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  “Do you have my retainer?”

  In answer, Desh removed 60 hundred-dollar bills from an envelope and fanned them out in front of the peephole. There was a rustle behind the door as a chain was unhooked and a loud click as a dead-bolt lock was turned, followed by the door creaking open.

  Desh entered the small, cluttered apartment. It bore the heavy musk of prolonged human habitation that Desh knew could be helped by an open window and the inflow of crisp, autumn air. Four high-end computers straddled a heavy glass-topped desk, all connected to each other through a spaghetti of makeshift wiring. On top of the desk sat a wireless keyboard and three high-definition, plasma monitors. Hanging on the wall above was a framed placard that read:

  HACKER-CRATIC OATH

  I swear to use my awesome powers for good, not evil.

  Other than this and a large black-and-white poster of Albert Einstein sticking out his tongue, the entire living area consisted of the desk, a single couch, a plasma television, and a small kitchen.

  Desh appraised the man in front of him. His name was Matt Griffin, and he was a bear of a man. He was at least 6 foot 5 and 300 pounds, with a bushy brown beard and long, wavy hair—almost a cross between a man and a Wookie. Despite his enormous size he had a harmless air about him that made him completely non-threatening. While his bulk and appearance could quickly lead one to the conclusion he was a dim caveman, his words were spoken with the intellectual affect of an ivy-league professor. Desh handed him the money and waited patiently as he counted to sixty.

  Griffin smiled affably. “Okay, Mr. Desh, I’m at your service for a period of one week. What can I do for you?”

  Fleming Executive Protection had its share of computer experts, but Desh couldn’t use them for this assignment, and he was supposed to be in playboy fantasyland anyway. Matt Griffin was said to be the best in the business. He usually worked for corporate clients doing fairly mundane tasks, but from time to time he helped private investigators if their cause was right, fully prepared to engage in illegal hacking, a victimless crime, if it could result in finding a missing person or stopping a violent criminal. Desh’s friend Adam had worked with Griffin several times and had been effusive in his praise for the man, who apparently took his hacker-cratic oath quite seriously, and would only work with someone if he had assurances their intentions were honorable. Adam had vouched for Desh and told Griffin he could trust him implicitly.

  Desh set his laptop on the only unoccupied space on the corner of Griffin’s desk. The giant eyed it with interest but said nothing. Desh handed him a typed page with Kira Miller’s name and last known home and work addresses, e-mail addresses, and telephone numbers.

  Griffin scanned the information quickly. “NeuroCure,” he said with interest, lowering himself into a black-leather swivel chair in front of his computer monitors while Desh remained standing. “Aren’t they developing a treatment for Alzheimer’s?”

  “Very good,” said Desh approvingly. “You’re certainly up to speed on your biotech.”

  Griffin shook his head. “I’m afraid I know next to nothing about biotech,” he admitted. “My aunt suffers from the disease so I tend to keep abreast of possible cures.”

  Tend to keep abreast. The dichotomy between Griffin’s Viking appearance and soft-spoken, lofty speech patterns was amusing to him. “I’m sorry about your aunt,” offered Desh.

  Griffin nodded solemnly. “Why don’t you fill me in on what you’re after as completely as you can. Nothing you say will leave this room.”

  “Good. Absolute confidentiality in this case could not be more vital. For your health as well as mine.” Desh locked his eyes on Griffin’s in an unblinking, intimidating stare, and held it for several long seconds. “You’re known to be a man of integrity,” he continued, “but betraying my trust would be a very, very bad idea …”

  “Save your threats,” said the giant firmly. “Veiled or otherwise. You have nothing to worry about. I take my responsibilities in this regard very seriously. As I’ve told you, your information is safe with me.”

  Desh knew he had little choice but to trust the oversized hacker. He stared at him a while longer, and then finally began to fill him in on Kira Miller’s tenure at NeuroCure, and the events that had transpired a year earlier. Griffin scribbled notes on a large pad of paper. Desh didn’t mention anything having to do with terrorists or Swiss banks, ending his account when the trail of the elusive Kira Miller had ended at the Cincinnati airport.

