Authors: Andrew Grant
Maybe calling McKenna was the way to go?
The payback would be sweet. Especially in LeBrock’s moment of triumph. But don’t they say the best revenge is massive success? And Homeland Security would confiscate the data. McKenna would take the memory stick away for examination. I was stymied without it. Losing it the first time was a blow. I couldn’t face it a second time, especially if I was the one handing it over and watching it being taken away in an evidence bag. I didn’t want to undermine the government’s case, whatever it might be, but I honestly couldn’t see what information
was on that memory stick that McKenna wouldn’t be able to get his hands on from somewhere else.
Plus there was my second Lichtenstein to think about. The one I wouldn’t be able to buy if I didn’t finish my new product ahead of whoever had stolen my prototype.
What about a compromise? McKenna needed the data. I needed the data. Why not share it? He wouldn’t agree—if he knew. So why not share it without him knowing? All I’d have to do was copy the files, then call him and volunteer to hand over the original memory stick. Everyone would win. Except perhaps that bastard LeBrock. And I wasn’t about to shed any tears over him. Or Carolyn. Perhaps the experience would help her. Show her that picking her job over her husband hadn’t been her smartest move. Assuming that was all she’d done …
The afternoon was shaping up much more productively than if I’d dived into that bottle of tequila. A plan was coming into focus. First, hide the memory stick. I didn’t want it lying around in plain sight in case the detectives showed their faces again. That would be embarrassing, not to mention hard to explain. Second, order a new computer. I couldn’t copy the data files without one. And finally, put the rest of the day to good use. Call a few of the people I’d need on board further down the line, as the project built momentum. Finance guys. Marketing. Public relations. And Intellectual Property lawyers, given that the prototype had been stolen.
My so-called friends had been reluctant to be associated with me recently.
But it would be different with the people whose pockets I crammed with cash.
I
’D KEPT THE PHONE PRESSED TO MY EAR FOR MORE THAN THREE
hours, whetting people’s appetites and furthering my plans for world domination. But when I heard tires on the gravel outside, I was on my feet in an instant.
Carolyn?
I ran to the window and saw—a UPS van. A guy in a brown uniform climbed out and after ducking into the cargo bay for a couple of minutes he started toward the front of the house, wheeling a heavily taped movers’ box behind him on a little trolley. I opened the door for him and he asked me to confirm my name, and that I was expecting a delivery from AmeriTel. Satisfied, he held out a little touch-screen device and gestured for me to sign. But when I reached out to take it he grabbed my hand and bent it back on itself, twisting my wrist and forcing me to spin around. Then he bundled me along the hallway and into the living room. Red-hot needles shot through my shoulder and into my neck. I pushed back and yelled for him to stop but he just wrenched my arm harder and kept on shoving until he had me down on my knees.
My first thought was that I was being robbed again. It must be the same people from a couple of nights ago. Dissatisfied with their haul, they were back for more. But now they’d chosen a time when I was home. And awake. They’d even confirmed who I was. There must be something specific they were looking for. Something they were sure I was hiding. Something they were confident I could get for them. But would they believe I didn’t have a secret stash of valuables? And how far would they go to get what they wanted?
“Homeland Security.” The man maintained the pressure on my arm. “Marc Bowman, do you have any weapons on you? Or concealed anywhere in the room?”
Not this again
, I thought, after a moment of stunned relief.
Do these idiots not talk to one another? Why have they come back?
And then I was filled with dread. Maybe they knew about the data? That I was holding out on them? I should have reported it straightaway. Keeping it made me look guilty. But that was crazy, surely. The memory stick was still where I’d hidden it, under the section of countertop in the kitchen that had been loosened years ago when Carolyn dropped her mother’s old stand mixer on it. There was no way Homeland Security could have found out about that. I was being paranoid again.
“Is Agent McKenna here?” The sound of blood rushing in my ears subsided a little and I realized I could hear other people moving around the room.
“Weapons?” The guy twisted my arm even harder. “Yes or no.”
