Flash Drive Page 2

  After putting the groceries away, he booted up the laptop and used the remote to turn the TV to CNBC for the international business report. In his email there were already ten newsletters queued up to read and he doubted he’d been gone an hour. Because of his job—both of them—he was practically always reading. There was so much to know, especially these days with all the companies merging, changing, going under, starting up, going public, embezzling, lying, falsifying reports, and then reorganizing, that he had come to rely on a myriad of newsletters from financial institutions all over the world. He let the financial pundits and publishers do some of the legwork, and a fair share of the tedious research, while he charted and checked their success rates and read consumer reviews about their products. Ultimately, that was how businesses were made or razed—by customer satisfaction.

  He charted how his predictions panned out, short term and long term, on spread sheets. He’d been doing this so long now that he had an amazing statistical analysis model that he updated and maintained. He knew who to listen to, who to hedge with—literally—who to trust with his money, and who to stay away from. Corporate idiots were often his silent gambling partners, and lately there were many who could be counted on to screw up phenomenally. He paid attention to the new whiz kids trying to bring their wares to market because more often than not, he could make hundreds of thousands on their mistakes before they figured things out. The way the market worked was complicated and quirky for newcomers and he scrupulously monitored the trends of America’s youth. They had more expendable income than most and if they liked something, they could make a company an overnight success with their social media skills. Yes, it was a lot of work, but what else was he going to do? He didn’t want to teach full time, it was too time consuming and too much damned work.

  He muted the TV, read the Money Matrix report, pondered for a moment, heeded the advice, and went into his account and sold some stock from his mini-account. Then he moved money from his maxi account and bought more gold. That was his favorite thing to do—buy gold. He felt sure that was the best investment there could be in these uncertain times. But he waited for the right deal before diverting money, because once he bought it, he didn’t plan on ever selling it—it had to always be considered part of his set-in-stone investment capital. He had huge reserves and was ready whenever the market fell, had an “adjustment,” or announced a failure. He was able to capitalize on doom and get his money into the market fast when volatile times came. He’d done very well with the housing crisis, in essence betting against the country, but he hadn’t been as aggressive as he should have been. Who would have thought it would go down so far, and then stay down?

  He was good with money because he was well read, diligent, and not at all timid. The rush of a gambler was in his blood, but so was the voice of the professor—the one who made $45,000 a year graduating students who would owe ten times that amount by the time he walked the processional with his colleagues and stood by to watch them receive their degrees. Yet he was a man who knew what it was like to eat beans out of a can, and to hide in his dorm room because he didn’t have the money for condoms, much less enough to go Dutch on a date. It had been touch and go those last two years of college and quite honestly, if it hadn’t been for the donuts, he’d have never made it.

  His dad had died during his junior year leaving his mother a paltry insurance policy and a pension account that the state had severely compromised. He blamed his father for not seeing to his mother’s future, but acknowledged that seeing to her welfare had been the driving principle that had fired his own ambition. And it had all started with a dozen donuts.

  He chuckled as he clicked and made the last transaction, anticipating the close of the market in ten minutes. Those clods, if they could only see me now. He shook his head as he made the final click and began the signing off process that would lock his business bank account and keep it secure.

  It had been worth it, getting up at 4:30 every morning to high tail it over to the Dunkin’ Donuts store to buy six boxes of donuts every morning. He’d turned a cash outlay of $18 and the loss of three hours sleep into $71 every single morning—except Sundays. At a buck a donut, it was a good deal for everyone. It was breakfast—fast, handy, and satisfying for the crusty-eyed jocks who were habitually hung-over, the geeks who stumbled down the stairs after studying all night, and the perpetual dieters who said, “No, I shouldn’t,” before finally taking one in each hand. The preppies with their doe-eyed and well-tumbled dates were his best customers though, as they often bought a whole box. All-night sex tended to burn the calories in a big way. And of course those little “swimmers” had to be replenished in time for the next nightly bout. His take would have been an even $72, as he always sold out, but he indulged his own sweet tooth, and so ended up with $71. Those dweebs would be amazed to learn that he had parlayed all that donut money into millions.

  Chapter Five

  Laurel

  She could not sleep. She tossed and twisted in the sheets. The angst of not knowing where her flash drive had ended up was keeping her from having a moment’s peace. Not a single second of it. She kept visualizing people finding her flash drive, plugging it into their own computers, and then finding out all her dirty secrets. She saw the lecher who drooled over her pornographic prose with his zipper undone, the teenager whose eyes bugged at the scintillating scenes she’d set, the outraged zealot who would want her hauled in front of a tribunal and then burned at the stake. In her nightmares, they each, in turn, sent her stories on—the lecher to the most base websites, the teenager to everyone he knew, the zealot to every righteous supporter, building community outrage. With the cacophony of click, click, click becoming louder and louder, she jolted and cried out in her sleep. Each recipient, in turn, forwarded her files until her most private thoughts circled the world and hordes of people came for her. Crashing through her door, hauling her from her house to strip her, jeer at her, and then finally to flagellate her in the streets. She woke drenched and shaking over and over again until finally, she didn’t even try to get back to sleep.

