Calculated Extortion Read online

  “What types of challenges?”

  “Any number of things, really. We could be helping people who have experienced natural disasters, like famine or hurricanes, or those who received a devastating medical diagnosis and the bills that come with it.”

  “Oh? So you direct the donations?”

  Jen gave a wry laugh. “No, I think you have me confused with Martín Vásquez. I just provide information and a financial analysis.” There was a bitter undertone in her voice he didn’t quite understand. “I’m sorry, Mike, but is the charity losing money or in some kind of trouble?”

  Mike laughed an easy laugh. “Just the opposite, Jen. The board of directors just wanted us to go around, talk to people, and see if there were any opportunities for us to help the charity be more efficient. Greater efficiency will allow us to help even more people.”

  “Oh. I see.” Her smile was genuine now and she sunk into her chair as if the weight of the world had just come off of her shoulders. Maybe their covers were too overkill for them to get to the truth. He’d have to tone it down or win Barbara over to get anything useful from his visit. Since the second one wasn’t working, toning it down was probably the best option.

  “Thanks for your work, Jen.” The nervous accountant shook his hand and he found Barbara, who directed him out into the hallway. She’d barely touched his shoulder, but her demeanor brooked no argument.

  Barbara said quietly, “It’s not easy, you know.”

  “Pardon?”

  Barbara crossed her arms. “It’s not easy. No matter what the accountants say, it’s not just numbers. There are people behind the numbers. Faces of people we have to turn away because we’re trying to make our dollar stretch the farthest we can. We can’t ever help everyone we want to. There’s only so much money to go around, which means we end up having more heartache here than you might think. Even in accounting.”

  “I understand. Really, I’m not here to lay anyone off. I’m just here to help.” Barbara put her hands on her hips and Mike raised three fingers in the air. “Scout’s honor.” Barbara chuckled and he took the advantage while he had it. “One last question—is there anyone new here?”

  Barbara thought for a moment. “No one I can think of, outside of the interns. And we’re lucky to have them. They’re either super high achievers or kids who have big stuff on their plate who decided to give back anyway. Emma is a cancer survivor, for example. She went through a year and a half of chemo and radiation at great cost to her family and they don’t have much to begin with. She’d barely been in remission three months when she showed up at the front desk asking how she could volunteer because the organization provided her with a small amount of support during her treatment. I can’t imagine her medical bills are even paid off and still, she’s giving her time. Freely. No questions asked. Now, Mr. Efficiency Expert, what do you say to that?”

  “It sounds like you are doing some incredible work, Barbara. Personally and professionally, I thank you for it.” Mike held out a hand and after a second of deliberation, she grabbed it firmly and nodded once. Despite all of her efforts to fight it, he’d managed to win her over. While he didn’t get much solid information, he’d found a reluctant ally whose motivations aligned with his own. It was a small win, but he’d take it. Barbara led him back to the lobby where Parker and Alexis waited with neutral expressions.

  Mike led his team back to the car in silence, but as soon as the doors closed, Parker asked, “What’d you get, guys?”

  Alexis scrunched up her nose. “Not much. Talked to the PR people. Didn’t get anything suspicious outside of one of the PR reps insisting on following me around everywhere I went. His name was Nick Burket. He was friendly enough but asked a lot of questions about what I was doing and why I was there. Too curious for my liking. His buddies seemed to think he’s opportunistic and looking for ways to climb the ladder. Seems like he has a lot of personal ambition for a not-for-profit employee. It could be desperation in disguise. How about you?”

  Parker said, “I got put into a room with the people in charge of IT systems. Whole lot of people with special access codes and a high level of visibility to the software used at the company. Pete Smythe, the IT director, was the only one I was sure knew about the hack. He didn’t say a word about it when I asked about security. He’s in his fifties, married, and shook when he talked to me. Not enough to go on, but worth thinking about. As far as I’m concerned, that whole department is suspect. You get anything, Mikey?”

