Abuse of Power

16

Jack stared at the two images side by side-the blowup and the e-mail attachment-and the only conclusion he could draw from this was that the parking sticker had come from the local British consulate. And that raised more questions than it answered.

“How accurate is your friend’s software?” he asked.

Max gestured toward the screen. “Pretty damn accurate, I’d say.”

Tony nodded. “That’s definitely a match.”

“So whoever drives that Escalade works for the San Francisco BC?”

“Unless it was stolen,” Max said.

Jack shook his head. “I doubt it. And judging by the guy in the sunglasses, we aren’t talking about office drones.” He looked at Tony. “What do you think? Consulate security?”

“Hard to say. Could be full-on Security Services. MI6 or special ops. I trained with some of those guys in the eighties and I can tell you firsthand they mean business.”

“This doesn’t make any sense,” Jack said. “Why would the Brits be involved in this?”

“Maybe these guys are freelancing, borrowed the company car,” Tony suggested.

Jack thought about this, then looked at Max. “How are your friend’s hacking skills?”

“Nonexistent,” she told him. “He’s strictly a software tech.”

“What about that guy you said you dated a few years ago? Made a living hacking college transcripts.”

“Dave Karras? Genius and loser, all rolled into one. Why do you think I dumped him?”

“You still have his number?”

It took Max a moment to realize what Jack was asking of her, and her expression soured. “Uh-uh, no way. Not gonna happen.”

“Come on, Max, I want to see what we can find out about these guys.”

She shook her head. “Forget it, Jack. I’m not contacting that freak.”

“Not even for me?”

Max turned to Tony. “You want to help me out here, stud?”

“Are you kidding?” Tony said. “I’m on his side.”

From all appearances, Dave Karras was a freak.

He came to the door wearing a ratty bathrobe and boxer shorts, with three days’ worth of stubble on his chin and unruly black hair in serious need of a shampoo and rinse.

The cramped apartment behind him was barely a step above Juanita Thomas’s, and Jack thought if he ever saw the guy on the street, he’d be carrying a cardboard sign: WILL HACK FOR FOOD.

Karras was what Max had described as a grad school dalliance, memorable for all the wrong reasons. And Jack had a difficult time picturing the two of them together.

Maybe he’d been a little more presentable back then.

“Where’s Maxie?” Karras asked, looking crestfallen when he didn’t see her standing in the hallway with them.

Max had finally agreed to set up the meet but had declined to be part of it. She’d told Jack she wasn’t interested in taking a trip down memory lane and had wished them luck.

“She sends her regards,” Jack said, then pushed his way into the apartment, Tony at his heels.

“Okay. Fair enough. Whatever.” Karras stepped aside, a small frown on his face. “Make yourself at home.”

The words were laced with mild sarcasm, but even if they’d been genuine Jack couldn’t imagine how anyone would ever manage it. This was not exactly a homey environment. There was little furniture to speak of, and the center of the room was dominated by a large, cluttered computer desk sporting three monitors, one of which was open to a Web site featuring several busty women playing topless beach volleyball.

In their brief phone conversation, Jack had learned that Karras was now making the bulk of his living hacking gambling sites and giving himself modest winnings at Texas Hold’em. Judging by Karras’s environment, Jack felt he should give himself a few more royal flushes. That, Karras explained, would raise automatic red flags. Which might explain why he’d agreed to meet with them.

Jack and Tony surveyed the room for a place to sit, but the old, deflated bean bag chairs didn’t look particularly inviting so they both opted to stand.

After closing the door behind them, Karras got straight to the point. “Max says you’ve got a job offer.”

“That’s right,” Jack said.

“My services start at two grand, cash only, and I don’t do banks, military defense, or intelligence agencies. Too much of a risk. That work for you?”

The fee was less than what Jack had been expecting, but Karras obviously wasn’t a greedy man. According to Max, he had the ability to make himself a millionaire at the stroke of a key but he avoided temptation. Why he chose to live like this was anyone’s guess.

“I think that works,” Jack said. “Although scrounging up cash at this time of night could be difficult.”

