by Jeff Carson
She nodded. “And then he…”
“He did it again. He told me about two more moves that would happen with two different currencies, because of markers his software was indicating. And bam. Happened just like he said again. And again. And again.”
Carl shrugged. “I was intrigued, and I became friends with the guy. Name’s Jon Spillman. Lives in North Carolina. The guy has been infallible for the last two months. I’ve been bugging him to get his software, and he’s finally agreed to send me a version. He’s not a professional developer or anything, just really good with databases, all that stuff I’ve never been good at. He didn’t even want to tell me the price. So, like I’ve been telling Minnie, the guy’s not a scammer. He’s just a good guy.
“But he doesn’t want everyone using his software, you know, stealing it and spreading it on the internet for profit and whatnot. So, he was like, fine, I’ll sell it to you. But it’s gotta be for a price. One that shows you’re playing real ball, not trying to scam me.”
She nodded. “Okay. I think I got it. He’s worried you’re going to scam him.”
“Yeah.”
“I understand now.”
“It’s good talking to a sane individual.” He chuckled. “Haven’t talked to one of those all day.”
She tilted her head back, dipping her toe into some things she wanted to say next. Finally, she settled on, “Let’s talk about a hypothetical situation, okay?”
Carl looked perturbed at the change of subject. Another cigarette came out of the pack.
“What if this guy sent out ten thousand personal messages that first day?”
Sounds of frustration struggled to come out of Carl’s mouth as he sucked the new cigarette alight. “Ten thousand? What are you talking about?”
“Just bear with me. Let’s say there were ten thousand messages he sent. Let’s say he had some software that helped him accomplish this task. These messages were segmented into ten versions. Could be more versions—twenty or thirty—doesn’t matter. Let’s say message version one talked about Bitcoin dropping and…I don’t know…what’s another cryptocurrency?”
“Hypercoin.”
“Hypercoin, thank you. So the first message talks about a Bitcoin drop and a rise in Hypercoin, and how he’s going to bank on that gamble with some information he has obtained from his software.”
Carl stared into the distance.
“The second version of the message, sent at exactly the same time, goes out to another segment of people. This version talks about Bitcoin going up and Hypercoin dropping. The opposite of the first. A third version goes out talking about the movement of two completely different cryptocurrencies.”
Carl’s drags per minute increased.
“There’s a fourth version sent to other people mentioning those same currencies with different outcomes. There’s a fifth version with those same currencies that—”
“Okay, okay. I get it.” Carl shook his head. “There’s no way. You couldn’t keep up the level of detail with ten thousand messages like this guy’s been doing to me. He knows my name. Calls me Carl. Knows about my kids, mentions them…” He stopped talking.
She continued. “At first, your friend is sending out ten thousand messages, then, after that first iteration, there’s only a segment of people he sent the correct prediction to. He drops those other nine thousand—or whatever the number is—people that he sent the wrong prediction to, never worries about them again, then concentrates on the remaining one thousand.
“He sends out the second message, also segmenting those now one thousand people into some new predictions. Maybe another ten or twenty of them. After that message, perhaps there are only a few hundred people left that he’s sent correct predictions to. After the next message, there are only, heck, I don’t know, a few dozen? At some point, he probably has a small pool, one that he can personally communicate with. Get to know their kids’ names.”
Carl dropped the cigarette into a beer can and it sizzled. He picked up the coffee mug next to him and sipped.
“At that point,” she said, “he has a few piping hot people who are amazed by his software’s abilities. Let me guess, he probably stopped predicting after a while?”
Carl’s face was slack at first, then he started shaking his head.
“With only a dozen or so people on his hot list, he can’t risk making a wrong prediction now.”
Carl made a sound somewhere between choking and scoffing. “I don’t know.”
“It’s an inverted pyramid.” She resisted telling him the scam had been around for a long time, and when she’d learned about it in Criminal Science classes in Boulder the scam had involved mailed letters and stock picks.
