Saving Isabella

Chapter 26: My pride and joy: Samuel

(story continues after Chapter 21, aka Tuesday morning)

POV NICK ROSSI:

I stretch my legs under the desk. The leather chair creaks softly as I lean back. I use my hands to push myself, making me and my chair spin around. I get up and walk to my mini fridge to retrieve a Coke. I NEED CAFFEINE! I walk back to my monitors, plopping down on the chair. My hands scrabble on the desk, trying to find my glasses.

"Fuck!" I exclaim as a two-day-old cup of coffee spills over my desk. I quickly pull away the papers I am working on and flap them wildly, while also pushing my keyboards out of the way. I throw the papers on my other desk as I dig through the mess this room is to find towels. At the lack of any other solution, I use a discarded T-shirt. In my defense, it is probably already dirty.

This room is dimly lit; my monitors glow with a faint bluish hue. On my left monitor, my game is paused—a multiplayer match I dominate from the start. On the right, lines of encrypted code scroll like a digital waterfall, my custom algorithm running a scan for anomalies in recent transactions. And in the middle, spreadsheets fill with rows of neat, organized numbers.

Most of the family doesn't get it—why I love my work so much. To them, spreadsheets and coding seem boring, tedious, like the opposite of the adrenaline-filled lifestyle we are all born into. But to me, it gives the same thrill. Numbers don't lie. Code doesn't betray you. Patterns always reveal themselves if you know how to look, and I spend most of my life teaching myself how to find them.

I love this room. It's my safe space. It's a gift from Arthur and Alex for my sixteenth birthday. I also put a couch in here to sleep on since sometimes I don't leave my room for days. It's not like I don't have a bedroom—I do, but I can't be bothered to move. No one is allowed in. I mean no one, not even the maids or my brothers. Only Samuel, but Samuel lives here. I look at him lounging on the couch while I slave away at my work. I wonder what Arthur says if he finds out I have a cat. He doesn't like cats much, but then again, he doesn't like any kind of pet. Honestly, I'm still surprised nobody finds out, with all the stuff I have to order for him, an infinite amount of lint rollers included.

The game on my left monitor pings, reminding me I am still logged in. My teammates are probably pissed I go AFK, but I'm not too worried. They don't stand a chance without me anyway.

Before I return to the match, a notification pops up on my center screen—encrypted, of course. I lean forward, narrowing my eyes as I decrypt the message. It's from Ryan.

Need you to trace a payment. Possible double-cross.

I sigh, cracking my knuckles as I minimize the game entirely. Guess fun is over for the night. I glance at the time in the corner of the screen, then set my fingers to work, pulling up the necessary programs to dig into the payment history.

"You're lucky I'm good at this," I mutter, opening a private server and setting up the tools I need. Hacking is second nature by now—it isn't just a skill, it's like breathing. There's a strange satisfaction in breaking through layers of encryption.

As I work, my mind wanders, like it always does when I'm in the zone. The repetition of typing, scanning, and decoding gives me space to think.

"Alright, let's see what we've got here." The payment history comes up on my screen, rows of data flashing by. My fingers move automatically, pulling up IP addresses, transaction IDs, routing numbers. I read the smallest details like an open book. It takes me years to develop the skills to do this.

"Gotcha," I mutter, a smirk tugging at my lips as I catch the anomaly. A ghost payment—a fake transaction buried under layers of real ones. Whoever does this thinks they are clever. They don't count on me.