“All right. What exactly did she say?” Big Tag sat back.
“I asked her about the woman she’s seen with Byrne. She doesn’t have a name. I asked if she’s got a picture because we could take it down to Adam,” Deke explained. “She said she’d tried to grab a shot from security cams, but the woman is wearing glasses that disrupted the images.”
Charlotte frowned. “Like the woman who worked with Layne. That tech isn’t available to the public, so we have to assume she’s at least with the same group even if she’s not the same person. I know you don’t like coincidence, but…”
“A woman with crazy secret tech shows up at the side of another billionaire tech giant? Yeah.” Tag sighed and shook his head. “I don’t want to get into this.”
But he would because Tag wouldn’t trust anyone else to do it. “I will make it my mission in life to get a good shot of this woman if you let me go and bring a small team. Maddie said she should be coming to Byrne sometime in the next week or so.”
“She can’t know the schedule.” Tag seemed to be looking for a way out.
“I think we have to take the chance. If The Collective is up and working again, we have to know,” Deke pointed out.
“The rumor is they are calling themselves The Consortium now. Like changing their name means they’re invisible again.” Tag growled a little and took a sip of Scotch. “I hate the fuckers, and if Byrne is one of them, we do need to know. He’s shooting satellites into space, and if he has his way, he’ll control access to space itself. He’ll fucking privatize the moon and charge us all for the tides.”
Charlotte stood, straightening her skirt. “I’ll go and talk to Genny about travel and per diems. Are we sending the whole crew Deke asked for?”
Tag nodded, reaching for his wife’s hand and giving it a squeeze. “Give him whatever he wants. But if he wants MaeBe, he has to take Kyle. I’m not going to listen to my nephew whine that his emotional support hacker is in another state.”
She winked his way. “Will do. And Deke, we’ll expect regular updates. I mean the text group, not Ian. We’re all boring married women. We need some drama. I want to know the minute Kyle and MaeBe throw down. Like I want to know before they do.”
He wasn’t sure how he was going to make that happen, but he would do his level best to provide his group with some entertainment. The group had started out as a way to easily connect a bunch of moms to help with carpool and bake sales and other kidcentric activities, and like all things McKay-Taggart, had quickly dissolved into an amusing shitshow of gossip and speculation and well-meaning nosiness. He fucking loved it. “Will do, boss.”
Charlotte strode out.
“And there goes the best part of my morning.” Tag set the Scotch down with a sigh. “I won’t see her again until we go home, and then we’ll be all about the kids. Getting old and responsible sucks ass. All right, Deke. You’re the most reasonable of all my employees. Tell me what you think.”
It was good to know the boss believed in him. “I think Maddie is the smartest person I’ve ever met, and if she believes something is wrong, then something is wrong. I’m going to explain to her that we will work this op for her, but we have our own mission and that’s to ID the woman meeting with Byrne.”
Ian stared down at the Scotch but didn’t pick it back up. “You’re not worried she’s involved?”
Deke shook his head. “Not at all. She’s solid, boss.”
Ian’s head cocked as though he was considering the situation. “How do you know? You haven’t had a relationship with her since you were both in high school. There are a lot of years between you and the girl you remember.”
“She’s stayed somewhat close to one of my sisters. She and Angie even kept in touch while Maddie was at Yale.” Sometimes he thought his sister had done that so she could tell him about the amazing things Maddie was doing. Not to make him feel bad about himself, rather to let him know he’d made the right decision all those years ago. “Maddie is incapable of doing anything truly morally wrong. It’s why she’s here.”
“She could have gone a lot of places,” Ian pointed out. “She could have called the FBI. She didn’t. She came here, or more importantly, she came to you.”
“I’m likely the only person she knows with the skills required to do the job. Again, I’m sure my sister has told her all about my adventures in the private security world.” Sometimes he wondered if Angie would do that to let Maddie know he was still available. Or to remind her she’d made the right choice.