Carl stood and walked to his door. “See you later, detective.”
The door shut and the lock twisted.
“See you later,” she said, walking back to her Explorer.
As she sat behind the wheel, she stared at the Yorberg’s house. Carl had been looking out, but now moved away from the window. Minnie came up and took his place. She glared and disappeared.
“See you later,” she said under her breath, and fired up the engine.
She picked her phone out of her pocket and took a look at the screen. Still no reply from Wolf. It was seven-thirty a.m., and she wondered if Wolf was in the office yet. It was time to find out.
Chapter 13
Wolf’s phone rang again, and he picked it up from the center console.
Patterson.
He pressed the silence button and put both hands back on the steering wheel.
“More avoiding calls,” Burton said.
“Forget me. Back to you.” Wolf said. “Blackmail? You want to blackmail the guy so we get included in the investigation? Not a good idea.”
“It’s not blackmail.” Burton sipped his coffee and looked out the passenger window. “It’s leverage.”
“It’s the definition of blackmail.”
“I want to know what they have. They might give it to us, they might let us hang around, but they might not. I’m not gonna come out swinging with my guns blazing, I’m just telling you, if he gives us any flak, I’m gonna hit him with it.”
Wolf frowned. “Mix metaphors much?”
“Huh?”
Wolf flipped down the sun visor and shifted in his seat. They were coasting the final stretch of road toward Ridgway.
The clock read 7:35 a.m. Burton had been awakened by a nurse checking his vitals at four a.m., and they’d been moving ever since, starting with Burton walking out of the hospital without so much as a goodbye to Scotty the security guard.
“I thought you were in on this with me,” Burton said. “I thought you were going to help me help Jesse.”
“Do you even remember our conversation last night?”
Burton said nothing.
Wolf eyed him. It was a miracle the man was upright. His eyes had dark bags under them, and his face was pallid, covered in stubble, but there was a spark that danced inside the old man for some reason this morning. Maybe it was the intravenous saline last night, or the hangover just hadn’t kicked in yet.
“I told you I have to get back to Rocky Points by tomorrow morning. I have a meeting with the County Council.”
“Yeah, I remember that. The BS meeting with the County Council. And I told you screw them. They don’t know their asses from their elbows. Look. I just want to see what they have on Jesse. There’s no harm in hearing what they have to say.”
“And if Roll doesn’t want to share what he has?”
“Then I’ll use my leverage.”
Wolf rolled his head side to side. Carrying Burton over his shoulder and then sleeping across three plastic waiting room chairs overnight, and now speaking with the old man, had his neck screaming in pain.
“What do you have on Roll? Either tell me or we’re not even stopping in Ridgway.”
Burton smirked. “Okay, fine. I used to have a buddy named Rip Reedy, used to work for Roll do
wn in Ouray. One time I came down to visit, and I was supposed to meet Rip at the station. I was early by about an hour, but I thought nothing of it. I hadn’t even looked at the clock, and I just went into their little station they have down there. You seen that little thing? It’s like a closet.”
“They have a new building now,” Wolf said.
“Whatever. Anyway, I went to the door and pulled on the handle, but couldn’t get inside. I peeked through the window, and caught more action than I bargained for. Because on the other side of that glass, I saw Sheriff Roll with some woman from town. I stood there frozen, you know, afraid to move but afraid to keep watching.”
“But you kept watching,” Wolf said.
“Yes, I did. Anyway, they were groping each other, really going after it. The woman had all sorts of hands down his pants, and vice-versa. And then he saw me.”
Burton laughed at the memory.
“Oh, he came to that door faster than a bullet, and then he came outside. I was out there on that sidewalk, smiling like I am now.”
“And he was married at the time,” Wolf said.
“Yes, he was. To none other than the famous Mrs. Lindsay Roll. You’ve met her. Worked in the San Juan DA’s office. Used to come up with Roll to Rocky Points every now and again. Big curly blond hair?”
