Ava McCarthy - The Insider

‘Mums are hard to please.’

She darted a quick look at him. There was no hint of mockery in his dark eyes.

He indicated the package on her lap. ‘Christmas present?’

She shoved the parcel to one side. ‘It’s for my dad. Haven’t given it to him yet.’

‘He’s away?’

‘He played poker on Christmas Eve. He’ll probably turn up in a day or two.’

Dillon stopped what he was doing. ‘He missed Christmas?’

Harry shrugged. ‘He misses most Christmases.’

Dillon was silent for a moment. She shoved the parcel on to the bed, the contents rattling. She’d bought her father a full poker set: six hundred plastic chips, two decks of cards and a thick rule book, all stored in their own shiny black case. She’d saved up for it for months.

Dillon turned his attention back to the screen. His eyes narrowed as he worked through one of her files, and Harry peered at the screen to see what had caught his interest. It was the code for one of the hacker tools she had designed herself.

With a staccato flick of the keys, Dillon snapped the file shut and opened up another one. He scrolled down through it, and then stopped to examine it line by line. He gave a low whistle, his eyes riveted to the screen.

He pointed to a line in the code. ‘What’s this bit doing?’

Harry read through it and then started to explain her design, the words tumbling over each other in her impatience to communicate her ideas. She had to lean across him to reach the keyboard, and she became aware of the warmth of his body and the light spicy soap that he used.

When she finished, he looked at her for a long moment, his eyes searching her face. ‘Did you do all this yourself?’

‘Yes.’ Harry took a deep breath. ‘Can I ask you a question now?’

‘Sure.’ His eyes never left hers.

‘How did you find me?’

‘That was easy. You posted too many details of your exploit on the bulletin boards. Security guys monitor those things all the time, you know. Stay online long enough and we can track you down, too.’

Harry felt like an idiot. So simple. She’d been careless. But then, she wasn’t used to hiding.

Dillon tapped a few keys and closed down her files. Then he spun the chair so that he was facing her. He picked up the screwdriver again and began turning it end over end on the desk.

‘You interfered with trading records belonging to the Dublin Stock Exchange,’ he said. ‘Do you know what happened when they found the error?’

‘No.’

‘The database administrator almost lost his job.’ Dillon leaned forward, his face stern. ‘He’s only twenty-four and his wife is pregnant.’

Harry hung her head. Her skin crawled as though she had a nasty rash. ‘I didn’t think. It seemed such a small thing to do.’

Dillon shook his head. ‘You’re not just messing with computers here, you’re screwing up people’s lives.’

She couldn’t look at him. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘So tell me about the other systems you’ve damaged.’

She jerked her head up. ‘But I’ve never done anything like this before. I don’t damage things, I just look around.’

He watched her for a moment. She couldn’t tell if he believed her. Then he tossed the screwdriver on to the desk with a clatter and folded his arms, as though he’d made up his mind.

‘Okay, I’ve seen how you hack,’ he said. ‘Now I want to know why.’

‘But I’ve told you why.’

‘No, you haven’t. Your answer was a cop-out. Tell me again. Why do you want to hack?’

Harry’s mind went blank. What kind of answer was he looking for? She felt as if she was back at school, with the teacher asking a series of questions designed to lead her to a single answer. But what was it?

She tried to analyse how she felt when she started an exploit. ‘Okay, well, maybe I love to break into things and be somewhere I shouldn’t.’

‘So you like taking risks. Why? Does it make you feel powerful?’

Harry thought of the way the hairs stood to attention on the back of her neck whenever she felt close to cracking a system. She thought of the exhilaration that pumped into her bloodstream like a drug as she unlocked the final door into someone’s network. He was right. Hacking made her feel powerful in a way no other part of her life ever could. But there was something else.

She shook her head. ‘That’s part of it, I suppose. But mostly I just don’t believe people when they tell me I can’t break into a system. Just because it says it in the manual doesn’t make it true.’ She rubbed her nose, as if that would unscramble her thoughts. ‘I know there’s always a way in, if I stick at it long enough.’

‘So it’s about the technology? You want to find out what makes it tick?’

‘Yeah, in a way. It’s like … I dunno.’ She looked into his face. ‘It’s like finding the truth.’

Dillon’s eyes glowed and he sat very still. ‘That’s exactly what hacking is all about. The search for truth.’

Then he leaned forward with his elbows on his knees and clasped his hands in front of him. His face was inches from hers.

‘People think hacking is all about destruction, but nothing could be wider of the mark. It’s about exploring the technology, about pushing it to its limits and sharing the knowledge. A true hacker expands his mind beyond what’s in the books or what he’s been taught. He finds a way to do things when conventional thinking fails.’ Dillon locked eyes with hers. ‘Hacking is good. It’s people that are bad.’

He grasped her hands in his. A flash of heat shot through her and something jolted inside her chest.

‘Think of hacking as an attitude,’ he said. ‘We don’t just hack computers, we hack our whole lives.’ He squeezed her hands, pumping them for emphasis, and his eyes burned into hers. ‘Never let yourself be limited by what other people tell you. Never accept their version of how things have to be.’

Harry listened, mesmerized. Limited . That described how she felt every minute of her day. Boxed in by her mother, who was always so disappointed in her; labelled at school where she failed to measure up. With a flash of insight, Harry realized he was telling her how to cope with her life.

Without warning, Dillon dropped her hands and sat back, as though suddenly embarrassed at his own intensity. ‘End of lecture. Thanks for talking to me.’ He jumped to his feet and headed for the door. ‘I’ll see myself out.’

Harry stood up, dizzy at the sudden change. ‘But wait – what happens now?’

Dillon shrugged. ‘Probably nothing. I’ll need to inform your parents about everything you’ve been doing, but no one’s going to prosecute a thirteen-year-old girl. Do it again though, and you’ll be in trouble.’

He stood with his hand on the doorknob and looked over at her, his eyes still slightly feverish. ‘Someday I’ll have my own company, with the best engineers in the country.’ His lips twitched, and he winked at her. ‘Stay out of jail long enough and maybe I’ll hire you.’

12

Cameron stood outside the wrought-iron gates. The girl was inside the house, and had been there for almost an hour. He pressed himself up against the bars. He badly needed to finish what he’d started.

He dug his fingernails into his palms. The train station had been such a fuck-up. She’d been so light, like a child. But the instant he’d broken contact with her, the mob of commuters had barged in front of him, blocking his view. He’d heard the shrieking trains, seen them crashing by. But the crowd had robbed him of the sight of her fear.

Without that, it wasn’t finished.

He peered through the gate. The driveway looked like a landing strip with all those fucking lights. He made out the shape of the house ahead, two lit windows glowing in the dark. He leaned his face against the cold metal and imagined the girl in one of those rooms. Heat filled his groin.