Bad Nerd Falling Read Online Free Page A

use the word
little, because Vlad had never been small, made peace with himself
through the years. Even looking for it, he almost missed the
amiable side of Vlad. That lethal edge was still there, only it
appeared to have been honed to precision sharpness. And it outshone
the friendlier facet to the extent one could quite easily miss the
more sociable part.
    He was happy Emerson got stuck vetting
Vlad before him and Maks. Emerson was the nicest of the three of
them. He tended to take people at face value before he dug deeper.
One trait Emerson had in abundance was the ability to read people.
He was also a great judge of character.
    He sincerely hoped that Vlad was on
their side.
    And why did Helena like scary,
dangerous men?
    Vlad stopped in front of his desk. He
didn’t look sheepish or uncomfortable. Instead he looked like a man
on a mission.
    “ What can I do for you?”
Aleksi wished Emerson had stayed.
    Vlad reached into his pocket. “Your
father wanted me to give you this.” He appreciated when Vlad
stopped, his hand curling for a moment, and then swallowed hard
before handing over a small, rectangular item. “In the event he
wasn’t here.” His voice sounded thick.
    “ Thank you.” He accepted
the object. “It’s a USB drive.”
    “ Yes.”
    “ What’s on it?”
    “ I don’t know. He just
asked me to give you this if he wasn’t here.”
    “ No
instructions?”
    Vlad shook his head. “He must have
assumed you would know what to do with it.”
    “ Do you have any ideas?”
He raised the drive to peer at it.
    “ I imagine it’ll tell you
what to expect in the event of a terrorist attack.”
    Certain he wasn’t going to get more
info out of Vlad, he nodded. “Fair enough. Admiral O’Riley warned
me to not assume terrorists weren’t interested in us.”
    “ Don’t assume that,” Vlad
agreed. “O’Riley knows what he’s talking about.”
    “ You know Admiral
O’Riley?”
    “ Took some training with
him.” Vlad shook his hand. “Nice to see you again, Prince Aleksi.”
With a final nod, he turned and left the room so silently he would
have never noticed he left the room if he didn’t watch Vlad cross
the room, open the door, and exit.
    His obvious skills raised the hair on
the back of his neck.
    There was no doubt Vlad Wellington was
even scarier now than he’d been in their youth. Back then he
possessed a lot less skills than he apparently enjoyed these days
and he was scary enough then. Still, just from this brief
interaction he had learned some vital info. The first was that Vlad
respected and missed Aleksi’s father.
    The second was that Vlad’s respect had
now transferred to the new prince. He wasn’t certain what to think
about that. It was nice Vlad intended to give him a chance. Yet
Aleksi wasn’t so certain he was worthy of Vlad’s
respect.
    The fact that Vlad didn’t know what
was on the USB device but was instructed to hand it to him
personally made him wonder what could possibly be on it. He took a
deep breath and paced to his computer. There he slid the storage
unit into a port. The screen for opening files popped up and asked
for a password.
    “ He didn’t say there was a
password,” he muttered. Yet he had been pretty certain there would
be.
    Now, out of all the passwords his
father had used he had to figure out which one secured this device.
Obviously the information contained here was
confidential.
    He entered each password and was
denied.
    His father had left him several
confidential files. None of them had been left with someone. They
had been stored in the family safe that as far as he knew, only he
and his mother knew the combination to.
    Still, it seemed odd to leave critical
information in the hands of one person. What if Vlad had forgotten
it? What if he was killed? And why had his father felt he could
trust Vladimir Wellington?
    “ What is that?” Emerson’s
interested voice asked from behind him.
    “ Where did you come
from?”
    “ The secret