Wolf sipped the cold remnants of coffee out of his cup and put it back in the center console. “Yeah, I remember her. Okay, so if I agree to stick around for the day and see what Roll and his team have on Jesse, then we agree that you let me do the talking, and you keep that little story to yourself.”
Burton exhaled. “Fine.”
The speed limit dropped as they passed a Ridgway City Limit sign.
Like Rocky Points, Ridgway was built on rugged Old West foundations that still shone through. The side roads off the main strip of the town were unpaved dirt, and most of the buildings had been built at least a hundred years ago, with the ragtag local population dressed for function over form.
And just like Rocky Points, the Old West was gilded with the modern. Craft brewers had taken over some of the smaller brick buildings, their hanging carved wood signs adorned with shiny metal. A freshly painted grocery store with plenty of windows touted itself as a healthy market. The vehicles on the roads ran the gamut from mud-slung tractors to luxury European SUVs.
Burton looked up from his phone screen. “Take a left at North Railroad Street.”
Burton pointed out his window toward mountains rising in the south. “Whitehouse Mountain. That’s Potosi. And …”
“Sneffels,” Wolf said.
“Yeah, Mount Sneffels. I love the skyline here.”
“It’s pretty beautiful,” Wolf said, looking at the jagged mountains to the east.
Wolf rolled down his window, letting in a cold morning chill scented of bacon coming from a diner called Lucille’s. Even though they’d already eaten from a drive-thru in Cortez, his mouth watered. But Sheriff Roll had said he’d be at the Ridgway Marshal’s Office at eight a.m. for a meeting and there was no sense missing that boat. If they wanted to get all they could on Jesse’s case, this was the opportunity Burton was waiting for.
“Left here,” Burton said.
Wolf turned and followed a dirt road a couple blocks, where a cluster of vehicles from a variety of Ouray County agencies choked the street, and parked behind a large pickup with a lightbar on top.
They got out, and Wolf took a minute to stretch his body. A breeze rolled down from the southern peaks. Nearby, a trio of uniformed men chatted near a large van adorned with the circular Colorado Bureau of Investigation logo.
Wolf nodded.
“Can I help you?” one of them asked.
“Yeah,” Burton said. “We’re looking for Sheriff Roll. He inside?”
The guy saw Wolf’s badge on his hip. “Who you guys with?”
“Sluice County,” Burton said.
“Sluice-Byron,” Wolf corrected.
“Yeah, he’s inside. Center door.”
“Thanks,” Burton said, leading the way with the practiced gait of a man who always belonged.
They walked into a dimly lit building that was full of conversation and movement.
Wolf counted six people, all of whom ignored their arrival. Three of them wore Ouray County Sheriff’s Department uniforms. Two of them Wolf recognized from last night at the hospital—the tall guy, Triplett, and Sobeck, the powdery haired man. They were at the far end of the room pouring coffee from a drip carafe.
A woman sitting at a front and center desk looked up and nodded. She lifted a pencil by way of greeting, then waved them over and placed the pencil on a sign-in sheet.
Burton leaned a butt-cheek on her desk, ignoring the offering.
“Okay, I’ll let him know…I said I’ll let him know.” The woman hung up. “Can I help you?”
“Need to see Sheriff Roll.”
“And you are?”
“Burton.”
She leaned sideways and looked at Wolf. “And?”
“Detective Wolf, ma’am.”
“And your name?” Burton asked, extending a hand.
The woman eyed it suspiciously and shook. “Cassandra.”
“Beautiful name.”
She pulled her hand back.
“Hey, it’s you.” The tall, skinny guy, Deputy Triplett, stood behind her, pointing at Wolf. “This was the detective who wrangled Jesse Burton last night. You must be Jesse’s uncle.”
“He’s back here.” Sobeck came up behind Triplett and gestured them to follow.
