Crash - Part Three Page 6

  "And I can tell from the way you are avoiding answering me that I am right."

  "Actually, little Miss Smarty-pants, you are completely wrong. I was a writer. Still am, I guess. I have a book out, although it's under pen name; I still get the odd royalty check."

  I don't know what surprised me more: that Carter was an author, something far more creative than I would have expected, or that he just called me Miss Smarty-pants.

  "You don't hear the name ‘Miss Smarty-pants’ much in America, you know," I said.

  "Well, I think it's rather apt here, don't you? I suppose now you're going to ask me what type of book I wrote and want to read it. That's what everyone used to ask when I told them I had written a book."

  "You know what? I don't want to know. That's not who you are anymore, and given everything that has happened, I want your past to remain in the past. Like it or not, you are now an investment banker. You're my investment banker."

  "Thank God for that," Carter said, visibly relieved. "Frankly, the book is dreadful. I used to keep it a secret, but one of my friends found out and I ended up being the laughingstock of the pub. You were right about one thing, though: I do have an accounting degree. I suppose it’s actually useful now, but at the time, I just did it so that I would have time to write."

  "I knew it," I gloated, taking my victories where I found them.

  "Smarty-pants," Carter mumbled under his breath. "Enough about me and my crappy book. How's the business going? We haven't spoken about it in ages."

  I grimaced, not entirely sure how to answer. On the face of it everything was progressing rather well. LimbAnalytics wasn't ever going to make money quickly, and we always understood there would be a large costs upfront while we perfected the technology, but I couldn't deny that the recent events had shaken my confidence a little bit.

  "Good, I suppose. We're on track and meeting our goals."

  "You don't sound entirely convinced. Getting pressure from your investor?"

  "No, the investor is great. He or she stays behind the scenes and is really supportive of us. The perfect investor, really."

  "He or she? You don't know the investor?"

  "We deal with an intermediary. The investor is another LLC, and we deal with the manager, not the owner."

  "Is that common? It seems a little sneaky, but lots of investors try to hide their identity, I guess, especially through offshore companies. Maybe the investor is just trying to hide from the IRS. As long as you're comfortable with the situation, that's all that matters."

  "It's working so far, that's all I know." Then I looked over Carter's shoulder and saw that the boat was approaching the Golden Gate Bridge. "Come on, let's go enjoy the view."

  We stood at the front of the boat and Carter wrapped his arms around me. I couldn't help but think of the cheesy scene in the Titanic movie, but hopefully my story would have a happier ending.

  Chapter Fifteen

  I was spending more time with Carter than ever, but it felt like an eternity since we had last had sex. Carter's work schedule had become completely erratic over the past few weeks. He had a lot of international clients, and that meant he had to be on conference calls at crazy times. He promised that this was an unusually busy period and it wouldn't last forever. Still, I was getting increasingly frustrated knowing his apartment was full of sexy underwear and even sexier toys. I was still a little nervous about using some of that stuff with him, but it was an excited kind of nervousness.

  John was still spending more time at my apartment than his own, but at the moment, I appreciated the company.

  "Still no news?" I asked, referring to our attempts to catch whoever was hacking into our security.

  "No, nothing. I'm starting to think that no one has hacked into our systems."

  "That's good news, right?"

  "I suppose," John said, sounding not at all convinced. "I would be happier if I knew what the hell was going on. Someone is getting the information somehow. I guess a part of me was hoping it was just a hack, because that's something I might be able to stop. Now I just feel helpless."

  "If it isn't a standard hack, then we have to look into the possibility that we have a more traditional leak."

  "God, I hope it isn't that. Where would we even start?"

  "We can rule out the beta testers," I said. "They didn't have access to that kind of information. Plus, most of them have been with us for months now. All these leaks started in the last few weeks, so it has to be someone who has recently come into the fold."

  "What about that new group at Stanford University?" John asked. "We didn't start using them until we got all the investment money in. Although I guess they don't have the same information, either."

  "No, I don't see how they could have deduced our plans from just what we have been doing with them. They are running relatively basic tests and interpreting data; again, nothing that reveals our plans for the future."

  "I don't like where this is going," John said.

  We had ruled out the majority of the people we worked with, and there were only three left of any significance. If it was one of those three, and at this stage it had to be, then we could be in real trouble.

  "Scott knew about the patent applications," I said. "In fact, he has access to a lot of information regarding our business. He has for a while. Maybe he’s been leaking information to PharmaTech this whole time. It would explain their early offer to buy our business."

  "But he's a lawyer. They have pretty strict confidentiality rules, and you have to assume that if he was screwing us over he would be doing it to others, as well. I can't imagine he would get away with that for long. Plus, to be honest, I trust him. He's a nice guy, and he doesn't ask lots of questions of us. If he was leaking information, he would probably be digging for lots of juicy details."

  "I agree," I said. "And he didn't know anything about the military contract. That leaves two people."

  "I mentioned the military contract to the accountant," John said. "But she didn't know a thing about the patents."

  "So that leaves…"

  "Marissa? Why would she do that? What does she have to gain by hurting the business?"