  She walked around the house seeing absolutely nothing as she reasoned with herself. It’s not so bad; at least in this country what I’ve done isn’t illegal. She bumped into a doorjamb because she didn’t want the starkness of bright light right now. She knew she already had the deer in the headlights look, she could feel her face taut with it. We have freedom of speech, freedom to say or write what we want; I can’t be arrested for this.

  Then another voice intruded, her skeptical, sarcastic, negative, downer self: Yeah, but in some countries, what you wrote could get you killed. They would behead you in Iran. Drag your entrails through the streets of Bahrain.

  She put her hands to her head and gripped her hair. What had she done? She’d ruined her life, that’s what she had done! Think, think, think! Where could that damned

  thing be?

  She’d already gutted her purse, literally ripped the lining out and turned it inside out. Gone over every inch of her car, methodically searched her house, her garage, gone back through the calendar and written down every single place she’d been. There wasn’t a minute not accounted for. And she had called or gone to every place she’d been—over and over again. Now the clerks only shook their head when they saw her approach.

  She sat down and stared at the spot of light shining on the wooden floor coming from the glow of the nightlight on the icemaker. Then a thought occurred to her. How would they know? How would they know it was hers? Oh . . . was that better, or worse? Some of her best writing was on that drive and now she wouldn’t even get credit for it. Couldn’t claim it. Well, she could . . . God, what was worse? Everyone in the world knowing she wrote the stories, or having her stories read, talked about, maybe even published and no one knowing they were hers? Is this how Anonymous got started? God, could she make up her mind—was she proud of them or ashamed of
them? Then it occurred to her that her Quicken files were on that flash drive. They would know!

  Every single transaction she had with her bank, every check, every debit card charge, every deposit—it was all there. It would lead to her. She couldn’t hide. It told the story of her life. Where she shopped, who her doctors were, how much she paid for her car, her mortgage, her insurance payments. Oh God, this was worse than she thought. Her identity could be stolen! She ran for her checkbook. Just how bad was this? What could they know exactly, and would it lead to her? And was that a good or a bad thing? The way she was feeling right now, she’d happily pay a five-thousand dollar reward if someone would just put the damned thing in her hand instead of plugging it into their USB port.

  Chapter Six

  Garrett

  Garrett took his peanut butter and jelly sandwich to the table and dumped a handful of barbequed Fritos between the two halves. Then he twisted the cap off his Michelob Light Lime Cactus and took a hearty swig. Sitting down, he shrugged his shoulders as if readying for battle and picked up the flash drive.

  In it went, into the port on his keyboard. He absentmindedly chomped on a few Fritos as he waited for the icon to appear on his desktop. His steely gray eyes focused on the monitor waiting for the first glimpse, and he wondered what the drive had been named. It jumped on screen and sat in the bottom corner as unobtrusive as butter on toast. It was titled “Backups.” Boy, that was original. No help there.

  Checking to make sure his virus protection was on, he double clicked and watched as files filled the screen. His eyes flared wide as he read some of the names on the files: The Master’s Serf, Debauched Housewives, Take My Wife & Let Me Watch, Dr. BDSM, The Village Blacksmith and the Widowed Lady, Mary’s Wedding Night, Surrogate Husband, The Doctor and His Nurse, Forced to Marry My Dead Husband’s Brother, The Rake and the Young Innocent, The Dr. and the Corporate Raider, One Climax Too Many, The Professor & His Submissive, Quicken98.

  Unless he missed his guess, the owner of this flash drive was female with kinky sex on her mind. He reached for his beer while deciding what to click on first. He knew he should click on the Quicken file, as it was the one most likely to have the kind of information he needed to track this wild woman down. But the business day was over, he was relaxing, and he was primed for a good story. He was tempted to read about the professor and his submissive, but that was a little too close to home, so he chose Surrogate Husband and double-clicked to open the file.

  Surrogate Husband

  or

  The Officer’s Submissive Wife

  He trusted him with his life, now he would trust him with his wife.

  Chapter I

  It was all Caliente could do to keep from screaming out her frustration to the night. Alone again, in the oversized bed, and needing his touch so badly her skin was tight and tingly—itching with a lustful fever that she could not endure. She had a need she could not slake no matter how many times she touched herself. She needed Clint, and she needed him like a feline in heat needed a tom.

  But it wasn’t going to happen. Clint was still overseas on some damned mission. Six months had come and gone, and she’d been prepared for them, accepting them to some degree. As the last day of the fifth month had been crossed off the calendar, she’d felt her body shift in anticipation, psyching itself up for his return. She remembered the day she began to allow herself to draw the thaw of the long winter into her bones and to let her body melt to the supple readiness that was her true nature. Clint had emailed that all was going according to plan and that soon he would be able to shave off the godforsaken beard he’d had to grow as part of his camouflage for the hills of Afghanistan. A sniper by profession, but now elevated to the rank of Captain, he was in charge of the special ops team that had captured, and was now holding, a key communications tower for the Army. Her body had sung as she’d zipped through the commissary laying in supplies for his return. He’s coming home, he’s coming home! was the mantra that repeated in her head as she stocked up on rib-eyes, Cocoa Puffs and all his favorite snacks.

