Interference

by Danielle Girard

  There was a long silence.

  “Who has these reports?” Lanier asked.

  “Ryaan Berry and Hailey Wyatt. Jamie Vail may as well.” Mei thought if it weren’t for Lanier, she’d have access to them, too. She changed her mind about going home. She was going to dinner. At the very least, she’d get a chance to talk through this latest development with Ryaan or Hailey or Jamie. In person, not on the phone. The phone. She all but dropped it. Surely they were bugging that, too.

  “I have to go,” Mei said, suddenly aware of every word. “I’ll be in touch.” She hung up as though it was her meeting to adjourn. And maybe it was.

  She shut the phone off completely, a knee-jerk reaction from an older age of technology. With the right equipment, it wouldn’t matter if her phone was off. Mei started the engine of the car and cranked the heat. Then, she checked that the doors were locked and pushed her seat back as far as it would go.

  What would it take to bug an iPhone? These days, bugs were mostly software. In that case, turning it off had been smart. Mei tried to shake the chills, but even as the hot air filled the car, she was cold.

  She tried to talk herself down. A bug in the form of an app seemed unlikely. She still ran an app from the FBI that scanned for spyware and programs running unauthorized code. It hadn’t reported anything unusual. Mei was also very cautious about what apps went on her phone. At the moment, she had only nine. Not much place to hide a bug. Still. She should have checked it after her tablet had gone missing.

  Mei popped off the hard outer navy-striped case. Removed the thin rubber layer beneath it. Using the overhead light, she studied the phone’s edges. No evidence that it had been pried open. She turned it over in her hands. Nothing. It was pristine. No scratch marks, no excess glue. It didn’t mean someone hadn’t accessed the battery. She’d have to pull it apart to be certain. She looked around the car. No flat surface. No good light. No magnifying glass. She couldn’t do that here. She tried to reassure herself. There were no outward signs of a bug at work. Bugs drained a phone’s battery. Her battery life was in line with the programs she ran. Bugs also created random screen flashes. She’d had none of those, either.

  Mei pulled the rubber inner case over the white phone. The headphone jack caught her eye. A strange shadow. Something in there. Mei grabbed her purse off the floor and dumped the contents onto the passenger seat. She scanned for something sharp, a pen or a bobby pin, but there was nothing like that. Ayi’s ashtray was filled with loose change. Only paperwork in the glove box. Desperate, Mei dug deeper. At the bottom of the glove box was a single safety pin. Perfect.

  Using the sharp point, Mei dug gently along the inside edge of the headphone jack, applying pressure until she could go no deeper. Slowly, she pulled the pin back out. With it came a thin, curved device. Similar in appearance to a microprocessor, it was maybe half the size of the fingernail on her pinky finger.

  Mei picked it up between her nails and dropped it into her palm. Bringing it close to her face, she studied it. Her expertise was on technology that ran processors and code. Nothing like this. Even still, looking at it she was sure that she was being tracked and monitored, recorded. She thought about the conversation she’d had with Ayi and Hui, her talks with Sabrina, her date with Sophie. Those were just her personal ones. What about Jamie and Hailey and Ryaan? Could the phone have picked up that conversation in the hallway? Did the killer know that they’d homed in on the department?

  Mei had the momentary urge to throw the thing out the window, but instead she opened her wallet and dropped the bug into her coin purse. With the interior lights shut off, she pulled back into the street and headed toward Tommy’s. Whoever was tracking her could see where she was going, but she had no choice but to take him—whoever he was—with her to dinner. The good news was that she was going to dinner with a roomful of cops.

  Chapter 40

  Mei parked on a side street and walked down Geary to Tommy’s. She held her wallet tight against her, feeling overly conspicuous, like the tiny piece of equipment was broadcasting a siren down the street. As always, Tommy’s was crowded. Mei pushed her way through the throng to the back. A couple of guys tried to stop her to chat, but Mei didn’t even pause as she shook her head and passed.