  "If it is Marissa," I said, "we have to assume she is doing its on behalf of the investor."

  "Okay, so why would the investor do it? I don't want to sound like I'm stating the obvious, but surely the investor wants this company to succeed as much as we do."

  My head sunk into my hands and I expelled a loud sigh. How could we have been so stupid? So naïve?

  "We're screwed. We're completely fucked. PharmaTech has been playing us all along, ever since we turned down the offer, probably."

  "I'm not following," John said. "If the company fails, then the investor loses his or her money. Why would they want that?"

  "How much will they lose? A few hundred grand. That's nothing compared to the millions PharmaTech can spend. The investor is probably PharmaTech, or at least someone they have control over. Think about it. They invest in us and get to hear all our secrets, everything we are doing before we do it. That's worth losing a few hundred grand over."

  "But that's got to be illegal," John said, exasperated. "Surely you can’t use information in that way. There has to be security laws or corporate law… things that prevent it!"

  "Probably," I said. "But I expect they covered their tracks. The investor is probably not directly connected to them. Maybe it's a friend of a board director, or something like that. Either way, I guess they stayed just within the law or close enough that we won't be able to sue them easily."

  "My God. It's genius, when you think about it."

  "I'm not going to take this lying down. Let's find out for sure the leak is coming from Marissa. Once we know, we can think about what to do. There’s no way we are going to let them win."

  "I'll call Marissa later with a fake piece of information. We should know for sure within a day or two, but this won't be easy. I'm with you. I want to take them down, but they are
a huge corporation—and not just that; they are a huge corporation that's plays dirty."

  "Then we will play dirty, too."

  There was one positive aspect to receiving this new information about our supposed investor: it completely eliminated any regrets or doubts I may have had about rejecting the initial ten-million-dollar offer from PharmaTech. In the back of my mind I had wondered whether they were really as bad as John and I made them out to be. Perhaps they really would use the technology to help others in the same way that we were planning to do. All right, they would make a bit more profit along the way, but that didn’t make them a bad company. Corporate espionage of the type that seemed to be at play here did make them a bad company, though. If they were prepared to use the investors to obtain information about their competitors, then they were every bit as dirty as I had suspected.

  I left John to make the call to Marissa while I sent a message to Carter. I'm coming round tonight. It's been a tough day and I need to work out the stress. E xx

  Looking forward to it, came the reply.

  I put the phone down and took a deep breath. Demanding sex from Carter was surprisingly empowering and went some way to improving my mood. I slipped out of my clothes and into the shower, making sure I was shaved where I needed to be. I planned to spend a lot of time naked tonight and wanted to look my best. At times like this, I needed Carter more than ever.

  Chapter Sixteen

  I took a taxi to Carter's so that I wouldn't be hot and sweaty by the time I arrived at his apartment. Unfortunately, this being San Francisco, the traffic was horrendous and I ended up in the back of the car for thirty minutes. Once I got to his apartment, I practically ran into the elevator and tapped my foot, eagerly waiting for the lift to arrive on his floor.

  The elevator doors opened and Carter reached in, grabbed me, and pulled me into a tight embrace. He pushed me against the wall, lips locking against mine as he started to undress me.

  "Slow down," I said, forcing myself to push him away even though I was more than ready for him to take me. "I want to slip into something more comfortable." I had a feeling the underwear would be far from comfortable, but I had heard women say something similar in TV shows.

  "Hurry up," he growled. "I can't wait much longer."

  I ran into the bedroom and saw some of the underwear we’d bought the other day laid out on the bed. I chose a pair of lacey, light green French panties and the matching bra. John had told me I looked good in green, although I had never been brave enough to wear green underwear. I usually stuck with whites and only occasionally wore black when it would be well hidden anyway.

  My clothes hit the floor in a heap, but I left on a pair of high-heeled shoes. Knowing my luck I would end up sticking a heel through Carter's expensive sheets, but being a bit taller made me feel sexier, and right now, that was all that mattered. Once I was “dressed” I looked at myself in a full-length mirror. Usually my eyes were immediately drawn to my prosthetic leg, but now it faded into the background. If Carter didn't care, then why should I?

  "I'm ready," I shouted out as I walked over to stand by the bed. My eyes flicked around the room, but I didn't see any of the toys out on display. Sex with Carter was more than enough without any additional contraptions, but I knew he liked to play around in bed, and I wanted him to know he could do that with me.

  Carter walked into the bedroom, already unbuttoning his shirt. "I don't know what to say. You look gorgeous, obviously, but that is such a criminal understatement at this point."

  "You don't look so bad yourself," I said, admiring his smooth, chiseled stomach. Somewhere in his busy schedule he was obviously finding the time to work out. You didn't get a stomach like that without doing serious time in the gym.

  Carter approached and placed his right hand on my left cheek, pulling me in slowly for a kiss while his left hand went to my waist. I was sure I could feel his fingers itching to touch me between my legs, but he managed to resist. I unbuckled his belt and opened his trousers while his tongue moved gracefully inside my mouth. I sat on the bed and pulled him down with me, giving him just enough time to yank off his trousers in the process.

