The Blue Nowhere: A Novel

by Jeffery Deaver

  Department of Defense agent Backle was still intent on collaring Wyatt Gillette for a laundry list of offenses involving the Standard 12 encryption program and he now wanted to arrest Frank Bishop as well—for breaking a federal prisoner out of custody.

  As for the charges against Gillette for the Standard 12 hack, Bishop explained to Captain Bernstein, “It’s pretty clear, sir, that Gillette either seized root at one of Holloway’s FTP sites and downloaded a copy of the script or just telneted directly into Holloway’s machine, broke through the firewall and got a copy that way.”

  “What the hell does that mean?” the grizzled, crew-cut cop had snapped.

  “Sorry, sir,” Bishop had said, then translated the techno-speak. “What I’m saying is I think it was Holloway who broke into the DoD and wrote the decryption program. Gillette stole it from him and used it because we asked him to.”

  “You think,” Bernstein had muttered cynically. “Well, I don’t understand all this computer crap that’s been going around.” But he picked up the phone and called the U.S. attorney, who agreed to review whatever evidence CCU could offer supporting Bishop’s theory before proceeding with charges against either Gillette or Bishop (both of whose stock was pretty high at the moment for having nailed the “Silicon Valley Kracker,” as the local TV stations were describing Phate).

  Agent Backle grudgingly returned to his office in San Francisco’s Presidio.

  At the moment, however, the attention of all the law enforcers had turned from Phate and Stephen Miller to the MARINKILL case. Several recent bulletins reported that the killers had been spotted again—this time right next door, in San Jose—apparently staking out several other banks. Bishop and Shelton had been conscripted into the joint FBI/state police task force. They’d spend a few hours with their families for dinner and then report to the bureau’s San Jose office later tonight.

  Bob Shelton was home at the moment (his only farewell to Gillette had been a cryptic glance, whose meaning was completely lost on the hacker). Bishop, however, had delayed his own departure home and was sharing a Pop-Tart and coffee with the hacker while they waited for the troopers to arrive to transport him back to San Ho.

  The phone rang. Bishop answered, “Computer Crimes.”

  He listened for a moment. “Hold on.” He looked at Gillette, lifted an eyebrow. Handed the receiver to him. “It’s for you.”

  He took it. “Hello?”

  “Wyatt.”

  Elana’s voice was so familiar to him that he could almost feel it beneath his compulsively keying fingers. The timbre of her voice alone had always revealed to him the entire range of her soul, and he needed to hear only a single word to know whether she was playful, angry, frightened, sentimental, passionate. Today he could tell from her greeting that she’d called very reluctantly and that her defenses were up like the shields on the spacecrafts of the sci-fi movies they’d watched together.

  On the other hand, she had called.

  She said, “I heard that he’s dead. Jon Holloway. I heard it on the news.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Are you all right?”

  “Fine.”

  A long pause. As if looking for something to fill the silence, she added, “I’m still going to New York.”

  “With Ed.”

  “That’s right.”

  He closed his eyes and sighed. Then, with an edge in his voice, he asked, “So why’d you call?”

  “I guess just to say that if you wanted to stop by, you could.”

  Gillette wondered: Why bother? What was the point?

  He said, “I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

  They hung up. He turned to find Bishop looking at him cautiously. Gillette said, “Give me an hour. Please.”

  “I can’t take you,” the detective said.

  “Let me borrow a car.”

  The detective debated, looked around the dinosaur pen, considering. He said to Linda Sanchez, “You have a CCU car he can use?”

  Reluctantly she handed him the keys. “This isn’t procedure, boss.”

  “I’ll take responsibility.”

  Bishop tossed the keys to Gillette then pulled out his phone and called the troopers who’d be transporting him back to San Ho. He gave them Elana’s address and said he’d okayed Gillette’s being there. The prisoner would be returning to CCU in one hour. He hung up.

  “I’ll come back,” the hacker said.

  “I know you will.”

  The men faced each other for a moment. They shook hands. Gillette nodded and started for the door.

  “Wait,” Bishop asked, frowning. “You have a driver’s license?”

