The Heart of Luthor

Part 3

The phone call came at 10:45pm, when Ruby was just preparing for bed. She would usually climb under her cosy covers and spend a few good hours playing with her programs, creating fun stuff that really had no chance of selling in her business. This was her happy hour, her me-time.

Until the phone rang, that is. "Hello?"

"Do you really want in, Ruby? Because there's no going back if you change your mind."

That voice sent shivers down her spine. Shivers of excitement and the possibility of adventure that had never before happened across her path. Ruby would not miss this opportunity. "Of course," she breathed.

"Be outside your apartment in 5," he hung up. A man of so few words, yet such power in each, it made her heart thump. Then she remembered the brunette. Hopefully she wouldn't be with him; she clenched her fists just thinking about that perfect porcelain doll.

The black limo out front of her place was a surprise, and the rough way a blindfold was immediately tied over her eyes the moment she hopped in was definitely enough to trigger something akin to panic. But she had heard of Lex's underhanded ways, and prayed she would never get on his wrong side.

"I'm sorry for the cloak and dagger measures used to bring you here, but I hope you can appreciate the importance of the secrecy involved," Lex's smooth voice greeted Ruby when the blindfold was finally removed after a long car ride, a stumble up some stairs then down some, the sound of security locks beeping open and closed on the numerous doorways they passed through, ending in Ruby being pushed into a chair.

"I didn't know I was signing up for the CIA," she couldn't help but respond sarcastically.

Lex's laugh made her smile. "You're good. But let's see how good you really are before you're shown the secret handshake. We want access into a mainframe that is storing data from as far back as 1995. The information should complete a piece to a puzzle I've been solving for quite some time now."

She stared at the high-tech computer in front of her. "If the information is classified, then wouldn't it be illegal to try and retrieve it?" she dared to ask.

"Don't tell me it wasn't you who hacked into the dean's computer during your MIT days, rigging the entire assessment system," he leaned over her shoulder, his breath sending goosebumps sprawling across her skin.

Boy, had he done his research. Perhaps playing with the big leagues wasn't a good idea afterall. But she was in it now. Tapping away quickly, she pulled up hundreds of files off the hidden network that had long remained un-accessed. "What am I looking for?" Pictures of high school students, articles from a paper called 'The Torch', and sketches of a ripped teenager with dark hair meant absolutely nothing to Ruby.

"Anything paranormal, strange, out of theordinary....Anything to do with Clark Kent."