Encrypted: An Action-Packed Techno-Thriller

by Carolyn McCray

  “Is it just me, or are they getting better at this?” Ronnie asked. Was that a hint of desperation he heard?

  Quirk focused his attention on her laptop feed. Sure enough, she was smack-dab in the middle of a standoff. The great Robin Hood hacker was stymied. He was actually happy that, every once in a while, Ronnie was reminded of why she needed him and his very specialized expertise.

  “Warp may have made some improvements, but no one is as geeky as I,” Quirk said. He knew how to drag out a dramatic pause. “We are going cold.”

  With flamboyance that Liberace would have been proud of, Quirk pressed a button, and a panel under the main computer tower opened up. Even at fifty-two degrees ambient temperature, frost poured out from the chamber of liquid nitrogen. Slowly, the tower lowered into the vat of freezing solution.

  He watched as all processes on her laptop sped up exponentially.

  “Whoa, there,” Ronnie said as her typing accelerated to keep pace with the processor speed. “You are lord of the geeks.”

  He knew that, but it was still nice to hear it every once in a while. Not all was hunky-dory though. “Yeah, the only downside is that we have to finish the transfer before the chips completely freeze.”

  “And how long is that?”

  “Yeah, um. I’d hurry.”

  Quirk watched the computer’s internal temperature plummet as the red dots converged toward Ronnie’s glowing green sphere. “And I mean spatially as well as temporally.”

  “Huh?”

  There was no way to say it gently. “They’re closing in on your position.”

  * * *

  Zach paused. Were those footsteps in the upper stairwell?

  “Is she directly above me?” he asked Warp.

  For once, the techie’s answer was direct and prompt. “She’s two floors up, and thirty feet to the south of you.”

  “So, let’s get moving,” Grant urged as he joined Zach.

  If the junior agent thought that he had startled him, Fifer was greatly mistaken. Zach had picked up on his entrance a good two stories ago. Those lifts inside Grant’s shoes must have given him away.

  “Took you long enough,” Zach grumbled. “Let’s go.”

  “Aren’t you going to bitch me out that I’m not guarding the back?”

  Zach rolled his eyes as he continued up the staircase. “If I’d needed you back there, I would have told you to follow me. Now, move!”

  “But it doesn’t make any sense,” Grant whined. “Why is she going up?”

  “Don’t know,” Warp said, and then quickly followed up. “But we’ve got a new problem.”

  No, Zach thought. There were no other problems. Tonight was a problem-free zone until he caught her.

  “Um, yeah, guys, Interpol has requested that we take custody of an arsonist that tried to torch a Picasso at the El Paso Museum of Art.”

  Was that all? A modern art critic with a Bic lighter? That didn’t even register on Zach’s problem radar. “Can do, after we wrap up things here.”

  “More like now.”

  Was that Warp being bossy? “Excuse me?”

  “Sorry, Hunt, but Interpol is working on behalf of the Vatican.” Zach was about to ask what in the hell that had to do with anything even remotely involving him, when Warp rushed on, “And the deputy said to cut an agent and have him head over to the museum.”

  “Just one?” he asked.

  “Just one.”

  With a savage grin, Zach turned to Grant. He could kill two birds with one stone. Make the deputy happy and ditch his partner.

  “Screw you!” Grant shot back, but his partner must have seen in Zach’s eyes that he wasn’t in the mood to be screwed with. The younger agent turned to obey, but couldn’t keep from mouthing off. “You know, one day they’re going to figure out that you’re trying to catch her for yourself—and not because of the warrant, asshole.”

  Not worrying about which statement was true, Zach headed up the stairs alone.

  * * *

  Ronnie hit the roof door at a run. She didn’t need to look at her watch to know that they were on her ass. She continued her flight across the dark roof as the fireworks display reached its crescendo. Each explosion was brighter and larger than the last. And each time, as they were designed to do, her infrared glasses adjusted and avoided that completely uncivilized whiting-out normally associated with light bursts. She might even consider a raise for Quirk if he kept developing bleeding-edge technology like this.

