by Ray Daniel
“Hello.”
Nothing.
“Hello.”
Snuffling sounds, maybe breathing.
“Hellooooo?”
Pocket dialed.
I broke the connection.
The rye whiskey worked its magic, slowing my thinking, calming my stomach, giving me the chemical illusion that all was right with the world. I knocked back the rest of the liquor and padded off to bed.
Thirty-Six
Riverside Station is the westernmost outpost of civilization. It’s the last stop on the Green Line; after that, you have to drive or take the commuter rail. I walked down the station’s ramp, holding an empty Wired Puppy cup and looking for an address, the last known location of PassHack.
I tossed the cup in the trash, pulled on my gloves, and followed my Droid’s walking directions. It led me to the end of the driveway and down the sidewalk. The day was brilliantly cold, just as predicted. My nose hairs stiffened in the bitter air, a sign that the temperature was in the single digits. Sadly, I was wearing a leather bomber jacket instead of my punctured ski jacket. The cold lanced right through the leather.
Hard snow crunched under my UGGs as I made my way into the office building’s lobby and batted my arms to warm myself. I exited the elevator on the third floor, looking for a sign that said PassHack. There was none. There was a desk. Behind the desk sat a dapper young man with blond hair and braces. He wore a blue button-down shirt, a repp tie, and a navy jacket. He looked like a Young Republican on a job interview.
“I’m looking for PassHack,” I said.
“Certainly, sir,” Repp Tie said. He looked at his iMac, tapped some keys, and talked on the phone.
“Your name?”
“Tucker.”
Repp Tie spoke into the phone. “Mr. Tucker is here.” He hung up and gestured to a coffee area. “Please make yourself comfortable. Mr. Kane will be here momentarily.”
“Mr. Kane?”
“Yes.”
“Of PassHack?”
“Yes.”
I’d never heard of him. I wandered into the coffee area and confronted a contraption that claimed to make coffee from one of a dozen little packets hanging like tiny sides of beef. I suspected the coffee would taste the same no matter which packet I chose. I picked a Kona blend, hoping that thoughts of Hawaii would warm me. Stuck the packet in the slot, pushed the button, watched the machine gurgle out a cup of coffee. Tasted the coffee. It tasted like coffee made by a machine using a packet. No images of Hawaii sprang to mind.
A short guy wearing a tight black polo shirt and jeans walked toward me. He crossed his arms, looked at me.
I said, “Mr. Kane?”
“Yup.”
I stuck out my hand. “Tucker.”
Kane looked at my hand. “Yeah?”
I dropped my hand. “I came by to talk about PassHack. I thought they were out of business, but this address popped up on the web.”
Kane said, “There’s nothing to talk about.”
“Hmm. I’m not so sure—”
We were interrupted by a bunch of guys engaging in post-
meeting good-byes. They shook hands, slapped shoulders, laughed, and stopped for coffee. “One for the road,” one joked. The others laughed; clearly Mr. One-for-the-Road was the boss. The jovial band of business brothers hung around the coffee machine, agreeing with their boss about the superiority of packets when it came to coffee-making. Kane and I waited for them to leave. I tweeted:
If I ever get a real job, please kill me.
I said to Kane, “Can we go somewhere?”
Kane turned, beckoned, and walked down the hall. I followed him to a small office with a desk, a phone, and a window. There were no decorations, no pictures, no Red Sox posters, no sign that this guy had any life beyond this small room. Kane sat, pointed at a chair. I sat.
“Shut the door,” Kane said.
I reached back and swung the door shut.
Kane asked, “What?”
I said, “I just came by to learn what happened to the PassHack technology.”
“Do I look like a guy who would know what happened to PassHack’s technology?”
“You’re not wearing a tie, so yeah, you do.”
“Well, I don’t.”
“Then why are you sitting in an office for PassHack?”
“Look, Tucker, I don’t know where you got your information.”
“The web.”
“Well, the web is wrong. It’s possible that PassHack was in this office, but they’re not now. I use this space.”
“Do you pay for this space?”
Kane blushed—honest to God blushed—then narrowed his eyes.
“Why do you ask?”
“I wondered if David Anderson paid for it.”
More blushing, a twitch in the cheek. Mr. Poker Face. “I’ve never heard of David Anderson.”
“You suck.”
“I suck?”
“At lying. You suck at lying. You’re the worst.”
“You’re an asshole.”
“At least you really believe that. What’s your relationship with David Anderson?”
Kane stood. “Get out.”
I appraised Kane again. Small guy, tight clothes, buzz cut. Reminded me of Jael.
“Holy shit,” I said. “You’re David Anderson’s security guy.”
“Get out.”
“I’ve heard that you make a shitload of money.”
Kane came around the desk and grabbed my leather jacket—which he had not offered to take before—and pulled me to my feet. He was a strong little bastard.
“Get the fuck out of here!” Kane pulled open the office door, threw me into the wall across the hallway, and slammed the door shut behind me.