  The Rookie Club dinner was supposed to be a time to talk about work without talking shop. Tonight, Mei wanted straight shop talk. Ryaan and Sydney were already at the table. Jamie wasn’t coming but she hoped Hailey would arrive soon. She needed to hear every last theory about what the hell was going on. Across from them were two women Mei had met though she couldn’t remember their names. Mei took a seat next to Sydney who reintroduced her to Jess Campbell of the INS and Cindy Wang, a bomb expert. Mei opted for water when the waiter came for her order. Sydney raised her water glass and clinked it against Mei’s.

  Across the table, Jess and Cindy were talking, so Mei opened her wallet and emptied her change pocket onto the table top. Cindy Wang glanced over at the clinking of coins.

  “I can loan you money, Mei, if you need it,” Ryaan told her.

  Mei didn’t smile, but put the small square device in the palm of her hand and showed it to Ryaan and Sydney.

  Sydney pushed Mei’s hand lower, trying to focus on her palm. “I can’t see without my readers. What is it?”

  Ryaan looked at Mei who raised her eyebrows but said nothing. Sydney pulled a pair of reading glasses from her purse. After studying it herself, Sydney snapped her fingers at Jess and Cindy then pointed to the thing in Mei’s hand. Ryaan pressed her finger to her lips. Mei held her palm out across the table so the others could see.

  “Where?” Cindy Wang asked her and then mouthed, “Where did you find it?”

  Mei lifted her iPhone with her free hand.

  “Inside?”

  Mei shook her head and pointed to the headphone jack.

  Sydney took the device from Mei’s hand. She turned it over in her palm then passed it across to Cindy. “She’s seen enough of these,” Sydney whispered to Mei.

  Cindy handed the device to Jess and circled the table. Squatting beside Mei, she said, “It’s a passive listening device, for sure. It might be pulling a little juice from the jack, just enough to keep it running.”

  While Cindy returned to her seat, Mei unrolled her silverware and laid her napkin flat on the table. Jess slid the device onto the napkin then Mei wrapped it carefully. She pulled the car keys from her purse.

  “Where are you going?” Jess asked her.

  “Going to put this thing in my car where it can listen to the traffic on Geary,” Mei said.

  Sydney took it from her. “Better yet, let it listen to traffic from my car.” She met Mei’s gaze. “Just in case it’s doing more than listening. I’ll get it to the lab tonight and have the third shift work on it.” She paused. “I could go now.”

  Mei shook her head. “It can wait until after dinner. I’d prefer to have your brain power here.”

  “Okay,” Sydney agreed. “I’ll put it in the car and be right back.”

  Ryaan slid into the chair next to Mei while Cindy and Jess leaned in.

  “What are you working on?” Cindy asked her.

  “I wish I knew,” Mei admitted.

  Ryaan filled Jess and Cindy in on a few of the details of the case. Mei was grateful for the expertise at the table. When Hailey arrived, she took the chair on the other side of Mei. She pulled her purse strap off her shoulder and shrugged out of her coat before leaning into Mei. “I just saw Sydney. Jesus Christ. What the hell is going on?”

  Mei had no answer for that.

  Hailey ordered a lemonade. Mei was tempted to get a glass of wine, but she didn’t want anything dulling her senses. Jess and Cindy ordered another round of margaritas though their first ones weren’t quite half done.

  Sydney returned a couple minutes later. Ryaan moved to sit across from Hailey so they coul
d talk more easily.

  “If there was one in your phone,” Sydney said. “There might be others.”

  Hailey nodded. “Right.”

  “At least you know your phone is clean,” Ryaan said.

  Mei looked around the group.

  Sydney put a hand on her shoulder. “You look exhausted.”

  “I heard our pharmaceutical company was in the paper this week,” Ryaan said.

  “Really? What paper?”

  “The Chronicle,” Ryaan said.

  Mei wondered why her team hadn’t flagged the article. “For what?”

  “Some wonder drug that wasn’t really a wonder,” she said.

  “I wonder if it has anything to do with the breach,” Sydney said.