Karras shrugged. “Don’t worry about it. You’re a friend of Maxie’s, I’ll trust you. I’ll even give you a discount, you get her to deliver it to me.”

No chance in hell that would ever happen, but Jack smiled and nodded. “I’m sure she’ll be happy to.”

The prospect seemed to make Karras’s day.

“Good,” he said, crossing to the chair at his computer station. He sank into it and stabbed a key, making the porn site go away. “So what’s our target?”

“I need to look at some personnel records.”

“Corporate?”

Jack shook his head. “Government.”

“Hmm,” Karras said. “That gets tricky. Foreign or domestic?”

“The local British Consulate.”

Karras’s eyebrows went up and for a moment Jack thought he was about to refuse. But he had only been thinking, apparently, for an instant later he shrugged it off. “Easy as making white rice.”

Jack was surprised. “How do you know? You been in there before?”

“I’ve made a few exploratory trips.”

“Why?”

Karras shrugged. “Why not? I like challenges, so I go looking for them.”

Jack regarded him critically. “But why the British Consulate?”

“The U.K.’s Terrorism Act of 2000 made hacking an act of terrorism,” he said. “I keep checking to make sure I’m not on any of their watch lists.”

“By committing the very act that would put you on the list,” Jack said.

“Yeah. How else?”

Jack held up his hands. “Beats me. I’m already on that list, so I’m not one to judge. You were saying, about challenges?”

“Right. The BC’s firewalls are state-of-the-art, but the biggest vulnerability of any organization is people and training. No matter how many times you pound it into an employee’s head to create strong passwords and keep them secure, there’s always some fool who doesn’t listen. It’s an IT manager’s nightmare.”

“Which you use to your advantage.”

“Little social engineering and I’m in. And once I’m in, that sucker is mine.” He jabbed a key with his index finger and the screen on his right came to life with a list of files. “I think I have a password that’s current.”

Tony, who had been looking disappointed ever since the porn site was banished from view, said, “You keep this stuff on file? What if you get raided?”

“Kill switch,” Karras told him as he scrolled through the files. “I can fry every single one of my hard drives in about thirty seconds flat. You’d need a forensics miracle worker to figure out what was on them.” He found what he was looking for and opened the file. “Here it is. Hermione10.”

“Hermione?”

“Yeah, daughter. Women tend to use their kids’ names, pet’s name, or mother’s name for their password, in that order. God bless Facebook, it’s like a big, fat password directory.”

“Pretty scary when you think about it,” Jack said.

“Best not to,” Tony suggested.

Karras typed something and a network portal blossomed on his center screen showing the British embassy logo. The lion and the unicorn.

Navigating to the local consulate’s page, he called up the log-in box, typed in the name, Winterbottom, Jane, the password, Hermoine10, then punched the enter button and waited.

“Let’s hope she hasn’t changed it,” he said.

Jack almost hoped she had, simply because he couldn’t believe how lax people were about their security. There were office towers in the city that changed their elevator passwords every twenty-four hours, but during that time handed them out to every pizza delivery man and overnight delivery service that came by. Unless he was honest or a complete moron, that gave potential intruders a full day to get in and out of so-called high-security buildings.

A moment later Karras was inside the network and zipping around it like a bee on a hillside. Opening a command window, he started typing again. It all looked like gibberish to Jack, so he just waited as Karras did his thing.

Tony said, “You got something to drink? This looks like it could take a while.”

Karras gestured. “Beer in the fridge. Make it two.”

“Three,” Jack said.

Tony disappeared around a corner, made some noise, then brought the beers and went back for a couple of dinette stools to sit on. They drank and watched as Karras typed, Jack trying not to think about how much jail time they’d all be facing if he got caught.

Karras seemed to read his mind.

“Don’t worry,” he said, “I’m covering my tracks as I go. They’ll never even know we were in here.”

“Famous last words.”

“An expression coined, I’m guessing, by someone who wasn’t very good at what he did,” Karras said.

