Hack

1st place award in the 2023 Feathered Quill Book Awards, Mystery/Suspense category When a top secret and powerful US surveillance technology is stolen and offered for sale on the black market, an exiled reporter races to expose the theft and untangle the plotbefore the story is spiked, and he is silenced for good. Coming off a successful investigation into a major banking scandal, Newshound reporter Nik Byron arrives in Washington, DC, with high hopes for his career. But a disruptive corporate merger and a vengeful boss quickly dash his plans. Relegated to scut work and the graveyard shift, Niks career and emotions are in a tailspin. That is, until a late-night explosion levels a high-tech office parkhome to some of the nations top clandestine programsand provides Nik with an opportunity to reverse his fortunes. As Nik tries to unravel the mystery at the heart of the explosion, he suddenly finds himself confronting domestic terrorists, rogue American and Chinese spies, mercenaries, and a brilliant but temperamental computer expert. With the help of a small team of colleagues and his new girlfriend, Samantha Whytethe chief investigator for the Northern Virginia Sheriffs Department, who has her own secrets to concealNik follows a bloody trail of bodies from DC to the upper Midwest. But as word gets out that what he has dug up threatens to expose the theft of highly sensitive US technology, now being sold to terrorists and repressive regimes, new enemies close in. How far is Nik willing to go for a story, and how much is he willing to risk to reveal the truth?