by Tony Wiley
After she left with her steaming pot, Morrison said, “New deals will have to wait. I have to get to the bottom of this first. This is not up for debate.”
Johnson sighed again. Obviously this didn’t please him. “You’re gonna have to be more specific. What exactly do you wanna trace back?” he said.
“You remember how we structured the deal?”
“Yes. We had five banks lined up. You wanted access to prepaid debit card accounts in each of them. Change the account limits so we could withdraw a total of two million dollars from each of these banks for a total of ten million.”
“That’s right,” Morrison said. “Now, how much did I have with me when I got busted?”
“According to the papers, you had two million dollars in that car.”
“Exactly. For once, the papers were right. What does that tell you?”
“The end of the world is near.”
Morrison cracked a grin. “Dickhead.”
Johnson said, “You only had time to flush out the accounts of one of the banks. Chelfington Bank.”
“That’s right. Now what I want to know is what happened to the accounts at the four other banks. They were all ready to be tapped from my part of the operation. You had the codes set up and everything. So, has anyone managed to?”
Johnson shook his head. “No other bank made the papers. It was just Chelfington,” he said.
“Doesn’t mean anything,” Morrison said. “Chelfington made the news because I had fake magnetic cards and material made out for their accounts. It was all seized up at the same time I was arrested, so of course it made the news. But if somehow someone managed to tap the other banks, you wouldn’t necessarily know about it, right? It’s embarrassing for banks to be defrauded. It happens all the time but it’s not supposed to. The whole banking system works on trust. Confidence. So when they’re hit and it stays quiet, they won’t be the ones to shout it out from the rooftops. Wouldn’t look good on them.”
“I told you, I destroyed all the codes. Everything. The minute I heard of your arrest.”
“You deleted the list of codes and passwords that you kept, but you didn’t reverse the setup, right? You didn’t log on to those banks’ servers to put everything back as it was before?”
“Of course not. I didn’t have time for that.”
“So someone knowing these codes and passwords could still have accessed the accounts.”
“It’s theoretically possible, yes. But the question is for how long? When Chelfington made the news, other banks probably took a deep look at their operations. They could’ve used the hint to spot our setup pretty fast.”
“True,” Morrison said. “But we’re talking about four banks. Two million dollars each. That’s eight million total. Don’t you think it’s worth a little extra investigating?”
Chapter 10
Johnson wasn’t thrilled with the assignment. To soften the blow, Morrison offered him a sweet retainer. The money would come from Mike’s pocket anyway. Morrison didn’t care. They shook hands on the deal, then Johnson drained his second cup of coffee and left the restaurant.
Morrison stayed behind to finish his own cup and read the paper for a while. The kind of quiet, pleasant moment he was so happy to renew. At nine thirty p.m., he realized he was the only customer left. The old couple and the lone woman had gone. The Korean owner and the waitress were probably anxious to close up for the night. He signaled for the check.
The waitress brought it out to him. He dropped a couple of bills on the table and asked, “Is there still a waitress here called Sara? Redhead. Medium height. Rather cute.”
She shook her head. “No, sorry,” she said. “I’ve only been here for six months and I don’t know of any redhead working here. But I can ask Mr. Kim if you want.”
Morrison waived off the proposition. “No, it’s all right,” he said. “Never mind. Thanks.”
He left her a nice tip and walked out.
Outside, the air was cool. He had been right about buying a light jacket. He felt full from his big meal so he decided to go for a walk.
Starting north, he settled into a nice even stroll, taking in the few changes that had occurred here and there on Main Street during his absence.
As far as he could see, he was the only person walking downtown at this hour. Very few cars were parked in the angled spots, and just a lone car passed by from time to time. Dear old Acton. Just like it used to be. Morrison decided he would walk the half-mile to the town square, sit on a public bench to gaze at the stars for a while, then come back to the Navigator and call it a day.
On his way, he passed by the Chelfington Bank building. It was closed, of course, but the lobby was lit up like a stage, as was appropriate. Basic security measure. Make sure everybody can see from the outside, so a bum wanting to stick up customers coming in to make a withdrawal would have no place to hide. Inside, a long accordion door fenced off the bank’s public area so that you would only be able to access the three ATMs sitting there. Purely out of habit, Morrison peered at the ATMs.
Then a broad smile illuminated his face.
Sons of bitches, he thought.
He went to the heavy glass door, pulled it open and got in.
Chapter 11
The three ATMs faced him. Standard Wincor Nixdorf models. At the time of his arrest, they were still fairly recent. But now they were four or five years old. The industry would consider them old trusted hands. Morrison scanned them. The three machines were identical. Their left-center section featured an oversize screen with two rows of buttons on either side, a keypad underneath and a cash dispenser squeezed in between. On the right side, the receipt printer headed a column also comprising the card reader and the deposit slot. Nothing fancy. Just sturdy and reliable equipment. Time tested. Proven. Cheap to operate. Exactly what all the banks were looking for. Keep your fixed costs to a minimum so that you can maximize your profit margins. Since all three machines were identical, Morrison picked one at random to have a closer look. He went for the one in the middle.
