Holly smiled at Marissa. "I feel like we haven't been formally introduced. I'm Holly Barrett, Elijah's wife."
"And the Vice President of the Barrett Corporation. I know who you are. I appreciate the work you do in Africa."
Marissa flashed the woman a genuine smile. She may not always get along with other women, but she knew a bad ass when she saw one and Holly Barrett was a definite bad ass.
When Garrett and Holly were gone, Lance gave her a lopsided smile. "I think you might be on to something with Isabelle's application. I want to look at every application that came in between when she applied and when it was speculated in New York that Austin was a member of the club. The media never verified anything, so we figured that was just reporters speculating because of her connection to Hunter. Now I'm wondering if it was some kind of warning shot."
"On it. That's about a four-month window, right?"
Lance clicked a few keys. "Looks like fourteen weeks to be exact."
"Remember that time we broke into the Cook County health and human services website to get that group of homeless people into low-income housing?"
Lance winced. "I try not to think about the horribly illegal things I did when we were young."
"Hey, I don't care for the implication that I'm not young anymore."
Lance smirked. "Yes. I remember. What's the point?"
"First of all, we always had the hottest sex after we did something like that. Second of all, think about how we did that. We basically planted an auto-bot into their application code and had all of the people we were trying to help fill out their applications."
"OK. I'm still not following."
"I'm just saying, someone could have done something similar with your application code but with more nefarious purposes at heart. Looking for a RAT is one thing, but I can't find one. You know I'm the best at sniffing out RATS."
"Rats?" Marissa and Lance turned to find Isabelle standing in the door.
"Remote Access Tool," Lance said.
"How are you doing, sweetie?"
She smiled. "I'm better now that Master is here. Thank you for rescuing me."
Marissa watched Lance as he talked to the girl. There were definitely no romantic feelings between them, but Lance cared for her as he might a sister. It was sweet.
"I'll always be there for you. Try not to worry too much. We're going to do our best to figure this out and you know everyone around here loves you and we'll keep you and your family safe."
Isabelle came fully into the room to stand next to Lance's chair where she bent and kissed his cheek. "Thank you, Master Lance. Do you want me to set up a cabin for our guest or will you put her in your suite?"
Marissa knew she was the guest Isabelle referred to.
"Please don't go to too much trouble for me. I'm capable of crashing just about anywhere."
Isabelle smiled. "It's no trouble. We've got the space."
"Put her in my suite for now. I'll crash in a cabin or I'll stay at the Glenview."
Isabelle nodded and went in search of Garrett and Holly.
"Speaking of this weekend," Lance said when she was gone. Marissa watched as he closed the laptop and shoved it to the side—a sign he was about to get serious.
"I'm listening," Marissa said.
"We don't want to tell the general membership what you're doing here so tonight, you'll be here as my guest."
Marissa nodded. She already knew that.
He cleared his throat. "What is it?" she prompted.