  “Some dirty looks from my tour guide, but she could be an asset later if we need her. I get the feeling her sense of right and wrong is pretty black and white. I met the interns—young and ambitious with pretty varied backgrounds. And apparently one is a teenage cancer survivor. Hard to believe anyone would go after these people.”

  “Anything else?” Alexis asked.

  “Yes. A finance person named Jen Duncan. Didn’t get anything firm but she was acting…weird.”

  “Well, she did have to talk to you,” Alexis said and Mike did his best to appear annoyed with her in the rearview mirror. Alexis sighed. “But, since it could be something else, I’ll write it down.”

  Parker said, “Good work, team. Let’s write up the reports and err on the side of detail until we figure out what matters. Then we’ll pass the information along to Scarlett. She’s anxious to make some progress and it’s time for Mike and Scarlett to meet anyway.”

  Mike raised an eyebrow. “I’ve worked remotely with the profilers in DC for years. I’m not sure why we need to be best friends now that she’s in the office.”

  Parker raised an eyebrow. “Because no matter how much you think you can outsmart him, Sandy isn’t going to let you stay in the surveillance van forever. You’re good at strategy, dude. You’ll be working with the profiler and everyone else in the office at least once a week before you know it.”

  Mike grumbled and drove towards the inevitable.

  Five

  The morning after their visit to World Partners for Peace, Mike dutifully reviewed his notes on every detail of the prior day’s interactions. It was too much of a hassle to get video surveillance approved, which meant he had to do everything by hand. He grumbled at his paperwork and scribbled another note. Accustomed to working alone, he didn’t consider that he might have witnesses to his annoyance.

  “Aw, sitting at a desk too hard for you, Moretti?” Mike looked up from his computers to glare at the two fellow agents carving time out of their day to give him shit. While Mike was a Special Agent and the two men were both Supervisory Special Agents, the formality of the hierarchy didn’t extend that far.

  “Nah, just got the news I have to spend more time with you two. I’ve requested hazard pay.” One of the men flipped him off, and Mike grinned in response. He fired off his report to Parker and put his head back into the evidence. Halfway through the latest report from the IT team, he got tired of reading. The profiler had noted that she was working with their best IT guy to find the source of the hack. He pushed away from his desk and went to find Jordan. Their best IT guy couldn’t be anyone else, and he’d rather hear the latest from the source directly.

  Jordan cracked his knuckles without moving his eyes from his monitor, covered with indecipherable code, as Mike approached. He remained frozen until Mike clapped him on the back. “Hey, Jordan. Good work on the charity case so far.”

  “Thanks, man. Got a lot more to do.” Jordan shook his head, as if struggling to break his focus from the task in front of him.

  “I’ve got some questions about our hacker.”

  Jordan swiveled around in his chair to face Mike. “You and me both. Heard you were on the ground yesterday. What’d you guys figure out?”

  “You first. But dumb it down for me. I don’t speak software.”

  “Sure thing. Their IT director, Pete Smythe, believes that ransomware was installed on the hard drive of the CEO’s laptop. Once it was connected to the network, his computer was used to lock down the enti
re network until the CEO paid the ransom. Once he gave me access to their system, I was able to get them a patch for the holes I could find, but he fixed the CEO’s computer personally. He seems pretty protective of his systems and is keeping me on a short leash. Bad news is, I can’t say that those measures will keep the malicious code from worming its way in again. Oh, and I can’t guarantee that the holes I patched were the holes our guy exploited, since even I couldn’t even find them all until I was on the inside.”

  “You’re full of good news. So you think someone in the charity is behind it.”

  “It’s possible, but they still aren’t willing to let me all the way in without supervision. I can’t even prove they’re right about how the hack happened. It’s clear they targeted the CEO since he had access to the money. Doesn’t mean an employee did it. Or if they did, that they even meant to. You can download some of this stuff from a link in an email.”

  “Did they?”

