Binary: An Encrypted to Cipher Bridge Short Story Read online

  From Carolyn McCray, the #1 Bestselling author in Men’s Adventure, Techno-thriller, Action Adventure & War, comes Binary, an Robin Hood Hacker bridge short story. The events of this 8,000+ short story take place between the events of Encrypted and Cipher (due out Feb 2013)

  Praise for the Robin Hood Hacker…

  “Encrypted by Carolyn McCray is a fast paced, hair-raising thriller with a cast of fascinating characters. The heroine, Ronnie, has Laura Croft’s moves, Sherlock Holmes’ intellect and Indiana Jones’ charm.”

  Charlotte Abel

  Author, Enchantment

  “From the moment I started reading this book, I was in awe. Encrypted is action packed from the first sentence. I couldn’t turn the pages fast enough. From hackers, special agents, to the plague, you won’t be able to put this one down until the end!”

  Book Goddess

  Book Reviewer

  More praise for The Robin Hood Hacker series…

  “Dan Brown blinked and Carolyn McCray took over. Encrypted is the best thing that I’ve read in the thriller genre, hands down. It’s got history, mysticism, shadowy organizations manipulating world events. Oh, and did I mention the most incredible opposites attract relationship EVER? This novel knocked my socks off.”

  Ben Hopkin

  Thrillers Rock Twitter, Book Reviewer

  “Halting the spread of a weaponized redo of the Black Plague? Intending to plunge the world into a medieval hellish vision of the Hidden Hand? It’s never good when the dead could turn out to be the lucky ones. That’s a lot of responsibility resting on the shoulders of a brilliant cyber hacker and a sexy FBI agent. Makes you wonder who’s calling the shots? God, the angels or a 13th century cult that would make Lucifer blush.”

  Taylor Lee

  Author, Big Girls Don’t Cry

  “I found this book to be just as the title said an action packed techno thriller. I read at least a book a week but this was one of those impossible to put down books. It was well worth the money and based on this book I bought her other book and will be placing the next in her series on my wish list.”

  Scott Powner

  Amazon Reviewer

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  About the Author

  Afterword

  Other Works by Carolyn McCray

  Copyright

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  Table of Contents

  PROLOGUE

  North Mariana Islands, South Pacific

  10:30am Hagåtña Time

  Ronnie stood on her tiptoes as the muzzle of the gun pushed her chin upward. The man berated her in Japanese. Yeah, too bad she didn’t speak Japanese. Of course, her assistant should have been translating for her, but her mic was currently being crushed by the gun.

  “Ta?” the man asked, grinding the muzzle into her skin.

  She didn’t know how she’d gotten into this situation. She didn’t know what the guy wanted. She didn’t know where Zach was.

  All she knew was that the guy looked ready to fire.

  CHAPTER 1

  North Mariana Islands, South Pacific

  12 Minutes Earlier

  “Would you slow down, Ronnie?” her assistant asked.

  “Um, let me think about that,” Ronnie replied to Quirk. “That would be a ‘no.’”

  She was late. Really late. And they both knew what happened the last time she was this late. Zach had been kidnapped. Then the whole stopping-the–rampant-Black-Death thing. Ronnie would rather avoid that whole scenario again if she could. Which meant hauling ass right about now.

  “The sensors are just showing the pounding of your not-so-delicate feet.”

  Ronnie snugged what might look like a baseball cap tighter onto her head. But it wasn’t a baseball cap at all. It was truly a marvel of modern technology. The fabric of the cap was crisscrossed with fibers that were picking up her mind’s electrical activity.

  They were testing out another prototype. Which, of course, meant the thing was not working as it was supposed to. Then again, it was meant to be used in a laboratory setting, not on the mean streets of Micronesia.

  She could see the clothing factory just down the street. The North Mariana Islands had been the hub of high fashion clothing construction for decades. But then, with even cheaper Chinese factories, the islands lost their main industry to the mainland. After the plague, though, which had hit China hard, the industry had swung back to the islands, since their population had been relatively isolated during the plague and had minimal losses.