  Gillette laughed. “No, I don’t have a driver’s license.”

  Bishop shrugged and said, “Well, just don’t get stopped.”

  The hacker nodded and said gravely, “Right. They might send me to jail.”

  The house smelled of lemons, as it always had.

  This was thanks to the deft culinary touch of Irene Papandolos, Ellie’s mother. She wasn’t the traditional wary, silent Greek matron but a sharp businesswoman who owned a successful catering company and still managed to find the time to cook every meal for her family from scratch. It was now dinnertime and she wore a stained apron over a rose-colored business suit.

  She greeted Gillette with a cool, unsmiling nod and gestured him into the den.

  He sat on a couch, beneath a picture of the waterfront at Piraeus. Family being ever important in Greek households, two tables were filled with photographs of relatives in a variety of frames, some cheap, some heavy silver and gold. Gillette saw a picture of Elana in her wedding dress. He didn’t recognize the shot and he wondered if it had originally shown the two of them and had been cropped to remove him.

  Elana entered the room.

  “You’re here by yourself?” she asked, not smiling. No other greeting.

  “How do you mean?”

  “No police baby-sitters?”

  “Honor system.”

  “I saw a couple of police cars go past. I wondered if they were with you.” She nodded outside.

  “No,” Gillette said. Though he supposed that troopers might in fact be keeping tabs on him.

  She sat and picked uneasily at the cuff of the Stanford sweatshirt she wore.

  “I’m not going to say goodbye,” he said. She frowned and he continued, “Because I want to talk you out of leaving. I want to keep seeing you.”

  “Seeing me? You’re in prison, Wyatt.”

  “I’ll be out in a year.”

  She laughed in surprise at his effrontery.

  He said, “I want to try again.”

  “You want to try again. What about what I want?”

  “I can give you what you want. I will. I’ve done a lot of thinking. I can make you love me again. I don’t want you out of my life.”

  “You chose machines over me. You got what you wanted.”

  “That’s in the past.”

  “My life’s different now. I’m happy.”

  “Are you?”

  “Yes,” Elana said emphatically.

  “Because of Ed.”

  “He’s part of it. . . . Come on, Wyatt, what can you offer me? You’re a felon. You’re addicted to those goddamn computers of yours. You don’t have a job and the judge said that even when you get out of jail you can’t go online for a year.”

  “And Ed’s got himself a good job? Is that it? I didn’t know that a good income was important to you.”

  “It’s not a question of support, Gillette. It’s about responsibility. And you’re not responsible.”

  “I wasn’t responsible. I admit that. But I will be.” He tried to take her hand but she eased away. He said, “Come on, Ellie. . . . I saw your e-mails. When you talk about Ed it doesn’t exactly sound like he’s perfect husband material.”

  She stiffened and he saw he’d touched a nerve here. “Leave Ed out of this. I’m talking about you and me.”

  “Me too
. That’s exactly who I’m talking about. I love you. I know I made your life hell. It won’t be that way again. You wanted children, a normal life. I’ll find a job. We’ll have a family.”

  Another hesitation.

  He pressed forward. “Why are you leaving tomorrow? What’s the hurry?”

  “I’m starting a new job next Monday.”

  “Why New York?”

  “Because it’s as far away from you as I can get.”

  “Wait a month. Just one month. I get two visits a week. Come see me.” He smiled. “We can hang out. Eat pizza.”

  Her eyes swept the floor and he sensed that she was debating.

  “Did your mother cut me out of that picture?” He grinned and nodded at the snapshot of her in her wedding gown.

  She gave a faint smile. “No. That was the one Alexis took—on the lawn. It was just of me. Remember, the one where you can’t see my feet.”

  He laughed. “How many brides lose their shoes at the wedding?”

  She nodded. “We always wondered what happened to them.”

  “Oh, please, Ellie. Just postpone it for a month. That’s all I’m asking.”

  Her eyes studied some of the pictures. She began to say something but her mother stepped into the doorway suddenly. Her dark face was even darker than before. “There’s a call for you.”

  “Me?” Gillette asked.

