Total pages in book: 67
Estimated words: 62620 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 313(@200wpm)___ 250(@250wpm)___ 209(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 62620 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 313(@200wpm)___ 250(@250wpm)___ 209(@300wpm)
MATTY: Shit. So that wasn’t just part of the role-playing?
CHRISTIAN: NO! AND HOW MUCH OF IT DID YOU WATCH?
MATTY: NOT MUCH, I PROMISE! RELAX!
CHRISTIAN: I CAN’T RELAX! I knew this was a bad idea. I knew someone was going to get hurt. I thought it would be me because I was going to fail at keeping things casual.
Fuck, I wish it were me.
I’d do anything to make this go away for her.
She’s never going to forgive me.
I’M never going to forgive me.
MATTY: Of course, she will. Just remind her how much you love her. With love on your side, you can get through anything, right? Isn’t that what the wise people say?
CHRISTIAN: We don’t say that kind of shit to each other. This was supposed to be casual. Just a month or so of fun until I move out of town and then we’d pretend it never happened.
I don’t have anything to offer her to make this better. I feel so damned helpless. How did this even happen? I was the only one who was supposed to have access to that footage.
MATTY: I’m guessing someone hacked your nanny cam account. We should know more in a few days. My friend in the Cyber Division promised he’d move this to the top of his list.
CHRISTIAN: That’s still weird, and I want to know when and how you met this “friend,” eventually. But right now, I’m more worried about who did this. Do you think one of the guys at the shop found the camera?
MATTY: That’s my guess. Though…not to be a dick, but I’m honestly shocked anyone at your shop had the skills to hack your account. Unless you used the same username and password on the nanny cam account that you use for inventory or something at the shop.
Something those guys would have access to.
But you wouldn’t do that, right? You know how important it is to have different, secure passwords for all the sites you use.
CHRISTIAN: I hate myself.
MATTY: Shit.
CHRISTIAN: Yeah. I’m an idiot. Huge idiot. Biggest idiot ever.
MATTY: No, you’re not. This isn’t your fault. You wouldn’t have had to worry about this if the people you trusted hadn’t betrayed you. You’ve treated those guys so well. From the get-go. You should have had their loyalty.
CHRISTIAN: But I didn’t. I decided to sell the shop and they turned on me. I did one thing they didn’t like, and all the loyalty was out the window. Just like with Ashland.
MATTY: Ashland was a very specific case of a narcissist with borderline personality disorder. Not that I’m claiming to be a psychiatrist, but even a kid with a high school psych class could have diagnosed that woman. And these guys are a very specific case of being gearhead assholes who are jealous that you own the shop and are moving on to better things and they’re still mechanics working for someone else.
CHRISTIAN: But most of them know I built the shop from the ground up. I earned the down payment working construction during the summers in high school and killed myself those first two years before I could afford to hire Gage full time. Sometimes, I’d end up working twelve hours days, twelve days in a row. It’s not like my rich parents handed me the shop or something.
MATTY: They don’t care. People like that, people who want to justify their bad behavior, will always find an excuse. Bottom line, you did nothing to deserve it, and we’ll work together to minimize the impact on you, Starling, and the family.
I mean, assuming you want my help. I don’t want to be like Mom, sticking my nose in where I’m not wanted.
If you want me to back off and stay out of it, I will.
CHRISTIAN: No, I’d appreciate your help. And your friend’s help. I’m clearly not the most tech savvy person. I can use all the cyber expertise I can get. Can I meet you somewhere now? To talk things over in person? I don’t want to wake Starling until I have a plan. She could use the rest and she’s planning to get up early anyway, to go look for Kyle before work.
As long as I’m here to talk through things when she wakes up, we should be fine. She has her ringer on silent at night, and I seriously doubt any of her friends are going to come across our sex tape and try to make contact at this hour.
Which reminds me…
How did you come across it?
How did you find out about all this before I did?
MATTY: The same connections that tipped me off that someone was using your place as an after-hours chop shop gave me a heads-up. He said one of the guys was joking about it and he overheard. Guess they got a decent amount of money from whatever distributor he sold it to originally. Since you and Starling are so…photogenic and all.