  She could hear the legion of sewing machines stitching away all around her. There was only one shop that interested her, though, and that was the Lee & Yin Clothiers factory. After the fashion industry had abandoned the islands, Lee & Yin had diversified into other more unsavory pursuits. Drugs, gambling, and prostitution, to name a few. They had accumulated quite a syndicate and had used this factory as their cover. Now that clothes assembly was back in town, they weren’t beneath restarting their legitimate business.

  The part that Ronnie cared about was that they kept their secure servers on the property. There were hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of bank accounts in that computer vault. There were accounts from the Caymans, Switzerland, and even Malta, the new super-rich tax haven country.

  And Ronnie meant to steal it all. She and Quirk had been pinging the system for weeks, probing its weaknesses. The security wasn’t all that much, actually. Thugs usually didn’t think in terms of geek. They thought a rotating password and a few security guards were enough. They thought through their security as if they would be the ones to assault their servers, not world-class hackers.

  Their mistake.

  On her back she carried a pack filled with high tech gear. She estimated it would take her seven minutes to transfer the funds once she was in the server room. Hundreds of millions of dollars, and they put up less than ten minutes’ worth of defenses. Gangsters, man.

  But she should be glad. Usually she was breaching large corporations’ systems, which were extremely well guarded. Those could take hours to crack—not minutes.

  But absconding with some spending cash wasn’t why she was in such a hurry. No, it was because Zach was going to be here. Not for a social visit, but on the job. Quirk had made sure that Warp had “discovered” their latest target. Zach was on the island to capture her.

  This is what her love life had descended to. Zach and her date night would be observed by every law enforcement service in America and filmed through satellite imagery and thermal scans.

  Awesome.

  All of which she was about to be late for.

  She hit the side door to the factory at full speed. She ran down the aisle between a hundred sewing machines. Thousands of dollars’ worth of silk and cashmere was being sewn into high end garments all around her.

  The clatter of the sewing machines reverberated against the unpainted walls. The sound set her teeth on edge. No one even looked up at the blonde kaivalagi running through their midst. All eyes were focused down at their sewing.

  These women worked under sweatshop conditions, yet their employers were sitting on several hundred million dollars in profit.

  You would think that Ronnie would be used to the cruelty that humans could deal to one another, yet she was still shocked at it each and every time. Her desire to hit the gang where it hurt doubled.

  The next door she went through held a floor-to-ceiling loom. The large shuttles clacked their way back and forth between the cotton fibers. This loom was making specialty prints. There were only a few employees here, mainly to make sure the loom didn’t get tangled or
, worse, stop. This thing ran 24/7. According to Quirk, the loom itself made several grand a day for the syndicate.

  She rushed through that room and burst into the next room. The dying room. The air was filled with colored steam that rose from the vats.

  “Is he there yet?” Ronnie asked as she made her way to the staircase and headed up.

  “Of course he is. The FBI agent is punctual.”

  Ronnie just took the jab. Quirk wasn’t wrong. Zach was always on time, whereas Ronnie? Well, her tardiness wasn’t all her fault. Much blame could be laid at Quirk’s feet. How long did it take to put on make-up, anyway? They really needed to allow, in the future, if there were any future meetings, for an hour and a half to get her dressed.

  At least she wasn’t in a hoochie dress and high heels this time. Nope. She was in her ninja gear. Black leggings. Black tight turtleneck. Black boots. Quirk had been scandalized, of course, but Ronnie had put her foot down. Zach was just going to have to get used to the real Ronnie.

  If he missed his couture-wearing model girlfriend, then so be it.

  Nearly winded, Ronnie made it to the top of the stairs. She put her hand on the doorknob. Was she ready for this? The servers were through the next room. But there was someone there to stop her.

  Zach.