  “It’s somebody named Bishop. He says it’s important.”

  “Frank, what’s—”

  The detective’s voice was raw with urgency. “Listen to me carefully, Wyatt. We could lose the line any minute. Shawn isn’t dead.”

  “What? But Miller—”

  “No, we were wrong. Stephen Miller isn’t Shawn. It’s somebody else. I’m at CCU. Linda Sanchez found a message for me on the main CCU voice mail. Before he died Miller called and left it. Remember when Phate broke into CCU and went after you?”

  “Right.”

  “Miller was just coming back from the medical center then. He was in the parking lot and saw Phate run out of the building and jump in a car. He followed him.”

  “Why?”

  “To collar him.”

  “By himself?” Gillette asked.

  “The message said he wanted to bring the killer in on his own. He said he’d screwed up so many times that he wanted to prove that he could do something right.”

  “Then he didn’t kill himself?”

  “Nope. They haven’t done the autopsy yet but I had a medical examiner check for traces of powder burns on his hands. There weren’t any—if he’d killed himself there would’ve been plenty of trace. Phate must’ve seen Miller following and then killed him. Then he pretended to be Miller and intentionally got caught cracking into the State Department. He hacked into Miller’s workstation at CCU and planted those fake e-mails and took his machines and disks out of his house. We’re sure the suicide note was false too. It was all to stop us from looking for the real Shawn.”

  “Well, who is he?”

  “I don’t have a clue. All I know is we’ve got a real problem. Tony Mott’s here. Shawn hacked the FBI’s tactical command computers in Washington and San Jose—he got in through ISLEnet—and he’s got root access.” In a low voice Bishop continued. “Now listen carefully. Shawn’s issued arrest warrants and rules of engagement for the suspects in the MARINKILL case. We’re looking at the screen right now.”

  “I don’t understand,” Gillette said.

  “The warrants say that the suspects are at 3245 Abrego Avenue in Sunnyvale.”

  “But that’s here! Elana’s house.”

  “I know. He’s ordered the tactical troops to attack the house in twenty-five minutes.”

  VI

  IT’S ALL IN THE SPELLING

  CODE SEGMENT

  ASSUME DS:CODE,SS:CODE,CS:CODE,ES:CODE

  ORG $+0100H

  VCODE: JMP

  ***

  virus: PUSH CX

  MOV DX,OFFSET vir_dat

  CLD

  MOV SI,DX

  ADD SI,first_3

  MOV CX,3

  MOV DI,OFFSET 100H

  REPZ MOVSB

  MOV SI,DX

  mov ah,30h

  int 21h

  cmp al,0

  JnZ dos_ok

  JMP quit

  —portions of the actual source code of the virus Violator—Strain II

  CHAPTER 00101011 / FORTY-THREE

  Elana stepped forward, seeing Gillette’s alarmed expression. “What is it? What’s going on?”

  He ignored her and said to Bishop, “Call the FBI. Tell them what’s happening. Call Washington.”

  “I tried,” Bishop responded. “Bernstein did too. But the agents hung up on us. The rules of engagement that Shawn issued say that the perps will probably try to impersonate state cops and try to countermand or delay the attack order. Only computer codes are authorized. Nothing verbal. Not even from Washington. If we had more time maybe we could convince them, but . . .”

  “Jesus, Frank. . . .”

  How had Shawn found out he was here? Then he realized that Bishop had called the troopers to say that Gillette would be at Elana’s place for an hour. He remembered that Phate and Shawn had been monitoring radio and phone transmissions for keywords like Triple-X and Holloway and Gillette. Shawn must’ve heard Bishop’s conversation.

  Bishop said, “They’re near the house now, at a staging area.” The detective added, “I just don’t understand why Shawn’s doing this.”

  But Gillette did.

  Hacker’s revenge is patient revenge.

  Gillette had betrayed Phate years ago, destroyed the carefully socially engineered life he’d made for himself . . . and earlier today he’d helped end the hacker’s life altogether. Now Shawn would destroy Gillette and those he loved.

  He looked out the window, thought he saw some motion.

