“I'm a hacker,” I said, shrugging, glad for the sensation to come back to my shoulders. If my legs would just start responding, I'd feel a lot better.
“A hacker?” he asked, his brows going upward. “You're a hacker?”
“What? Because I'm not some pimply, pervy thirty year old hiding out in his parent's basement, I can't be a hacker?”
“Don't meet a lot of hackers with tits is all,” he said, smirking a little when my eyes started shooting daggers at him.
“Listen asshole,” I started, my words hot, “I get that you have a job here. To hold me and kill me or whatever. But please refrain from torturing me with your asinine male chauvinistic ramblings first. Having tits doesn't negate having a fucking brain, you idiot.”
At this, he chuckled, the sound low and deep and maybe it made my insides feel oddly wobbly. Okay. It definitely made my insides feel kinda wobbly.
“Alright, I take it back.”
“Take what back?”
“You ain't a criminal.”
“Why not?” I asked, unreasonably annoyed that he came to that conclusion. I was, in a way, a criminal in my own right. I broke tons of laws daily. Granted, mostly privacy and cyber laws. But still. They were laws. And I broke them. That made me a criminal.
“Because any criminal worth their salt would know better than to call someone holding them hostage an asshole and an idiot when they got at least a buck fifty on them weight-wise.”
“Maybe I thought you were too dumb to rise to the bait.”
“Ain't dumb, doll. That's why I know you're more than some two-bit hacker pissing off some nobodies.”
“Oh, do please tell me how you know that,” I drawled dryly.
“I know that because I know who I was hired by. And he ain't a nobody.”
“Who were you hired by?” I asked, a tightening in my belly.
His head tilted to the side.
“Lex Keith.”
Holy.
Shit.ThreeBreakerShe flinched back like I had struck her, physically shrinking away from me. Her eyes, already big, got wider.
So she knew who Lex Keith was.
Which only confirmed what I had been suspecting. That she was definitely not some upstanding citizen caught in the crossfire. Or some random chick Lex had a thing for that turned him down or something.
Good people didn't know men like Lex Keith existed.
Good people didn't know exactly how bad it was that a man like Lex Keith had paid someone to kidnap her.
All that was left to answer was what she did to get on his bad side. Hacked into his systems? Messed with his money? She lived in the crappiest apartment I had ever seen, the smell of soy sauce seeping through the walls, the floors worn and uneven. If she stole from him, one would imagine that she could at least buy herself something better than a twin sized bed with a mismatched pile of throw blankets to ward off the chill of the late Autumn air.
The only thing worth anything in her apartment was the laptop that she had on her desk. Not one of the plain streamlined black ones you can walk into any box store and pick up. No. Her's was some special order kinda shit. Top of the line.
Which made sense if she was a hacker like she claimed.
“Lex Keith?” she repeated, her voice airy. Her hands were curled into themselves tightly, her nails cutting into her palms. Terrified. She was completely terrified.
“What's he want you for?”
Her eyes went to mine, dark and desperate. “I don't know. I don't know how he even knows who I am.”
I believed her. Call me crazy, but I was a damn good at detecting lies. She was being honest with me.
“But you know who he is.”
Her head bobbed up and down. “Unfortunately.”
“So you know he's a crazy fuck?”
“Yes.”
“Any idea what he does to women?”
At this, a hard swallow, her voice a lot weaker. “Yes.”
“Shit,” I said, getting back onto my feet, looking out the open train doors.
“Who are you?” she asked, still sounding weak. I think I preferred the chick who was slinging venom at me a few minutes before. Ain't nothing worse than knowing you (or you by proxy) put fear like that into a woman. Only the worst kind of scum did that.
Maybe I was a fuckin' monster after all.
“Breaker,” I said honestly. What good would it do to lie to her?
“Is that like... a real name?” she asked.
I turned back to find her studying me. “Yeah, doll, it's a real name. My last name.”
“What's your first name?”
“Why?”
At this, her eyes rolled. Rolled. Like she was annoyed with me. “Fine. Don't tell me. I was just curious. Don't need to be all suspicious. Not like I'm a threat to you. Scared I'm gonna hack into your computer and see what kind of twisted porn you're into?”
“Twisted porn?” I asked, feeling my lips twitch upward.
“Yes. Twisted porn. Granny fuckers. Bestiality. Or the more tame, but no less disgusting: gangbangs, monster cocks, ATM, creampie, facials...”
Jesus fucking Christ.
No way was the tiny slip of a chick with the big god damn doe eyes sitting in a train car I trapped her in, knowing full well what might happen to her at Lex's hands, talking to me about coming on chicks faces.
I scraped a hand across my brow, trying like fuck to not imagine her naked, mouth open, begging me to come on her.
Fuck.
Last thing she needed was me walking around with a hard-on. She was freaked enough.
“You have an extensive knowledge of porn. You little perv, you,” I went with, trying to lighten the mood.
To this, she snorted. “I get paid to look through browser histories. Most men's histories are at least seventy percent porn.”
“Not mine, doll,” I said, shaking my head.
Another snort. And an eye roll.
“I want pussy,” I said, looking down at her, “I go get some pussy. I don't stare at it through a fuckin' computer screen. I get my fingers and cock inside a real one. And maybe, if it's real sweet, I'll get my tongue in it too.”
I fought the smile tugging at my lips when I saw her blush. Bright, bright crimson.