The Canton Connection (11 page)

Bob Snow was waiting excitedly for Jake to return to the office. “I looked into Simon Wu,” he said. “You won’t believe this.”

“Believe what?” Jake removed his business jacket and la
id it over the back of a chair. He sat down, exhausted, in another chair.

Bob remained standing behind his desk. “You knew that Simon Wu is working in WITSEC.”

Jake nodded. The Federal Witness Protection Program was also called the Witness Security Program, or WITSEC for short.

“You won’t believe who Wu is assigned to protect,” Bob said.

Jake was tired from battling the traffic and just wanted to get to the point. “Who?”

“Stacy Stefansson.”

That got Jake’s attention. “Let me get this straight. Simon Wu’s in charge of protecting her?”

Bob grinned. “Maybe Wu
was
protecting her on the bike path. Maybe Han Chu was actually planning to assault her.”

“That’s not Stacy’s recollection.”

“Maybe Chu had a concealed weapon.”

Jake tried to picture the scene. “If that’s the case, why didn’t Stacy identify Wu as the assailant?”

Bob shrugged. “Witnesses are often unreliable.”

“Not
that
unreliable. Stacy knows Wu as a friend. She would have recognized him on the bike path. Of course, she didn’t recognize Han Chu there, either.”

“She knew Han Chu, too?” Bob said with concern.

“According to Michael Epstein, Chu worked with her company.”

Bob was serious for the first time. “Jake, what happened on that bike path was not spontaneous. And it certainly wasn’t a coincidence.”

Jake had to agree.

But he focused on the news that Wu was assigned to protecting Stacy. Was she being protected by a killer?

Jake had trained briefly alongside the witness protection unit several years ago, but was hardly up-to-date with their methods. “What sort of access does Wu have to Stacy?”

Bob looked troubled. “A lot.”

“What do you mean by a lot? One of the first rules is not to draw attention to the person you’re protecting.”

“And the second rule is to protect her. Jake, Simon Wu lives with her.”

“Lives…?” Jake was floored. “Stacy said he’s her ‘guy friend.’”

Then it all became clear.

“I drove past her house a couple of times earlier this week,” Jake confessed. “And there was an Asian man carrying in her groceries. I think it’s the same guy who hustled her away from the funeral.”

“That’s your Simon Wu.”

Jake shot to his feet and stared out the window. “This doesn’t make sense. If the U.S. marshals are protecting Stacy, why did Director Hoffkeit assign me to investigate the case?”

“As I’ve said before,” Bob said
, “this amounts to an internal investigation. How far do you want to go with this before taking it to the Inspector General?”

“I have to assume that Hoffkeit wanted me to solve the case.”

“Did he?”

Jake stared at the Washington Monument on the eastern horizon and thought back to the meeting he had with the director and other top brass at FBI Headquarters immediately after his interview with Stacy. Hoffkeit had waxed poetic, suspecting that the murder might be the result of “patriotism.”

What had he meant by that?

And why select Jake to handle the case?

He remembered how the director had come all the way out to the field office to look him over, review his service record, grill him, and probe his inner thoughts.

Jake had been proceeding under the assumption that he had the director’s full support.

For the first time, it occurred to him that maybe the director had picked him for his mediocrity. Maybe the director didn’t want the case solved.

That made him feel great.

But what concerned Jake even more was why Stacy was in Witness Protection. What did she do or see? Who were the marshals protecting her from? Why did the WITSEC program settle her in DC?

He adjusted the gun in his shoulder harness and reached for his jacket.

“Where are you going?” Bob said, alarmed.

“I don’t care what Epstein says. I’m going to find Stacy and pull her out of this situation.”

“You can’t barge into a protected witness’s life,” Bob said. “You’ll blow her cover.”

“Cover for what?”

Jake strode out of the office and Bob raced after him. “I’m coming with you.”

Jake slammed his car door shut and Bob jumped in beside him.

“Where are you taking us?” Bob asked.

“Stacy’s house.”

Jake drove briskly through town. Things were beginning to add up.

The evidence implicated Wu. Regardless of Stacy’s testimony, the murderer had been a short person, and Wu’s personnel file backed up that fact.

As far as access, nobody was closer to Stacy and had more opportunity to protect her than her WITSEC handler. Wu could very likely have been on that bike path at the time of the murder.

And lastly, Wu was sure to know about Stacy’s job, and would be in a position to know about Han Chu and his company’s involvement with the A root server. If Wu knew of any malfeasance on the part of Quantum, he would be on the lookout to protect Stacy.

They reached Patrick Henry Drive.

Suddenly the irony of the street name struck Jake. Patrick Henry, who had proclaimed “Give me liberty or give me death,” was a true patriot. Was Wu a true patriot, or masquerading as one?

They would soon find out.

It was late afternoon and the harsh sunlight had grown muted by an atmosphere thick with humidity. The sun was a red ball in the western sky.

Jake nosed the car up to the curb. He stopped under a tree in front of Stacy’s house and idled there.

Her Jeep was gone. No lights were on. And all her shades were pulled down.

