . thinking for over an hour.”
    She knew she was goggling, but she couldn’t stop. “You can’t hack into the HSO.”
    “Well, I hate to disagree, but as you can plainly see—”
    “I don’t mean you can’t. I mean you can’t.”
    “Relax, Lieutenant, we’re shielded.” He leaned over and kissed the tip of her nose. “Right and tight.”
    “Roarke—”
    “Ssh, you haven’t seen it yet. Computer, employ passcode. Now, you’ll see the file I dug for is encrypted, for obvious reasons. You’d think a gang like the HSO would employ more complex encryptions. Then again, I don’t suppose they counted on anyone actually getting through to this point. It was a bloody battle.”
    “I think you’ve lost your mind. You may be able to get off on an insanity defense. They’ll still torture you, brainwash you, and lock you in a cage for the rest of your life, but they might not beat you to death if they know you’re insane. This is the HSO. The antiterrorist organization that employs methods every bit as dirty as the terrorists they were initially formed to seek out and destroy.