“I’m not without my own skillset.” Jude’s voice was dry. “But yeah, there’s a few details to work out yet.” He rolled his shoulders tiredly, brushing against hers with the movement.
“Perhaps Munson could be, uh, persuaded to let you make the clones,” Hunter suggested delicately.
“You need to approach him when he’s in the house.” Mia broke off when the attendant stopped a cart next to their seats and proceeded to hand out beverages. She drank thirstily from her soda. She hadn’t had near enough caffeine before they’d left the hotel this morning. “Likely if he’s home, the computers would be running. He’d be logged in and save you a lot of trouble.”
When she leaned forward to pull the tray down for her drink, she caught both men’s gaze on her. “What?”
“There’s a kernel there we can massage,” Jude said slowly. “Go up to the door? He’s a suspicious type, remember? He’ll never let a stranger in.”
“Getting the door open at least gives you an opportunity,” Hunter inserted.
Mia thought more about it for a moment. “He has to want you inside. If you can do something for him…have something for him…”
“Pretty sure the Publishers Clearinghouse scam isn’t going to work.”
Ignoring Hunter’s humor, she considered. “It has to be an opportunity he can’t pass up. You offer to share hacking information with him. No.” She dismissed the thought as soon as it occurred. “What would he want that you have? It came to her in the next moment. “Money.”
Jude’s expression was intrigued. “You have a devious side that’s very appealing. Why do I want to give him money?”
“I can’t do all the heavy lifting. There’s your nugget. Massage it.” And she sat back in her seat, more than a little fascinated as the two men proceeded to do exactly that.
* * * *
There was no way to determine if Munson was even home. Jude parked on a residential Denver street well down the block from the man’s small white clapboard house. Its attached garage was closed, and the blinds were drawn. It wasn’t yet seven PM. Too early for lights to go on in an occupied house. With a sense of déjà vu he settled in.
His wait was rewarded far more quickly than it had been in Tucson the night before. After only thirty-five minutes the garage door at the house raised. A decades old black Jeep Cherokee backed down the drive as the door lowered again.
Jude fired up the engine of his rental. They’d taken out extra insurance precisely because of what he was going to do next.
Accelerating, he caught up with the Jeep quickly, because Munson was already slowing for the stop sign ahead. Jude did not. He hit the Jeep’s bumper with enough force to jolt it forward several yards, before screeching to a halt.
He was out of the vehicle before the other man exited his, kneeling down to survey the damage. “Oh man, oh man, oh man,” he moaned rocking a bit in his position. “I’m really sorry. It’s my wife. She calls me every damn time I get behind the wheel and distracts me.”
Munson was a hulk of a man whose stated weight on his driver’s license had been a result of wishful thinking. And he was a seething hulk of a man right now. “You idiot! Are you blind? Stop signs are red for a reason!”
“I know, I know.” Jude got to his feet, staggered just a little. “It’s my fault, totally. I’ll pay to have the dent removed from your bumper.”
With a cagey expression Munson said, “You’ll do more than that. The whole damn bumper will have to be replaced. Not to mention where you scraped the paint.”
Lowering his voice, Jude pulled out his wallet. “Listen. We can take care of this, just the two of us, can’t we? I’ll make it right. No one says the police have to be involved.” He swayed a bit. Visibly fumbled to open the wallet he’d prepared earlier in the day.
The big man stepped closer when Jude started pulling out bills. “You maybe trying to avoid a drunk driving conviction, is that it, pal?”
“No, no.” A hundred dollar bill fluttered to the ground and Jude made a grab for it. Fell to one knee in the attempt. “Couple of beers, that’s all.”
“Yeah, right. How many DUIs do you have already? I oughta let them haul your ass to jail right now.”
“Look, I got five hundred on me.” Jude pulled the cash out and folded it in one motion, tried to stuff it in the other man’s hand. “I’ll get more.”
“Uh-huh.” Munson wasn’t having it. He wiped his perspiring forehead on the edge of his shirt. “You know, now that I think about it, my neck is killing me. Whiplash is a bitch.”
“How much? How much to make this whole thing go away?”
Munson sent an appraising look toward the white Impala Jude had rented. Thought for a moment. “Three thousand.”
