by Tony Wiley
The book was getting better but at ten to seven, he folded down the corner of the page he was at and put it down on the counter. Then he swiveled on the stool to scan the room. There were more people than when he’d arrived. And they kept coming. A steady, if sparse, trickle. Morrison stayed with his back to the bar. He wanted to have a clear view of the entrance.
A group of excited students came in next. Three girls and two boys. He was convinced that they carried ID that made them at least twenty-one years old. But he was also convinced they were fake. They looked like teenagers barely out of high school. Their enthusiasm to get into such a simple country town bar belied them. They swept across the floor in a tight pack and huddled together in a booth.
Seconds later, a woman came through the door with a folded copy of the New York Times under her arm. She was alone. Not very tall. Black hair. Late thirties. Not a beauty pageant queen, but not a plain woman either. Far from it. Her features may have been ordinary, but the confidence that oozed from every pore of her skin made her stand out. She looked vibrant. Radiant.
What also struck you was the way she walked. She had slightly arched legs and she moved forward with her hips in an almost masculine way.
Morrison hadn’t seen her in more than three years, but here she was.
His good friend, Cowgirl.
Chapter 23
After Morrison’s departure, Johnson interrupted his hacking work to go upstairs and lock up the front door. He used the opportunity to raid his kitchen. He came back down at the helm of his brightly lit ship with a bag of mixed jellybeans and a big bottle of soda.
He was on a roll. During his first meeting with Morrison, he hadn’t been totally straight about burning all bridges to their failed deal’s setup. Three years is a long time. He had forgotten a lot about the intricate details of that setup. And even more about how he had flushed them.
Turned out that he had kept bigger chunks of them than he remembered at first. Essentially, Johnson had been responsible for hacking his way into five banks and altering a number of accounts so that Morrison and his partners could drain them in flash ATM operations. Morrison had paid him two hundred thousand dollars for this work. All up front, from his own pocket. A huge loss for Morrison. Especially when you added three long years of hard prison after he was busted. But that was the name of the game. Johnson had had no problem pocketing his money and enjoying it afterward. After all, he’d performed most of the work required of him. Morrison’s arrest and his failure to capitalize on his setup was not Johnson’s problem. Johnson figured he’d opened the doors to a potential ten millions dollars for him. His job stopped right there and then.
Johnson took a swig of ice cold root beer: his fuel of choice for long hacking sessions. He just loved the taste. And there was lots of sugar to keep him sharp and awake.
So he was able to get back on his feet faster than anticipated, which always felt good. Good for the ego and good for business. At the moment, with the information he had retrieved in the last twenty-four hours, he had once again assembled the big picture of his setup at a second bank, First Collins Bank, and at a third one, Candela Bank. Those two were ready to be hacked into once again to perform an audit. He knew the server names he had to aim for, how the security logs were set up, which user IDs he had leveraged last time. A nice little package that a competent hacker could immediately put to use.
Johnson remembered that First Collins had proved tougher to crack than Candela. At the time, they had extra layers of security and a very tight monitoring system. So he decided to attack this one himself and give Candela to his sidekick. As for banks number four and number five, they would have to wait. He wanted to see what he could find out about First Collins and Candela Bank first.
He used a slew of anonymous email addresses to communicate with his sidekick. They cycled through a series of these addresses, rarely using one more than two or three times. That made their exchanges extremely difficult to track and unlikely to be detected. On top of that, no one email ever contained a full message. He always divided specific instructions into numerous pieces and sent them independently. It was up to his guy to piece everything back together and then get on with whatever Johnson was asking him to do.
After he finished sending the last of his emails concerning Candela Bank, Johnson paused to grab a handful of jellybeans. He loved to munch on them. He felt an instant kick from the thick sugary juice. He bought the jellybeans specially made out for sports use, the ones loaded with caffeine and minerals. Helped to keep the mind alert. To prolong the buzz, he took a big gulp of root beer, straight from the bottle.
And now, on to First Collins, he thought. Johnson sat back in his chair and stared at the ceiling for a moment. He had to tread very lightly. First Collins’ security was tight, constantly monitoring every single connection made there. Log files compiled every action performed by every user on their servers. He had to strike fast and effectively. With his eyes closed, he assembled a sequence of actions in his mind, then reviewed it and modified it slightly. When he thought he had pieced together a good plan of action, he sat up in his chair and got to work.
There were a million things to do. First, find a way to establish a connection. Then put a small program in place to control the logs and make sure they were expunged on the fly of any mention of his current activity. This was hard but essential work. He had to get in, in a secure way, before he could think about perusing the servers and actually perform his audit. That task required all his focus. Tapped every hacking skill he’d developed since his early teenage years.
It took him over an hour to establish a connection to a server in the First Collins landscape, a lot longer than he’d anticipated. Since the last time, the bank had improved its procedures a lot. Shit, I’m not charging Morrison enough for this, he thought as he went along. His connection established, Johnson paused for a beat. He refueled with another mouthful of jellybeans. Chased them down with another big gulp of root beer.