A moment later Karras jabbed a key and a list of names filled the screen. “Gentlemen, I give you the employees of the San Francisco British consulate. You interested in anyone in particular?”

“Security staff,” Jack said. “I was hoping for ID photos.”

“I think I can arrange that.” Karras typed in a few key words and hit enter, then a dozen names and faces popped up. “There you have it. The SFBC security staff.”

Jack and Tony leaned forward, studying the photos. Jack didn’t see anyone who looked even remotely like the guy in sunglasses.

“You see him?” he asked Tony.

Tony shook his head then sipped his beer.

“Okay, so he’s not security. Let’s go through the rest of the staff, department by department. All the males.”

“Your wish is my command,” Karras said.

They spent the next few minutes going through each of the employee photos, working their way from the lowliest maintenance worker to the consul general himself.

Still no sign of Sunglasses.

“I guess we got it wrong,” Jack said to Tony.

“Or they’re MI6, which means they wouldn’t be in this system.” He turned to Karras. “Any chance you can hack into the British security services?”

Karras balked. “What did I say when we started-”

“That you like money and challenges. Another grand?”

Karras still didn’t bite. “You got a couple weeks and a safe house in Brazil? Those people have firewalls on top of firewalls and enough booby traps to discourage even the most aggressive attack. Getting past them would take a lot more than social engineering and, like I told you, I don’t do intelligence networks.”

Jack sighed. “So we’re at an impasse.”

“Not necessarily. This guy you’re looking for-what made you think he works for the consulate in the first place?”

“Long story.”

Karras took a sip of beer and nodded. “Sure, sure-need to know. But just because his file isn’t here today, doesn’t mean it wasn’t here yesterday or a week ago. Could be he quit or got fired.”

Jack immediately understood. “Archives.”

“Most organizations keep their employee files for years. I could go back a couple months, look for recent terminations.”

“Do it,” Jack told him.

Karras called up another command screen and went to work. A few moments later, he said, “Looks like there’s only been three terminations processed in the last year and a half. All female. But there is something a little strange here.”

“What?”

“Some data remnants that look like they were purged from the personnel database a little over a week ago. Could be an employee record and it might be your guy.”

“Can you access it?”

“Data only completely disappears when you nuke the drive. So, yeah, I’m pretty sure I can pull something up. But give me a few minutes.”

He went at it, working the keyboard furiously, all of his concentration focused on that center screen. Jack and Tony were about halfway through their second beers when he finally came up for air.

“Success,” he said. “It’s only a partial, but at least I’ve got a name and a photo for you.”

He stabbed a key and the file opened up on-screen.

The employee was male, but it wasn’t Sunglasses. Not even close. However, the photo stirred something inside Jack and he felt his heart kick up a notch.

“You say this was purged about a week ago?”

“Give or take.”

Jack stared at the screen. Could it really be who he thought it was?

“What’s wrong?” Tony asked. “You know this guy?”

“No, but I know someone who might.” He looked at Karras. “Can you download this photo and send it to a cell phone?”

He was already maximizing a snip program to copy the photo without leaving a fingerprint.

“Just give me the number.”

Jack did, then dug out his phone and dialed the number himself. After three rings the line picked up and he said, “This is Jack Hatfield. I’m gonna send you a photo. I want you to take a careful look and call me back, okay?”

He got the answer he was hoping for then clicked off.

“Jack, what’s going on?”

“I’ll explain in a minute,” he said, staring intently at the computer screen as he waited for his phone to ring. A moment later it did, and he answered quickly. “Is that the guy? The one you and your brother saw at the Arco station?”

“It’s him,” Leon replied.

“You’re absolutely sure?”

“I’m sure,” Leon said.

Jack thanked him then clicked off, turning to Tony. He gestured to the face on the screen. Dark, Middle Eastern descent. The name next to it read ABDAL AL-FIDA and listed him as a computer maintenance technician.

“He’s the one,” Jack said. “The reason for the cover-up.”

“The Iranian guy?”

Jack nodded. “That’s why they wiped him from the database.” He paused, not quite believing what he was about to say. “The bomber was working for the Brits.”