Downward Dog in Miami

by Larry David Allman

  “You’ve been hacked,” I started. I said this to Ed, then glanced at Ziv. Ed, Ronnie and Avram showed zero reaction. Ziv’s eyes went a little more intense, but within a trained protocol. Give away nothing.

  “There’s a vicious little worm we found, a kind of sophisticated malware that gave them access to everything, literally everything in all of your systems and servers and communications. And they took advantage. It came in directly through your station, Ziv. Do you have any idea how that happened?”

  “Fuck you!” Ziv yelled. I had expected this. I’d be pissed, too, if this had happened to me. This looked bad for him.

  “Where were you two Saturdays ago, like in the night?” I had a very definite theory about how this had happened. I was going to play it now in real time. “What’d you do that night?”

  “Does it matter?”

  “What happened, Ziv?” Ed asked, imposing his authority.

  “Well, Carl and I went out. We went to LIV. What’s that got to do with anything?” I saw a slight sign of recognition in his eyes, very subtle.

  “What’s LIV?” I asked.

  “You know, LIV, the club at Blue.”

  “What’s Blue?”

  “The Fontainebleau Hotel. You know, the famous hotel!” He was getting hot.

  “When were you there? What time?”

  “You know, you go late, arrive like eleven. That’s when things start.”

  “And,” Ed prompted. Ziv was his sister’s son, but this was about his business.

  “Okay… Okay… I got lucky. I met a woman, drank a little, smoked a little. She came back with me to my apartment. We fucked. Is that what you want to know?”

  “Yes, that’s exactly what I want to know.” I focused on Ziv. “Please, continue.”

  “Okay. So we fucked, we fell asleep, when I woke up, she was gone. That’s it.”

  “Let me guess. You were asleep about three?”

  “Yeah, around there.”

  “And when you woke up, you were a little groggy?”

  “Well, yeah, we had smoked and drank quite a bit. What is this about?”

  “Sorry, Ziv, you got hacked. You were targeted. They ran an op on you. That’s how they got into the system here and caused all of these problems.”

  “What?”

  “Tell me, when was the last time you went to Wendy’s?”

  “I don’t go there! I don’t eat beef… and the rest of their menu sucks. Why?”

  “Why would you download a Wendy’s app on your cell phone?”

  “I didn’t.”

  “There’s one on your phone… That’s how they hacked your system. Through your phone. It’s a live beacon. They could hear everything you did, everything you do. That’s why I turned it off. They can even hear and discern keystrokes on your computer, because you keep your phone close, like everybody. Their wireless capacity is the best we’ve ever seen, state of the art.”

  “Shit!” It hit him like a shot to the heart, an emotional pain outside the bounds of any training.

  “Here’s the way I see it,” I said and paused. This was about human engineering, the part of an op where human nature is the target, where the perpetrators can attack that very spot where the gullible and naïve live, where a man’s weakness to flesh can be exploited to a maximum degree.

  “She’s a pro,” I continued. “Looks good, knows how to talk, sexy dresser, dancer, knows how to fuck like a champion racehorse. After you got spent, she went to the bathroom, prepared a little something for you, offered you a water or wine or beer or whatever you guys were drinking, and wham! You’re out for a few hours, and she’s free to take your phone apart and download and place whatever she brought with her, which was neatly concealed in the Wendy’s app. Even the icon is hidden, so you wouldn’t see it unless you looked for it. It went in at 4:22 a.m. that night, while you were in dreamland. She may have left some other toys in your apartment. We’ll need to sweep that. Did she leave you her number?”

  “No!”

  That was the final piece, the nail that sealed the proverbial coffin, or, more accurately, ended the op and got her out as cleanly as possible, cutting off any trail or further contact.

  Ziv’s energy and body language receded into a level of pain few know, because an event like this cuts so deeply into that place where the heart, the emotions, and the sense of loyalty and honor reside. He looked at Ed; there were tears forming in his eyes.

  “I am so, so sorry.” He buried his head in his hands, lost in pain.

  “Shit happens,” Ed offered philosophically.

  * * *

  I called Linda while we were still in the meeting. She informed me that the dive on Siroco and Adams was progressing slowly because they had strong encryption. I told her to get moving on it, that I’d be back here at Sabra at four my time, and that I’d be with the clients then and I needed results, not excuses. She didn’t need me to elaborate.

  Ziv had tears running down his face, and a look that confirmed what I had suspected: that he was a victim who had nothing to do with the hack. I think Ed had the same feeling.

  “I need a little more time. My office is dissecting Siroco and Adams and their operations. We need that before I can help you with the next steps.”

  In a great show of leadership, Ed rose and walked over to Ziv, who was sunk down in a couch with his hands over his face. He pulled him up and wrapped him in a bear hug. No words could have been that effective.

  “I’d like to come back this afternoon, say around four. I’ll have more then.”

  “Sure, we’ll be here,” Ed said as he unwrapped Ziv. “Charlie,” Ed shouted. The door opened immediately. “Meeting back here at four,” he said, pointing to all of us in the room. “Cancel that other thing.”