He glanced across at the passenger seat, and Bob slumped into a relaxed position. They would wait for her to return.

An hour later, she hadn’t shown up.

Bob was checking email on his smartphone. “Get this,” he said with a note of excitement, and handed Jake the phone.

According to Michael Epstein, Stacy Stefansson had made an unexpected trip to Charlottesville. There was a local police report shortly thereafter that an engineering student had been murdered in his bed. He was a computer engineer by the name of Jason Yang. Epstein was directing assets to Charlottesville the next day.

It was clear to Jake where he needed to head immediately. “Want me to drop you at the office?” Jake offered his boss.

“You aren’t going to Charlottesville,” Bob said.

“Stacy’s there, and another Chinese software guy was murdered there. I’m going to Charlottesville.”

Bob looked at him sideways. “Let me talk to Epstein first.”

Jake consented, and worked on defrosting the air conditioner.

The call went through quickly and Bob asked for updates. He nodded repeatedly. “Packed her bag… Left with someone named Simon Wu… Cleaned out her refrigerator… Took her passport. Got it.”

Bob exchanged glances with Jake. Jake shook his head and put a finger to his lips.

“I’m with Agent Maguire,” Bob said. “What should I tell him?”

Jake could hear the angry response over the phone. “She’s my subject. Keep his hands off Ms. Stefansson.”

The line went dead.

Bob looked at Jake. “You heard him.”

“Didn’t hear a thing,” Jake lied.

He looked at the closed-up house and could imagine the scene that had transpired there just hours before. He could picture Wu gathering up Stacy’s passport and hustling her off to Charlottesville.

Bob was uncharacteristically subdued. “Epstein doesn’t know we’re looking into Wu.”

Jake was mildly surprised that Bob hadn’t mentioned Wu’s name to Epstein. But nobody wanted to reveal an internal, undercover investigation.

“I’m afraid for Stacy’s safety,” Bob said at last.

Jake looked at him. “You coming?”

Bob gave a doleful look. “You’re on your own, rookie.”

Jake put the car in gear and peeled away from Stacy’s house. He took his boss straight to the office, and let him out at the front door.

“Be careful,” were Bob’s parting words. “And take your passport.”

Charlottesville was a hilly town, covered by forests and centered around railroad tracks that ran straight past the university campus.

Jake had called ahead and requested that the local police preserve the crime scene including the body.

The detective
in charge of the investigation sounded peeved that Jake asked for him to wait as he drove down from the Washington area, but reluctantly consented to preserve everything until Jake arrived.

It was dark when Jake
reached the residential street just off campus.

Flashing blue lights from a police cruiser and ambulance illuminated the structure where the murder took place.

It was a two-story, white frame house, the kind used by students sharing expenses. A pair of policemen relaxed against the hoods of their squad cars and watched him pull up. One car was marked as campus police and the other was a city patrol car.

Jake identified himself to the men and the city cop lifted the police tape for him to enter the
crime scene.

“The sergeant is waiting for you upstairs. Watch out for the broken glass by the door.”

Jake saw where someone had poked something through a glass window beside the front door, presumably to reach inside and unlock the door.

H
e stepped carefully over the shards of glass and climbed the stairs. He could smell death halfway up to the second floor.

The last member of a forensics team was just leaving a bedroom. Jake found the detective, a large, grim-looking man, inside.
He was accompanied by a female assistant who was still taking notes.

Jake
shook hands with the two, then turned his attention to the victim.

The body was large and hairless and lay naked in the middle of a queen-sized bed. The monogrammed silver handle of a steak knife stuck straight out of the victim’s chest.

Jake didn’t study the corpse for long. He had seen death before. Above the stench of a body that had been lying there for over two hours, one could always smell in the room whether there was foul play.

The young student appeared to have been murdered in his sleep. There was no sign of a struggle. The only sign of a crime aside from the body was the broken glass by the front door.

It looked like a straightforward case of breaking and entering, climbing upstairs past the rooms of other tenants, finding the student asleep without clothes, perhaps because of the ninety-five degree, non-air-conditioned room, and killing him.

The only thing odd aside from the murder was the lack of a computer. Otherwise, the desk was orderly with a can of pens and a pad of scratch paper.

Jake turned to the detective. “You said he was a computer engineer?”

“Grad student,” the cop said with all the extra vowels associated with a southern Virginia accent.

“And where’s his computer?”

“Never found one.”

There was a power strip under the desk, indicating where electronics might normally be charged.

“Other tenants suspect it was stolen from the room.”

“About these other tenants,” Jake said. “Foreign exchange students?”

“A whole house of Chinese.”

Jake nodded. The similarities to the bike path murder in Arlington were inescapable. It involved a Chinese victim, computers and a stabbing to the center of the chest.

“Dust the murder weapon?” Jake asked.

“Got prints,” the detective said. “We’re running a check now.”

“Check the Department of Justice personnel files, too,” Jake said. “I’m afraid that’s where you’ll find a match.”

The detective frowned. “One of you?”

“I’m afraid so,” Jake said.