  When just a week later he had emailed with the news that a lucky shot had hit a propane tank and blew up their shack along with their communication lines and that they were moving on to capture the next tower to repair the lines, she had known that the homecoming she’d been anticipating would not be right around the corner. Two days later he had been officially notified that his tour had been extended another two months. A week after that, he emailed that his best friend, Rand, had been hit and was being sent stateside. No one knew how serious it was, but any gunshot wound was serious when there were no hospitals, surgeons, or antibiotics to fight infection. He said he’d given Rand a letter for her as his gurney had been lifted into the med-evac helicopter. He told her to read it carefully, that it was what he wanted. He didn’t say anything else. The following day, he wrote that his team was on the move once more and that he didn’t know when he’d be able to contact her again. He said he loved her and that he wanted her happiness more than anything in the world.

  She had cried herself to sleep that night, and then, frustrated beyond belief, reached into his nightstand for their toys, selecting the one that would guarantee enough satisfaction to at least allow her to sleep. It hadn’t.

  Mondays were the worst days, especially here on post where the activities of Ft. Bragg dominated everyone’s life. Everyone was back at work, the kids were back in school, and the neighborhood was quiet. There were no parties for her to attend, no socials for her to bake for, no ladies groups to dress up to go to. Nothing to do but cut more coupons, pay a few more bills, and maybe wash Clint’s vintage Camaro for the umpteenth time since he’d left.

  Clint had asked her not to look for a job when they had married a year ago, hoping to have her all to himself for a few years before she became a bored housewife or busy mother. But the Army had other plans, and instead of spending her days doing his laundry, ironing his dress shirts, cleaning their house on base, and preparing his dinners, she was writing him letters she hoped would find him, and pining for him with every cell in her body.

  She didn’t know how she was going to make it another two and a half months. She was desperate for his touch, for the feel of his skin on hers, for the fullness of her body as his cock slammed into her.

  The doorbell rang and she dropped her dust rag onto the coffee table to answer it. No one on post worried about calling out through the door; if you made it through the gate, you were no threat to the military, and that included their wives and children. She’d never lived in a more secured place.

  She opened the door wide to a smiling officer—a very handsome, tall, smiling officer, in full dress as if he’d just come from a military ceremony. There was a funeral at least once a week and any soldier on base not working at the time, was usually obligated to attend. But the grin on this man’s face didn’t gel with that thought, he was way too happy to have come from burying a friend.

  “Callie! I’m Rand Preston, Clint’s buddy. He asked me to stop by and see you.”

  She looked at him closer. She had seen grainy Internet pictures, but they didn’t do him justice. No siree, they did not. He was at least six-foot three, likely an inch or two taller. He had sandy brown hair that, while thick, was flattened and indented on the sides from the dark green cap with the corded and embellished insignia of the Army that was now tucked ceremoniously under his arm. He had the standard military haircut, short and close-cropped. The men either preferred that, or all of it off—at least when they were stateside. His eyes were a deep brown covered with gold flecks sparkling in the sun. She appraised his long, sooty lashes, well-defined eyebrows, and clean-shaven jaw that was squared off with just the hint of a cleft in the center. Then her eyes fell to his expressive lips, lips that were now quirked up at the corners. God his lips, a little chapped from the Afghan desert, they were full and sensuous an
d very inviting.

  I’ve been too long without a man, she thought, I shouldn’t be taking this man’s inventory like this! This was Clint’s best friend for g-d-sake! Mentally shaking herself, she remembered her manners and pulled the door wider, “Rand, please come in. I thought Clint said you’d been shot.”

  “I was, in the bicep, but I was really fine by the time they got me stateside. They actually shouldn’t have bothered bringing me in. By the time Frankfurt was finished with me, I was ready to be returned. As far as I’m concerned, I’m ready to go back, but my doctor says otherwise. He says to give the muscles and tendons another month to mend.”

  He strode into the room and typical to his training, took in everything at once. “Nice place. Clint’s lucky; you have a flair for decorating. One would never suspect this is post housing. At least from the inside,” he added with a grin. Every house on this street looked identical from the outside—all were two-stories, with wrap-around white porches and terra cotta-styled tiled roofs. The only things that distinguished one from another were the cars in the driveway and the plants on the porch.

  “Thank you. I kill time looking through magazines and copying the pros.”

  “Well it looks great, the colors are very relaxing. Beats the drab olive and tan I’m so used to seeing everywhere.”

  “Would you like something to drink?”

  “Yes, as a matter of fact I would. Clint says he always keeps some special Dewar’s on hand, could I have some over ice?”