  “I’ll follow up with them. See if they’ll talk to us now,” Mei said and turned to Hailey. “Did you hear anything from the church?”

  Hailey shook her head. “Not much. The director of the outreach programs wasn’t there. Hal talked to a guy who works in the kitchen. He didn’t recognize the name Albert Jackson.”

  Dinner arrived and a few minutes passed in silence before Ryaan spoke up. “A lot of soup kitchens have no way to track the names of their visitors. We may never link Jackson to St. James.”

  “If we can get in touch with the director, we could show a picture of Jackson,” Mei suggested, picking at her green chili enchiladas. She wasn’t particularly hungry.

  “Someone must know how to reach the community director,” Sydney said.

  “The church administrator would, but she had gall bladder surgery yesterday,” Hailey said.

  “And the guy in the kitchen didn’t even know the director’s name?” Cindy asked.

  “He said her first name is Jo,” Hailey said. “Maybe short for Joann or Jolene.”

  “But no last name?”

  “No. He wasn’t sure about that. He thought it was something like Pollack or Bullock.”

  Mei froze, fork in the air. “Pollack?”

  “What it is, Mei?” Ryaan asked.

  The hair at the base of Mei’s ponytail stood on end. “There’s a guy in my lab named Aaron Pollack.”

  Mei thought again about Aaron. How strange and reclusive he’d been since her arrival. Why hadn’t she considered him more seriously before? He had wanted her job. He was threatened by her presence. Disrespectful. Stubborn. Arrogant. Vengeful. That last one wasn’t as clear. And violent? “Amy Warner has been tracking me for someone else,” she said.

  “What?”

  “Somebody hacked into Lanier’s phone and sent Amy instructions to follow me. Amy thought the emails were coming from Lanier.”

  “So maybe it was Aaron giving Amy orders,” Ryaan said.

  “Maybe,” Hailey said. Mei could tell her tone was shifting. “But the guy was guessing at a name. I’ll call it in and get someone to look into it. But, it’s not Aaron working at the church… unless he’s dressing as a woman twice a week.” Hailey smiled, but Mei couldn’t find her humor.

  “I’m just tired,” she said.

  “I know. It’s all-consuming when it’s your life.” Hailey took a long drink of her lemonade as though it were something stronger. Maybe she was speaking from experience.

  Mei waited until the others had finished dinner. When the waiter came back for another drink order, she asked for her check. “I’m not much company tonight,” she said. “I think I’ll head home and get some sleep.”

  Sydney promised to call her as soon as she had information on the bug, and Hailey assured her she’d be in touch when she heard back from the church. As Mei walked out of Tommy’s, the only thing on her mind was Aaron Pollack. If Amy was following her on someone’s instructions, Aaron was the perfect suspect. It wasn’t as though someone had spoofed Sergeant Lanier’s email with a virus. No, this person had hacked into her account. Lanier loved Aaron. She still met with him on cases that had been in progress before Mei started. It wouldn’t be that hard for Aaron to have accessed her office and her computer. People were stupid with their email passwords. Hell, she might have even told him. If he wanted to verify her email on his own computer, he could easily have sent a text to her phone and seen it on her screen. That was if Lanier even locked her phone.

  Instead of driving back across the park toward home, Mei drove to the station. There would still be people working, but the station was a different place at night. She came in through the back doors and descended the stairs to their basement lair. At the FBI, she’d had an office with a window. Spending ten hours a day in the basement was another thing that took getting used to. The hallway was quiet but well lit. Sometimes when she came in early, the hallway was dark. It made her wonder who shut the lights down late at night. The only sound in the lab was the hum of the main server. Mei tucked her purse under her desk and looked around. Aaron’s laptop was on his desk, attached to the docking station. She was sure she’d seen him pack it up when he left.

  She scanned the room again. Jumped at the shadows from the equipment. Peered behind the large consoles until she was certain she was alone. Her heart pounding, she hurried to Aaron’s desk. Shook the mouse until the screen on the large free-standing monitor came to life. Aaron was logged into the department’s case system. He was uploading something to a Drop box account. According to the pop-up screen, the process would be completed in another twelve minutes. Aaron was here somewhere.