  “Wyatt?” Elana asked. “What’s going on?” She started to look out the window but he pulled her back roughly. “What is it?” she cried.

  “Stay back! Stay away from the windows!”

  Bishop continued. “Shawn’s issued Level 4 rules of engagement—that means that the SWAT teams don’t make any surrender demands. They go in assuming they’ll be met with suicidal resistance. They’re the rules of engagement they use when they’re up against terrorists willing to die.”

  “So they’ll shoot tear gas inside,” Gillette muttered, “kick the doors in and anybody who moves is going to get killed.”

  Bishop paused. “It could go like that.”

  “Wyatt?” Elana asked. “What’s going on? Tell me!”

  He turned, shouted, “Tell everybody to get down on the living room floor! You too! Now!”

  Her black eyes burned with anger and fear. “What’ve you done?”

  “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. . . . Just do it now. Get down!”

  He turned back, looked out the window. He could see two large black vans easing through an alley fifty feet away. In the distance a helicopter fluttered a hundred feet in the air.

  “Listen, Wyatt, the bureau won’t go ahead with the assault if there’s no final confirmation. That’s part of the rules of engagement. Is there any way to shut down Shawn’s machine?”

  “Put Tony on.”

  “I’m here,” Mott said.

  “Are you in the FBI system?”

  “Yeah, we can see the screen. Shawn’s imping that he’s the Tactical Operations Center in Washington, issuing codes. The tactical agent in the field’s responding like it’s business as usual.”

  “Can you trace the call back to where Shawn is?”

  Mott said, “We don’t have a warrant but I’ll pull some strings at Pac Bell. Give me a minute or two.”

  Outside, the sound of heavy trucks. The helicopter was closer.

  Gillette could hear the hysterical sobbing of Elana’s mother and her brother’s angry words coming from the living room. Elana herself said nothing. He saw her cross herself, glance once at him hope
lessly and bury her head in the carpet beside her mother.

  Oh, Jesus, what’ve I done?

  A few minutes later Bishop came back on the line. “Pac Bell’s running the trace. It’s a landline. They’ve narrowed down the central office and exchange—he’s somewhere in western San Jose, near Winchester Boulevard. Where Phate’s warehouse was.”

  Gillette asked, “You think he’s in the San Jose Computer Products building? Maybe he got back inside after you finished going through it.”

  “Or maybe he’s someplace nearby—there’re dozens of old warehouses around there. I’m ten minutes away,” the detective said. “I’ll go over there now. Brother, I wish we knew who Shawn was.”

  Something occurred to Gillette. As when he was writing code, he applied this hypothesis against the known facts and rules of logic. He came to a conclusion. He said, “I have a thought about that.”

  “Shawn?”

  “Yeah. Where’s Bob Shelton?”

  “At home. Why’re you asking?”

  “Call and find out if he’s really there.”

  “Okay. I’ll call you back from the car.”

  A few minutes later the Papandolos phone rang and Gillette grabbed the receiver. Frank Bishop was calling back as he sped down San Carlos toward Winchester.

  “Bob should be home,” Bishop said, “but there’s no answer. You’re wrong if you’re thinking Bob’s Shawn, though.”

  Looking out the window, seeing another police car cruise by, followed by a military-type truck, Gillette said, “No, Frank, listen: Shelton claimed he hated computers, didn’t know anything about them. But remember: he had that hard drive in his house.”

  “The what?”

  “That disk we saw—it’s the kind of hardware only people who did serious hacking or ran bulletin boards a few years ago would use.”

  “I don’t know,” Bishop said slowly. “Maybe it was evidence or something.”

  “Has he ever worked a computer case before this?”

  “Well, no . . .”

  Gillette continued, “And he disappeared for a while before they raided Phate’s house in Los Altos. He had time to send that message about the assault code and give Phate a chance to get away. And, think about it—it was because of him that Phate got inside ISLEnet and got the FBI computer addresses and tactical codes. Shelton said he went online to check me out. But what he was really doing was leaving the password and address of the CCU computer for Phate—so he could crack ISLEnet.”