“No. No weapons. But who are you? And what the hell do you want?”
“I’m going to release your arm now. You can slide up onto the sofa, but you must remain sitting. Make no attempt to stand. And keep your hands where I can see them. Understand?”
I nodded, the guy let go, and as I wriggled around and slithered into a sitting position I got my first good look at him. His UPS uniform seemed genuine enough, but on closer inspection I noticed the buttons across his chest were struggling to remain fastened and the pants were maybe an inch too short. Another man was standing behind him, next to Carolyn’s hideous antique jardinière, near the doorway. He was wearing a suit—dark gray—with an identity card clipped to his breast pocket. And he had a gun in his hand. I was still struggling to reconcile all this when the two detectives from yesterday walked in. Hayes was first, looking worried. Wagner followed, and she just looked pissed off.
“You’re from Homeland Security?” I studied the strangers’ unfriendly faces, trying to read their intentions. “Where’s Agent McKenna? Have you spoken to him? What’s this all about?”
The guy in the UPS uniform leaned down till his face almost
touched mine, and he stared at me as if he were examining an object in a museum to see if it was a fake.
“You think we came all this way to answer
your
questions? Are you new? You better get with the program, pronto, or we’re going to drag your pampered ass out of here, away from your comfy house and your fancy car, and introduce you to a whole other world. One so different from what you’re used to, you can’t even imagine it.”
“OK.” I raised my hands. “I hear you. And I’m happy to cooperate. Just as long as you are who you say you are. Could I see your ID, please?”
The guy sighed, then pulled out a leather wallet and thrust it at me. The card inside was blue. It showed his photo, his name—Agent Daniel Peever—an eagle, some arrows, the Homeland Security logo, and all the other identifiers I’d seen on McKenna’s.
“Satisfied?”
“I can’t tell.” I handed the wallet back. “It looks like the other agent’s one, but—”
“What other agent?”
“Jordan McKenna. He was here, yesterday. Don’t you people coordinate at all?”
“You’re sure he was an agent?”
“Absolutely.”
“What makes you so sure?”
“He had ID. And, I don’t know. The way he behaved.”
“You’re an expert in the way Homeland Security agents behave?”
“Well, no. But he was … professional. And respectful. He didn’t barge into my home and throw me on the floor. He asked for my help.”
“With what?”
“An investigation.”
“What kind of investigation?”
“I don’t know if I should say. Maybe I should call him? Clear it with him?”
“Go ahead. I’d very much like to talk to Agent McKenna myself.”
“His card’s in my pocket. Is anyone going to shoot me if I get it?”
Peever shook his head, so I dug out McKenna’s card and dialed his number on my cell.
“Put it on speaker,” Peever ordered. “This I want to hear.”
For thirty seconds the five of us were silent, transfixed by the harsh amplified ringtone that filled the room. Then the call dropped into voicemail.
“This is Jordan McKenna, Department of Homeland Security.” The recorded voice was a little distorted, but definitely McKenna’s. “I can’t take your call right now. If you are personally in physical danger at this time, hang up and dial 911 immediately. Otherwise, leave a message and I’ll get back to you when operational circumstances allow.”
I turned to Peever in triumph, but he only gestured for me to leave a message.
“Uh, Agent McKenna? This is Marc Bowman. I have some urgent information regarding the matter we were discussing. If you could call me back ASAP, that would be great. Thanks.”
“Good.” Peever was scowling. “Let’s hope he calls back soon. And while we wait, tell me more about him. He just showed up on your doorstep, yesterday, flashing a badge and asking for your help?”
“No. I was driving. Heading back here, actually. He and the other agents intercepted me.”
“These agents pulled you over?”
“In a manner of speaking.”
“How did they make you bring them here? To your house?”
“McKenna offered to come. I was grateful, actually.”
“Why’s that?”
“He asked if I’d changed my locks after losing my keys. I said no, and I was worried about the burglars coming back—a weird guy in an Infiniti had been following me that morning—so McKenna came to check the place out for me. And it’s a good thing he did.”