A massively perfumed woman carrying a manila folder stopped in the hallway and stared at me.
I said, “Apparently, there’s no soliciting.”
She shook her head. “Um. No.”
I asked, “Do you purchase office supplies for your company?”
She looked at the manila folders, looked back at me, and shook her head again.
“Well, then, “ I said, straightening my bomber jacket. “Good day, madam.”
I walked past her, the coffee machine, and Repp Tie, into the elevator and back into the cold.
Thirty-Seven
Riverside Station is the best place to catch the T in the winter because the warm trains sit and wait for their scheduled departure time. I found a seat farthest from an open door. Somewhere under my clothes, my Droid vibrated and played the Bruins foghorn. I fumbled my gloves off, dug into the folds of my jacket, and saw that David Anderson wanted to talk to me.
“Tucker, why are you bothering Jack Kane?” asked David Anderson.
“I didn’t think saying hello would bother him, but it turns out he’s a touchy guy,” I said.
“What did you want from him?”
“Information about PassHack’s technology. He doesn’t have any.”
“Of course he doesn’t have any.”
“Seeing as he’s your security guy.”
Silence. The train started moving.
I asked, “You still there?”
“What do you want?” Anderson said.
“I want to find Maria Rizzo.”
“What does that have to do with PassHack?”
“You said it yourself,” I said. “You and Sal had a falling out over PassHack, seems relevant.”
“You think I kidnapped his daughter? Are you fucking crazy?”
“I’m just following up on everything I can find.”
“Listen, you asshole—”
“Asshole?”
“Leave me alone. Don’t bother my employees. Don’t investigate my businesses.�
��
“Or?”
“Look. It’s logic. Either I destroyed Sal or I didn’t. If I didn’t, then you have no reason to harass me.”
“Okay.”
“And if I did, then I’m obviously not to be fucked with.”
“Are you threatening me?”
“Threatening you? No. Threats are useless.”
“I’m glad we agree.”
“I’m promising you. If you talk to my employees, investigate my businesses, or even Google my name, I will kill you.”
The connection died.
I called Bobby Miller and was surprised when he picked up.
“David Anderson just threatened to kill me,” I said.
Bobby said, “You have that effect on people.”
“Just thought you’d like the heads-up.”
“Is Jael sitting next to you?”
“No.”
“Is she watching you?”
“No.”
“Does she know that you were threatened?”
“No.”
“Idiot.”
“Nice.”
“The war for Sal’s turf just got bigger.”
“How?”
“When you guys killed Pistol Salvucci—”
“Us guys? What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Don’t fuck with me. There were witnesses.”
“Really? What did they see?”
“A tall woman dressed in black leapt over a table and killed a guy, then a guy in a suit jacket shot the other one. There was a third guy who didn’t do any thing useful. That would be you.”
I said nothing.
“Then the guy in the jacket took his MacBook Air and walked off down the street. Do I have to go on with this?”
“I don’t see how this makes Sal’s turf war bigger.”
“Pistol was running a crew of ten guys.”
“Okay.”
“Now you got ten guys trying to take over his spot.”
“It’s like the Hydra.”
“What?”
“You cut off a head and it grows back two.”
“Yeah. So you decided to go poke one of the heads in the eye.”
“I suppose.”
“I figured after yesterday you’d lie low. Instead you made another enemy.”
“There’s got to be some connection between Anderson and Maria.”
“What did you do, ask Anderson where he hid her?”
“I met a guy named Jack Kane.”
A keyboard’s clacking came through the phone. Bobby said, “Shit.”
“What?”
“Jack Kane is in my database.”
“Okay.”
“My potential terrorist database.”
“Oh.”
“He’s an ex-SEAL. Dishonorable discharge. Accused of shooting his squad leader.”
“Friendly fire?”
“Bar fight.”
The train rattled into Newton Center. I watched the diner in the Newton Center station pass by. They served an excellent Bloody Mary. I considered jumping off the streetcar and ordering a drink. The doors opened, they closed, I stayed put.
“Do you think he could have killed Sophia?” I asked.
Bobby said, “These are not people you should be fucking with.”
“Thanks for the advice.”
“At least call Jael.”
“I will.”
I closed the connection and waited for the train to take me home.
Thirty-Eight
I stood on the sidewalk outside Hynes Station, looking for Maria. I looked up Mass Ave. Maria wasn’t there. I looked down Mass Ave. Still didn’t see her. Okay. Now what?
The single-digit cold chewed my earlobes. I should have worn a hat, something knit, with earflaps. That’s what I’d do. I’d buy a hat. I turned down Boylston, heading for the Prudential Center.
The Pru, beyond being the skyscraper that uses its office lights to write the phrase “GO SOX” every few years, is a part of a terrible story featuring the unholy combination of petty rivalry and modern engineering. Prudential Insurance built the Prudential Center back in 1964, so as to have a taller building than the John Hancock Insurance tower. John Hancock, not being content with having a nice tower topped by a nifty weather-predicting light, put up another building—the new, mirrored John Hancock tower. The new John Hancock tower demonstrated the fact that an engineer’s life is nothing but a list of problems.
