The Devil's Daughter

ELLE

I hold my middle finger up in front of the camera a second longer. I hope that gets through to them.

The last thing I do is slowly peel off each of the strips of tape covering my nipples, then I walk to the camera and slap the whole sticky wad over the lens.

I throw on a comfy T-shirt and crawl back onto my bed to get to work digging around in Drake’s network again. I haven’t had any luck, but there’s a lot more to search through. The folder the cameras upload their recordings to is just sitting there, taunting me. Do I dare? They’re invading my privacy, but do I really want to stoop that low?

Maybe just this once. It’s only fair. I search for the folder that matches the ID on the camera hidden in Drake’s bedroom, then click to open it.

I have to admit, the striptease was fun. It made me feel powerful to think the guys might be watching, maybe even hoping to see more. Whether or not they even care about what I look like naked, I have no clue. Baz and Ben act like brothers, for the most part. Drake…I don’t know how to categorize how he treats me. He’s more than a boss, but less than a friend, so if he was on the other end…

Well, he can’t fire me, at least.

I grimace inwardly at that thought. I don’t like the person I’m becoming after all these mind-boggling changes in my life. I’m not mean by nature; I care about the people I’m close to. I just get so antsy being cooped up for too long and my aggravation manifests in not-so-nice ways. I’m allowed to be angry at my circumstances, aren’t I? At knowing so little about the two men who are dictating my life right now?

But acting out isn’t cool. If the only way to get what I need to stay sane is to act like an entitled brat, then maybe I need to make an effort to be more creative. Having a little more information at my disposal would certainly help, though.

Clicking into the folder, I find multiple gigs of footage and don’t know where to start, so I click the first. It’s just a fifteen-second shot of Drake entering the room, walking to his bedside table to pick something up, then leaving again. A few seconds after he disappears, the video ends.

The next one is something equally benign. Then there’s one that shows him enter, start undressing, and then wander into his closet. When he emerges, he’s in flannel shorts and a white T-shirt. Meh, not even a dick shot.

He disappears into the bathroom, and I fast-forward to him emerging. Then he crawls into bed and turns out the light. A few seconds later, the recording ends.

Boring, but it seems the cameras are motion-activated, so he should be present in all the shots. Hmm, I wonder where the feed showing his bathroom is.

I click back out, referring to the live feed for the codes each room is tagged with. A few of the views that were live before have disappeared, probably because they’re not actively recording if there’s been no activity for a minute or so. I know Baz and Ben do a check of every door and window whenever we enter the penthouse, so that explains why I could see so many more rooms earlier. But the twins’ rooms are still there, so I make note of the code for each one, then watch for a moment. Baz is seated at the desk in one corner of his room, talking on the phone while he stares at his laptop, clicking with his mouse.

Ben is doing pull-ups from a bar he installed in his bathroom doorway. Doesn’t he know Drake has a full gym right down the hall?

But as I watch the pair, it hits me how off this all is. Why would they put such invasive tech in their own rooms if all they cared about was watching over me?

A chill creeps in at that revelation, and I’m staring at the screen with an increasing sense of dread when a sudden barrage of heavy footsteps thunders down the hall, followed by banging on my door that startles me so much I squeak.

“Elle! You need to stop what you’re doing! That camera’s not what you think! Unlock the door!”

It’s Drake, which means he must have seen the video.

I scramble up and run to the door, propelled by my realization, though I’m not sure what to say or even how to face him. What the fuck was I thinking?

When I open the door, he shoves in without a word. The big blob of tape I stuck to the camera is plain as day, but rather than grab the camera, he rips the whole thermostat assembly off the wall, leaving loose wires hanging in its place.

Baz and Ben step in right behind him, looking alarmed.

“What the hell?” Ben says.

“It’s a fucking camera!”

“Wait!” Baz grabs Drake’s arm just as he drops the offending contraption to the floor and lifts his foot to grind it under his heel. “Don’t destroy it! We can use it to figure out who put it here in the first place.”

“So it wasn’t you?” Drake asks, his face red with rage, though he steps back and lets Baz bend to retrieve the busted bundle of wires and plastic.

Baz blinks. “Fuck no! I’m not some kind of peeping tom perv.”

“How did you know it was here?” Ben challenges.

“Oh my god. Please tell me it was one of you that put it there,” I say, even though I’ve already concluded that it isn’t and their exchange only confirms it.

All three of them turn to me. I’ve dropped back down to the edge of the bed, too terrified to stand. I feel ill, not because of my stupid dance, but because it likely reached a very unintended audience.

“Why would you think that?” Baz asks, sounding hurt.

“Because it’s your job?”

“Ellie, keeping you safe doesn’t require spying on you. I can’t believe you’d think that.”

I cast one last hopeful glance at Ben, who holds up his hands and shakes his head. “It wasn’t me, either.” He spears Drake with a hard look. “But you haven’t answered my question. How the fuck did you figure out it was here when her door was fucking locked?”

“You were watching, weren’t you?” I ask. “But I don’t understand. If you knew, why wait to take it out now? It’s been there since I moved in, I think. Longer, even. They’re all over the penthouse. There’s one in my bathroom too.”

Drake winces. “I was, ah, just checking in on your work. You’re using a Typhon laptop. I have software installed on all the Typhon machines that lets me track employee activity. I didn’t have access to those cameras, though. I only saw what I did because that’s what you were looking at.” He gestures at my forgotten laptop.

Baz strides over and grabs it, turning it to peer at the screen. “You hacked the security feed. But that’s not all you tapped into here. What the fuck is all this?”

“You were spying on my work?” I ask Drake, baffled and a little hurt that he’d be monitoring my job performance in some way. I should probably care more about him watching me undress, but I don’t.

“Don’t fucking start,” he snaps. “You hacked my whole goddamn network and were digging for dirt on ~me~. I don’t know what that little striptease was meant to accomplish, though.” He waves a hand at my body. His gaze sweeps down the length of me, and I’m suddenly painfully aware of the fact that I’m not wearing pants.

I blink and open my mouth, but can’t find an appropriate response. He has me dead to rights, but I still feel like I’m the one who should be pissed.

There’s a more pressing concern here, though. Glancing between him and the twins, I say, “Are you guys even paying attention? If none of you were watching, who was?”

“Oh, he was definitely watching,” Ben says, rounding on Drake and baring his teeth. “Weren’t you? Why else would you show up to her door with a fucking boner? Doesn’t fucking matter what she was doing in her own room, pendejo—it’s what ~you~ did that matters. I don’t care who put it there, ~you~ watched. You’re the guilty one.”

My attention darts back to Drake, my eyes wide. I can’t help but drop my gaze to peek at his groin, but there’s nothing particularly lewd going on. The man is packing, though. It was as evident in the camera shot I saw earlier as it is now.

“Jesus, okay. I watched, but I wasn’t looking for the fucking camera feed. I saw it because it was on her screen. Can we just focus on the fact that this place is riddled with surveillance ~none of us~ knew about?”

“We’ll take care of it,” Baz says. “Ben, chill out and go get the signal scanners. Elle, do you know where the one in the bathroom is?”

I nod and shoot Drake a glare just on principle before turning to walk toward the bathroom. Not only did he watch, it also turned him on, if what Ben says is true, and when I glance at the mirror through the bathroom door, it’s obvious his eyes are fixed on my ass in my skimpy pink boy shorts.

I don’t have time to decide whether I like the look in his eyes or not, because he only has a split-second to enjoy the view before Ben’s fist connects with his jaw and he hits the ground.