  “Their IT team says no.”

  “But you aren’t buying it. Any success tracking our hacker?”

  “One of our analysts dug through the first message sent to the CEO and extracted an IP address out by North Lawndale. It was buried through some fancy footwork but we unwound it pretty far. Big problem is that if they’re good enough to do this hack, they’re good enough to hide their location.”

  “We got anything else?”

  “Nope.”

  “Then send me the address.”

  Scarlett had almost finished clearing her inbox for the day when she saw Mike Moretti’s request to follow up on a promising lead that evening. Given that he tended to operate independently, the fact that he was taking the time to formulate a question meant he genuinely wanted her opinion. Answering him swiftly would help build trust between them. His question was a simple one. He had the paperwork in order, so what did she think about tracking an IP address from the first ransomware attack and knocking on doors?

  Scarlett tapped her finger on her desk and sighed at the too-short list of information she’d deduced about their perpetrator. Calculated, patient, intelligent, motive not purely financial(?). The only thing Scarlett was truly confident about was that their criminal was going to strike again. A few keystrokes later and he had her approval, if only to eliminate superfluous evidence. It was time to determine who was hiding behind the malicious code and if Mike Moretti wanted to knock on a door to help her find their guy, she’d take it. If she had her way, they’d all know more before the night was over.

  Mike joked with Parker and Alexis while they pulled on their bulletproof vests. They were only planning on knocking on a suspect’s door tonight, but like everything at the Bureau, it came with procedures, precautions, and paperwork. Mike shrugged into his jacket, checked his weapon and looked at his watch for the time. It was past quitting time for most of the office staff, but most people weren’t home in that part of town until after five and they only planned to knock once. They had information about the owner of the building but knew nothing about the tenant occupying the small greystone duplex. Alexis had spent part of the afternoon trying to determine who they were up against, but the appropriate paperwork hadn’t been filed with the city. That was all the sniffing around any of them were willing to do before showing up. It was never a good idea to tip-off a suspect with something to hide.

  An hour later, Mike led the way down a narrow entryway in the turn of the century building. While his partners were more than willing to take the lead, most people took Mike seriously from first impressions alone. Mike rapped his fist against the door. Nothing. Another knock. Scratching noises came from behind the door, but it still didn’t open. Parker and Alexis stood on either side of him and they both began to move their hands closer to their weapons. Mike raised his hand for three more forceful bangs of his fist against the door. When the door creaked open, he wasn’t prepared for who was behind it. A grandmotherly woman in a night coat peeked through a crack in the opening spanned by a locked chain. Looking for the source of the squeaking noise, Mike’s eyes fell on a walker with tennis balls on the feet. Well, he didn’t take this job for its predictability.

  Mike asked some questions of the curious tenant—her name was Myrtle Moore, thank you very much for asking—and they confirmed she lived alone. After apologies for disturbing her this late in the evening and thanking her for her cooperation, the team beat a strategic retreat. Once the door to the greystone slammed shut behind them, Alexis let out a small sigh. Before she could say anything, Parker said, “I am not going to be the guy writing this one up.”

  Mike grumbled. “First time in my career I’ve been tempted to falsify paperwork.”

  Parker gave a wry grin. “Does a walker count as a weapon?” Alexis laughed, and Parker put his hand on her shoulder. “I vote Alex does the paperwork.”

  “Seconded.” Mike said over his shoulder.

  “Fine,” Alexis said, “But I’m marking it top secret so we don’t have to talk about this ever again.” She sighed and pulled out her phone. “I guess I better tell Scarlett.” Mike rubbed a hand down his face. The new profiler was going to hear about this—the same one who’d given him her blessing to investigate the armed and dangerous octogenarian. So much for starting off with a good first impression. At least they hadn’t worn riot gear.