  My head hit the pillow as my legs opened, eager for him to take his rightful place between them. Instead he lay next to me on the bed with his lips still pressed against mine, his right hand caressing my stomach, but moving up to my breasts. Suddenly the underwear felt constricting, like it didn't fit and was too tight.

  "How long is an appropriate amount of time to wait before I rip this clothing off you?" Carter asked.

  "Get it off me," I moaned. "And get the vibrator."

  I caught a brief look of surprise on Carter's face, but he quickly went to a drawer and pulled out the combination of pink plastic and rubber that I was surprisingly eager to get inside me.

  "You sure?" he asked me. "I don't want you to feel like you’re under any pressure."

  "You're the one who should feel under pressure. You never know; if I take a liking to this, I may not need you anymore."

  Carter flashed a smile that drove me wild. "I think you’ll still need me either way. At least, I hope."

  After pulling off my panties, he couldn't resist taking a few long, slow licks at my wet slit. He paused to take my firm bud between his lips, sucking gently as his tongue flicked against it. Carter was right; I would always need him, at least until they invented a sex toy that could replicate his strong, knowing tongue. Finally his mouth moved up my body, kissing my stomach and then sucking lightly on my breasts before rejoining my lips. I tasted the hints of my sweet sex on him and closed my eyes as I felt the tip of the toy press against my entrance.

  "We can use some lube, if you like?" Carter asked.

  "I'm not going to need it."

  My eyes rolled to the back of my head as I tore my lips from Carter's, and I let out a loud moan as the toy slipped up inside me and made me whole in a way that only Carter had done before. The vibrator was slightly smaller than Carter's manhood, but it still managed to reach all the places it needed to. He slipped back down between my legs and took control of my pleasure. The toy started to vibrate gently inside me while another part of it buzzed against my button.

  I grabbed the headboard as I writhed about on the bed. My back arched off the mattress as I lost control. Carter's firm hands pressed me back down while he turned up the intensity that hummed inside my pussy. The shaft inside me started to spin gently, each turn bringing me new pleasure as it pressed against the rough skin on the top of my tunnel.

  Carter's hand still kept my body pressed down against the bed, but my hips were twisting and moving in time with the toy inside my sex. My body strained against him as my orgasm took hold of me.

  "I'm coming!" I moaned. "Oh, my God, I'm going to come so hard!"

  Carter looked into my eyes as once again he turned up the intensity and strength of the shaft inside me. I forced myself to keep my eyes open and locked on his, staring into his soul until the orgasm hit and my eyes shut and my head snapped back into the pillow. I came so hard that my hips shot into the air despite Carter's hold on me, and the vibrator only just stayed inside me as I covered it with my lust.

  When I opened my eyes, Carter was smiling at me and stroking my erect and sensitive nipples. "I take it you enjoyed that?" he said as he slowly removed the toy from my dripping wet pussy.

  I was panting hard, barely able to breathe, but I managed a quick nod. “More. I want more.”

  "I think I can manage that,” he said as he pressed the vibrator back against my wet slit.

  "No," I groaned. "I want you." I pushed Carter off me and onto his back before climbing onto him. "It's your turn," I said as I sat down on his hard member.

  Chapter Seventeen

  If there was ever a good time to call my mother, it was the morning after a night with Carter. I loved my parents, obviously, but conversations with them could sometimes get a little tense. Everything would start off pleasant and happy, but after ten minutes or so the c
onversation would turn to boyfriends and why I don't have one, or work and why I don't have a proper job. Mom tried to be more supportive, and for the most part she was, but she still didn't really get it. She couldn't understand why I didn't just go and work for a big firm and collect a paycheck. But after a night like last night, I was in such a good mood I could handle whatever topic they threw at me.

  "Hi, Mom," I said when she finally picked up the phone. "Sorry it took so long for me to return your call. It's been pretty crazy here." Mom had called me two or three times in the past week, but with all the business stuff going on, I didn't really feel in the mood to talk.

  "That's all right. I assumed you were busy. How are things going?"

  I couldn't tell whether she was referring to work or Carter, so I chose to start with work. "Good. The business is ticking along nicely." There was no point to telling her all the gory details about PharmaTech and their attempts to sabotage us. She would be appalled in that way mothers always were toward someone or something who had hurt their child, but I didn't really need to hear that right now. Mom wouldn't understand that it wasn't as simple as speaking to a lawyer and suing them. Real life wasn't like the trashy TV shows she watched.

  "I was actually referring to this man of yours. Carter, isn't it? Is he still yours? I do hope you manage to put the past behind you. From everything you told me, it wasn't his fault, and even Dad is coming around. I think knowing that the driver ended up killing herself has given him some type of resolution. I know that sounds horrible, but it's true. And I think it has tied up a few loose ends, because he always thought Carter's trial was a little odd.”

  I knew Dad would have been pleased with the news. He reacted badly to Carter being released from prison, and I knew deep down he always wanted the guilty party to pay a bigger price. He would never admit it, but thinking that Bella was dead was the best way for him to move on with his life. I wasn't about to take that away from him by telling Mom the full story.