He had read somewhere that when faced with a similar choice, more than eighty percent of human beings would make the same one. The study had been conducted on three continents among a diversity of age and socioeconomic groups, but the end result was the same. There seemed to be some deeply embedded reason for choosing the option in the middle, like a kind of self-preservation rationale. The farther you were from the edges, the farther you were from outlying dangers. It’s almost as if the brain instinctively perceived the middle as safer and therefore opted for it in disproportionate ways.
Up close, the keypad looked a bit worn out. On heavily used ATMs, they were changed regularly so that they always appeared fresh and crisp. This one would probably be done soon as part of the maintenance cycle. But the slightly polished and glaring keys were not what stood out the most about the ATM. At least not to him. For the average customer, that would definitely be it. But the eyes see what the brain knows. And his eyes were well trained to recognize this.
The card reader. Its front surface, where you inserted the card, sat exactly flush with the rest of the apparatus. Usually, you would find it slightly recessed, two inches or so below the rest of the interface’s surface. Morrison stared at it for a moment. It was very nicely done. The ATM’s color was a half shining silver. The card reader had been done in the same exact color. A professional job. With serious research. You rarely saw a match that perfect.
Morrison retrieved a tissue from his pocket and covered his hand with it. It wasn’t time to start leaving prints everywhere. He squeezed the tip of his fingers in the crease on top of the card reader and did the same with his thumb underneath it. Made sure he had a firm grip. Then he pulled. At first, nothing budged. The card reader was set firmly into place. He repositioned his fingers to gain more leverage, then went at it again. He felt the reader give way a bit. Kept pulling. Then it popped right out, all at once, like a tight cork from a good bottle of wine.
; Morrison turned the device around in his hand. The shape of its back portion was a perfect match for the ATM’s real card reader recess. It had been put in place with strong double-sided adhesive tape. Two strips: one at the top, one at the bottom. Across all its width. There was also a tiny fiberoptic camera embedded in the reader on the left side, where the ATM keypad was positioned.
Morrison grinned.
Classic ATM skimming equipment. A purpose built card reader installed in front of the real ATM card reader so that unsuspecting customers would have to slide their debit card through it. The counterfeit reader would skim the precious codes found on the card’s magnetic strip and store them up in memory. The fiberoptic camera would capture the user’s fingers punching the PIN on the keypad and voilà. You left the equipment in place just long enough to gather a few tens of sets of codes, then you uninstalled it, no trace left of the device ever having been there, and went back to your base to extract it all. Once you matched the cards’ magnetic tape info with the PINs, you had everything you needed to start tapping the unfortunate customers’ bank accounts. When the equipment was that well made, all customers fell in the trap. You really had to know a lot about security not to. Nice job, thought Morrison. Looks very professional.
But it still represented competition. However crude it was.
He checked the two other ATMs over. The same type of card reader had been overlaid on them too. Morrison dumped the one he had just extracted in the garbage can, but he left the others in place.
An interesting thought flashed through his head: There’s a better way to get rid of these than to do it myself. But first, he had to leave the bank lobby and get back to the Navigator.
He would make his phone call from there. It was safer that way.
He turned around and proceeded toward the heavy glass door. Pushed it open with his shoulder. Stopped in the doorway. He had to wipe his prints off the handle. That installation had nothing to do with him but, hey, you could never be too careful. He was about to head back south along Main Street when he heard the voice.
Low and deep. An annoyed rumble.
It came from behind.
And it said, “Just what d’ya think you’re doin’ here, little shit?”
Chapter 12
Morrison turned around sharply. The man standing in front of him was not a monster, but he was not a skinny puppy either. Six feet tall. One hundred eighty pounds. Reasonably fit. Morrison figured he was in his mid-twenties. Head all dark hair and angry eyes. Morrison had never seen him.
“You’re talkin’ to me?” he said.
“Don’t see no other little shit around,” Angry Eyes said.
“Show some respect, will you?”
The man stared him down and sneered. Morrison was a lot smaller and a lot thinner than him. Not a threat, obviously, in the guy’s mind.
“I have trouble with people who don’t mind their own business,” Angry Eyes said.
Morrison shrugged. “What are you talkin’ about?” he said.
Angry Eyes nodded toward the street. There was an unmarked white van parked at the curb on the other side.
“Cut the crap,” he said. “I saw you take the skimmer off and dump it into the trash can.”
Just my luck, Morrison thought. He was probably making a round to retrieve his stuff. He said, “A skimmer? Is that what it is?”
“You know exactly what it is. Nobody ever notices them.”
Morrison nodded. “I have to give you this,” he said. “It’s a good-looking device. Real neat. But your whole setup is not serious.”
“Let me worry about my setup, midget.”
“It’s inefficient and dumb. By duplicating actual people’s cards, you piss off a lot of them. And together, they make a lot of noise. All for a payoff that just doesn’t justify it. People usually have low withdrawal limits. When you operate like this, you have high fixed costs and low margins. High risks for low rewards. Obviously you haven’t been to business school, buddy.”
Angry Eyes shook his head. “Who are you?” he said. “Warren Buffett?”