“Why?
Had
the burglars come back?”
“No. But he found out how they knew about my work. Which is more than
some people
have done.”
Wagner shot me a look so sharp it could have sliced the leather I was leaning against.
“What did he find?” Peever’s expression was equally uninviting.
“Bugs. Listening devices. Someone had planted them in my study. They’d been watching me while I worked.”
“Who had?”
“We don’t know yet. One bug was too generic to be any help, apparently, but McKenna took another one with him, hoping to trace it.”
“Where were they planted?”
“One was in the—”
“No.” Peever took a step back. “Show me.”
I WAITED FOR PEEVER’S ATTENTION
to return to me from the Lichtenstein, then I pointed to the filing cabinet in the corner of the study.
“The first was over there. In the phone.”
“And the others?”
“One other.” I gestured toward the bookcase. “Second shelf down, roughly in the center.”
Peever stepped in front of me and picked up the phone.
“In the battery compartment?” He turned it over in his hands a couple of times.
I nodded.
He slid the cover off and probed the cavity in the back of the handset with his fingers, just like McKenna’s guy had done. After a few seconds he pulled his hand back. He was holding something. A tiny silver disc. A double of the one I’d seen removed from that same phone, yesterday.
How could there have been two? And how could McKenna’s guy have missed one of them?
Then another explanation dawned on me.
“Now you get the picture.” Peever was smiling, but without any warmth. “Still think your new buddy was
getting rid
of bugs, Marc?”
P
EEVER SENT THE OTHER AGENT OUT OF THE ROOM AND FOR THE
next few minutes I stayed still, pinned to the ground as if the force of gravity had increased by a thousand percent.
When Peever’s guy returned, he was carrying a black box, like an old-fashioned transistor radio. He set it at the center of my desk, flicked a switch, checked its display, then nodded.
“OK.” Peever pointed to the box. “This thing will block the signal of anything else that’s transmitting in here. It means we can talk.”
No one said anything, giving me a respite to focus on Peever in the hope of escaping my mental merry-go-round. It struck me that if McKenna would be at home working in a bank, this guy would be better suited to delivering your groceries. He was around six foot, but looked shorter because he was so stocky. His two-day stubble didn’t match his swept-back bleached hair, which looked like it had been transplanted from a My Little Pony doll. And neither could deflect attention from the unruly straggle that was escaping from his undone top button.
“Specifically, it means
you
can talk.” Peever swiveled around on one heel and jabbed his finger in my direction. “Let’s start with your computer.”
“Which one?”
“The one the detectives impounded, yesterday. Who knew they’d taken it, aside from yourself? Who did you tell?”
“Nobody. Except for McKenna.”
“Not your wife? She doesn’t know?”
“No. I haven’t spoken to my wife since before the break-in.”
“Why not?”
“She’s been tied up. With work. Her company won big at—never mind. But why? What does it matter who knew?”
“It matters because your computer’s been stolen.”
“Stolen?” I almost laughed at him. “No. The police have it.”
Peever didn’t reply.
“Wait. You mean, it’s been stolen from the police?”
“Someone broke into the evidence locker and took it.” Peever frowned. “Have you got any idea how much juice it takes to pull off a thing like that?”
“How would I?”
“It takes a lot. Believe me. Which tells us that someone with major-league connections was desperate to get their hands on your computer.”
“That’s ridiculous.” I shook my head. “The only valuable thing on it was my prototype, and that had been erased by whoever broke in here. Which was why I called the police in the first place.”
“Maybe that is why you called them.” Peever waggled his finger at me. “But you weren’t expecting them to take your computer. The detectives’ report says you were surprised, and reluctant to let it go.”
“Only because I needed it for work.”
“That’s not the full story, is it? You realized there was something else on the computer. Your problem wasn’t what’s missing. It was what’s still there.”
“This makes no sense.” I’d never liked people who spoke in riddles.
“Who did you call? Who else is involved? One name. Give me one name—one that leads somewhere—and it’ll go a long way toward making things easier on you.”