Blood Ties

by Robert J. Crane

  Bruce let out a low, almost pained chuckle, then settled into a few seconds of silence. “He stole the algorithm. For search. The main one.”

  “Okay,” I said. “That doesn’t seem so bad—”

  “Oh, it’s bad,” Bruce said, looking around once again. As though the farmers, the dude at the counter, or the long-term waitress were going to spring up and slaughter him before he could deliver his message here.

  “Here’s your milk,” the waitress said, swinging in unprompted. She didn’t have her order pad out, which told me she was checking in. “You guys planning to order dinner? Or you just having some drinks?”

  “Not sure yet,” I said, smiling at her from behind my shades. I’d altered my voice to go higher here and more sweet, match the outfit. “Mind giving us a few more minutes?”

  “Take your time,” she said, and she was gone like a flash.

  “Bruce—” I started to say.

  “The algorithm is shit,” he said, and his voice broke as it rushed out.

  I blinked, not quite sure how to take that. “Uhh. When you say ‘shit,’ do you mean—”

  “It couldn’t find chicken in a grocery store fridge case,” Bruce said, eyes darting furiously now. “It couldn’t find oil in the middle of a refinery. It’s a scam, a bullshit thing—”

  I shook my head. “Inquest is the number one search engine by traffic in the world—”

  Now it was Bruce’s turn to shake his head. “No. It’s really not. Because the algorithm is shit, and anyone who uses it for one search knows it’s not that good.” His eyes flashed around the room. “Those numbers are a scam, the algorithm is a pile of dog crap, and the fact is that Grendel—whoever he is—has it now—well, he’s going to know.” Bruce swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing madly. “And Berniece is terrified that this means everyone is going to know it soon, too.”

  64.

  “Okay, hold on, explain this to me,” I said, trying to wrap my head around what Bruce had just dropped on me. Inquest, the highest-traffic search engine in the world, was a scam?

  I thumped an elbow on the table and accidentally splashed some of my milk over the edge of the glass. Scrambling, I grabbed napkins and started to mop it up while Bruce sat there, eyes shifting like crazy, as though he were going to get attacked, and trying to compose himself while I cleaned up my mess.

  When I got done, he still hadn’t elaborated. So I probed. “How does a search engine climb to the top of the world traffic rankings,” I said, drawing out my words, casting a look around to make sure no one was paying attention to us and trying to get Bruce to re-engage after he’d spent himself and all his courage in that last revelation, “in the middle of Silicon Valley, without...y’know, getting exposed?”

  Bruce looked like he wanted to swallow his tongue, but eventually coughed up two words: “Traffic assignment.”

  I tried to figure out what that meant. It sounded vaguely familiar, though for all I knew it was from my various policing classes. I’d learned to direct traffic at some point, hadn’t I? “Explain,” I said, though, for clarity’s sake.

  “It means another site assigns you their unique page visits,” Bruce said, somehow getting that out around the mountainous anxiety that was apparently built up within him. “News companies use it to inflate their visitor numbers for venture capital purposes. Let’s say their actual site gets six million visitors a month. They buy the traffic from other sites, clickbait ones and whatnot, with lots of listicles broken down into individual pictures. Each counts as a unique visit or page view.” His eyes dashed around the room, and you would have thought he was selling me nuclear codes instead of cluing me in on what sounded the lowest stakes, dumbest scam since somebody came up with the Pet Rock. “They buy up, say, another six million views from these sites and—boom. Now they have twelve million, even though that additional six million never actually went to their site.”

  “Okay, that’s gross, but how does that fit with Inquest?” I asked. “You’re telling me half their traffic comes from somewhere other than their own site...?”

  Bruce lowered his eyes. “Yes. Berniece bought up—oh, I don’t know, two, three dozen smaller, niche search engines. Then bought a ton of ad space to raise our visibility, get our name out there, even though our algorithm is horse shit for finding things compared to a lot of our competitive set.” His entire posture had moved into this defensive, hunched-over, turtle-like position. I feared he was going to wake up with a lot of neck pain tomorrow unless he did some yoga to loosen up later. “Now she can proclaim we’re number one, which brings in a whole bunch more traffic, but it’s not because we’re the best. We actually suck.” His voice fell to a guilty whisper. “We’re number one thanks to smoke, mirrors and marketing.”