  Griffin whistled when Desh was finished. “Fascinating,” he said. “And very troubling.”

  Desh noted approvingly that Griffin didn’t attempt to explore why Desh had taken it upon himself to look for a psychopath who was wanted by the authorities for the brutal murder of several innocents.

  “So here’s where I’d like to start,” said Desh, “I’d like to know which scientific journals this Kira Miller subscribed to as of a year ago. I’m not interested in any that were sent to her work. I want to know the journals she got at home.”

  “Do you have a list of probables?”

  “I’m afraid not. And, unfortunately, I went online and discovered there are hundreds of scientific journals in her areas of interest.”

  The giant frowned. “Then this could take a long time. If you tell me the name of a journal I can tell you if she was a subscriber. But there’s no way to start with her address and work backwards to the journals.” He raised his eyebrows. “Not unless you’re prepared to engage in a little social engineering.”

  Desh was familiar with this euphemism used by hackers. “You mean get information from humans rather than the computer.”

  “Exactly. Man cannot hack using computers alone. The best hackers are also the most proficient at milking information from humans—the system’s weakest links.”

  Desh eyed Griffin with interest. “Okay,” he said. “I’m game.”

  “Great,” said Griffin, beaming happily. He swiveled his chair to face the monitors and his fingers flew over the keyboard, calling up one web page after another as Desh looked over his shoulder. The quartet of pricey computers, linked together, operated at blazing speeds, and Griffin’s Internet connection was the best that money could buy, and included custom enhancements. The end result of this was that web pages crammed with data and pictures and graphics each flashed up on the oversized monitor, complete, faster than the eye could follow.

  Griffin scrolled through nested menus and clicked on specific options before Desh could even begin to read them. Moments later he was several layers deep in the internal computer files of the D.C. police.

  “I’m surprised you can breach a police system so easily,” muttered Desh.

  Griffin shook his head. “You can’t. Their firewalls and security systems are state-of-theart,” he explained. “But I found a way in last year and created a backdoor entrance so I could return anytime I wanted. And I can use the D.C system to query the San Diego Police Department’s computers for their file on the Larry Lusetti murder investigation.” Griffin continued pulling up pages on the computer as he spoke, and moments later he had the file he was after. He skimmed through it rapidly, pausing to scribble a few names, a telephone number, and a date on his note pad.

  Griffin took a deep breath. “I believe I’m ready,” he said. He picked up the phone and dialed the number he had written down. A woman named Jill answered, but within a minute he had Roger Tripp on the phone, the postal carrier who had long covered the mail route that included Kira Miller’s condo.

  “Hello, Mr. Tripp,” said Griffin. “Do you have a minute?”

  “Well … I was just about to head out on my route,” he said. “What is this about? Jill said you were a detective.”

  “That’s right, sir. Detective Bob Garcia.” Griffin consulted his notepad. “I work with Detective Marty Fershtman. You may remember that Detective Fershtman interviewed you about a Kira Miller on September 28th of last year in regard to a homicide investigation we were conducting.”

&n
bsp; “I remember,” said Tripp warily.

  “Great. This won’t take but a minute. We’ve continued our investigation, and we had one additional question we were hoping you could help us with.”

  “I’ll try,” said postal worker Tripp.

  “Great. Do you happen to remember the titles of any periodicals that you delivered to Dr. Miller? Scientific oriented periodicals,” he clarified. “Do you know the type I mean?”

  “I think so,” said Tripp, showing absolutely no curiosity as to why the police had interest in this information. “They kind of stood out, if you know what I mean. Not exactly light bedtime reading. Let me see.” He paused for several long moments to visualize these journals in his head. “Human Brain Mapping. That one comes to my memory the clearest. And then, um … the Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience. Either that or something really close. And then, ah, … the Journal of Applied Gerontology. I wouldn’t bet my life these are the exact titles, but I’m pretty sure.”

  Griffin scribbled these names on the pad beside his other notes. He winked at Desh before thanking Tripp for his help and ending the call.

