True Love Waits

The IT director answered in a trembling voice, "Mr. Huo, we've never seen this sort of infection before. It changes every time it hops from one computer to the next. It moves code blocks out of the way, inserts itself, regenerates code and data references, including relocation information, and rebuilds the executable. It's different every time, so established pattern definitions don't defend against it. What's more, we jus can't keep up with it, since it replicates at an alarming rate..."

"Oh, is that so? Then you're all fired. Start looking for other jobs. We'll contract out for IT!" Carlos hung up the phone furiously.

Star Anise's message popped up on Carlos' computer screen again. "Mr. Huo, what's your decision?"

"One billion!" Carlos replied decisively.

"Deal." Star Anise added, "It's what I'd expected you'd offer anyway. So I was prepared to accept it. Perfect!"

Carlos' face completely darkened. If he could find out who the hacker was, he would skin him alive to vent his anger!

Carlos had thought he could track down who Star Anise was by investigating the bank account, but Dixon told him it was a dummy account. It had been shut down as soon as the hacker received the money. He did leave them a group of numbers, which also couldn't be traced. It was for tech support and service.

Carlos wondered if he'd been tricked, but all the computers returned to normal. There was no sign of the virus that had infected them. Not only that, cloud backups were operating normally.

Successfully going through the employee recognition system at the ZL Group's parking lot, Sheffield drove inside and parked his car at a particular spot. Then, he went straight to the floor where Evelyn's office

was.

This time, besides Nadia, there were two more people working as secretaries. Nadia was the first one to spot Sheffield. She stood up and greeted him. "Good morning, Mr. Tang."

"Hello! Your boss in? I have something for her." Sheffield shook the paper bag in his hand. "I know I normally let you have first dibs, but this is Evelyn's favorite food."

Nadia smiled. "Thanks, Mr. Tang. But, our CEO is busy right now..." She forgot to explain the CEO inside the office wasn't the one he wanted to see.

disturb your boss. I just came here to give her something and I'll leave. Don't let me disturb you.

secretaries whispered to Nadia, "Miss Hua, who is that

himself? How did he get in here? Does he work for

either. With a slight smile,

"Oh. Of course."

Sheffield even pushed open the door to Evelyn's office, he sang in a chirpy voice, "Eve, Eve, my dear Eve..." The door was pushed

few steps and closed the door. He groaned

office was none other than his future father-in-law, the guy he'd been

change tactics,'

his clothes, smoothed his hair and opened the

anything, his eyes met the old man's sharp, ice-cold eyes. In a panic, he called

addressed him, Carlos raised his

Wait, wait... Can we

face. The doctor dodged and ran toward the spacious room

was when he found

required a passcode to open it. The old man was going to catch a

ran to hide behind the couch. Carlos took off his suit jacket and approached the doctor, slowly, deliberately-one step at a time. "Um...Mr. Huo, can't we talk this out? Please calm down." "Where's Evelyn? Where's my Evelyn?'

jacket over the

jumped over it to dodge the attack. "Look, I know you don't want me to be with Evelyn. You don't have to punch me to make that sink in. Let's just try and talk about this like grown men. Think, man! Do you

after Sheffield as fast as he could; he didn't look

Carlos had caught up to him. Left with no choice, he

for a while in the office, but Sheffield still hadn't figured out how to get out. At last, Sheffield had one last trick up his sleeve. He simply tapped in one set of passwords and unlocked it. Not knowing if he had restored the factory setting of the lock or had cracked the password, anyway, the door opened. However, the high-tech lock in Evelyn's office, the one worth hundreds of thousands of

young man just escaped under his nose. In an instant, he ran out of the office to chase the guy,