  “That’s true in a lot of fields, though, isn’t it?” I asked. “I mean, I read a feature a few years ago that basically said the New York Times Bestseller list is total horseshit. That it’s whatever they want it to be that week. That they’ll punt books they don’t like off it. Hell, they even created a children’s list to keep the Harry Potter books from dominating.”

  “Maybe it is like that elsewhere, I don’t know,” Bruce said. “But I’ll tell you this—there’s a lot of talk around the Valley about how Inquest pulled this off. It’s kind of a coup. And no one’s really figured it out yet, exactly, or if they have, they’re not talking where we’ve heard them. If Berniece knew I was letting the cat out of the bag...” He shuddered. “I don’t know what she’d do. Kill me, maybe.”

  “That’s a little dramatic, don’t you think?” I asked.

  “No!” Bruce whispered. “Do you know how much money came her way—our way—after we took the number one spot? Because I don’t, but I have an inkling, and it’s a number that ends in ‘billion.’ Everyone wants to work with a winner, and second prize is worth a hell of a lot less. Advertisers don’t want to pay as much if you’re number two.”

  For some reason—Friday—the bass line to Droppin’ Deuces began to fire off in my head. What an unfortunate time for that to happen.

  “So if Grendel stole the algorithm,” I said, trying to work through the logical conclusions of this—

  “If he is in the industry at all,” Bruce said, “he’s going to know very quickly that we’re a paper tiger.”

  My phone buzzed and I checked it. Text from Shaw, partially obscured, all caps. I ignored it. It buzzed again a second later, and I rolled my eyes, hitting the button to silence it after I noticed Bruce get even more agitated as he lost my full attention. “Sorry,” I said, throwing it back in my jacket. “My boss is on some kind of tear. I think he needs more fiber in his diet.”

  “I need to get back,” Bruce said, standing up, almost dinging his knee as he did so. “Who knows what’s happened while I was gone? For all I know, Berniece has broken into my apartment again, looking for me.”

  “Wouldn’t she call first?” I asked.

  “I have no idea,” Bruce said, close to a moan.

  “Can I make a suggestion?” I asked, trying to keep a quiet, sensitive approach to him in his place of despair. “Dude, you’re wrecked from all this. Get out while you can. Kansas has gotta seem pretty good right now compared to this pressure you’re under. Or Austin. Whatever.” I waved a hand over him. “You keep living like this and Berniece is going to kill you even if she doesn’t do the deed herself. Heart conditions and strokes are no joke, Bruce. Silent killers.”

  “You’re right,” he said quietly. He stood there for a second, seemingly trying to make a decision. “One last thing.” He leaned over and jotted something down on a napkin, then stood up and presented it to me. “Here.”

  I took it from him carefully, afraid it might tear. It had words on it: 23837 Hidden Hills Drive, Mountain View. 2 AM tonight.

  Looking from the napkin to him, I asked, “What is this?”

  “I don’t know, exactly,” Bruce said, letting out a breath. “All I know is that it’s important to Berniece.” />
  I frowned at the address and time. “Is it a meeting?”

  “Maybe?” Bruce shrugged. “It’s like a social event, I think? Skull and Bones type club, maybe? For the big deals in SiliValley.” He managed a chuckle. “I kind of like that name. That’s growing on me.” He pointed at the napkin again. “I don’t know if it’s related to any of this, but here’s what I do know—they go religiously. Every week. And it’s super secret.” Bruce looked around one last time. “I gotta go.”

  “Get out while you can, Bruce,” I said, looking at the napkin.

  “That’s good advice,” he said, heading for the door. He paused there, before opening it, and looked back at me. “You should take it, too.” He shook his head. “Nothing good comes from this place...these people. I mean...think about your ribs.”