Problem One: The Hancock’s face was made of mirrored sheets of glass—mirrored sheets of glass that had a tendency to fire themselves into space and knife down onto the streets below. Police cleared the sidewalks, workers covered the window holes with plywood, and the John Hancock became the world’s tallest plywood building. Engineers finally figured out that two-pane glass couldn’t handle wind or temperature changes. They developed a new, bendy glass, and replaced all the tower’s windows.
Problem Two: The tower injected a fresh new hell into the lives of cubicle dwellers—motion sickness. It swayed in the breeze. People threw up. Engineers went to work again. They installed two 300-ton weights to the 58th floor to limit swaying. It was like forcing the building to carry a couple of full shopping bags for stability. The vomiting stopped.
Problem Three: The analysis for the swaying showed that the damn thing could, honest to God, fall over like a gigantic vertical Tacoma Narrows bridge. It would have either smashed Trinity Church, destroyed the Public Library, or knocked over the old John Hancock tower. Engineers added 1,500 tons of structural steel to keep that from happening.
At the end of all this, the John Hancock company was the proud owner of a building that was 51 feet taller than its rival. A full 7 percent (if you round up).
Despite the wonderful splendiferousness of the mirrored Hancock building, the Pru has a mall. I headed there to buy a cap. My ears were transitioning from howling pain to frightening numbness. A nice warm hat and a cappuccino might make up for a death threat.
They couldn’t hurt.
Once in the mall, I bought myself a stylish fleece beanie, black with an orange athletic logo. The sign next to the beanies said that the logo would show that I “meant business.” I considered hopping on a train and heading back out to Riverside to show Jack Kane my beanie, let him know that I meant business.
Instead I grabbed lunch at Boston Chowda, the name an homage to the accent we adopt to delight the tourists. I’m not normally a chowder guy, but something about the way winter creeps into the deepest parts of your body makes the thought of a steaming bowl of anything the highlight of your day.
Afterward, I wandered over to the Microsoft Store to engage in some retail therapy. Men relate to technology stores the way women relate to clothing stores. We go in, fondle the merchandise, and drop into a Zen-like state where the gadget in front of us becomes a portal into thoughts of who we are, how such a gadget would fit into our lives, and what has become of our childhood fantasies.
The gadget in front of me at the moment was a Surface tablet that someone had left logged into their Facebook page. Mikey Jones had written, “I’m at the Microsoft Store” as his status. Debbie Holt had liked the fact that Mikey was at the Microsoft store. I sent Debbie a private message that said, “I love you, Debbie, please bear my children and make me sandwiches.” Then I wrote Mikey’s status, “I’m a big stupid-head who smells like feet” and logged him out of Facebook, having taught him a lesson about computer security.
Things could have gotten a lot worse for Mikey. I could have poked around his account, discovered his mother’s maiden name, learned his email address, and perhaps even gotten his credit card numbers. Then I would have—
Maria was on Facebook.
The thought flashed into my mind like a billboard as I remembered Christmas.
&nb
sp; Maria had been puttering around on Twitter when Sal yelled at her to put her tablet away and come to dinner. She said she would, but she didn’t, so he yelled at her some more, then she turned off the iPad and came to dinner.
I like Twitter. Few people can deliver more than 140 characters of content. Facebook gives people enough space to hang themselves, as they do regularly.
That said, Maria’s list of followers would give me a new place to start. Some new people to talk to. All I needed to do was get into Sal’s apartment and find Maria’s tablet. I’d need some help with that. I pulled out my Droid and dialed Lieutenant Lee to see if he could be useful for once.
Thirty-NIne
“You realize that you’re a murder suspect,” said Lieutenant Lee in front of Sal’s apartment door.
“Are you going to open the door or not, Lee?” I asked.
“Are you going to tell me what happened on Hanover Street or not?”
“Nothing happened on Hanover Street.”
Lee pursed his lips, scowled. “Proverbs 19:5.”
I waited. He just stood there.
I said, “Are you going to make me ask?”
Lee waited, silent.
“You know, I have a smartphone. I could just look it up.”
“A false witness shall not be unpunished, and he that speaketh lies shall not escape.”
“Open the damn door.”
“Must you always swear?” Lee asked.
“I think you’ve got a Heisenberg problem, Lee.”
“What’s a Heisenberg problem?”
“There, now you look that up.”
Lee pocketed the keys. “This was a mistake.”
I raised my hands. “Okay. Okay. Heisenberg said that the observer always affects the experiment.”
Lee reached into his pocket, pondering my wisdom. Pulled out the keys, pushed the key into the lock. “Are you saying that you only swear around me?”
My turn to be silent.
“Did you swear around Maria?” Lee asked.
I mentally flipped through my interactions with Maria. “Now that you mention it, no.”
“Well, at least you’ve got some control over it.”
“Can we just go in?”