  “Remarkable,” said Desh, his voice filled with respect. He had wanted to begin his search for Kira Miller by identifying the scientific journals he knew would be indispensible to her, but he had been far from certain this would be possible. But Griffin had done so almost instantly, and without even breaking a sweat.

  “Quite effective, wouldn’t you say? If you have the computer skills to get information that establishes instant credibility, like dropping the name of the officer who interviewed Tripp, the world is your oyster. Once you’ve laid out your bone fides, people will tell you just about anything.”

  “So it appears,” noted Desh with amusement. “Thanks for the demonstration.”

  “You’re quite welcome,” said Griffin with a wide grin. “So now what?”

  “Can you hack into each journal’s database of subscribers?”

  “I’ll try not to be insulted that you phrased that as a question,” said Griffin. “That’s like asking Mozart if he can play chopsticks. This is why you’re paying me the big bucks,” he added, and then immediately began racing through icons and menus at an Olympic pace.

  “Once you’re in, ah … Amadeus,” said Desh, “I’d like to focus in on people who bought online subscriptions to all three journals, or even two of the three, about nine months to a year ago. Chances are, this will be Kira Miller.”

  “This might take a while,” warned Griffin. He got up and walked the few paces to his tiny kitchen, effortlessly lifting one of two large wicker chairs from around the small dinette and dropping it beside his own chair. Desh sat down appreciatively and continued to watch Griffin as he juggled multiple screens and programs with seemingly superhuman agility.

  After about an hour he was finally able to hack into the journals’ systems, but his subsequent analysis of subscriber databases was fruitless. Over the past year, in fact, not a single person had begun subscribing to more than one of the three journals, either online or by snail-mail.

  “She must have decided she could live without them while she was in hiding,” suggested Griffin.

  Desh pursed his lips in concentration. His best chance to find her was to count on her not making mistakes. “All right, Matt,” said Desh, “let’s try a thought experiment. Let’s imagine she has your level of skill with computers,” he began.

  Griffin looked amused at this thought. “My level of skill? My imagination may be prodigious, but that’s a lot to ask of it,” he said with a twinkle in his eye.

  Prodigious. Desh was amused once again at the giant’s choice of words. “I wouldn’t want to strain your imagination, Matt,” he said, rolling his eyes. “So let’s make this easy for you. Suppose you were on the lamb. And you knew that other computer experts were plugged in and trying like crazy to find you. Would you anticipate they’d try to track you through your online journal subscriptions like we just did?”

  “Absolutely,” came the immediate reply.

  “So what would you do if you were still determined to get journals you needed?”

  Griffin considered. “I’d put up relays,” he responded after only a few seconds of thought. “I’d break through firewalls and shanghai any number of Internet-connected computers around the world, using them as relays, routing the incoming journals through a tangled web of these before it reached me. With enough relays, I’d be virtually untraceable.”

  Desh considered. “And what if you didn’t want searchers to even have the satisfaction of knowing you were out there and receiving the journals,” he said. “Even if you were untraceable. What if you wanted the world to think you really had vanished—that you might be dead even?”

  Griffin answered almost immediately. “In that case, I’d just hack into the journals and steal the subscriptions. Then there would be no subscriber record in the databases for experts to find. And you wouldn’t have to pay for it either,” he noted. “In fact, now that I think about it, that’s the best reason of all to do it this way.”

  “To save money?

  “No. To save an identity.”

  Desh’s eyes narrowed. “I see,” he said as Griffin’s meaning registered. “Because the only way to buy an online subscription is by using a credit card.”

  “Exactly,” said Griffin. “So if those searching for you uncovered your purchase, even if they couldn’t trace you, the false identity you used would be blown.”

  “Okay. Suppose she did steal the subscriptions. Could you track such a theft?”

  Griffin gazed at the ceiling as he considered the various facets of the problem. “I think so,” he said finally.

  “Come on, Matt,” chided Desh. “Someone with your prodigious talent? Should be a snap for you.”

  “I’ll take that as a challenge,” said Griffin.