  “South by southwest, right?” she asked as she geared up for the jump.

  “The wind is coming in from the east, so it should be an easy—”

  Putting all her concentration into her leap, Ronnie didn’t hear Quirk’s next words. She was only steps away from the edge. Throwing her weight forward, she planted her lead leg and—

  A series of fireworks exploded one after another in blinding succession. A haze of white light obscured her vision. Disoriented, Ronnie tried to abort her jump, but there was no way. She had built up way too much momentum. She tried to correct in midair, but her legs were forward. Waving her arms, desperate to shift her center of gravity, she felt herself start to lose altitude.

  In another breath, her lower body slammed into the edge of the other roof. She tried to force her upper half over the ledge, but gravity was a bitch and she slid down the brick wall. Flailing, somehow one hand caught the ledge. Forcing herself to remain calm, Ronnie grabbed the ledge with her other hand. Under that much pressure, her gloves’ beads began snapping and popping.

  “What in the hell are you doing out there?”

  Quirk’s tone was livid. But she was hanging by ten fingers from the side of a freaking five-story building. “You had better hope that I die right this minute!”

  The snapping, crackling, and popping continued.

  “You’re upset?” he squealed. “Do you have any idea how hard it is to wire those beads?”

  * * *

  “I’ve stopped the bleeding! I’ve stopped the money transfer!” Warp was nearly beside himself with pride. Problem was, that wasn’t what Zach wanted to know.

  “That’s great, Warp, but I asked whether you had an image yet?” Zach repeated as he carefully checked the fifth-floor landing. There wasn’t anywhere else to go. The roof door was right in front of him. He needed to know what was on the other side.

  “Sorry. Our satellite feed of the area is fritzed.”

  Of course it was. Hacking into the NSA-secured satellite computer was child’s play to this chick. Zach’s jaw clenched and unclenched. This was not how he pictured this bust going down. “So essentially, that means I’m going out there blind?”

  “No, no,” Warp assured him, adamant. “Another satellite will come into view in three minutes.”

  Zach looked at his watch. The second hand was going around way too slowly to wait another one hundred and eighty seconds. Not when she could be right beyond this door. He tightened his grip on the gun.

  “I’ll be on the roof, then.”

  * * *

  Ronnie ever so carefully swung her legs to the side. Her only chance of getting off this damn ledge was to use leverage to counteract the gravity that wanted to plummet her to the pavement five stories down. But she lost another finger’s grip and had to abort her attempt. The added weight popped more beads.

  “Now what are you doing?” her assistant complained as she hung precariously by one hand.

  “So help me, Quirk…”

  Before she could work up a really good revenge plan, the squeak of hinges stopped her. She knew that sound. She had just made it when she opened the rusted roof door. They couldn’t be that close, could they? Could he?

  Adrenaline fueled her muscles, and in one panic-driven move, she swung her leg over the ledge and wrestled the rest of her body over. But she couldn’t stop there. She needed to get away.

  * * *

  Zach abandoned caution. He heard something. It must be her. “How far?”

  “I
t looks like the south-by-southwest corner.” Warp said. “Sixty feet ahead.”

  He checked his corners at a run—until he realized that wasn’t a step up ahead. That was the ledge. “Warp, buddy, twenty feet of that is open air.”

  “What?” Zach was about to explain, but Warp’s excited voice cut him off. “Hey, we just regained the partial satellite feed. Oh, boy…”

  “Oh, boy, what, Warp?”

  The techno-geek cleared his throat before he answered. “Well, you see…”

  “Warp!”

  “She’s on the other roof.”

  Turning back to the ledge, Zach looked at the gap between the buildings. There’s no way that she jumped it. No way, right? He checked the ledge, no sign of a grappling device or ladder.

  She had jumped it.

