02/07/2019

Thank you guys so much for the reviews! I'm having a blast and you are giving me some great ideas from your comments. There may be a clue hidden in this chapter. Only the Plum elite may get it.

5 Days Earlier

Ranger dreamed he was falling. He was in complete and suffocating darkness. He desperately tried to grab onto something, anything, to stop him from falling, but there was nothing there. He was suddenly awake, heart pounding and breathless. "That's the third dream I've had like that this week", Ranger thought. He glanced at the clock – 4am. Might as well get up and get a workout in.

Ranger changed into workout gear and headed down to the gym. He worked out hard for a couple of hours and then headed upstairs to shower and start his day. He was just finishing his breakfast of a bagel, low fat cream cheese, and smoked salmon, when he got a call from the control center.

"SE Corp just had a break-in," Tank said. "We've got a car in route, but I thought you'd want to know." "I'm on my way," Ranger said. Oh great. SE Corp was probably the most important client in Rangeman's book of business. They were also probably the most difficult. They paid top dollar for top dollar security, and it was not going to be fun to deal with this first thing in the morning. Ranger grabbed his keys to his Porsche Cayenne and rode the elevator down to the garage. He remoted open his car and put his foot to the floor as he headed across town.

SE Corp was located in an up-and-coming neighborhood just west of downtown Trenton. Specializing in wealth management services for clients with a net worth of $100 million and up, the company had good reason to want to protect its assets. The building was outfitted with the latest and greatest security system on the outside, and the computers were protected with a combination of physical and software barriers. Rangeman installed and monitored everything, and Ranger personally custom outfitted and designed the system. So it was equal parts embarrassment and frustration that the system he designed was compromised.

Ranger rolled into the lot and parked next to a Rangeman fleet car. He spotted Hal, who quickly strode over. "What do we know?" Ranger asked. "The power went out around 4am this morning" Hal said. "It was a scheduled disruption because the power company is working on some lines down the street." "We had them on battery backup, and a patrol car was checking on things every hour. Sometime between the 4:30 and 5:30 patrol, the control center realized that one of the computer terminals was not responsive. We sent a car to check right away and discovered the break-in. It's bad, Ranger," Hal said. "We think they were able to copy most of their clients' records, bank account numbers, and who knows what else. We still don't know how they accessed the building, no doors and windows were compromised."

Ranger felt sick. He was normally the calm one, but he felt the urge to dry heave as he saw the CEO, Mick Lucheck, headed Ranger's way. "Mr Lucheck," Ranger said. "I assure you we are making every effort to get to the bottom of what happened." "At this point, Manoso," Lucheck said, "it isn't really important HOW it happened, is it? You need to spend every waking minute figuring out WHO did this and I want names, I want bodies, I want heads on a platter! Someone is going to pay for this and it's either going to be the ones who did it or you. I trusted you when you said you were the best in the business! You have NO IDEA how far some of my clients would go if they knew about this," Lucheck said. "And I will be the first to throw your name to the wolves if you don't make this go away."

"I assure you I will get to the bottom of this," Ranger said. "You have my word." "Your word is worth about as much as your security system right now," Lucheck said. "Show me results – and fast – for both our sakes."

Ranger jogged to his car and dialed Tank. "My office, 15 minutes. We are in deep shit."