Morrison ignored him and pushed on. “The way to go is to target prepaid debit cards. You know, the anonymous kind that isn’t pegged specifically on an individual. Lots of corporations have them. That way, you don’t victimize anyone. Don’t cause too much fuss. The bank alone takes a direct hit. And for them, it’s a drop in the bucket. A crime without a victim. But you don’t do that by skimming ATMs, of course. It requires a whole different skill set. Much more sophisticated. Probably too much for a brainless dimwit like you.”
Angry Eyes didn’t appreciate the lecture. He cut Morrison down and said, “You’re gonna go back in there, take the skimmer out of the trash can and give it back to me. Like now.”
Morrison shrugged. He stared right back into Angry Eyes’ face and said, “No. Not at all. What will happen is that you will move over and let me go through, ’cause you’re really blocking the way here.”
Angry Eyes didn’t budge an inch. If anything, he planted his feet more firmly on the sidewalk and said, “You got some attitude on you, little prick.”
There they were. Less than two feet apart, locked into a stalemate.
Barring any unforeseen outside intervention, this would have to be settled with their fists. Morrison didn’t go around looking for that type of situation. But he knew when you couldn’t stand down. He had learned this a long time ago, the hard way. At school, he had always been the smallest one. The schoolyard bullies had always targeted him. At least initially. Because Morrison had learned to deal with it. All by himself. There had never been a father around to teach him how to do this, or anything else for that matter.
The first lesson he had learned was that it was all about willing yourself not to stand down. Because if you did, you were finished. Bullies were cowards. They looked for the easiest prey, those that wouldn’t dare oppose them. So you had to send the message loud and clear: I won’t stand down. In the long term, that alone avoided you half your troubles. The second lesson was that when you had to get your hands dirty, you had to make sure you included an element of surprise somewhere. Morrison’s favorite strategy involved talk. There seemed to be an unwritten rule that when two guys were about to fight each other, the shouting match would stop and the actual barehanded struggle would only begin in silence. It was another one of these strangely pervasive codes that nobody ever stated clearly but that were deeply ingrained. Morrison had witnessed the pattern countless times.
So before he engaged anyone, he always made sure he was talking. He looked Angry Eyes in the face and said, “Have you ever heard of the rubber duck? Well, you know what …”
The other guy interpreted the loose talk as Morrison not being ready to fight yet, maybe even contemplating running off as fast as he could. That was always the case. He could see Angry Eyes concurred just by his physical attitude. His tall frame seemed too relaxed, too confident. Confidence had a sharp edge. Not enough and you dissipated like misty fog. Too much and you didn’t see what was coming at you. From that moment on, Morrison knew exactly what he had to do.
He began by throwing his left hand on the side, palm up, fingers spread wide apart. That immediately attracted Angry Eyes’ stare. Couldn’t help it. Just a normal human reflex that magicians and stage performers exploit all the time. Morrison saw Angry Eyes’ head tilt in that direction, opening up his neck. Good. Then he raised his right foot and gave him a sharp sidekick on the ear. You didn’t need to punch the guy too hard with your foot, but you needed to make it quick.
The window of opportunity was tiny. And if you missed it, you were done.
Because when you’re a small guy up against a big one, surprise is really your only ally. The kick stunned Angry Eyes and made him raise both hands to his head in an instinctive move of defense, opening up his center. Morrison then raised his left knee as hard as he could into Angry Eyes’ groin. And the rest was easy. Angry Eyes folded back down in half in pain. Dropping his guard
for a nanosecond, which Morrison used to follow up with a hook on the jaw. A hard one. With all his strength.
Angry Eyes collapsed on the sidewalk with a muted thump, like a wet rag doll.
Instant knockout. No need for a count.
Always manage to be one step ahead. When you’re small, that was the key. Then fighting became easy. Like winning the lottery if you knew the numbers beforehand.
Only problem was you couldn’t fight the same guy twice. But it was all right. Morrison usually managed not to have to.
Chapter 13
Morrison left the scene at a brisk pace, peering behind from time to time to see if Angry Eyes was coming back to his senses.
He made it all the way to the Navigator before the distant slumped figure started to shift. By then, Morrison was sitting behind the wheel of the big SUV, safe in the knowledge that he could gaze at him undetected from behind the heavily tinted front passenger window.
Angry Eyes made two attempts to gather himself that ended up with him falling back on the sidewalk almost immediately. Morrison had hit him pretty hard. His own hand pulsed with pain. The third try proved more successful. Angry Eyes was able to steady his right elbow on the concrete surface and hold still in that position for a while. Then he moved to a crouch, on his hands and knees, breathing forcibly. His back arched as the air entered his lungs like some sort of panting dog. Then he rose to his feet, swinging back and forth until he found some semblance of balance. He didn’t aim for the bank. Instead, he just staggered his way to the white van, climbed behind the wheel and drove slowly away to the north.
Morrison allowed the van to disappear from his sight. The guy would have a serious headache, but otherwise he’d be fine. That’ll teach you. Then he backed up from his parking spot and headed south on Main Street.
He had a phone call to make. But first, he wanted to have a look at a few other ATMs around town.