“Who’s that?” Sheriff Roll appeared inside the doorway of a back room. He raised a coffee mug in salutation. “You guys made it. Great. Come on back, please.”
Wolf let Burton go first and got a whiff of the alcohol stench coming off the man.
If Sheriff Roll had looked exhausted last night, this morning he looked dead to the world. His eyes were puffy, his face slack. Hair, unkempt and greasy, poked out from a ball cap.
“Sheriff Roll, good to see you again.”
“Sheriff Burton.” Roll gestured to the coffee machine. “You guys need a cup?”
“Please.”
“Pour one, then come on inside. We’ll get started.”
“No thanks, I just had a cup,” Wolf said, stepping into the room past Roll.
Plastic tables and chairs, enough to seat a dozen, stood on a linoleum floor. Florescent lights flickered above, illuminating a board scribbled with notes and a bulletin board covered in photographs.
The room was cool, and the hanging pictures seemed to drop the temperature another few degrees. There was a lot of blood.
“This is Detective Milo. Milo, this is Chief Detective Wolf from Sluice-Byron and the former Sheriff Hal Burton.”
A man stood up from a laptop computer. “Pleasure.”
They shook hands, and Milo stood with a stiff spine, chin up, hands clasped behind his back. With his short-cropped blond hair and muscular physique, Wolf took him for military.
“I heard about how you guys brought Jesse in last night,” Milo said.
“That’s right,” Wolf said.
“We’re glad you found him.”
Wolf sensed no animosity behind the man’s words.
“You’ve met Deputies Sobeck and Triplett?” Roll asked.
Wolf nodded and got the same dead fish from Triplett, the strong clasp from Sobeck.
A third man, dressed in a pair of jeans and a CBI logoed polo shirt, rose to greet them.
“This is Special Agent Charlie Rushing with the Colorado Bureau of Investigation.”
“Nice to meet you,” Special Agent Rushing said. He had a warm, soft grip. The lights overhead reflected off his bald pate and his silver-rimmed eyeglasses.
“Special Agent Rushing’s a forensic specialist. You might have seen the van outside. We called in the CBI pretty early on this for assistance,” Roll said. “Our department is more like what you guys had a decade ago. We need a lot of outside help when s
omething like this comes up. Not that something like this comes up too often.”
“It’s just you?” Wolf asked Special Agent Rushing.
“No, I have two other colleagues up at a crime scene right now. I’m just here to help with the morning briefing.”
Wolf nodded, noting Special Agent Rushing, along with everyone else in the room, looked almost as tired as Sheriff Roll.
Burton walked in with a steaming cup of coffee. He did the rounds of introductions, and Wolf watched as each man sucked in the aroma of Jack Daniels and eyed Burton suspiciously.
“Right,” Roll said. “Why don’t we get started. Mr. Burton, if you wouldn’t mind letting me see your phone for starters.”
Burton pulled up the text message and handed it over.
“Please, you two take a seat. And, Detective Wolf, could you please tell us about what happened yesterday?”
Wolf told the room about Wolf and Burton’s adventure into Canyon of the Ancients and their extraction of Jesse Burton.
“Did he look like he was ready to use that gun?” Deputy Triplett asked.
Wolf shrugged. “I never gave him a chance.”
“How did you find him?” Roll asked.
“He found us. Like I said, Mr. Burton here was in trouble, and I had to get him out of there.”
All eyes went to Burton.
“I’m better now.”
His stench told them otherwise.
A few minutes later, and after Wolf fielded another few questions, Roll and the team seemed satisfied with the timeline of events.
“So, what exactly did he say during your car drive to Cortez?” Milo asked.
Wolf shrugged. “I got the feeling that he was piecing together a story as he was speaking with us. I got a chance to watch him in the mirror, and I saw somebody hiding something. I mean, he had a gun, and a flip phone with the battery removed.”
Burton shook his head. They ignored him.
Wolf continued. “He mentioned that Kyle…Farmer, is it?”