Hacker

Chapter 20 - The Last

"What... are you doing?" Ed asked slowly, standing at his office room door.

I looked up to him from the computer. "Oh, I'm playing a game."

He eyed me suspiciously. "On my computer?" There's a hint of coldness in his voice.

If I wasn't ready for this, I'd be shaking. I stood up from his seat and stepped away from it. "I'm sorry," I apologized, looking down like a child who's just been scolded.

He walked to his table to take a look at his computer. The solitaire game window was still opened, filling the whole screen. He closed it and checked if there's anything else that's opened. There was none.

Ed let out a sigh and faced me. "You know, for someone who takes privacy very seriously, you should know better to respect someone else's."

My guilty expression turned into a frown. "I got bored, alright? You went out too long and my phone's battery is at 0. And what even was more important than a guest who came here just to check up on you?" I shot him back.

He silenced.

The truth was, it was me who asked Ana the other day to help me by making Ed busy when I came to the office next time. She was terrified by her boss, of course. But knowing half of the story, she put her belief in me to put an end of this. Of Ed. Her hope just added a burden to my shoulder. But remembering Zack, I just smiled at the deal we made.

"It's not that." He finally said after minutes, "You are my priority, Lyn. I just worried if..." He left the sentence hanging.

If I found out about your secret information in there?

I sighed. "Forget it." I said. "Maybe some people will never change. Maybe you need someone who can understand you better now. Maybe it's not me. I don't know." I shook my head.

Ed stepped nearer and stood in front of me. "It's you." He reassured. "It's always been you."

Our eyes met and there's nothing but sincerity in his.

"Couples fight and make mistakes all the time, but that doesn't mean they're not right for each other." He said.

I just quiet at the change of table. The 'play victim' card didn't disappoint me, after all.

"I forgive you this time, but please don't do that again. Especially inside of this company. I don't want you to know what you're not supposed to and get hurt." He said in a low tone.

My brows furrowed at the statement. "What do you mean?"

He just gave a wry smile. "What you don't know can't hurt you, Lyn. And I'd like it to stay that way." His eyes not leaving mine as he replied it vaguely.

Honest to be said, I didn't think I knew who was this guy standing in front of me. There were so many things I missed, so many that I didn't know and yet, my stupid heart still cared about him.

"Okay." I muttered.

**

"I don't know that guy, but those don't seem good," Hayley said as she watched the files I opened.

"I know, right." I murmured.

Surely she caught up some names, as I scrolled, which everyone knew weren't clean and any trustworthy person wouldn't have a deal with. I heard Hayley shifted uncomfortably on her seat on the bed.

"Don't worry, this isn't that confidential. You won't get caught by seeing these." I reassured. Unless if you stole it, like I did, then that's a different case, I continued internally.

She let out a breath of relief. "Okay."

The question of where did I get these - and whose, most importantly - was still kept in silence by her. We'd been roommates for two years. I could guess her curiosity just as much as she understood me didn't like being asked something I didn't wanna tell. So she was just quiet, watching me from afar.

The content of the information I took were opened one by one. Detailed. I needed to know everything. From the company's assets to its illegal deals and workers' personal secrets. Yes, Ed actually had their secrets. And he got circles wide enough to destroy their lives. That's how he held them in grip, so that they're scared. That's why they worked like robots. Their salaries didn't even paid properly, yet they could do nothing about it as their boss covered his track very carefully. I winced at the thought of having such a manipulative employer.

Another interesting thing that I found was an email from a familiar name. It wasn't replied; I assumed they contacted more privately afterwards. The message contained a vague warning and I knew it wasn't from Zack. He would've told me if this was another gimmick he wanted to pull but he never mentioned this and logically, it's too risky. Having a guess in mind, I tracked the email down to make sure if I was correct.

And I was.
It's from your dramatic girl, Stella.

I shook my head at the screen. Love is blind was a joke, but I didn't know it's real plus a package with stupidity.

Instead of wasting much time after the discovery, I focused on other things that I could fix. By midnight, I had figured where the third asset - represented by the third red dot on the map, was located. It was an old building, in a quiet place. Ed ran a small techno shop there, but the 2nd floor was the store. And I wasn't sure if it had a basement. His other assets were at other states. I just relieved that he didn't bring Zack that far, it'd take some time to go there. I just didn't wanna waste any moment to make sure that Zack was saved right now.

**

"Surprise surprise!" I opened the door of his office and went straight right in without closing it. Thanks to Ana, I knew the time when Ed usually locked his door and when he didn't.

He was, obviously, genuinely surprised by my unexpected visit. I mean, I could tell him I'd like to come like I did before but for today, I needed the surprise element to make things work.

"Lyn?" He stood up from his seat and walked to me. "Why didn't you tell me you wanna come?"

I stopped at the center of the room, near the sofa and glass desk. "Don't you remember what today is?" I asked faked hopefully.

He glanced at the slightly opened door, feeling disturbed - which was the point. "No, not really." He replied before started to step towards it.

Check. I smirked.

Followed one step after him, I aimed the taser gun on his back and knocked him to faint. Ed fell to the floor. Mate. I quickly checked if he actually passed out, then locked the door once I was sure. 

I left the lying body, went to his computer and inserted the pen drive which I had classified the company's illegal deals and other dirty works to be emailed to the police. Uploading them in the anonymous email Zack gave me via the codes, I added a request to specifically check the third asset thoroughly for the accuse of kidnapping, before clicking send.

Now, for the last step...

The red pen drive was ready in my hand.

"Something that's hacked can be recovered." I remembered that one sentence of Zack's.

Whether I wanted it or not, this needed to be done. "I'm sorry." I whispered as I sat and connected the drive to the computer.

A loading bar appeared.

1%...2%... My heartbeat became faster as the seconds passed. 3%...4%... I didn't move my eyes from bar. 5%...

"Get off that computer." I heard a click sound after Ed's cold voice filled the quiet room.

My head slowly looked up from the screen to see he's already standing, with a gun in hand.