“Three thous--,” Jude threw up his hands. “C’mon, you’re killing me here. That’s a month’s wages.”
“Then you can afford it,” Munson said unsympathetically. The outcome of the evening wouldn’t have altered either way, but Jude was sort of glad the man was a complete prick. It made what was to come halfway enjoyable.
He studied the pavement for several moments before letting his shoulders slump a little. “Okay. I gotta go home. Try to sneak in without the wife seeing… She’s going to miss the money, man. I’m gonna have to take it out of her stash.”
“Do I care about your problems? Give me your ID.”
With a show of reluctance, Jude removed his false license from his wallet and handed it to the man. Munson studied it. “Sam Fielding. What the hell are you doing here from New Mexico?”
“Moved six months ago.” Jude manufactured a morose tone as he pretended to study the damage again. “Fresh start and all that. Like hell.”
“You’ve got an hour to bring me the rest of the money or I call the cops.” The big man waved the ID Jude had given him.
“Okay. All right.” His tone sounded properly defeated. “Where’s your place?”
“We can meet at a bar I know. It’s not that far from here.”
“Are you kidding me? I swear to God my wife is on speaking terms with every bartender in a ten mile radius. They’ll rat me out. Plus I gotta go to work in an hour. If we’re going to do this thing, it has to be quick.”
Munson thought better of the idea. It was clear from his expression. But the cash clenched in his fist was a powerful motivator. “Okay. See that shit yellow house down the street? 11876. It’s mine. If you’re not there in an hour, I’ll make sure your ass is in jail.”
“Your wife gonna be home? Because if she is, you don’t want her to know you’ve got this kind of money, believe me.”
Curling his lip, Munson said, “I was never dumb enough to get married.”
Jude returned to his car, satisfied that the man would be alone later. He waited for Munson to pull away. There really was a good-sized dent in the man’s bumper. A matching one in his rental’s. If he were feeling generous at the end of this, maybe he’d let the man keep the five hundred.
He timed it almost to the minute. He wanted Munson sweating his return. Pulling up in the driveway, he switched off the ignition and reached for a sack on the seat beside him. Running up the front walk to the porch, he pounded on the front door. It was opened immediately.
“Almost thought you weren’t going to show.” Munson held the knob with one hand to leave only a small crack in the door. He stuck a sneaker-clad foot in the narrow opening. “What’s in the bag? Give me the money.”
Jude made a show of looking over his shoulder uneasily. “Fuck that, I’m not waving around this kind of cash on the street. All I need is to get mugged before my wife can kill me first. The cash is in the bag.” He opened it briefly to show a stack of money. Closed it again. “Let’s do this inside.” There was a long silence. “C’mon man, we gonna do this or not? I gotta get to work.”
Finally Munson opened the door wide enough for Jude to slip through. He dug in his front pocket and brought out a fat wad of cash. “I need my license back.”
Munson took the thick stack of bills and smiled. “License is going to cost you another hundred.”
“Shit!” He reached toward his back pocket, but took the sap out of the waistband of his jeans. He slammed it upwards to make contact with the man’s chin, before rapping it smartly above his ear.
Munson staggered back, shook his head. Then, letting out a roar he rushed toward Jude, fists flying. He managed to duck the first one. The second roundhouse caught him in the left temple and had him seeing stars. He grabbed the man’s wrist and pulled him around, using his momentum against him. Yanking his arm toward the center of his back, Jude ran him toward the doorjamb and rammed his head against it with as much force as he could muster. Once. Twice. Again.
Munson still didn’t crumple. But he was dazed enough that Jude could get the zip locks out of his pocket and tighten them over his wrists. Because he didn’t think that would keep the man down, he shoved him onto the floor and used Munson’s belt to wrap around the man’s feet.
By the time he rose, Jude was breathing hard and had a bitch of a headache. He scanned the front room. Was gratified to see three computers taking up an entire side of it. “Well, this is convenient.” He locked the front door before going to the adjoining kitchen and rummaged in the drawers for a dishtowel. Behind him, Munson was yelling at an ear-splitting decibel. Returning, Jude wadded up the towel and shoved it in the man’s mouth. “By the way,” he said casually, gathering up the bag and prying the money out of the man’s fist. “TopCat says hey.”