  And with that, he left, disappearing into the dark, leaving me—somehow—with still more questions that I didn’t have answers to.

  And also, aching ribs, because this corset was literally killing me. God. The things I do for my work.

  65.

  Friday

  “This has been a good day, team,” Friday said into his camera, recording the last Instaphoto vid of the day. “Rock on. Sleep well. Hit the gym hard. Kill your quads. And get your protein intake balanced. Gainnnnnnnnnnnnzville, bros! Later!” And he signed off.

  Friday let out a long breath. He was alone in his hotel room, stomach not quietly back to business as usual, but better than it had been this afternoon. He was bruised, though, hardcore, from the fight at Socialite. Definitely so bruised that the tasteful nude selfies thing had to be put on hold. Maybe tomorrow.

  He stood and stretched. He’d had a killer jam session earlier, really cranking it. He’d worked on the follow-up single to Droppin’ Deuces, which he thought he was going to call either Yellow Paralyzer or maybe Bustin’ Guts and Nuts. It had a more gangsta rap feel to it right now, which made him lean in the direction of the latter. But it was still up in the air, creatively. Lots of room to move it around and work on the arrangement before he finalized things.

  “Tomorrow, we go out and conquer again.” He unlocked his phone again and checked his panels on Instaphoto and Socialite.

  “Whoa!” he muttered. His follower count was way up and one of his posts had gone viral. Megaviral, even. Oh, it was the question about lesbian anger. Sure, sure. That made sense. He couldn’t be the only one who’d ever noticed that issue.

  Friday yawned. Looked like it had thousands of comments, plus it had been reshared like crazy, people taking his awesome musings and spreading them far and wide across the social ’net.

  No time to parse the comments tonight, though. He was bushed. Healing and jamming and his workout from last night, plus the impromptu concert this morning.

  “That’s enough movement toward our dreams for one day, champ,” he said, talking to his own crotch. Because why wouldn’t he? Where else was he going to get intelligent conversation in this room? Not like his biceps had brains of their own, hugenormous and kittens as they were.

  With that, he fell over into bed, conking out perfectly within seconds of hitting the pillow. Making shit happen was exhausting. And tomorrow was going to be even more amazing, he could already tell.

  66.

  Sienna

  “Hey, Mendelsohn,” I said, the limo thrumming along down the road back to Silicon Valley, “it’s Sienna. I had that meeting and Brucie spilled a little detail about a few things. Gotta admit, I’m not quite sure what this has to do with the investigation, but he seemed to think it was big. Catastrophic, even, for Inquest. Call me back when you get a chance. I’d like to walk you through what he told me.”

  I hung up on his voicemail, shrouded in the darkness, the limo’s internal lights dimmed, the glass divider between me and the driver. Sitting in silence, I took a few moments to collect my thoughts and check the time.

  It was a little before 10. Maybe Mendelsohn was an early riser and had already gone to bed. Or he was doing something. Either way, I felt a little in the lurch until I got his perspective on the whole ‘traffic assignment’ thing Bruce had broken to me. Was it big? Was it small? I felt like I needed an insider like Mendelsohn to tell me.

  As to the napkin with the meeting time and place on it, I’d snapped that into my phone with a photo immediately in case I got attacked and the napkin got trashed. Which certainly wasn’t out of the question. I’d also done my best to memorize the details of it, and had, though it was no guarantee they’d stick if someone like Grendel came along and gave me enough skull trauma.

  I leaned back against the soft seat and got lost in thought.

  A big, bad, seemingly unstoppable beast that was stealing tech secrets far and wide. Maybe building a robot...something? Robot army, even, taking it to an extreme conclusion?

  With a score to settle against Silicon Valley.

  Oh, and Veronika and her crew seemed to be operating at the behest of a very angry CEO who was perpetrating some sort of tech scam to make more money for her company, and eager to keep that from getting out. Willing to kill for it, maybe even.

  I rubbed my eyes. The miles passed as I stared out the window into the darkness beyond, only the occasional light to mark our progress through the night.

