A blank expression came over McKenna’s face as if he were running my words through a mental lie detector.
“OK. I’ll buy that. If you can produce the stick.”
“I’ve got it right here. And you can take those computers, too. Carolyn used one—she didn’t remember which, they both look the same—to make the final copy, so it’s probably infected. But I do have one condition.”
“Another condition?” He pulled at the thread harder, breaking it loose. “What?”
“I promised Carolyn you’d protect her. I need you to do that.”
“Consider it done.”
“No. Really. I mean it. These guys who are blackmailing her? They’re seriously dangerous. Sick. Evil. And their organization has tentacles everywhere. So those fraud experts you mentioned? I want them on the case. I want this to be their top priority. I want you to hand it to their best guy, personally. I don’t just want an email getting sent, and then getting lost in some administrator’s in-box for months.”
“I’d want nothing less, if it was my wife.” He rolled the thread into a tiny ball and flicked it away. “Get Carolyn to write it down. Make it as specific as possible. I’ll see it doesn’t get ignored. I give you my word. And tell her not to worry. Dealing with guys like that is what we do for a living.”
“Good enough. And I have something else for you. Do you remember that guy, Agent Peever, you warned me about?”
“Of course. What about him?”
“On the way to find Carolyn, I had a little problem. You probably heard about it. You were probably behind it. Anyway, for a while I was hiding out in a supermarket. Peever was there. I overheard him saying it would be easier to put the AmeriTel case to bed if you were out of the way. Permanently. He was talking about avoiding paperwork. It sounded pretty sinister.”
“Thanks for looking out for me.” He got to his feet and scooped up the two laptops. “But don’t worry about Peever. He won’t be a problem for much longer. Now, is there anything else?”
I shook my head.
“Then if I could just have the stick, we can say our goodbyes.” He held out his hand.
I stood, too, dug the stick out of my pocket, and handed it to him. He held it up at eye level for a moment, as if the virus it contained was biological rather than electronic and the light would reveal lethal microbes swimming around inside. Then he nodded and turned toward the door. But he stopped again as soon as he touched the handle.
“Actually, I have a favor to ask.” He turned back to face me. “But please, feel free to say no. This is a genuine, bona fide, no-strings-attached request. Me to you, Marc. Your answer won’t affect how well your wife’s problem gets handled, or anything else.”
“What is it?”
“Here’s the situation. My team—not Peever’s—is within touching distance of putting the whole AmeriTel investigation to bed. There’s only one more task to complete. With good luck and a fair wind, we’ll be done with it before breakfast, tomorrow. But this thing? It’s a little specialized. And it’s something that’s right down your alley. So it occurred to me, maybe you’d help us?”
“I don’t know. What would I have to do?”
“Not much. The job’s pretty simple. We have a thing—I can’t remember the name of it—but it’s a little electronic gizmo. You’d know it if you saw it. Anyway, we need to plug it into the ARGUS node. Wait for a light to go green. And unplug it again.”
“Why?”
“We’ve confirmed the node as the insertion point of the virus. But we don’t know who the guy on the ground was. This gadget will collect the information we need to cross reference with the list of legitimate users and narrow down our pool of suspects. And because it’s a computer system and you’re a computer guy, and it’s in AmeriTel’s office and you used to work there, I’d be stupid not to ask.”
“This has to happen in the morning?”
“It doesn’t have to. But Sunday morning is generally the quietest time to be at an office. I don’t want to be tripping over people while we’re there. Why? Is there a reason not to do it then?”
“No. As long as I can be on the road by eleven. I’m meeting Carolyn. We still have a few fences to mend.”
“Eleven? No problem.” McKenna nodded to me. “I have a good feeling about this, Marc. Sleep well. I’ll pick you up at five.”
——
I GUESS THERE WAS STILL a part of me that was prepared to help a guy do the right thing. And another part that believed in quid pro quo. McKenna had gone out on a limb for me enough times. But the biggest part was the one that was gambling on Carolyn’s reaction, when she heard how connected I’d become to the guys who’d be keeping her safe.
If she agreed to stay.
Sunday. Early morning.
I’D JUST FINISHED SHAVING WHEN MCKENNA KNOCKED ON MY door at a couple of minutes shy of five am. He was wearing a plain gray coverall, stiff, with sharp creases in the arms and legs.
“Here.” He handed me another one, still in its packet. “Slip this on. We’re being mainframe installation contractors today. Should be right down your alley.”
I took the coverall and grunted, which was all the communication I could muster at that hour of the morning.
“I doubted it would fit.” He watched me struggle to fasten the buttons. “They only come in army sizes. Too big, or too small. Still, it’s more convincing than jeans.”
MCKENNA REACHED THE PARKING LOT first and nodded toward his white van.
“You’re riding shotgun, next to me.”
Two more agents were in the back. The woman from the Mercedes, whose nails were now violet, and a guy from one of the other cars. His hair was cropped a touch too neatly for his coveralls, and his shave was a little too smooth, reminding me of the undercover cops who used to show up at the bars near my old college campus. I smiled, and nodded a greeting as I belted myself in. Then McKenna fired up the engine and pulled away, taking the entrance lane because it was closer than the exit.
No one spoke until AmeriTel’s roof was visible in the distance, then a question popped into my head.
“How are we going to get inside? And move around? There are security doors between every work zone, and you need special swipe cards to get through. You weren’t relying on mine, were you? I don’t have it with me. I had to turn it in, when I was fired. It wasn’t authorized for the ARGUS node room. And anyway, it’ll be deactivated by now.”
McKenna pulled four plain white plastic cards from his pocket and fanned them out for us to each take one, then slid his own away again. “They don’t have fancy logos. But don’t let that fool you. They’ll get us through any door in the place. Guaranteed.”
“Where did you get them from? A sales guy tried to copy his once—so he could sneak his girlfriend in on weekends—but he was told it was impossible.”
“Marc, do we look like sales guys?” McKenna turned in through AmeriTel’s gates. “You really don’t know who you’re dealing with, do you?”
We looped around the back of the building, and I saw the exuberant pink Cadillac exiled in its usual spot.
“Look.” I pointed to it. “That’s good news. The security guard who drives it? I know him. He’ll be asleep right now. In Reception. If we go in the side, through the engineers’ entrance, he’ll never see us.”
“Good to know.” McKenna nodded. “Anything else?”