  “Good,” said Desh, determination burning in his eyes. “Because that’s exactly the way I intended it.”

  7

  Matt Griffin worked on the problem for an hour while Desh looked on patiently. As it neared lunchtime, Desh offered to go for takeout, an offer that Griffin readily accepted. Desh returned thirty-five minutes later carrying a paper sack containing a number of white, garden-variety Chinese takeout boxes and knocked on the door.

  Griffin hurriedly undid the locks and opened the door with a broad, cat-that-ate-the-canary grin on his bearded face. “I did it,” he announced triumphantly.

  “Fantastic!” said Desh, handing him the bag of Chinese food and shutting the door behind him. “What did you find?” he asked eagerly.

  “You were right about her. She’s good. Very good.”

  Griffin sat down at his desk chair and set the bag of food on the floor beside him. “If she really does have a background in biology rather than computers, I think she’s earned rookie of the year honors.”

  Desh lifted the large wicker chair with one arm and moved it a few feet back so it was facing Griffin. Desh sat down, his eyes locked intently on the giant as he continued.

  “It turns out that all three journals have a number of, ah … discount subscribers, shall we say, that they don’t know about. Somehow, considering the nature of these journals, that surprised me.”

  “Didn’t think readers of such scholarly journals would engage in petty theft?”

  Griffin nodded.

  “Nothing surprises me anymore,” said Desh cynically. “So how did you sort through them to find her?” he pressed, not allowing the discussion to become sidetracked.

  “Two of the journals were being siphoned to the same e-mail address as of about ten months ago. No other stolen subscriptions among the three journals had the same signature.”

  “Good work,” said Desh appreciatively. “Now tell me the bad news.”

  “What makes you think there is any?”

  “It couldn’t be this easy.”

  Griffin smiled. “You’re right, as it turns out. It’s a dead end. She’s more sophisticated th
an I had guessed. The e-mailed journals are routed through an impenetrable maze of computers. Even someone better than me—if such a person existed,” he added, grinning, “wouldn’t be able to trace through all the relays to find her computer.”

  Desh frowned. “At least we know she’s still alive.”

  “And still keeping up on the latest research,” added Griffin.

  Desh nodded at the bag of food. “Dig in,” he offered.

  Griffin went to the kitchen and returned with large plastic forks and the biggest cardboard plates Desh had ever seen, with a cheerful, orange-and-yellow floral pattern printed on each one. He handed a fork and plate to Desh, and dumped two full containers of cashew chicken along with a container of white rice on his plate. Desh slopped half a box of beef broccoli onto his own plate with some rice, and began picking at it, while Griffin shoveled the food into his giant maw as rapidly as he had navigated the Web.

  “You’ve done a nice job, Matt,” said Desh. “We’ve made faster progress than I expected. But this is about where I thought we’d end up.”

  “So any ideas of where to go from here?”

  Desh nodded thoughtfully. “As a matter of fact, yes. We can’t trace her through all her relays, but can we use them to contact her?”

  Griffin raised his eyebrows. “Interesting thought.”

  “Well?” pressed Desh.

  “Sure. It would be easy. Just name your message and I’ll send it,” he offered helpfully.

  Desh held up a hand. “Not just yet,” he said. “I’d like to ping her first. Send in some tracking software that she’ll detect and defeat.”

  “To what end?”

  “So she knows someone’s out there turning over this particular rock looking for her.”

  “You sure that’s a good idea? It gives her a warning. Also, it’s in her best interest to have as much information as possible about whoever is pursuing her. If I were her, I’d trace the ping back to us.”

  “That’s what I’m counting on,” said Desh with a thin smile. He rose and lifted his black laptop off the corner of Griffin’s desk. “I want you to set everything up on my laptop, so when she does trace the ping, she traces it back to me.” He paused. “Assuming she doesn’t already know my identity and that I’m after her. I wouldn’t rule that out,” he added warily. “Set up software that will watch for a breach and record everything possible about its source. I also want you to plant a tracer, so if she does invade my computer, it can latch on and follow the breadcrumb trail back to her.”