Free Wired by Liz Maverick

write?”
    â€œWell, yeah. Everything.”
I think
.
    â€œDid you back it up?”
    â€œNow that’s just insulting. Of course I backed it up. But my external hard drive and flash drives and all that stuff is gone too.”
    He swore, then raised his hand absently to the side of his face and stroked the stubble. “Anything else? Anything that struck you as odd?”
    â€œNo. Well, not here. But when I went to the agency to get my next project, they gave me an empty envelope. I guess someone took the stuff out before they gave it to me, but I don’t see how it could be Leonardo. He was talking to me at the time. I doubt he ever saw the envelope, much less took what was in it. How could he? But
you
could have seen what was in it. Maybe
you
took it.”
    Mason swore again. Then we stood there for what must have been several minutes while he alternately stared off into space and checked his cell phone. “I guess a fast-forward. But then . . . ,” he muttered cryptically. “Then if he had it, it would all be over. Right.”
    The oddness of the sentence pulled everything back into focus. “What did you just say?”
    â€œJust trying to put the pieces together.” He let out a big breath of air.
    I couldn’t hide the tremor in my voice when I asked, “You said something. You said ‘If he had it, it would all be over.’ ”
    Mason sighed. “He thought maybe you’d written the code by now. He stole your computer to look for it, but if he’d found it, we would know because then he would have it and this would all be over. But it’s not. And Leo’s not going to stop trying until he gets what he wants.”
    My head was spinning. “Well, that’s ridiculous. He knows I haven’t written the code. He said so. Why would he suddenly think I have it now unless this is the future you said he wanted?” I said sarcastically. “Enough with this crap already. What’s going on?”
    â€œI don’t want you to freak out, is the thing.”
    â€œIt’s a little late for that. Give me an explanation for what you claim Leo has done that I can make sense of.”
    He tugged at his earlobe, and then said, “You know at a club, when they scratch a record backwards and forwards but it’s always continuing on to the end of the song?”
    â€œYeah?”
    â€œYeah. Think of it like that.”
    I stared at him in disbelief. It wasn’t really an explanation. He was making fun of me. He had to be. But I had a weird feeling like I almost understood. If I opened my mind like he asked me to . . .
    The gun was there; the gun wasn’t there. Theagency was in one place; then it didn’t exist in that spot. Backwards and forwards . . . 
Ridiculous
. Ridiculous.
This is Mason Merrick, the same Mason Merrick you knew before. He says things like this. He does things like this. And like he said, you used to like it. Part of you still does, but what he’s suggesting is just too much
.
    â€œSo, can I come in now?” Mason asked. “I’d like to see his handiwork.” He gestured behind me to the inside of my house.
    I didn’t budge, though part of me wanted to despite everything. He couldn’t have known how close I was to letting him in this time. But whether all of this was one of Mason’s games or not, it was being played with real weapons, and that wasn’t something I could just laugh away.
    â€œOkay, fine,” he said tightly, making it clear that it wasn’t. “We’ll just continue talking here in the doorway. Wouldn’t want to sit down and make ourselves comfortable or anything while we talk.”
    â€œNo. No, we wouldn’t,” I said, not giving an inch.
    Our standoff lasted another few seconds; then Mason finally said, “Jesus, I should have known when you went all aggro on me earlier. He got to you and told you a