According to Logan’s report, TopCat was the name of the man’s nemesis with which he had a long-running feud. Munson would be looking for a reason for Jude’s interest in his hard drives. The name of the other black hat would give him one.
Stepping over his body, Jude dropped the bills back into the top bag and pulled the entire sack away from the one hidden beneath it. The bottom bag held four stand-alone hard drives that he’d bought when they’d gone shopping after landing in Denver. He’d need only three, one for each of the computers on the long table in front of him.
Jude took a moment to look at each screen and grinned. Mia had been right. The man was home, so he was wired. Maybe he should put her on the payroll.
He took a few minutes taking the hardware out of the boxes and hooking them up to the computers to clone Munson’s hard drives. Realizing what he was up to, the big man fought to his feet and hopped toward him, fury in his eyes.
Sighing, Jude got up and grabbed the man’s shoulder, tripping him and shoving him down ungently at the same time. The floor shook when his weight hit it. “This is going to be very tiresome if we have to do this over and over, so stay down. I’ll be out of your way soon enough.”
Munson stayed down. Crossing to the computers again, Jude began looking at what the man had. Most of the files were encrypted, which wouldn’t be a problem when he got the cloned drives back to the other purchased equipment at the hotel. He’d spent a good deal of money duplicating hardware he already had at headquarters, plus he’d likely have the expense of shipping it all back east. Tossing the man a look, he saw he’d rolled to his back, all the better to glare at him. “Hope this is worth my time. I heard you were behind that breach at Belways. Am I gonna find all those customers’ credit card info on here?”
Munson gave a muffled roar and Jude smiled. “TopCat will be pleased. Have to wonder why you’re living in this shithole if you struck the big time, but maybe you’ve got your money stashed somewhere, huh? If so, I’m sure we’ll find it when we have time to go through the drives later.”
It was hard to tell if the man was buying the farce, but Jude figured he’d installed plenty of doubt. He spent the remainder of the time looking through the web search history on each machine. Found nothing of interest. There might be more hidden deeper, but it was likely the history was securely wiped at regular intervals.
It was Munson’s email that would be the most valuable, of course. It would save them a lot of time if they could find verification of Eldon Weale’s location. Or damning proof that Weale was the man they were hunting.
The copying was finished in less than half an hour. Whistling tunelessly, Jude unhooked his drives and piled them in the bag again. “You can keep the five hundred,” he said, skirting the man’s body as he lifted the blind of the front window an inch to peer outside. Getting close enough to go through his pockets wasn’t worth the possible trouble. “It won’t buy you a new bumper, but I have a feeling you weren’t going to fix your car anyway.”
* * * *
In addition to the new computer equipment, the three of them had bought some clothes. But it was the hardware that took up most of the available surfaces in the outer room. Jude had ordered another suite, but because Mia had suggested it he’d gotten Hunter a separate room for use when Jude was here. Likely the man’s whining about his back had eventually gotten to her. After updating his operative, he’d dismissed him hours earlier. The man had a lot of qualities that made him a valuable employee, but his computer skills weren’t among them.
Not for the first time in the last few hours, Jude glanced at the bedroom door. Resisted the urge to check on Mia. It took more self-control than it should have. He didn’t want to take the chance of disturbing her. She needed the rest and he couldn’t afford the distraction. Already thoughts of her were lodged in the back of his skull, difficult to banish.
Rubbing his eyes with the heels of his palm, he stared blearily at the computer screen. He’d gone through two drives already and it had taken him most of the night to crack the encrypted files. There was plenty there to intrigue. Munson kept logs of his successful breaches, proving once again that ego could trump self-preservation. He also apparently did freelance work for anyone with the money to pay. The spreadsheet of labor and payment was coded. Jude ignored it for the time being. If they found nothing else Logan could tackle it. So far Jude hadn’t found a link to Mia.
He discovered it on the third cloned drive. He stared, half stunned as he recognized the contents of the file he’d cracked. There were screen shots of blocks of jumbled computer gibberish. Beneath each were typed snippets of information that the man had obviously pieced together from them. Names were highlighted. A note in all caps was at the bottom of the document.