  Turning the knob, Ronnie opened the door. There he was, across the room in his usual black suit, white shirt, and skinny tie. His blue eyes stood out against his dark hair. His lips parted in a grin.

  That was about the time he pulled a gun on her.

  Date night had officially begun.

  * * *

  Zach hated drawing down on Ronnie, but he had to for the benefit of Warp and half of the agency, who were watching with thermal imaging. They needed to see his arm out and ready to shoot—even though the only thing he wanted to do was rush over and hug his little hacker.

  Ronnie wasn’t idle, though. Ronnie threw a metal disc down onto the floor, then flipped a switch. The metal rings began rotating, and soon Zach had to clutch onto his gun as it was pulled toward the hyper-magnets. He had to trust her one hundred percent as he pulled the trigger. The bullet flew about halfway across the room, then fell to the floor.

  Finally, the gun flew from his hands as well, slamming into the disc, clanging loudly as metal hit metal.

  Then Ronnie raised her arm. It looked like she was holding a gun, but he knew that not to be true. However, she did pull the trigger, and two prongs shot out of the weapon, connected by long wires. The metal prongs sunk into his chest. At first it felt like a pinch, then the voltage caught up.

  Zach’s muscles spasmed, clenching under the Taser’s shock. A loud pop sounded in his ear as his hearing and microphone piece went on the fritz. Even though the Taser wasn’t at full capacity, it still hurt like hell. Zach grabbed the wires, yanking the prongs from his chest.

  Ronnie ran over, throwing a right hook. Zach blocked it and straight-armed her limb down, pulling her close.

  “Did it work?”

  “They can’t hear,” Zach croaked out. “Although we’ve got to figure out a way to meet without me getting zapped.”

  Ronnie leaned forward and pressed her lips against his. The effect was nearly as jolting as that of the Taser. His body felt electrified. Then she pulled away.

  “Hopefully that made up for it,” Ronnie commented.

  Yes, it kind of did.

  “Um, I can still hear you two slurping,” Quirk said. “I think I deserve hazard pay or something. And, oh my God, your hypothalamus is lit up like a Christmas tree.”

  Ronnie rolled her eyes. “Better get back to convincing them we’re enemies.”

  With that she put a knee in his groin. For a woman who hoped to be using that equipment soon, you’d think she’d be a little kinder.

  But they did have to make this look real. To that end, he backhanded her, snapping her head to the side. A bit of blood sprayed out. He hated to hit the woman he loved, but he also didn’t want either of them to hang for treason.

  She recovered quickly with a back roundhouse kick. He caught her foot midair and spun her around. Ronnie landed hard on the floor. Face down. He reached to help her up, but her foot caught his chin and reeled him backward.

  The hacker came at him with a combination of punches and kicks. Zach used his forearms to shield himself from most of them. Sad that the most physical contact they’d had was in the form of combat.

  His therapist was going to have a field day with this one.

  “Quirk, are they down yet?”

  “Working on it. I mean, I’m just hacking into the DoD, so no biggie.”

  A little tired of taking a pounding, and from a female hacker, no less, Zach took a swing of his own. It landed right on Ronnie’s lip. She stumbled back a few steps.

  “Got it! You are good to go,” Quirk said.

  Zach rushed forward and caught Ronnie before she pitched backward. He put a tender finger to her lip. “I’m so sorry.”

  “Yeah, tell the boys I’m sorry, too. But I had to make it look real. They couldn’t get any preferential treatment.”

  Zach grinned. “They forgive you. So how long until the government has eyes on us again?”

  “Eighty-six seconds.”

  “Well, then, let’s make the most of them,” Zach said, leaning in to kiss her again. Less than a minute and a half was not ideal, but he’d take it. How many months had he been waiting for these eighty-six seconds? He’d fantasized about it over and over again. It was what kept him going all these months. But before their lips touched, the front and rear door burst open and several armed Asian men burst in.