  Also, what was up with Wittman? The guy had invited me out here after his businesses had been hit twice, but he’d frozen me out the entire time I’d been here, saddling me with Mendelsohn. Maybe he was just a busy CEO, but I felt like there was something deeper going on there. Another missing piece.

  Somewhere during the slow swirl of thoughts, I remembered Georgia West, and how she’d died at the outset of all this. I’d really liked West. Of all the people I worked with at the FBI, she’d easily been the most palatable. Tough, professional, serious about the job, with none of the burnout, ex-wives and baggage bitterness of Holloway or the new-puppy, drooling enthusiasm of Kerry Hilton.

  Damn, West. I wanted to avenge her something fierce, and sticking Grendel’s own hand into his guts didn’t quite scratch that itch. But it was a start.

  My mind drifted back to my conversation with Jaime Chapman earlier in the day, too. His casual, malicious sense of superiority was a thing I’d encountered a time or two. I’d been famous long enough that I was well over people who sneered at me and thought me a complete dunce due to my lack of formal education.

  Credit to Mendelsohn; he must have seen this. I realized, a little belatedly, that in our conversations, he’d taken a sort of opposite tack of Chapman. Almost like he was building me up in spite of my—admitted—insecurities related to that lack of education.

  Then there was Friday. I sighed, loud, there in the empty limo.

  What the hell was I going to do about Friday?

  Harry had passed the message that Friday was somehow crucial to this investigation. Thus far, he’d thrown himself brainlessly into a fight with Grendel only to get disemboweled—which, hey, I could sympathize with, having had it happen to myself once or twice—then pissed off Veronika to a higher level than she’d already been pissed off. Which did not seem to bode well for me in the future. Or Friday, if it came down to it.

  I pulled the napkin out of my pocket again. The edges were already showing wear from my constant handling of it.

  Whatever was going on at this place tonight, I needed to at least take a look. The idea that it could be a trap occurred to me, and made me wonder what the best path to handle it would be?

  I could bring Friday as back-up. If he were any other agent, that’s exactly what I would do, in fact.

  But...

  This was Friday we were talking about.

  I hit the button for the intercom to the driver and read out the napkin address to him. After he acknowledged he had it, I said, “Take me there and park a half mile away or so. I’m setting my alarm for 1 AM and I’m going to get some sleep. You can do the same if you want. Just don’t tell anyone this is our destination, okay?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” he said,
and that was it for our communication.

  I set my alarm, then stretched out across the back seat as I came to a decision.

  Hell no, I wasn’t bringing Friday along on...well, whatever this was. If Mendelsohn called back, I’d talk to him about it, otherwise I’d go alone and just sniff around the edges. I wouldn’t go ‘in’ on whatever it was unless I found out it was totally innocuous.

  With that decision made, but a thousand other questions swirling in my head, I lay back on the seat and thought of someone I desperately wanted to talk to as I drifted off to sleep.

  67.

  “Ma’am?”

  I woke in the back of the limo, which was far from the worst place I’d woken up to recently. “I’m up, I’m up,” I said, in a deep grog. The driver’s voice was coming out of a speaker, and there was a buzzing noise going off nearby. It was pretty subtle, and it took me a second to realize it was my phone. Who knew how long it had been going. I hit the button to shut off the alarm, then closed my eyes again for a minute.

  “Ma’am, it’s almost two in the morning,” the driver’s voice came over the intercom again.

  That snapped me awake, a little more harshly than I would have liked. I guess I’d hit snooze a few times. Usually that wasn’t a problem for me; I tended to get up fairly early and vault out of bed with the first ring of the alarm. But every once in a while when I’d hit my limits, the snooze button did become an option. Apparently that had happened here.

  “Okay, yes, I’m sitting up,” I said, and did so, blood draining out of my head and making me regret fighting against gravity. Bed was so much more of an attractive option than getting up to—what was I doing again? Oh, right, staking out an address given to me by Brittle Bruce. I took a couple long breaths. “Okay. Okay, I’m shoving myself out the limo door and hoping the night air will briskly wake me.”