“I need to go check the cameras. Ever since one of our watering troughs was poisoned, I’ve been monitoring them.” He pointed to a short stand nearby with a trail camera.
I studied it, noting it was top-of-the-line equipment. Almost military grade. “You know who’s responsible, though, right? Vince?”
His lips thinned. “Yes, but he’s been paying people to mess with us. If he hired someone else, I want to know who.”
“Why is he doing this? What turned him against you?” I didn’t expect an answer, but I needed to ask.
He grabbed his horse’s reins, and his shoulders rose and fell. “He has his reasons. And if it were just me he was targeting, I might give him a pass. But he crossed the line by messing with my family.”
Mason swung up into the saddle. The set of his jaw told me he would say no more. I mounted Ginger, and we quickly moved to a jog, not taking time to appreciate the beauty surrounding us like we had on the ride here.
When we reached the barn, he called out to his brother, Ethan. “Can you take care of the horses? Someone tampered with the trough in the west pasture. I need to check the cameras.”
Ethan’s welcoming smile disappeared at Mason’s words. “Of course. Tell me what you find.”
“I’ll update the group chat as soon as I see something.” Mason’s long legs ate up the ground between the barn and his workshop, forcing me to jog to keep up with him. Once inside, he headed straight for the back wall, where a desk full of monitors sat. The screens rotated through different views of the ranch.
“What the… you’ve got the entire place under surveillance.”
“Not quite.” He powered up the computer monitor on the desk and pulled up a specific camera feed. “The ranch is too big to fully cover, unfortunately.”
“Isn’t this overkill?”
“No, Vince still gets past them. I keep hoping someone he hires will get caught on video, but he tells them where the cameras are pointed. They deliberately keep their faces turned away.” His frustration overflowed, and he kept talking. “This plays right into his specialty in the military. I try to circulate the feeds, but he always seems to know when they move.”
“Could he have gotten into your system?” I bit my lip, fingers itching to hop on the keyboard and check. I may not have finished my degree, but I still kept up with the field.
“It’s possible. I have top-of-the-line security software, but he’s an expert.” He cursed when he forwarded the video, pausing when it went dark. He backed the feed up, advancing frame by frame as something was dropped over the lens. A few minutes later, the obstruction was removed.
“You need cameras that spin.” I tapped my toe, holding myself back from shoving him out of the way so I could check his system.
“None of the trail cameras I can get my hands on are capable of that.” His voice was grim.
“Can I—” I cut myself off, not wanting to overstep. But if we figured out how Vince learned the camera positions, it would only help them. “Let me check your system. Maybe I can see if he’s breached your security software.”
He huffed. “Right. You got your degree in computer science. Aaron always bragged about how you were a whiz with computers.”
“Never finished my degree.” I nudged him out of the chair and slid onto the warm seat, almost gasping at our first contact of skin on skin. It was just a nudge, a light push to get him to move, but it still sent my pulse racing. I licked my dry lips, forcing myself to focus on the screen in front of me. This was neither the time nor the person to be experiencing attraction with.
My fingers flew over the keyboard as I checked the various systems. At first, I didn’t notice anything. The system was clean. Almost too clean…
Finally, I found it. An admin login from outside the ranch in the early hours of the morning, followed by the deletion of security logs. “You ever access the system off-site?”
“Never.”
“Someone’s been in at least once. Scanning for more missing logs… yep. There it is.” I pointed to the screen, showing him several stretches with no security logs. “Your system runs constant checks—curious where you got the software; this definitely isn’t commercial—but there are gaps every night shortly after you log out. He may have installed something to alert him when you’re offline. That will take longer to find.”
“That’s enough for now. I don’t want him to know we know. Might be able to use it against him.” Mason crossed his arms, eyes narrowed at the screen.
“Let me install a bug. Something to track where he’s logging in from.” I started typing again. “He’s routed himself through a series of VPNs, but give my program enough time, and it will find him.”
“Why didn’t you finish?”
“Huh?” I was only half-listening as I entered code.
“Your degree. Aaron said it was your dream.” He frowned at me.
“Oh. After Aaron died, I needed answers, and the only information I had was your name and Vince’s in an email. So, I got a job working for a private investigator and had him train me. It’s taken me this long to finally track you two down.”
