The Con Job

by Matt Forbeck

  Of course, that might only be due to the fact that she was able to tolerate him and his many flaws. She knew him as well as anyone—much better, in fact—and she still stayed with him. That meant more to him than he might ever let her know.

  “I’ve seen the movies,” Eliot said. “You can’t avoid the things. Stupid capes are everywhere.”

  “There really aren’t that many capes these days,” Hardison said. “Superman and Batman’s about it. Hell, most of the superheroes lost their capes for the movies.”

  Eliot snarled at Hardison, who just stared him down. The hacker knew better than to show Eliot any fear, no matter how certain he might be that Eliot could take him apart in seconds. “Are we going to do the briefing or not?” Eliot said to Nate.

  Nate picked up the remote and pressed a button. The wall of screens behind him leaped to life. In the center one, the face of Lorenzo Patronus grinned out at them.

  Patronus looked as slick as he was. He was short but carried himself like a larger man. He wore a cheap but stylish suit, and he stared into the camera with all the false charm of a real estate agent on the prowl. He kept his hair swept back tight and shiny. Nate was willing to bet it wouldn’t be moved by anything less than a class-five hurricane.

  “This is Lorenzo Patronus, of Anaheim, California. He doesn’t seem to have much of a past, which indicates that whoever he claims to be now, he’s likely using a false identity. He cropped up on the rare comics and memorabilia scene about a year ago, and he’s been aggressively courting a number of the most legendary names in the industry to sign on as his clients.”

  “He promises them large percentages of huge prices, but once he sells the goods, his clients never see a dime,” Sophie said. Nate could tell she was guessing, but per usual, she had nailed it. “It’s a classic scam.”

  “Classic or classless?” Hardison said. “Ripping off old people for the simple crime of trusting you doesn’t seem like much of a challenge.”

  “Aren’t we a little out of this guy’s league?” Parker said, blunt as ever.

  “The man’s out to rob these comic-book legends of the last things they want to get rid of,” Hardison said. “They gave the world some of its finest heroes. Saving them’s the least we can do.”

  Eliot’s lip curled in the direction of a sneer, but he aimed it at Nate rather than Hardison. Nate shrugged it off. Hardison had a point.

  “The worst part,” Hardison said, “is these people really don’t have a whole lot else. Most of them worked as freelancers their entire career. They got no heath insurance, no retirement package, nothing.”

  “Just like us,” Sophie said as she gave Nate a meaningful look.

  Nate knew she was referring to his son, Sam, who’d died because IYS—the insurance company he’d worked for as one of its top claims investigators, back when he’d chased after the people he worked with today—had refused to cover the expensive treatment that might have saved Sam’s life. They’d claimed it was experimental and therefore ineligible. Nate had fallen apart after that in a spectacular way that had ended both his marriage and career.

  That had forever put him on the side of the underdog, a class into which Simon Curtiss and his fellow comic-book creators squarely fell.

  “Some of these comics guys are sharp,” Nate said. “They ask for recommendations, and Patronus gives them what they want.”

  “They’re faked, of course,” said Sophie. “But all he needs is a few people to not bother to check, and soon he has a few legitimate clients he can use to gin up his credentials. It snowballs from there.”

  “Precisely,” Nate said, pointing toward her.

  “So what the hell’s the rush?” Eliot said. “You called us in on this like the artwork was all on fire.”

  “Patronus is going to hold a huge auction of all the artwork and collectibles he’s managed to scam out of his clients,” Nate said. “And it’s going down next week. If we don’t stop him before then, the stolen goods will be gone, dispersed among dozens of buyers.”

  Parker nodded. “And if he’s smart, he’ll disappear right after that. Destroy his identity and pop up someplace else as someone entirely new.”

  “Right,” said Nate. “If we want to put an end to this, it’s now or never.”

  Eliot unfolded his arms and shrugged. “All right,” he said. “Let’s put this punk out of business. Where we headed?”

  “San Diego. Patronus is going to hold the auction in the heart of the largest pop culture convention in this hemisphere.”