Just when he was about to get back to work and install his log-editing program on the server, the power failed. The big neon lights went instantly dark above him. As did the reading lamp at the far end of the room.
“Shit,” he muttered to himself. “Shit.”
The only light in the whole basement now came from his table. From the laptops and the computer screens. The laptops ran on battery power so they would be fine, at least for a while. As would be the screens. Since they were plugged into UPS’s, they would also have a couple of hours’ worth of power. As for his wireless router and the modem from his Internet provider, they were also plugged into a UPS.
But, nonetheless, a chill ran down his spine.
He immediately checked his Internet connection.
It was gone.
“Shit!” he shouted this time. “Shit! Shit! Shit!”
Then he thought, Is this happening just in my house? He got up and paused. Looked around. Obviously, there was no one else in the room. Then he listened hard. He didn’t hear much. Maybe a faint car engine sound. Or a truck passing by. But nothing too close to his house. At least that’s what he thought.
He went to one of the front windows. Drew the curtain an inch or so. Peered outside. It was pitch dark. Then he drew the curtain the full width and sighed. The whole street was plunged into darkness.
Johnson always felt edgy when he was on a hacking binge. It always tensed him up. Always made him paranoid. He shook his head and muttered to himself, Damn! Then he drew the curtain over the window and went back to his desk. There, he took another big gulp of root beer and looked at his laptop.
The Internet connection was still down. Some portion of his provider’s network must have been affected by the power failure too.
He shook his head.
That was bad.
That was really bad.
It meant that at that precise moment, a connection with a hacked user ID and password was open on a First Collins Bank server. It was just sitting there. Idle.
The logs were picking it up. Registering it. Soon, those logs would be replicated to other servers. They would be making their way up the chain.
Johnson wasn’t worried by the possibility of anyone tracing back that connection to him. He was using multiple layers of proxies between himself and First Collins. But still, if he didn’t react fast enough, that idle open connection was like waving a red handkerchief in front of the security guys. Didn’t necessarily mean they would pick up on it. They could be looking the other way while you waved. But they could also be staring right at you.
Johnson checked the screen again for the connection icon. It was still down.
He cursed profusely. Pushed his chair back from the desk.
Now he had no choice.
He had to hurry up and go for plan B.
Chapter 24
Cowgirl rushed up to Morrison and hugged him.
“Morrison, what are you doing here?” she said.
He could tell she was genuinely happy to see him. You couldn’t fake that mix of intense surprise and elation. He hugged her back and was surprised at how good her embrace felt. He hadn’t had any physical contact with a woman in a long time. They kissed on the cheeks and then hugged again.
“Friday night, 7:00 p.m., that means Flanagan’s Bar with the New York Times for you, right?” he said.
They took a step back.
“God, am I that predictable?” she said.
Morrison shrugged. “It’s not necessarily a fault,” he said.
She scanned him from head to toe.
“Wow!” she said. “For a guy who’s just done three years, you look good, Morrison. You look really good.”
He scanned her in return but from the bottom up. She wore white sneakers, a pair of tight, pale jeans and a dark blue silk blouse. With two buttons undone, it showed just the right amount of cleavage. Nothing fancy. Nothing over the top. Just comfortable clothes with a delicate touch of elegance where it counted.
“So do you,” he said. “Always riding your horses?”
She smiled. “That’s how I keep fit.”
And fit, she really was. Her whole body exuded a healthy vitality interspersed with a sort of rugged sexiness. Cowgirl made a small gesture of the hand toward the barman. Something that meant bring me the same as usual, and then she said, “Come on, let’s go to a quiet corner. We have a lot of catching up to do.”
Morrison picked up his book and his drink and followed her across the creaky floorboards to a booth at the far end of the room. Seconds later, a waitress brought her a glass of white wine and a small platter of roasted pistachios. They clicked their glasses. She toasted him.
“To your freedom,” she said.
They took a sip. “I knew you were about due, but I had no idea you were already out,” she said.
“I was only released yesterday.”
“Who went to pick you up?”
“Nobody.”
Technically that wasn’t true. Mike had sent his thugs after him, but if it hadn’t been for them, he would have left the correctional facility alone. He preferred to hold on to that version for the moment.
Cowgirl frowned. “What about that redhead you were with?” she said. “Sara, right?”
Morrison shrugged. “Ancient history.”
“Uh … sorry to hear that.” Cowgirl paused to take another sip of wine. “I’m surprised, Morrison. That girl really liked you. I can tell you that. It was obvious from the way she always looked at you.”
“As soon as I was arrested,” he said, “she vanished into thin air and I haven’t heard from her since. Mind you, I don’t blame her. She had no idea what I really did for a living.”
Cowgirl nodded, then she flashed a big wide smile and said, “Good then, that means you’re free.”
Morrison chuckled. “Christ,” he said, “you don’t waste your time.”
Cowgirl shrugged. “Have I ever?”
Morrison smiled. “Hell, no! I recognize you right there, Cowgirl.”
