Read Online Her Perfect Game by Shannyn Schroeder - Free Book Online Page B

trail that had been deleted that showed Maverick had been there and then exited without leaving his mark. There was no reason to do that unless you didn’t want people to know you’d arrived.
    Carl straightened. “Maverick.” Everyone shifted as Charlie reentered the room. “Are you really going to make me pull registration to match names with ID? Grow the hell up.”
    A guy in the corner shoved away from the table. “I’m Maverick.”
    Carl tilted his head to get Maverick to come forward.
    â€œScrew this.” Maverick grabbed his laptop and stormed out, not even waiting to hear the accusation.
    Carl took a deep breath and said to Poison, “I’m not sure how to make this fair for you.”
    â€œDon’t worry about me. As long as no one else fucks with me, I’ll smoke everyone in the room.”
    When everyone quieted, Jonah stood. “I hope that’s the last problem we run into. You guys have to realize that there’s more to this competition than the prize money and ticket to Def Con. There are companies here looking for people like you. We want to hire brilliant thinkers. Not cheaters.”
    He walked away, disappointed because Maverick had been on his list of people to check out. Carl reclaimed his spot at the front of the room and announced time for players to restart. When they were all attacking their laptops, Carl wandered around before making his way back to Jonah.
    When he was close, Jonah whispered, “Who gave you the tip?”
    Carl looked over his shoulder. “The blonde. She sat there for five minutes, and you could tell something was poking her. I thought maybe she was the guilty one until she tucked that paper in my hand. Even then, I thought maybe she was trying to throw you off her trail.”
    The energy of the room buzzed. The sugar- and caffeine-fueled participants continued on their quest, but they were somber, like they just realized the rules were there for a purpose. Some stole glances at him, probably wondering who he was.
    Not Charlie. She tapped away at keys, and he itched to check to see how far along she was. He couldn’t wait until after this challenge. He wanted to know how she knew Maverick was guilty. She hadn’t been sitting by him, so she couldn’t have watched.
    Because of the level of difficulty in this challenge, people stayed put when they finished. They needed to make sure they hadn’t taken a wrong turn. Carl had also told them that the last challenge was going to be different and they needed to hang around for directions. Carl and Jonah hunkered down to check paths and code as people declared they’d reached the end.
    Charlie was the third to finish. Jonah made sure that Carl checked her. Although he wouldn’t cheat for her, he didn’t want to take any chances with someone accusing him of letting her win. After they checked everything and announced the top ten finalists, the losers left.
    Carl stood. “Tomorrow night, plan for what might be an all-nighter. You’ll need a partner because we’ll be doing a capture the flag.”
    All ten hackers started mumbling, but Poison spoke up first. “What does that mean for the prize money and the Def Con registration?”
    Carl smiled. “Glad you asked. We’ve got a second registration set, but you’ll have to split the prize money. Still not a bad deal.”
    â€œWhat if we prefer to work alone?”
    â€œThe sponsors want to see how everyone works as part of a team.” Carl didn’t expand on that explanation, but Jonah could see that a few guys were not pleased by the prospect.
    Jonah could’ve called it. Poison was a lone wolf. He wanted to do his own thing and not have to answer to anyone. He was skilled, Jonah would give him that, but he was arrogant.
    The players all started looking around sizing each other up more than they had upon entering the room for the past two nights.
    â€œYou have