  Six

  Scarlett Callahan slammed her foot into a heavy punching dummy in the FBI gym with a satisfying thunk. She repeated the motion a few more times, switched sides and delivered another roundhouse seconds later. It was a good thing her first meeting wasn’t for another two hours. It was going to take more than a few hard kicks to chase the stress away today.

  The charity had been hacked again last night. Her explicit approval of the investigation into the retiree while the hack was in progress was the cherry on top of it all. Finally, upon learning of these developments, the Special Agent in Charge decided to reallocate Mike Moretti’s other assignments in order to fully dedicate him to her investigation. Which meant the S.A.C. thought she couldn’t do her job. Lovely.

  After the tops of her feet began to ache from the repeated impacts, she took a step back from the dummy and raised her fists, bouncing lightly on the balls of her feet as she alternated between jabs and punches. When she spun to chop the dummy’s neck, she saw a familiar outline in the doorway.

  “Hey, friend.” Scarlett stepped away from the outlet of her frustration to pick her towel off the floor and wipe her face.

  Alexis approached slowly with her hands raised in surrender, and Scarlett grinned before throwing the towel at her. Alexis snagged it out of the air. “You okay?”

  Scarlett put her hands on her hips and nodded before looking away. “I will be.”

  “You couldn’t have done anything to prevent the hack. And hey, at least you weren’t there when we met Myrtle. She offered us cookies and tea if we wanted to stay for a while. Thanked us for our fine service to our country.” Scarlett grimaced in response. “Oh, that’s not helping. Too soon?”

  Alexis slid her shoes off at the edge of the mat and picked up a pair of thick padded targets for her hands. She gestured to the pads. Scarlett alternated tapping them with her foot, lighter than she’d been kicking the dummy.

  Alexis raised them slightly. “Again. Harder. Don’t insult me by taking it easy.”

  Twenty minutes later, Scarlett felt like herself again. Well, she felt 80 percent like herself and 20 percent like a failure, which was at least an improvement. It was nice of Alexis to notice she was upset when they’d talked in the locker room this morning. Of course, venting about their investigation before storming over to the punching bags and dummies wasn’t a subtle signal, but she appreciated it all the same.

  “Thank you,” Scarlett said. “I needed that.”

  “I suspected. You ready to talk about it?”

  “Almost.”

  “It’s not your fault, Scarlett.” Alexis watched Scarlett’s shoulders bunch up again. Scarlett had flown through her Ph.D. program an
d started working for the FBI at the age of twenty-four. Her unwillingness to admit defeat and overdeveloped sense of responsibility had contributed to her success but it came with its own sort of baggage. Not surprisingly, Scarlett was blaming herself for not being clairvoyant and had come in this morning to work off some of the frustration. It was a tactic Alexis herself employed. Nothing brought clarity to a tough case like pounding out five or six miles on a treadmill, which she planned to do just as soon as she got Scarlett back on track.

  “I appreciate the support. It just sucks.” Scarlett grabbed a curl that had escaped her ponytail and tucked it back behind her ear before pulling her leg up behind her in a stretch.

  “Yeah, I know. But we’ll figure it out.” Alexis dropped a hand over her friend’s shoulder and then made a face, theatrically wiping the sweat off her palm. Scarlett bumped Alexis with her hip and Alexis diverted to the treadmills, giving her a wave as she jogged over to the equipment to start her workout in earnest.

  As Scarlett showered and got ready for her day, frustration and nervous energy trickled back into her psyche. All of the signs of distress she looked for when questioning a suspect manifested themselves in her without her permission. She kept rubbing her necklace absently and when she tried to smile, she didn’t even have to look in the mirror to realize she wouldn’t fool anyone. Scarlett had a meeting this morning to report out on the developments of her case with the Special Agent in Charge, the same agent who had informed her via 11 p.m. email that Agent Moretti would be helping her out full-time now. While Scarlett typically specialized in the unusual, this case was proving especially difficult to untangle on a short timeline. Their culprit remained stubbornly invisible, bleeding the charity of funds a little at a time.