The Prisoner's Gold

21

Garcia walked into the library wearing a T-shirt with an Atari 2600 joystick icon, a pair of battered tan cargo shorts, flip-flops, and a huge grin. He pulled out the chair next to Maggie and sat down across from Sarah, who seemed perturbed about the interruption.

‘Don’t worry,’ he assured the women, ‘there are no listening devices active in this room. I hacked the feed and put it on a silent loop so we could speak in private.’

‘What are you talking about?’ Sarah asked with a straight face.

‘Come on, Sarah. Don’t play dumb. I know you know about the bugs. And I know that Papi is the one who put them there. It doesn’t take a genius like me to figure that out.’

‘Genius?’ Sarah said with a laugh as she secretly pulled the bug detector from her pocket and activated it under the table. A quick glance down at its darkened LED confirmed that the listening devices that were normally present in the room were not recording, just as Garcia had said. ‘Aren’t you the same guy who mistook our translator for the maid?’

Garcia blushed but didn’t take the bait. ‘I want in on the search for Papi’s employer.’

‘What search?’ she demanded.

‘Come on, Sarah. I know you and Jack are trying to figure out why this house is bugged and why Papi’s keeping us in the dark about his funding. I want to help.’

‘Help?’ Sarah blurted. ‘If I remember correctly, you were involved with spying once before — but you were doing it for Papi and against us.’

Garcia groaned. He knew she was going to bring up the incident on the train. ‘How many times do I have to tell you: I didn’t betray anyone. He was paying me. Back then you were total strangers, and I was merely doing my job. Things are different now, and you know it.’

‘Maybe so,’ she said, reluctantly acknowledging the loyalty Garcia had shown ever since. ‘But there’s nothing to tell you. Maggie and I were just talking about history.’

‘Relax,’ Garcia said, ‘I looped the bugs in the next room, too. Even if you shout, no one will hear you.’

‘Why do I get the feeling that you’ve said that to women before?’ Sarah teased.

Maggie put her hand over her mouth and tried to stifle her laugh. She had been completely quiet up to this point in the discussion, but the line was just too funny to ignore. ‘Sorry.’

Garcia remained focused on Sarah. ‘Tease me all you want, but the truth is I watch your backs all the time — even when you don’t know I’m doing it.’

Sarah leaped to her feet. ‘So you are a perv, just like Josh said!’

‘What?’ Garcia blurted.

‘I swear to God, if I find out that you’ve been watching me in the shower—’

‘No!’ he shouted as he stood to defend his honor. ‘Nothing like that! I swear! All I do is make sure you’re safe. That’s it. That’s all I do. I make sure the team is safe.’

‘Safe, how?’ Sarah demanded.

‘For instance, I ran a thorough check on Maggie as soon as I knew she was joining the team — even before you and Jack asked me to.’

Maggie stopped laughing and stared at Garcia. She knew that they were going to check up on her, but she was surprised that they were going to reveal the results with her in the room.

‘And?’ Sarah asked.

‘She is who she says she is: a high-end travel guide based in China. I thoroughly checked her credentials, and there’s nothing weird in her history. And she’s not reporting to Papi, either. As far as I can tell, the two of them first spoke earlier this month. No prior connection.’

Sarah stared at Maggie. ‘And since then?’

Garcia answered. ‘One phone call, two emails, and three texts; all before she was introduced to the team. Nothing since.’

Maggie simply nodded.

Garcia took a deep breath. ‘Seriously, Sarah. I’m here to help. Just tell me what to do.’

Sarah reluctantly sat down again and signaled for him to do the same. Thanks to a rocky childhood and many years of undercover work with the CIA, she found it difficult to trust people — especially those who had wronged her in the past. Even so, she realized that sometimes a second chance was warranted, and she sensed this was one of those times.

Of course, she wasn’t going to make it easy on him.

That wasn’t Sarah’s way.

‘Look,’ Maggie said to break the icy silence, ‘I came to this party a little late, but if it’s okay with you, I’d like to speak on the matter.’

‘Go ahead,’ Sarah said.

‘As I understand it, we were hired by Jean-Marc to find a treasure. We were selected for our abilities and our willingness to step outside the law to accomplish that goal. I don’t find it the least bit surprising that he might have some skeletons in his closet. And considering the amount of money that he’s paying the team, I understand his desire to keep tabs on us.’

Sarah and Garcia nodded grudgingly.

Maggie continued. ‘I can see where Jack might want to have more information about Jean-Marc’s motivation, but how exactly does that help us accomplish our goal? I mean, all that matters right now is that Jean-Marc does want us to succeed on this mission, right?’