Morrison had never met a more grounded and direct woman in his entire life. She knew what she wanted and she always told it like it was. Could never have been a lawyer or a diplomat, that’s for sure. Her nickname was spot on.
“I’ve always wondered what you were like between the sheets, Morrison,” she said. “Something tells me you’re worth a try.”
“You know I don’t like to mix business with pleasure,” Morrison said.
“Business? What business? We have no business going on right now.”
“It could change.”
Cowgirl made a face. “What? Are you already on to something?”
“Possibly.”
“Christ, you don’t waste your time, Morrison,” she said.
“Have I ever?”
They both laughed.
“Don’t tell me anything about business just yet, then,” she said. “Just bring me back home, all right?”
Her glass of wine was already half empty. To emphasize her point, she drained the remainder right there and took her purse. Forgot all about the New York Times and left it on the table.
“That way,” she said, “I get what I want and you can still abide by your principles.”
Morrison smiled.
“Principles are important,” he said.
“I know,” she said with a laugh. “I’ve never met a more principled crook than you in my entire life.”
He looked at her. Her cheeks were glowing with a pinkish hue. She had even started to breathe harder. He could see the swell of her chest rise and fall in an accelerated rhythm. And that hint of cleavage …
Morrison thought about Johnson. His hacker was hard at work for him. There was nothing he could contribute to his effort. Nothing he could do himself. While Johnson dug into First Collins Bank’s landscape, he was free as a bird. He looked at Cowgirl again. God, she looked good. Morrison decided he could really use some R&R. After all, he had just spent three long years away from any feminine presence. It was more than time to remedy this.
“You know,” he said, “I’ve always wondered what you were like between the sheets too.”
She smiled. “Let’s go find out then.”
He motioned to her and said, “After you, Cowgirl.”
Chapter 25
Johnson’s plan B rested on his mobile phone.
But just to make matters worse, he’d left it upstairs. He got up and climbed the stairs in the dark. Then he wallowed around the main floor, feeling his way clumsily with extended arms. Cursing his goddamn penchant for procrastination. He’d meant to install some emergency lighting for months if not years, but he kept putting it off. One of the major faults his total freedom allowed him to indulge in. Johnson pretty much only ever did what he wanted. But for sure, when he was done with Morrison’s contract, he’d call up an electrician and take care of this.
He walked around cautiously like the blind man he now was, wary of hitting something hard with his shins. He had forgotten where he’d left the phone. Usually, it would be in the tidy by the front door, but it wasn’t there. As he roamed through the kitchen, he could hear the clock ticking in his head.
Those logs. Those bloody server logs.
While he groped for his phone on the kitchen counters, he finally clicked. He had left the mobile phone in the living room. That’s where he had last used it. On the couch.
He went there as fast as he could without crashing into a wall or a piece of furniture. Then, when he finally palmed his mobile, he used it as a makeshift flashlight to thread his way back downstairs into his control room.
He would use the phone as a wireless Internet connection. That was easy to do, but it still required numerous changes to his setup. First, he had to plug the phone into one of the laptops. Then he would have to forget about the two other computers and focus only on this one to perform all his tasks. That meant starting new sessions. Replicating some of the work he’d done on the other laptops. A big freaking pain in the butt.
Especia
lly when he knew those logs were still lying there, unedited.
Johnson worked in a fury. Going from one session to the next on his laptop computer. Typing commands frantically. Moving his way one step at a time closer to where he had been when the power had gone.
All in all, it took him twenty minutes to get there. Twenty long minutes during which, he was sure, the logs containing traces of his breakin had had the time to spread further on the First Collins network. Johnson cursed aloud and fixed the log issue on the server in a second. With a little chance, it would go unnoticed. Too small a blip on the radar. But it still bothered him. By nature, he was a meticulous hacker. He hated to leave any trace behind.
After all this wasted time, he was ready to resume his work and start digging into First Collins’ archives.
That’s when the power came back.
The bank of neon lights above flickered for a moment, then engulfed him in a clear whitewash. Johnson looked up.
“Shit! Shit! Shit!” he shouted.
He would’ve been less annoyed if the power had remained down.
“Shit! Shit! Shit!” he shouted again.
But for all his frustration, he chose not to change anything back in his setup and to carry forward on that lone computer. He had lost enough time already.
Johnson quickly settled into a rhythm. The tips of his fingers were on fire, his brain more alert then ever. Anger seemed to sharpen his focus.
He worked in a frenzy.
Munching on a handful of jellybeans.
Downing a big gulp of root beer at regular intervals.
For three straight hours, he never relented. Then, finally, he was able to catch a glimpse of what he was looking for.
The four hundred accounts they had targeted at First Collins Bank.
Johnson focused on the activity in those accounts that took place in the days leading up to and including the day of Morrison’s arrest.
The archives showed nothing. No withdrawal had been made from them. Large or small. From a branch counter or from an ATM. Nothing. No deposit either, although this would have come as a surprise. The accounts had remained untouched.
