His father shook his head. “Far from it.” He looked over at Victor as if assessing if he could be trusted with certain information. He said, “We’re bio-engineering the next generation of encryption-organic keys-encoding information at the DNA level. Imagine having chemical access codes stored within your very own cells. Codes that remain intact even as the strands change as a result of breeding. Technology could truly be something you leave your children.”
Victor waved an excited hand in the air and said, “That’s impossible. You can’t add codes to DNA without changing their function.”
Jim countered with a humble shrug. “It’s impossible in animals so far, but we’ve proven it can work with certain plants.”
DNA encryption? His parents were wandering further from reality than he’d thought. “Another world-changing discovery? Aren’t you afraid Victor will steal the idea now that you’ve shared it?”
His mother looked over her shoulder at her husband and then back at her son. The lines of her face deepened with emotion. “Your father and I have come to an awful realization recently-we’re not going to be here forever. We’ve spent some time re-evaluating our priorities.”
Jake sighed impatiently and half-turned away from her. “Judy, don’t take this as harshly as it sounds, but I don’t have time to entertain your mid-life crisis right now.”
His father nodded, but his tone was surprisingly firm. “We probably deserve that comment, son, but give your mother a few more minutes of your time.”
It was really only Victor’s presence that held Jake’s tongue. “Fine. I’m listening.”
His mother looked uncomfortable-almost nervous-as she said, “I know we weren’t the parents you wanted, Jake. You wanted someone to rush to school when you scraped a knee or cook for some bake sale.”
Not about to sugar coat the past, Jake said, “I would have been happy if you had just attended one of my graduations.”
“It’s not an excuse, Jake, but research can be addictive. You get so close to a breakthrough – you don’t want to walk away. Time escapes you and suddenly you realize another day has gone by.”
“Well, then I suppose I should thank you for coming here at all,” Jake said unkindly.
To his surprise, his mother clasped her hands in front of her as if she found his words upsetting. “Your father and I made some mistakes. We didn’t protect ourselves or our discoveries as well as we should have and because of that we lost some of them to others. But do you know what we regret more than any of that?”
Jake shook his head and glanced at his watch.
“We didn’t protect you from our obsession.” Her voice shook and Jake felt an anger burning in his stomach. He didn’t want her words to touch him, to reawaken a yearning he’d put behind him years ago. “We missed your childhood and I know that you’d rather be anywhere but here with us, but don’t shut us out. We love you.”
“Love?” Jake recoiled from the word. “Love is for people who have nothing better to believe in. I don’t need love. I need to know if you can fix the server and then disappear back to that northern farm you think you’ll change the world from.”
A gasp from the doorway echoed through the painful silence that had followed Jake’s harsh words.
“Lil!” he said and took a few steps toward her.
She held up a hand to stop his advance. “No, don’t say anything else. I had almost convinced myself that you actually cared about me and Colby, but now I see that you’re not capable of caring for anyone, are you?”
A man who appeared to be in his mid-twenties, dressed in a brown checkered dinner jacket that didn’t look like it quite fit him-too long at the sleeves a bit loose around the waist. With zero dress sense and even less survival skills, the man chose that moment to walk over to Jake’s parents and say,“Hey, aren’t you the Waltons? This is so cool.”
Jake grabbed one of Lil’s arms as she was turning to leave. “You misunderstood what you heard.”
She gave her arm a yank, but he didn’t let it go. “Oh, I understood perfectly. You really mean all that trash you say.”
“This was not about you.” Regardless of what happened between him and Lil, chances were good that she would never see his parents again, anyway.
Lil shook her head violently. “I disagree. I feel sorry for whatever happened to you that left a black hole where your heart should be, but I can’t be with a man who thinks love is something you outgrow believing in like Santa Claus.”
“Don’t do this, Lil,” he warned.
His tone seemed to enrage her. Instead of pulling away, she went nose to nose with him and spat,“Don’t do what? Don’t expect better from you? Get your hand off of me.”
Jake didn’t. He couldn’t. He had to make her see. “You’re making a big deal out of nothing.”
His words didn’t have the soothing effect he’d hoped for.
“That’s because I just realized that what we have is exactly that…nothing.” She closed her eyes as if the thought hurt her. “I can’t believe I was willing to put my friends in jeopardy for you. I’m such an idiot.”
“What are you talking about?”
Lil opened her eyes, hurt turning to anger. She tore her arm out of Jake’s grasp. “Ask Jeremy. But understand that I’m only helping you now for Abby and Dominic’s sake.”
With that she
Jake’s loyalty was torn.
Jeremy took a bite out of a crab cake and said, “Man, women will make you nuts, won’t they? First I’m asked to hack into your computer like it’s no big deal. Then I’m told I could meet two programming icons as long as I take that secret with me to the grave. Now I’m supposed to save your company by spilling what I know about the backdoor I found to your mainframe…”
“You found a backdoor access point?”
The young man held up a hand. “Only if it means you’re not going to prosecute me for admitting any of this. Not that you could prove it, anyway. I cover my tracks well.” He smiled at Jake’s mother, looking quite pleased with himself.
Jim interjected, “Knowing what we are dealing with is going to make all the difference. We should be able to have the server debugged in plenty of time now.”
The news didn’t bring Jake the sense of relief he thought it would.
What did this mean in terms of Lil?
He looked at Jeremy more closely, “Who are you?”
“I’m a friend of Lil’s. Well, Alethea, really. I’ve had a crush on that woman since high school.” Jeremy’s eyes widened at the audible growl Jake emitted. He quickly clarified, “Alethea, not Lil.”
“You hacked into my computer for them. That was you?”
“Yes.”
“Lil wanted to keep me away from my computer that day.”
Jeremy nodded.
The more he thought about it, the angrier he became. It had all been a lie. The date. The fake outrage that he didn’t love her. Everything. What he couldn’t understand, though, was why Lil had wanted to access his files at all? Was she working for someone? He usually had a good idea of what was happening in most situations, but this one had his head spinning and grasping at theories. “What were you looking for?”
Jeremy wiped his greasy fingers on the hem of his checkered jacket. “I knew you were paying off programmers around the country. I know you gave them hush money, but for a rich man, you are way too cheap with your bribes. Anyway, Alethea thought Abby might be in danger. Lil said she needed proof before she’d say anything to Abby.” Jeremy shrugged. “I probably shouldn’t have accessed your computer, but I have a hard time saying no to Alethea. However, I got in by piggybacking on a backdoor code that I stumbled on. It was surprisingly easy so I went deeper than your email. The hacker community is not all that big. I took a guess that someone had been there before me and I was right.” He smirked. “It was that west coast weasel, Sliver. He’s pathetically predictable when it comes to his attack codes and, luckily, his passwords, too. He had complete access to your mainframe. I changed his