  Hardison’s face split into an ear-to-ear grin. “Pack your bags, baby,” he said. “We’re going to Comic-Con!”

  FOUR

  The crew piled into a minivan cab outside San Diego International. Nate and Sophie took the two seats in the middle row while Hardison, Parker, and Eliot filed into the back row.

  “I always get the hump,” Parker said as she settled into the middle seat. “It’s not fair.”

  “There’s no hump in the middle of a minivan,” Eliot said, already frustrated with everyone. It had been a long flight from Boston. “The hump in a car goes over the driveshaft, and the minivan sits up high enough that it goes right over it.”

  “That’s just what somebody who didn’t have to sit on the hump would say.”

  “Where we headed?” the cabbie said.

  “Comic-Con,” Nate said.

  “Straight to the show?” The cabbie shrugged, a note of fear tingeing his voice. “Suit yourself.”

  “Is that a problem?” Nate asked.

  “Kinda crazy down there right now. Preview night’s about to start. Hard to get within a quarter mile of the front doors.” The cabbie looked back at them. “Sure you don’t want to head for your hotel first? Easier to get there and walk in. Or flag a couple pedicabs if you can find them.”

  “Just how crazy is this place?” Parker said. Nate couldn’t tell if she was disturbed or excited. Maybe both.

  The cabbie laughed as he pulled into traffic. “Crazy as it always is. You get a hundred and fifty thousand people descend on your city for five days, you tell me what happens.”

  Eliot frowned. “I don’t like crowds. Too many ways for things to go wrong.”

  Parker’s eyes sparkled. “Big crowds make for easy pickings. And easy getaways.” She noticed Nate giving her a stern look. “Not that I would do that just, you know, for fun.”

  “I love the buzz of a crowd,” Sophie said. “It feels like an audience forming.”

  “So,” Nate said to Hardison, “where are we staying?”

  Hardison winced. Nate often let the young man shoulder the brunt of the planning logistics. He was such a whiz with a computer that no one else could come close to doing it better, especially if they ran up against a problem.

  Also, Hardison had made it clear to Nate that he wanted to full-on run missions for the team. He had a lot to learn, but he was sharp and ambitious. With a little guidance and the chance to mature, Hardison might someday be better at that part of the game than Nate—not that Nate was about to tell him that. The hacker didn’t need any more confidence in himself than he already had.

  “I couldn’t find us a place within ten miles of the convention center,” Hardison said.

  “Ten miles?” The cabbie laughed again. “You did a good job, then! I know people staying all the way out in Carlsbad. Hell, I got a friend who decided it was easier to find a place in Tijuana.”

  Every member of the crew glared at Hardison. “You brought us all the way out here without a place to stay?” Eliot said. “What’re we supposed to sleep on, a park bench?”

  “Most of those are full too,” the cabbie said with a wicked grin.

  “Couldn’t you just do your thingy with the computer?” Parker said. “Get us someone else’s room?”

  Hardison wavered. “Sure, I could have, no problem. The security they got around those room booking systems is like a kid’s playpen, but I just couldn’t bring myself to do it.”

  Eliot
reached across Parker to grab Hardison by the front of his shirt, but Parker shoved her shoulder between the two men, foiling the effort. “That’s your thing, man,” Eliot said over Parker’s shoulder as Hardison backed away into the corner of the cab. “What’s stopping you?”

  Hardison shrugged, embarrassed. “All the people who come out here, they’re doing it for the sheer joy of being a geek about something. Might be the Avengers, Star Wars, Sailor Moon, or even them sparkly vampires, but hey, they took a week off work, saved up all their pennies for the badges—which sell out in about ninety minutes—and got their butts out there for the show. I—I just couldn’t do that to them.”

  Eliot put a hand over his eyes and shook his head. “Fine,” he said. “You got your geek solidarity.” He dropped his hand and snarled. “But where are we going to sleep tonight?”

  “Hey, ain’t no need to get nasty about it.”

