Drake unzipped one of the bags. “Nothing. I don’t know what her problem is.”
Amanda and Drake, known collectively as Mandrake by Walker’s techs, had been the Triple Seven’s token office romance for years. In Nick’s opinion, they should have been the Triple Seven’s token married couple, but Drake couldn’t pull the trigger. Every time things got serious, he did something stupid to pick a fight, like flirting with their waitress at dinner. Nick didn’t believe Drake’s nothing for an instant. “You’re an idiot.”
Drake lifted a Heckler and Koch MP7A1 compact submachine gun from the duffel and checked the chamber. “I know.”
Both fell silent and continued their equipment checks. While Drake moved on to a nine-millimeter Beretta Nano micro-compact, Nick popped open a wide, flat case, revealing six black boxes set in gray foam, each the size of a deck of cards. Each had a small screen and keyboard, and each had a tiny earpiece mounted on copper contacts in the upper left corner. These would serve as the team’s field radios, controlled by an app on their smartphones, or by touch and voice commands should the phones become unavailable.
Nick activated all the screens to make sure the earpieces were charged and then shut them off again. When he closed the case, Ethan Quinn was standing in front of him, glancing back and forth between the two quiet operatives. “What’d I miss?” he asked.
The older operatives responded simultaneously.
“Nothing,” said Drake.
“He’s an idiot,” said Nick.
Quinn clapped his hands and rubbed them together. “Situation normal then. I guess it’s time to go catch ourselves a hacker.”
CHAPTER 11
Nick parked his team’s rented Suzuki Vitara against the chain-link fence of a snow-covered rail yard and glanced across the street at the target address, a six-story brick structure. “An apartment building,” he said. “That confirms the NSA’s assessment.”
“Why couldn’t it have been a mansion with armed sentries and killer guard dogs?” asked Drake, slowly shaking his head. “That would be so much easier.”
Dr. Scott Stone, the Triple Seven’s lead engineer and tech guru, leaned forward from the backseat and pushed a pair of wire-framed glasses up the bridge of his nose. “Exactly what makes hired guns and killer dogs easy?”
“Not easy. Easier,” corrected Drake. He gestured at the building. “The IP addresses captured by the NSA all trace to this structure, but not to a specific apartment. We have to find a way to narrow it down without terrorizing the locals or spooking the target.”
Scott shot a glance at the icy slush that covered the street between the Vitara and the apartment building. He pulled his overcoat tighter around his small frame. “I have to go in with you.”
“Out of the question,” said Nick. “Your job is to sit in the car and play lookout until I send for you.” He hadn’t wanted to bring the engineer along at all. Scott had no field experience, but he convinced the colonel that he might have to hack Grendel’s hardware on-site, something he claimed would prove impossible for the knuckle-dragging ops team, even with his guidance over SATCOM.
The engineer scrunched his gaunt face into a sneer. “So, what then? Are you planning to search the entire building? Blow in a few doors, rough up a few old ladies and hope that one of them is the hacker?” He shook his head. “Get me into the utility room, and I can tell you exactly which apartment Grendel is hiding in.”
Nick and Scott stared at each other across the seat back for a few moments. Then Nick shut off the engine and cracked open his door. “Fine. Come on.”
The three older operatives gathered at the back of the Vitara, dressed in dark overcoats and slacks to blend in with locals. Scott had added a Windsor flat cap to cover his thinning hair. At the same time, Quinn made his way toward a bus stop a half block west of the apartments. He wore grunge jeans and a long-sleeve T-shirt beneath a gray canvas jacket, better suited to the twentysomethings in the area.
“Nightmare Three, I’ll call you if Grendel makes a break for it,” said Nick, speaking through his SATCOM earpiece and using Quinn’s mission callsign. “I’ll give the best description I can. Taser is primary, drugs to knock him out. I want a live prisoner.”
“Copy that, Nightmare One. Check your ten o’clock. I think a good prospect for entry is heading your way.”
Nick glanced left and saw a grizzled old man in a hat with earflaps pass the bus stop and continue down the sidewalk toward the apartment building. He walked briskly, keeping his head down and his hands tucked deep into the pockets of his brown coat.
“That’s our cue,” said Drake. He pulled a large cardboard box marked AQUASTELLA WATER from the back of the Vitara, pretending to struggle with the weight of it. “Act like this is heavy,” he said, passing the box to Scott.
“It is heavy,” grunted the engineer as soon as Drake allowed the full weight to settle into his hands. “What’s in here?”
“Your tools, genius,” said Nick. He and Drake each pulled a similar box from the Vitara and then Nick closed the back end and led them across the street. He timed his approach to arrive at the apartment building’s entrance just before the old man. He barred the local’s way, pretending to struggle with his box and fumbling in his pocket for a nonexistent set of keys.
Within a few seconds, the old Hungarian lost patience. “Elnézést,” he said, gruffly excusing himself and squeezing around Nick. He used his own key to unlock the door and pushed through.
Nick caught the door and held it open with his foot. “Köszönöm,” he said, but the old man continued on without reply, trudging up a flight of stairs to the left of the door.
As soon as the local was out of sight, Nick led his team down to the basement level and into a short, dimly lit hallway. There were four wooden doors, each bearing a plastic sign. “Anybody know the Hungarian word for utilities?”
“This one.” Drake tilted his head toward the door closest to him. “Has to be. I can hear the heating unit.”
Nick shifted his box to one arm and checked the knob. It turned. The three of them moved quickly inside and set their boxes down. Drake closed and locked the door behind them.
“All right, Scott, you’re in,” said Nick, pulling a black duffel from one of the boxes. “Now tell me which apartment is our target.” He tossed the heavy bag at the engineer, hitting him in the chest and nearly knocking him over.
Scott glared at him for a moment and then pushed his glasses back up on his nose and turned to scan the room. He zeroed in on a gray plastic box mounted on the wall next to a row of water heaters. “This area uses DSL. Their Internet will be running through the phone lines.”
Inside the panel was a black hub with sixty phone lines running out of it. Each connection was labeled with an apartment number. “All we have to do,” said Scott, pulling a wire-stripping tool out of his bag, “is find the line with the right IPs. We don’t even have to disconnect them.”
While Nick and Drake looked on, the engineer stripped the line labeled 101. Then he traded the wire stripper for a black box with a small LCD screen and a set of alligator clips. He attached the clips to the exposed phone line. A series of numbers scrolled up the screen. Scott compared them to a document from the NSA and shook his head. “That’s not the one.”
Drake raised an eyebrow. “That’s your method? This is going to take all night.”
“Agreed,” said Nick. “There has to be another—”
Before he finished the statement, his eyes fell on the rows of electricity meters mounted on the wall opposite the phone box. “Hey, Scott,” he said slowly, walking over to the meters, “would you ever be caught dead in a dump like this?”