Read Online Active Shooter by Eduardo Suastegui - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Eduardo Suastegui
Ads: Link
linger and drift in the
space between us before she punctuated it with, “Don’t get entangled. ”
“She's not my brand. Is that it?” I fought to
seem nonchalant.
“Something like that. Listen, Andre. We
haven't known each other for long, but I can read you well enough.
You're a troubled soul. That's alright. Most artists are,
especially the good ones. You just have to channel that trouble.
You point it like a laser, OK? You must focus it into your art, and
nothing else. Whatever's going on here, with you, with her and
whatever else, don't let it pull you away from your art.”
We stared at each other for few moments that
felt like an hour.
“Am I getting through here? Am I making
sense?” she asked.
I had to look away, through the kitchen
window and out into the night. Yeah, she'd gotten through, mostly
because she'd said something I knew all along.
Chapter 8
Back at my apartment, Bridget more or less
ran to her laptop the second I unlocked the front door. She didn't
say why, and I didn't ask. This time, though, I did go to her and
stood over her shoulder. She didn't seem to mind.
She brought up a command window and typed a
few commands. It took me a minute to decipher what she was doing. I
stopped breathing when I did. She was running a utility to see
whether anyone had accessed her computer while we were gone.
Another minute passed, and she pointed at the screen and the
warning message flagging that a keyboard monitoring app had been
installed. She typed another command, followed by another, followed
by a third, which in turn executed a batched set of commands.
When that concluded, a message appeared
confirming the offending app had gone into quarantine. She ran a
quick diagnostic and flashed me a thumbs-up when it came up with a
all-clear indication.
Still staring at the screen, Bridget
grinned.
She switched windows to bring up a browser.
Within it, she reviewed the Twitter stream for her news network.
She stopped at two identical entries about a train derailment. With
her index finger, she wagged back and forward between the two
items, then nodded. It took me a few seconds to notice what she
saw. A one character difference, X instead of H, in the hyperlink
each of the Twitter messages listed.
Bridget looked up at me with a grin. “See
that?”
“Yeah, interesting story.” I said that as my
mind guessed at what that one character difference meant. An
encoded something, from the way she reacted. Confirmation of
whatever she was expecting to learn, maybe about meeting with her
source?
She went back to the command screen and
unleashed a flurry of keystrokes, the grand total of which read, “I
feel like one of Goldilocks' bears. Question is, which one should I
be?”
I read it in silence. Once I nodded, she
back-spaced to erase her one-on-one text message.
She then reached into her purse and took out
a device I recognized. It took all manner of self-restrain not to
ask her where she'd gotten it.
Bridget turned it on and frowned at it until
a green light came on. She then began to walk around my apartment.
The device's green light turned red once by my TV, and twice in my
small kitchen, by the microwave and across the way by the stove. It
lit up three times in my bedroom and twice in the other bedroom I
used for my office. We went into the bathroom last, where there
wasn't much room for concealment. The device lit up once when
Bridget brought it to the toilet.
She reached behind the tank, felt for it, and
pulled it out: a small putty-looking black thing with a translucent
hair-like antenna hanging from it. With a grin, she held it out to
me in the palm of her hand.
I wanted to tell her we shouldn't destroy it.
To do so would alert whomever had installed it that we were onto
them, and that we were taking evasive measures, something that
might drive them to make a move on us.
“We really must talk about your
house-keeping,” Bridget said. “The rest of the house is clean
enough, but this
space between us before she punctuated it with, “Don’t get entangled. ”
“She's not my brand. Is that it?” I fought to
seem nonchalant.
“Something like that. Listen, Andre. We
haven't known each other for long, but I can read you well enough.
You're a troubled soul. That's alright. Most artists are,
especially the good ones. You just have to channel that trouble.
You point it like a laser, OK? You must focus it into your art, and
nothing else. Whatever's going on here, with you, with her and
whatever else, don't let it pull you away from your art.”
We stared at each other for few moments that
felt like an hour.
“Am I getting through here? Am I making
sense?” she asked.
I had to look away, through the kitchen
window and out into the night. Yeah, she'd gotten through, mostly
because she'd said something I knew all along.
Chapter 8
Back at my apartment, Bridget more or less
ran to her laptop the second I unlocked the front door. She didn't
say why, and I didn't ask. This time, though, I did go to her and
stood over her shoulder. She didn't seem to mind.
She brought up a command window and typed a
few commands. It took me a minute to decipher what she was doing. I
stopped breathing when I did. She was running a utility to see
whether anyone had accessed her computer while we were gone.
Another minute passed, and she pointed at the screen and the
warning message flagging that a keyboard monitoring app had been
installed. She typed another command, followed by another, followed
by a third, which in turn executed a batched set of commands.
When that concluded, a message appeared
confirming the offending app had gone into quarantine. She ran a
quick diagnostic and flashed me a thumbs-up when it came up with a
all-clear indication.
Still staring at the screen, Bridget
grinned.
She switched windows to bring up a browser.
Within it, she reviewed the Twitter stream for her news network.
She stopped at two identical entries about a train derailment. With
her index finger, she wagged back and forward between the two
items, then nodded. It took me a few seconds to notice what she
saw. A one character difference, X instead of H, in the hyperlink
each of the Twitter messages listed.
Bridget looked up at me with a grin. “See
that?”
“Yeah, interesting story.” I said that as my
mind guessed at what that one character difference meant. An
encoded something, from the way she reacted. Confirmation of
whatever she was expecting to learn, maybe about meeting with her
source?
She went back to the command screen and
unleashed a flurry of keystrokes, the grand total of which read, “I
feel like one of Goldilocks' bears. Question is, which one should I
be?”
I read it in silence. Once I nodded, she
back-spaced to erase her one-on-one text message.
She then reached into her purse and took out
a device I recognized. It took all manner of self-restrain not to
ask her where she'd gotten it.
Bridget turned it on and frowned at it until
a green light came on. She then began to walk around my apartment.
The device's green light turned red once by my TV, and twice in my
small kitchen, by the microwave and across the way by the stove. It
lit up three times in my bedroom and twice in the other bedroom I
used for my office. We went into the bathroom last, where there
wasn't much room for concealment. The device lit up once when
Bridget brought it to the toilet.
She reached behind the tank, felt for it, and
pulled it out: a small putty-looking black thing with a translucent
hair-like antenna hanging from it. With a grin, she held it out to
me in the palm of her hand.
I wanted to tell her we shouldn't destroy it.
To do so would alert whomever had installed it that we were onto
them, and that we were taking evasive measures, something that
might drive them to make a move on us.
“We really must talk about your
house-keeping,” Bridget said. “The rest of the house is clean
enough, but this
Similar Books