  She retreated from his desk to check the supply closet they used for a break room. Back in the hall, she listened at the door of the bathroom. She could take the entire laptop home and work on it there, but that meant tipping him off. She wasn’t ready to do that.

  Mei grabbed a flash drive from her top drawer and slid it into the USB port on Aaron’s laptop. She took a screen shot of his desktop, moved the pop-up that showed nine minutes remaining out of the way and took another shot. She scanned the case details. The initial case was opened by the SFPD, but it was no longer one of theirs. It had been handed off to the DOJ. She hit page down and took screen shots as she went. What was Aaron doing?

  Moving quickly, she dragged the images onto the USB and deleted the originals. The images were still on his computer, but he’d have to be looking for them. A door closed in the hall. Mei froze and counted to ten. When no one entered the lab, she kept working. She opened Aaron’s email and scanned through the in-box. Nothing stood out. She didn’t think he was stupid enough to keep evidence on his department computer. Mei checked for erased cookies and Internet history. Nothing. His browser history was empty. He must have been running a program that deleted his history.

  She found his browser minimized. She touched it once and Aaron’s private email server opened. The in-box appeared, and Mei took a screenshot. Every email subject was a sequence of numbers. At first, she thought they might be case file numbers, but there were too many numbers and no alpha characters. She clicked on one. The clock came up on the screen. “Don’t bump me out,” she whispered. “Come on. Come on.” The list of emails disappeared and she was bumped back to the log on screen. “Damn it.”

  She checked recent activity in his office email account, then his other programs. It wasn’t enough. She tested Aaron’s desk drawer. Locked. She paused to listen. All quiet. She retrieved the silverware she had stashed in her bottom drawer. Using the cafeteria knife on Aaron’s desk, she pried open the lock and pulled the top drawer open.

  The drawer fell open. There would be no hiding that she’d been through his desk now. She peered into the top drawer. Sticky notes, pens, most of it was the normal stuff. In the second drawer were old disks and an external drive. No way he’d leave anything on a drive at the station.

  In the bottom drawer, she spotted his bag. She stared at it. Going through his computer and his desk was one thing; those were department property. His bag wasn’t. She checked the process update again. She’d been there four minutes. If he w
as in the building, he’d be back any minute.

  She pulled his bag out of the drawer. In the main pocket was a case folder for one of his ongoing cases. She found car keys, a small umbrella, mints, his wallet with driver’s license, credit cards. The billfold contained forty-odd dollars. Nothing unusual there. In the small pockets, she found a card for a personal shopper at Nordstrom. Behind that was an American Express Platinum card. In the name of Aaron Alexander Pollack. The cards had a $350 annual fee or something. Designed for high-income executives, not lab techs.

  Mei slid the card back and checked the bag for anything else she might have missed. One pocket had several pens, a pass for a swanky gym with a membership fee only someone earning six figures could afford, and a card for the Four Season’s Half Moon Bay. Maybe Aaron had family money. Not a crime.

  She put the wallet back and checked the hall again. Surely, he would be back soon. Rushing, she pulled out the case file. Pushed the bag back into the drawer. A white envelope slid out onto the ground. Mei flipped it over. Blank. She tore it open, pulled out a stack of folded pages. Case summary pages. She flipped through them, the cases unfamiliar. Then, one caught her eye. She scanned the case number QF17643294AL. The same one she was not authorized to view. The shooting at Ayi’s. Aaron had a print out of her case.

  “What the hell are you doing?”

  Mei jammed the pages under her arm and spun around. Aaron stood, holding a cup of coffee and his phone.

  She rose slowly. “I thought I heard your phone ringing in your desk. I was trying to find it.”

  Aaron looked at his computer screen which mercifully had gone black again. “I have my phone right here.”

  Mei backed slowly against the desk. She glanced at Aaron’s coffee cup.

  His gaze followed hers and he set the coffee on the far corner of the desk, out of reach. “What were you really doing?”