  He backed away from the ledge as Warp reported to the rest of the agents, “We have lost the suspect atop the—”

  Warp didn’t finish his sentence because Zach wasn’t backing away in defeat. He was giving himself room to build up speed before he leapt. The distance flew by, and Zach actually thought he had a chance of clearing the ledge, but at the last second, his trajectory flattened. His body made it over, but his shins weren’t quite so lucky. He went down, hard. But he was across.

  Damn, that hurt! But he rolled up and was on his feet before his body could tell him to stay down. Nothing broken, or least nothing bad enough to stop his pursuit.

  “Belay that last,” Warp said as Zach brought his gun to bear. “Hunt is still on her tail.”

  * * *

  Ronnie ducked behind another chicken coop. Unlike the last bare rooftop, this one was a maze of shacks, coops, and downright garbage. Good for hiding, but not so good for navigating while still attempting to siphon money protected by triple-encryption layers, and now the FBI. Especially when half her beads were out on her keyless-keyboard-mode gloves.

  She also made a note to tell Quirk that he was right about one thing. They did need a cooler name for those.

  “Ronnie, come on,” Quirk begged. “We’ve got over a billion. Let’s cut and run.”

  “Never,” she said as she made her way to the other side of the stinky coop, and then typed frantically, making certain that money still flowed into her account.

  Pigeons squawked to the north, irritated by her pursuers.

  Quirk must have heard it, too. “Okay, can’t you hear the heavy footsteps of fate behind you?”

  Damn it, she had to stop again to block an extremely clever move on Warp’s part. “Yes, but as you know, we don’t get our ‘commission’ unless we nab the entire amount.”

  “Which sucks, I might add.”

  Grinning, Ronnie overrode another line delete and the money really started pouring in. “It does, and I don’t know about you, but I want to buy some more toys.”

  Shouts carried on the wind took a little bit of the satisfaction away, but she was still the best, and that money was hers, damn it!

  * * *

  Crap. Real crap. Chicken crap. It was slippery. Zach quickly scraped the bottom of his shoe and continued his pursuit. She was so close.

  “Well?” he whispered into his headset.

  “Yeah, hold on.”

  Zach’s brow furrowed. Warp might give you the wrong answer to your question. He might hyperventilate. But put you on hold? That didn’t sound good.

  “Hold on?” Zach asked.

  “I’m, yeah, okay. No bueno.”

  Zach paused his steps, but kept his gun at the ready. “To what, Warp?”

  “Um, well, you see…we lost not only the satellite feed, but the patch into the corporation’s account.”

  “So we’re all blind?”

  “Yeah, pretty much.”

  Behind him, Zach could hear the other agents gathering force, weaving through the ramshackle maze. Bolder, he moved forward. Satellite or not. Patch or not. He was going to get his woman tonight.

  * * *

  Hah! Ronnie had kicked Warp out of the server onto his pasty white ass. The money was pouring into her account like a thunderstorm. Only a few more minutes, and her life would be enriched by another two billion dollars.

  Sweet.

  “Resting on your laurels?” Quirk asked.

  With the FBI out of the cyber picture, she could resume her headlong flight, because two billion dollars didn’t do anyone a lot of good in prison. And she could see the stairwell door. Another ten steps, and she would be free!

  But the muzzle of a gun at her neck brought her to a skidding halt. She was caught. Red-handed.

  How?

  The gun cocked. It didn’t matter how. He was serious.

  Slowly, she raised her hands in the air. “All right. All right. I give up.” Still, the man pressed the barrel to her flesh. “Just don’t shoot.”

  The man pulled the gun back, then pulled the trigger.

  Water shot all over her chest and face. Laughter poured out of the maze as half a dozen kids tumbled out, all firing water guns at her.

  “Damn it, remember what I said about expensive electronic equipment and water toys?” Quirk demanded in her ear.

  Ronnie couldn’t answer, as she was laughing too hard. Even when she “lost” these little simulations, there was fun to be had. She got to hone her skills, keeping her sharp for the day that the FBI was really on her ass, and she gave these kids a fun-filled evening of cat and mouse.

  Flipping several coins in the air, Ronnie smiled. “Mucho bueno.”