Sarah sighed. ‘Yes, but the thing is, we were hired on the understanding that Papi was in charge. It was all presented as a scenario where we were working for him and spending his money, but we sense that isn’t the case. And that makes us very uncomfortable.’

‘Why?’ Maggie wondered.

‘Why?’ Sarah echoed. ‘Because I’d prefer not to be working for the Russian mob. Or a Mexican cartel. Or any of the million or so criminal organizations in the world.’

Maggie conceded the point.

‘Plus,’ Sarah continued, ‘why is Papi — or our real employer — spending millions of dollars to find these ancient treasures if they just give them away?’

Garcia nodded. ‘That’s been bugging me, too.’

Sarah glanced at him. ‘Hector, I’m going to ask you an important question, and I need you to be upfront with me. No bragging. No exaggerations. Only the honest truth.’

‘Go ahead. Ask me anything.’

She stared at him. ‘How good a hacker are you?’

‘I’m very good. Why?’

She shook her head. ‘I mean, if you were to rank yourself compared to all the other hackers in the world, where would you fall?’

Garcia gave the question some consideration. ‘Probably near the top ten, if not in it. It’s hard to say. There are a lot of us out there who don’t exactly advertise.’

‘You’re that good?’ Maggie asked.

Garcia tapped briefly on the small tablet he’d brought into the room. In less than a minute, he had the information he was searching for. ‘You have precisely $107,123.11 in your numbered account in Liechtenstein.’ He smiled at Maggie. ‘You shouldn’t have set that up online.’

Maggie grimaced. ‘Hector, if I forgive you for calling me the cleaning lady and for snooping on me, will you show me how to hide those funds better?’

Garcia nodded. Then he turned back to Sarah, who was waiting patiently. ‘Why did you ask about my ranking?’

‘Two reasons,’ she answered. ‘The first is obvious: if we’re going to get more information on Papi and what he’s really up to, we’ll need your help. The truth is Jack was always going to bring you in, but I asked him to hold off until you and I had a chance to talk. Now that we’ve cleared the air, I think it’s time to prove your worth.’

‘Just tell me how.’

‘We know that Papi has access to millions of dollars to pay for us, this compound, his yacht, and everything that we need on our missions, and yet we’ve gotten absolutely nowhere on his background and business holdings. So we have to assume that he’s got some incredible cyber power on his side.’

Garcia was surprised. ‘You think he’s hired someone better than me?’

Sarah nodded. ‘I think he thinks he has. Now it’s up to you to find a way past his defenses and prove him wrong.’

Garcia grimaced. All this time he had been thinking that the reason he couldn’t find anything on Papi was because he was clean. He had honestly never considered that someone better than he was responsible for hiding the Frenchman’s dirt.

‘It’ll be easier said than done,’ Garcia replied. ‘Don’t get me wrong, I can do it. I’ll just need some time.’

‘How much?’ Sarah asked.

‘A few days. Maybe a few weeks.’

‘Weeks?’ Sarah groaned. ‘Why so long?’

‘If someone else is protecting Papineau’s digital footprint, then I can’t just bombard his accounts with everything in my arsenal — they’ll pick up on that and know we’re up to something. I’ll have to come at this from another direction, something they’ll never see coming.’

‘But you’ve got something in mind?’ Maggie asked.

Garcia nodded. ‘Yeah, I think I have something that’ll work.’

‘Good,’ Sarah said. ‘Get to it.’ She didn’t need to know the specifics of his plan; she just needed it to do what he said it could.

‘Will do,’ Garcia said as he grabbed his tablet and stood.

‘Wait,’ Sarah said. ‘We’re not done.’

‘Right. You said there were two reasons you wanted to know my worldwide ranking as a hacker, and you only named one. What was the second?’

‘You have to double-check all your protocols.’

Garcia flashed a look of confusion. ‘I’m not following.’

Sarah stood and walked around the table to place her hand on Garcia’s shoulder. Though he had the highest IQ on the team, his lack of street smarts was sometimes disconcerting. ‘Think about it, Hector. If Papi hired a hacker who is better than you, what do you think his first assignment was? Here’s a hint: I guarantee it wasn’t me.’

Garcia’s face went pale when he realized her point. Everything he had established might already be compromised. Until he had rechecked his system, he had to assume that all of his work was unsecure. The thought sickened him.

The team was vulnerable, and it was all his fault.

Garcia nodded. ‘I’ll start right now.’