  Nate put up his hands to calm the two men down. “Look, guys,” he said, “I understand how Hardison feels.” The hacker started to give Eliot an I-told-you-so smile, but Nate cut him off. “But Eliot here has a point. We can’t run this, ah, business from Tijuana. That’ll put a real cramp in our operation.”

  Hardison held up his hands. “I know, I know. I should have said something earlier. I just figured, you know.” He glanced at Nate and Sophie.

  “No,” Nate said, confused. “You know what?”

  “I know,” Sophie said in a warm, understanding tone. “He just figured that we could handle the situation once we were on the ground here.”

  “Oh, good!” Parker said with a girlish delight. “Can I break into a penthouse?”

  “I’m sure you could,” said Nate, “but that wouldn’t really help us out when the people who booked the room show up to claim it. No, this requires a little more finesse.”

  He looked over at Sophie. She gave him a knowing smile.

  “That it does,” she said. “Fortunately, I know just how to handle it.” She turned forward again to speak with the driver. “Sir?” she said. “Can you take us to the Horton Grand?”

  As far as Nate knew, Sophie had never been to San Diego. The way she spoke the hotel’s name, though, sounded like she was talking about an old friend.

  “Anyplace you like, miss,” the cabbie said. “As long as I don’t have to drive you to the con’s front door.”

  FIVE

  “You’ve been here before, I take it,” Nate said as he and Sophie walked up to the front of the Horton Grand. They’d left the others waiting in the cab.

  “Of course,” Sophie said. “It’s a beautiful place, truly historic. The restoration of the main staircase is fantastic.”

  Nate stared up at the building from the corner of Island and Fourth. It looked like something straight out of Vienna, Austria, a classic facade that featured tall windows on the first floor and bay windows with balconies on the second and third. They walked toward a blue awning with the hotel’s name on it and entered the wide, airy foyer.

  “Did you know that Wyatt Earp used to live here?” Sophie said.

  “The lawman?”

  “More like the gambler. He owned three saloons while he lived in back in the late 1800s, and every one of them offered games of chance.”

  “That wasn’t exactly illegal around here back then, though, was it?”

  She gave him a little smile. “He was a scoundrel just the same.”

  Only a few people milled about the foyer at the moment. One pair of them was dressed up as Superman and Batman, Nate knew, but versions of them that he’d never seen before. He recognized the two icons, of course. It was impossible to live in America and avoid them. But he didn’t read comics—at least not anymore—and he wasn’t up on any of the changes that might have happened to the characters in the pages of their comics.

  Nate and Sophie walked straight through the foyer to the front desk, situated off to the right. There, a tall man in a faded Batman T-shirt and a name tag that read Ray greeted them with a forced smile.

  “Hello, how may I help you?” he said.

  Sophie stepped up to the counter, removed her sunglasses, and spoke to the man in a flawless Southern California accent. “We’d like to check into our rooms,” she said. “They should be under the name Chris Bucket.”

  The man tapped a few words into his computer and bared a grimace. “I’m sorry, but I don’t seem to have any reservation under that name. Did you place it through the convention housing bureau?”

  “Of course not,” Sophie said with a nervous laugh. “How do you think that would work out for Mr. Canyon? He’d be mobbed.”

  “How are you spelling it?”

  “Canyon, as in Grand,” Nate said, pumping up his own obnoxiousness. “How the hell do you think it’s spelled?”

  The desk clerk started to scowl at Nate’s attitude but quickly caught himself. “C-A-N-Y-O-N, sir.”

  Nate threw up his hands and turned to Sophie. “They lost our reservation. I told you. I knew this would happen. You put Carissa in charge of tackling hotel reservations. You can’t expect them to be done right.”

  Sophie put a hand on Nate’s shoulder to calm him down. “It’s all right,” she said. “I’m sure there’s just been a misunderstanding.” She focused her dazzling smile on the clerk. “Isn’t that right, Ray?”

  Ray shrugged. “I’m afraid not. The entire downtown area’s been booked solid for months.”

