Free The Last Minute by Jeff Abbott Page A

– he was a hacker and a scumball and he’d been murdered.
     He searched the rest of the room. Nothing electronic remained. He saw no papers, no records. The room had been picked clean
     except for Nic’s computer books.
    No sign of a notebook. He didn’t even know how big it was, which could affect where it was hidden.
    He checked the room a final time, being extra careful, and then went back to the old woman’s bedroom. She was snoring now.
    He sat on the edge of the bed and shook her awake. He thought she would scream in horror at a stranger in her room. Her eyes
     stared at him, muddled, then widened in fear. ‘Who … Get away from me.’
    ‘I won’t hurt you. I’m a friend of Nic’s.’
    ‘Friend of Nic’s.’ She spat at him, made her face a scowl.
    ‘I am. He gave me a job.’
    She stared at him. ‘Get out of my house.’
    He pointed to the healing wound on his neck. ‘The people who killed your son did that to me. I want to make them pay.’ He
     tried to smile. What did you say in a situation like this? ‘I am his friend, I promise you.’
    ‘His friends got him killed. And now the police, they say all these lies about my Nic. That he did terrible things.’
    ‘Mrs ten Boom, please, let me help you.’ He got up and jetted water into a clean glass and brought it to her. She drank it
     down and then she glanced at the vodka bottle. Uncertain, he poured a tiny bit into the glass. She took a tiny sip, as though
     embarrassed, and then looked at him with sullen eyes.
    ‘I’ll leave you alone,’ Jack said, ‘but I know of a way to get back at the people who hurt Nic.’ Like avenging Nic was hismotive. Lying to a grieving mother. Gosh, he was so proud of himself these days. A slow throb of headache began to pulse in
     his temples. He looked at the vodka glass instead of her, which was fine as she was looking at the vodka as well.
    ‘How?’
    ‘Nic was researching the bad people who led him astray. He learned their secrets. I helped him a bit, but I don’t know where
     he would have hidden the information.’
    ‘He kept everything on computers. I don’t even know how to work one. I don’t like them.’ She flapped her hands, as if computers
     were gnats floating near her face. Her voice turned a bit petulant.
    ‘It’s a notebook. With printouts in it from the computer. Where would he keep it?’
    Her gaze went sly. ‘How do I know you’re not a cop, or one of the people who hurt Nic?’
    ‘If I was a cop, I’d arrest you and take you down to the station,’ Jack said. ‘If I was your enemy, I would not pour you vodka.’
    ‘You waited a long time to come.’
    ‘The people who shot me killed Nic,’ he said. ‘I just got out of the hospital. You see the news last night?’
    ‘Yes.’ She blinked at him and then sipped the vodka as though it would sharpen her recollections rather than dull them. And
     maybe, Jack thought, they would. ‘Yes. I remember you. Nic’s friend. At the coffee shop. The smart boy from Hong Kong.’
    ‘Yes, ma’am.’
    ‘Yes. All right. Give me some more.’
    He dribbled more vodka into the glass, feeling guilty with each chug of the clear liquid. No vodka like morning vodka, he
     thought. She drank it down, wiped her mouth with anage-spotted hand. ‘I can’t help you. The police came. They took all the computers. They said there were dirty pictures on
     them, and they said Nicky had hacked into the police’s own computers.’ She threw up her hands. ‘He’s dead. No one cares about
     his reputation any more except me.’
    ‘Well, I do. Do you remember him having a notebook, maybe one that he would have hidden?’
    She blinked, considered, drank more of the vodka. These seemed new questions to her, Jack thought, ones the police hadn’t
     asked.
    He poured another few fingers of vodka into the glass. ‘This notebook will protect you and it will protect me. Think.’
    ‘But you know him and his computers. He did everything on them.’ She blinked