Cyber Rogues Read Online Free PDF

muttered irritably. “I’ve got a lot to do today. That’s one thing I could do without.”
    “Oh dear.” Chris picked up Ron’s coffee and began moving away toward their office. “I think I ought to go and see how Ron’s been getting on. See you later.”
    Dyer continued to fume while Betty turned her attention to returning various documents to the file drawer by her desk. A few seconds later Ron’s voice rose from the other side of the still open doorway.
    “We’re gonna have to change the whole structure of the default linkages. I still say they’re all screwed up.”
    “They’re not screwed up,” Chris’s voice sighed with infinite patience. “Did you extend the frame-matching algorithm.”
    “It doesn’t need to be extended. I keep telling ya that—”
    “Shut up for a second, Ron. What test limits did you set on the I-sub-D parameter?”
    “I-sub-D had nothing to do with it. I-sub—”
    “It has too got something to do with it. In fact, if you’d only stop for a second to think about it . . .”
    “It has not! I-sub—”
    “Shut up, please.”
    “I-sub-D only affects the—”
    “SHUT UP, RON!”
    Dyer sighed. Despite their diametrically opposed natures, Chris and Ron were inseparable. That meant they would go on like that all day. Still irritable, Dyer frowned at the unoccupied desk standing opposite Betty’s on the other side of the doorway that led out to the corridor.
    “Where’s Pattie?” he asked. “I thought she was on early-start this week?” Betty sensed his mood and made a face.
    “Usual thing I guess,” she replied in guarded tones. “You know how kids are—especially Pattie.” Without being asked she went on, “Do you want to talk to her about it or shall I?”
    “She’s your assistant,” Dyer said. “See what you can do. If that doesn’t work I’ll talk to her.”
    “Okay. Oh, Kim wanted to talk to you as well. She’s over in Services but she said she’ll be in around ten. I said I thought it’d be okay. She said it was personal.”
    “What time’s that Fenning woman showing up?” Dyer asked,
    “The message didn’t say.”
    “Personal. Oh God.” Already it had been a long day. Dyer opened the door into his office. “Okay, I’ll be in all morning. I’ve got a report to check over. Tell whoever shows up first to come on in.”
    “Will do,” Betty acknowledged.
    He sat down at his desk, activated a voice channel on his own console and tapped his personal access code into the touchpad.
    “Active,” a synthetic voice informed him from the audio grille.
    “Data bank,” he replied. “Reports reference HESPER slash S.A.P. slash Stokes two-zero-nine slash D dot seven. Video only.” The screen presented him with the machine’s interpretation.
    “Confirmed,” he said. A few seconds went by while computers elsewhere in the building relayed his request across the city to the local primary node of the North East Sector of the North American Region of the TITAN network.
    “Females!” he muttered.
    “Excuse me?” the console inquired politely.
    He sighed.
    “Delete.”
    “Deleted,” the console advised.
    Machines! he thought to himself.

CHAPTER TWO

    “Okay, Ray. We agree on that one.” Kimberly Sinclair checked off an item from the list glowing on the view-pad balanced on her knee, and paused for a second to consider the next.
    As he waited with his chin propped on the ball of his thumb, Dyer studied the soft cascade of fair-brown hair tumbling around her shoulders and the interesting undulations that pressed outward against the jacket and skirt of her expensively tailored pale-blue suit. The lines of her face were straight and firm, but rounded just sufficiently not to appear harsh. One of those fascinating women who exuded sexuality without in any way qualifying as beautiful, he thought. For an instant he felt a pang of envy for her lawyer husband, Tony, who seemed to spend most of his life airborne between one city and another. On second