  Nate groaned. “We’re going to lose our jobs over this. All of us!”

  Sophie leaned in over the counter and spoke to the clerk in a conspiratorial tone. “He worries so much. It’s just that, well, Christian—I mean, our employer—has been going through a rough patch, and he is a bit more temperamental than usual. Are you sure there isn’t any way you can help us?”

  The clerk gave Sophie a sympathetic wince. “There really is no room at the inn.”

  Nate leaned forward over Sophie’s shoulder. “This is ridiculous,” he said to the Ray. “Is your manager here?”

  Ray pointed to his name tag. Right below his name, it read Day Manager.

  Nate threw up his hands again and started to walk away. He didn’t look back.

  Sophie sighed. “Well, that is too bad. We’d heard so many excellent things about the Horton Grand. Our employer was hoping to make this place his headquarters during the show—his man-cave, if you will.”

  Nate stormed back and took Sophie by the arm to lead her away. “Well, Mr. Bale’s just going to have to learn to live with it,” he said. “But if he winds up sleeping on the streets this weekend, then we’re all going to end up there. Permanently. Let’s go see if we can find some other place for our batty boss to hang.”

  “Wait,” Ray said as Nate and Sophie turned from the desk. Knowing that Ray couldn’t see his face, Nate allowed himself a brief, small smile.

  Sophie took her arm back from Nate, who stopped in his tracks, and turned around. “Yes?”

  The flustered clerk looked down at her. “I, ah—I just remembered that we do have one last suite left. It’s the manager’s suite, but, you know…” He gestured at the name tag on his Batman shirt.

  “Since you’re the manager?” Sophie sidled back up to the front desk.

  “I can release the room to you, of course.” He gave Sophie a sheepish smile and then let his fingers fly across his keyboard. “Ah, yes. Here we go.”

  Nate returned to Sophie’s side. “How big is this suite?”

  “About six hundred square feet. It comes with a king bed in the bedroom and a queen sofa bed in the sitting room.” He looked up, chagrined. “I hope that will work for you.”

  Nate grimaced, thinking about how they would manage with all five of them crammed into a single room. “It’s going to be a tight fit.”

  “Are you sure you don’t have anything else?” Sophie asked, a grateful yet hopeful tone in her voice.

  Ray wrung his hands. “That really is the last room we have. We’re entirely booked, and I’m sure you’ll find the s
ame is true at every other hotel within a dozen miles of here. I do hope it’ll be enough.”

  Sophie reached over the counter and gave the manager’s hand a squeeze. “I’m sure we can make do.”

  SIX

  “This ain’t so bad,” Hardison said as he glanced around the room. “Nice big place. Lots of woodwork. Historic atmosphere.”

  “There are only two beds,” Eliot said. “Which part of the floor do you want?”

  Hardison arched his eyebrows at the mercenary. “I can’t sleep on the floor,” he said. “My chiropractor says I have a condition.”

  Eliot rolled his eyes and pointed at the door to the main bedroom. “Nate and Sophie are shacking up in there. That leaves the foldout couch.”

  “There’s room enough for two of us on that.”

  “Who?” Eliot glared at Hardison. “You going to share that bed with Parker? Or are you going to make her sleep on the floor?”

  Hardison glanced toward Parker and blushed. He’d had a crush on her for years now, ever since they’d started working together. Despite that, he’d never been able to make a solid move forward with her. She was one of a kind—quiet, athletic, beautiful, and smart. She was also one of the sharpest thieves he’d ever known—she could crack a safe just as fast as he could bust open a secure server—but in many ways she was also a complete innocent. Part of that meant that she had barriers around her that were so high that only she could scale them, and she needed to trust that the world would be safe for her outside them first. Until then, he’d set up his camp outside of those walls to wait.

  Sharing a bed with her this weekend was not going to work.

  “All right,” Hardison said. “We can go round up some air mattresses or something.”

  “Sure,” Eliot said with a smirk. “Wouldn’t want to worry about your delicate condition.”