  * * *

  Really? Now? The Triads, the Chinese equivalent of the mafia, had to burst in now? Right now? Not eighty-seven seconds from now?

  They looked all tough and ready for business until the guns in their hands started to rattle. The automatic weapons flew out of their hands and landed on the magnets.

  Taking advantage of their shock, Zach sucker-punched one and threw the guard into the other. Ronnie moved into action as well, firing her Taser at the nearest man. She cranked the voltage up, though. No reason to go easy on him. The last man beat a hasty retreat out down the hallway. He was sure to bring some friends back with him, though.

  “Quirk!” Ronnie shouted.

  “What?”

  “We just got attacked by the Triad.”

  “Bummer,” Quirk said.

  “Quirk!”

  “What? You’re the one who wanted the satellite knocked out. Ergo, I can’t see a thing.”

  “Only because you assured me that physical security on the premises was light to non-existent.”

  “Well, I wasn’t aware at the time that Lee & Ying were hosting a mediation meeting between the Triad and the Yakusa.”

  “The Yakusa?” Zach asked.

  “Yes, it just came across the CIA’s Far East desk. They are meeting to divvy up territories to end a turf war that’s lasted for seventeen years.”

  Great. And they were in the middle of it.

  Instead of breaking into an out-of-the-way, low-security facility, they had stumbled onto a summit of two of the largest criminal syndicates in the world.

  “I’m bringing the satellite back online so we’re not blind,” Quirk said.

  That would be helpful.

  “Get out of there!” Quirk yelled. “There are over twenty armed men heading your way!”

  Ronnie looked down at her plastic Taser. It was not going to do the trick. She flipped the switch and turned off the magnet. Zach leaned down and grabbed not only his gun back, but the automatic rifle, as well.

  They were going to need each and every bullet in those guns.

  “Which way?” Ronnie asked.

  “Go out the way Zach came in, then take your first right.”

  They took off, heading in the direction Quirk had given.

  “No!” Quirk yelled. “Your other right!”

  Ronnie wasn’t sure what he meant until the
y ran through the next door to find a dozen men sitting around a table. Half of the men had a dragon tattooed on their neck. The Yakusa. They had stumbled onto the meeting.

  Another dozen guards stood guard along the periphery of the room.

  “Oh, shi—”

  Zach started to curse as Ronnie threw the switch and tossed the magnet onto the middle of the large round table.

  Bullets flew but, thank goodness, her magnet bent their trajectory away from Ronnie and Zach and toward their bosses. Screams filled the air as the henchmen mowed down their own employers.

  The guards nearest Zach and Ronnie were far enough away from the magnets to be able to turn their sights on the white intruders.

  Ronnie pulled a small device from her bag and threw it, hard, at the wall behind the men. It exploded with a loud bang and bright flash. Sparks twinkled in the air.

  “That was a pretty weak flash-bang grenade,” Zach noted.

  “Oh, it was never meant to deafen or blind,” Ronnie said. “It’s laced with LSD.”

  “What?” Zach exclaimed as he stared at the men, who had dropped their weapons and were now taking off their clothes. They certainly did seem to be tripping. So Ronnie had herself an LSD grenade. Good to know.

  “You’d better stop lollygagging,” Quirk said. “Those guards are still on their way.”

  “Which way?”

  “How about you tell Zach the directions this time,” Quirk countered.

  Yes, Ronnie was known to confuse her right from her left. “Will do.”

  “Take the hall to your left, then your first right.”

  Ronnie repeated the instructions.

  Zach grabbed her by the elbow and guided her away from the door she wanted to go through. “Left,” he repeated.

  Ronnie double-checked by starting the pledge of allegiance. Sure enough, Zach was correct. So left they went, then quickly took a right. The real right.

  “Quirk, is this the way to the server room?” Ronnie asked.

  * * *

  “No,” Quirk said, yelling over the sound of the rotors. “It is the way to the exit.”

  “I need to get to the server.”

  His boss could be a little tunnel-blind at times.