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“Thirty-eight.”
I shrugged. “You could?—”
A loud, vibrating sound came from the hollow log where we’d left our clothes, and Nero hustled over to retrieve his phone. McMahon had confiscated mine just in case someone was using it to track me. The buzzing stopped, then started up again, and my heart hammered in my chest. It was late, too late for a polite social call, which didn’t bode well that whoever was on the other end of the line was calling with good news.
He finally got the phone out of his pocket and tapped the screen to answer it. “Julius? What’s up?” Nero looked concerned. “Wait, hold on. I’m going to put you on speaker. He pulled the phone away from his ear, tapped the screen again, and held it out in his palm. “Okay. Go ahead.”
“Felix, you need to get back here. I think I found something.”
CHAPTER
THIRTEEN
NERO
The ride homewas almost silent, our little bubble of happy solitude well and truly burst.
Julius refused to give us any details over the phone, and more than anything, I thought that was what was bothering Felix. He nibbled on the side of his thumbnail, lost in thought, while I drove.
When I pulled up in front of the house, I expected him to jump out and go running to find my brother, but he didn’t move.
“Hey, you okay?” I asked, putting a hand on his thigh. He jumped, then looked around, realizing where we were.
“Sorry. I guess I zoned out there for a minute.”
“It’s okay.” I gave his leg a squeeze. “You ready to go in, or do you need a second?”
He took a deep breath, then nodded. “I’m ready.”
Julius was waiting for us in the kitchen, his black hair that was normally meticulously styled standing up in all directions like he’d been running his hands through it. “I was about two seconds away from coming out there to get you. This is time-sensitive.” He spun on his heel and hustled down the hallway without waiting for us to catch up or giving us any indication of what we were walking into.
Back behind his computer, he pulled up several screens and started typing at breakneck speed. Felix took the seat that had more or less become his, and I stood behind them so I could read over their shoulders. Not that I thought I’d understand much.
“I was following the path you took when you started looking into Amanda Vanderkaamp just like we agreed, and I got locked out at the same point. The second I tried to hack into her financial records from before her arrest, I got bounced out. Which is strange because she used a bank I’ve hacked in the past. Someone is trying to keep something in her past from prying eyes. I’m running a few more things in the background, back doors I’ve been able to exploit before, to see if I can get around whatever is keeping us from getting to that information, but that’s going to take time.”
Felix nodded. “Makes sense, but none of this is new information.”
“You’re right. But this is.” He tapped on his keyboard, and a new screen opened. “I set up alerts for any mention of Amanda Vanderkaamp on the dark web. So has someone else. Right after I got shut out, I got this. Apparently, someone else is looking for her too.”
Felix leaned in to get a better look at the screen, and so did I. There was a message from someone with the username TheUpsideDown. “CaesarsRome. It seems like we have something in common. Do you have the file? Respond tonight. Willing to pay,” Felix read out loud.
“File?” I asked. “What file is he talking about? I thought we were looking for some sort of list.”
Julius shrugged. “I have no idea. Felix?”
My mate was rereading the message over and over, his lips moving without sound. He didn’t acknowledge Julius’s question.
“Felix?” I put a gentle hand on his shoulder, and he spun in his chair.
“Hmm?” He was looking at me, but I could tell his thoughts were spinning.
“Do you know what file this guy’s talking about?” Julius pulled up a few other windows. “I ran some searches for Amanda’s name and any mention of a list to see if I could connect it to a missing file, but I haven’t gotten any hits.”
“I don’t know.” He chewed his bottom lip. “Have you responded yet?”
My brother shook his head. “I was waiting for you.”
“Let’s see if we can get more information on what kind of file they’re looking for.”