  The kids scrambled for the American silver dollars as she looked out over the horizon. Mexico City. Alive with Cinco de Mayo festivities. Alive with fireworks. Alive with youth.

  A view like this, and, very shortly, two billion dollars richer?

  Nights like this didn’t come along very often.

  * * *

  “Oh, God!” Warp wailed as if it were his own money being stolen. “She’s got one point six. Point seven.”

  The geek’s distress stripped away any last bit of caution in Zach’s search. He rushed through the maze.

  “Point eight. Point nine!”

  Was that her up ahead? If he was going to stop her, it needed to be now. He burst through the last of the shacks, gun arm out, safety off.

  “Freeze!”

  No Ronnie. No one at all. Zach stumbled to a stop as Warp finished his countdown.

  “An even two billion. She’s got it all!”

  But he didn’t need the geek’s announcement. Zach already knew it. Knew it, because a laptop was propped open on a chair. The screen flashed an orange $2,000,000,000.00, along with her lovely catchphrase “Better Luck Next Time!”

  Zach charged over to the keyboard. Maybe with Warp’s help, he could somehow trace her. Find out where she really was.

  But before he could even voice this hope, the number on the screen started going down. Fast. Maybe they were able to get the upper hand on her, for once.

  “Warp, were you able to install the reverse worm?”

  “Hell, no. She shut that puppy down hard.”

  Zach stood there, confused. “If we aren’t reclaiming the funds, then where is the money going?”

  But he didn’t need to wait long. Once the new account had drained one hundred million off, it automatically closed and flashed, “Ethiopian WHO Hunger Relief Program.” Immediately, another account opened, and twenty five million filled it. The “Ukrainian Alternate Energy Source Program,” and then another.

  Enraged, Zach knocked the laptop from its perch. “Damn it!”

  Other agents rushed to the scene, staring at the spectacle Zach was making, but he didn’t care.

  How could this have happened?

  How?

  Behind him, Agent Halbaucher called in the update. “She’s left us a decoy. Let’s set up a four-mile perimeter and—”

  “Don’t bother,” Zach stated, regaining his composure. “She’s nowhere nearby.”

  He looked up into the night sky. There was a satellite tasked directly above their po
sition in Texas. A satellite specifically located to capture her movements. Instead, Zach was certain that she had used it to track him. She was probably using it to watch him right this very second.

  Halbaucher stepped up next to him. “But protocol states that—”

  Zach shook his head and looked away from the sky and his fellow agents before anyone could see the hot tears springing to his eyes.

  “She’s probably not even in the country…”

  CHAPTER 3

  CDC Animal Research Facility

  Plum Island

  9:48 p.m., MST

  Dr. Amanda Rolph squirmed in her seat. The 1950s-style conference room with its peeling paint and probable asbestos-filled ceiling only exasperated her claustrophobia. Especially as another dozen people entered the cramped room.

  Fighting the urge to jump up and run from the room, Amanda looked out the window. Moonlight illuminated acres of green farmland rolling out from the laboratory complex. Sheep lazily grazed, oblivious to the dire threat looming from the east.

  Yet even amongst this pastoral scene, signs of this once-proud institution’s decline showed in broken fences and rusted machinery left to become part of the scenery. As newer and much more modern level-four disease research facilities sprang up around the world, Plum Island became obsolete. Their facility was slated for decommission, to be replaced by a brand-spanking-new facility in Kansas—until now.

  Now that the plague was making a resurgence? Plum Island was once again the jewel in the CDC’s crown. Who else would be researching the bubonic plague but a bunch of silly animal researchers out in that old, decrepit facility? Since the plague had been treatable with a very high success rate with antibiotics for over a half century, the amount of funding that went into bubonic research was 0.0092 percent of the total CDC budget. The Black Death was a thing of the past—accounting for less than a thousand cases and only a handful of deaths per year. Compared to Malaria with its 225 million people infected each year? The plague’s research had been relegated to this crumbling facility.