The detective nodded wordlessly at his assistant, who pounced on her handheld device to put the suggestion through to the lab.

“Can we remove the body now?” the detective asked without
masking the hostile sarcasm in his voice.

After all, Jake considered, the guy had a right to be mad about federal agents killing people in his jurisdiction. And the smell was getting to everyone.

“Of course,” Jake said.

He couldn’t wait to leave the room, either.

Nor could he wait to get back to his boss.

Jake stepped outside into the
dark yard. He placed a call to Bob Snow’s personal phone. “Just as we suspected,” Jake reported. “Another murder nearly identical to the bike path murder.”

“Prints?”

“Yes. The local police will check them against Justice Department personnel files. I’m convinced it’ll come up Simon Wu.”

“I’ll check into the fingerprint situation tomorrow,” Bob said. “If Wu is murdering all these people, why is he leaving fingerprints all over the place? It doesn’t make sense.”

Jake could see Bob’s point. If anything, a federal law enforcement officer would know not to leave prints at the scene of a crime. It almost looked like he was deliberately leaving signs that he was there. “Let me know what you find out.”

“Seen any trace of Stacy?” Bob asked.

“She wasn’t exactly waiting for me, if that’s what you’re thinking,” Jake said. “I didn’t tell her I was coming.”

“Well, don’t tell her you’re there,” Bob said. “Epstein will be there tomorrow and track her down.”

“I don’t even have her cell phone number,” Jake said.

“Don’t act so naïve. The FBI can track her down through her credit card or cell phone in minutes.”

“I’m not asking anyone to track her down,” Jake tried to assure him. “But I’ll bet she’s long gone.”

Jake had spent four great years of his life at the University of Virginia. He had even made it to living in the Ellipse his senior year. Freezing cold with no heat and having to use outdoor plumbing had been part of the experience of reliving life on the campus as Thomas Jefferson had designed it two hundred years before.

Tonight, he craved an air-conditioned restaurant and some time to think.

The waitress was a brunette college student, bright-eyed and talkative. Jake just wanted a beer.

He had checked into a locally owned hotel and dumped his hastily packed bag on the bed. Then he had slipped his passport and wallet into his coat pocket before heading off to the bar.

The waitress was from Northern Virginia, but had travelled a lot. And she wasn’t shy telling people so.

She had begun the conversation as she brought his beer and chicken wings with, “
Itadakimasu
.”

“What does that mean?”

“Oh,” she said, and giggled. “I didn’t even realize I was speaking Japanese. See, I’m taking a placement test tomorrow.”

“That makes sense. Well, good luck.”

“
Gambatte
,” she said. “That means ‘Good luck.’”

“I see. I guess you’re going to do pretty well on the test.”

“Why? Do you speak Japanese?”

Jake thought the question laughable, but reminded himself that he was back in an academic environment. “Don’t ask me about languages,” he said. “I barely passed my four years of French.”

“You go here?”

“Did. Twenty years ago.”

“That’s cool. What was your major?”

“Criminal law.”

That threw her for a moment. “You a cop?”

“Kind of.”

“Cool.” She gave him a wink and turned to head for the kitchen to get the rest of his order.

He lifted the beer mug to his lips and admired her form as she walked. She had a posterior that just wouldn’t quit.

When she brought out the burger, he was ready to subtly interrogate her. “Do you have a lot of Chinese students on campus nowadays?”

“Summer? Not really. They all go home for the break. But they’ll be back in droves starting next week.”

“Do you know any of them?”

“It’s a hard bunch to get to know. They stick together and don’t engage much. It’s changing, though. Every year, they seem a bit more sophisticated.”

Jake was thinking computer sophisticated. “What do you mean by that?”

“I’m talking about their attitudes. They’re more worldly. Trying to figure Americans out. Trying to fit in more.”

“Do you speak Chinese?”

“No. I missed that boat. That’s where all the jobs are these days.”

Jake understood that lots of jobs had been shipped to China.

“Silly me,” the waitress said, sitting down to share the bench with him. “Here I am learning Japanese. Such a quaint language from the past.”

“Why the past?”

He felt her hips squirm, momentarily brushing against his.

“Japanese, Taiwanese, Koreans, Chinese. They come in waves. Every ten years there’s a new influx from Asia. Next it will be Vietnamese.”

She sounded pretty sure of herself. But her shorthand of recent history seemed to match his observations.

He was running out of things to say. He wanted to eat his burger, but he also didn’t mind her company.

“Maybe you should study Vietnamese,” he said.

She turned to look at him, mere inches from his face. She gave a sloppy, wry grin. “Yeah, maybe.”

She left the table to clean up after departing
customers. Jake watched her work as if her mind wasn’t into it. She was already thinking about her future, perhaps switching majors on the spot.

Two decades out of college and he couldn’t flirt like he used to. Nor could he keep up mentally.

His beer foam swirled toward his lips as he lifted his mug again. He was past learning about the world, and had to operate in it on a day by day, crime by crime basis. He had to worry about what hackers were up to, and what government agencies handled cyber threats.

He no longer had the luxury to dream.