  “Got it,” she responded as she took in the sight of Ziv and his face and body language, a Ziv she had never seen before.

  “Can I use a room here for an hour or so? I have something to do,” I said.

  “Sure,” Ed said. “Ronnie, take Derek to Sixteen, and make sure nobody disturbs him.” Ronnie stood up. He was huge, probably two-fifty and six-foot-four, but he moved easily for that size.

  I got to my feet and finished the meeting. “Thanks. I’ll be an hour. Ziv, go back to your office and do whatever you do. Be normal, no changes. Keep your phone shut down.” I handed Ziv his phone with the battery removed. “We’ve disabled the worm in your system. Nothing is getting in or going out now that you don’t want. Your internal systems are safe for the moment.”

  I made direct eye contact with all four. “For your information, there’s more to this… It’s bigger than Sabra. These guys at Siroco are some bad dudes, and they’re messing with other people, other companies here in Miami. I’ve pretty much handled the computer part here. We need to assess the rest of the threat, which will not be as easy. We’ll get it done. I have experience in situations similar to this.”

  Ed and I shook hands. He looked to Ronnie, pointed to me, then pointed to the door.

  Ziv started to leave.

  “Ziv,” Ed said in a register only dogs can hear, “stay.”

  * * *

  Ronnie led me a short distance to a nearby room. I watched the way he moved. Even though large, he was clearly trained and in good physical shape. He pulled keys out of his pocket and unlocked the door marked 16. It was a good-size room, maybe twenty by twenty, with a makeshift conference table and several chairs and empty white walls. He stood inside, near the door, eyeing me in a curious way. I assumed he was making sure I was comfortable.

  “Am I being watched in here?” I asked him.

  He smiled. “Not in this room. We can do that in some of the others, but not this one. That means Ed trusts you.”

  “Good… Thanks,” I said.

  We were interrupted just as Ronnie was leaving. A yo
ung kid—or young man, I’m not sure, probably eighteen years—popped in. He was tall and thin, with a bushy mop of dark brown hair… but a lot of confidence. He stopped in front of Ronnie.

  “Ed needs you,” he said.

  “This is Arthur,” Ronnie said to me, “Ed’s grandson. He’s an idiot, but we keep him here anyway.” Ronnie smacked him on the shoulder, clearly having a lot of affection for the young guy.

  I stuck out my hand. Arthur took it and gave me a vigorous shake, with lots of eye contact and a cheery face.

  “Hey, man,” Arthur said.

  “I’m Derek,” I said.

  Ronnie turned toward the door and signaled to Arthur to leave with him. They left and closed the door behind them. There was a good feeling here at Sabra, more family than business.

  I opened my briefcase and took out my laptop, my sat phone, my office phone, one of my burners, and some charging cords. I got Linda on the sat line again. “We’ve got work to do. How’s that dive on Siroco coming?”

  “Slow. Heavy encryption. Looks like 512 stuff… Heavy.”

  “Okay. I want you to call James over at the Stanford lab, see if he’ll crunch it on their mainframe. Tell him it’s important to me and I need it now. Push him! If it’s anything but yes, call me back and I’ll call him. Also, I want you to hack into a club here called LIV, at the Fontainebleau Hotel. I want to look at their surveillance tapes for Saturday night two week ago. Do that right now and give me the access codes. I’ll go through the tapes here. You can continue on the other stuff.”

  I heard her clicking rapidly on her end. Something like this was child’s play for us. Security systems like that rarely had any kind of their own defenses, a kind of paradox in the security world.

  “Wow… They have… looks like twenty-four cameras,” she reported.

  “How many just for the club?”

  “Twenty-four.” She gave me the access codes, for the club and for the rest of the hotel. One hundred and eight security cameras in all. That’s a lot to review. But it also meant that we would definitely get a facial on the woman who’d hacked Ziv.

  We had dissected Ziv’s phone completely—I was a little surprised that Ziv had not taken a quick shot of her with his phone. If he was former Mossad, he had definitely lost some of those skills.

  I settled in to watch the security tapes. This part of what we do for clients is critical. I knew that I would find her. Once I got a good photo of her, I could find out a lot through the various facial recognition databases that we use and have access to—some of that access is not official. I also was sure that I would find handlers or muscle or somebody from Siroco overseeing the op.

  I found her within minutes. Once Ziv entered the club, she was like a stinger missile, the way she homed in on him and his friend; she had clearly been briefed with an op plan and photos. I got a good shot, full face. She was a real beauty, no doubt about that. Strong features, like the models who come from Ukraine and Russia and Eastern Europe, and healthy, with cleavage which could make any man stand up and take notice, plus all the rest of the right equipment. She was a pro. Ziv had had no chance.

  I fed her photo back to Linda with instructions to put her into every facial recognition database we used. Then I went back and looked for the handlers.

  * * *

  On my way out of Sabra, shortly after one, I stopped in to see Ziv. He was hunched over his computer, a shroud of failure and shame misting around him.

  “Can I show you a photo?” I asked in a soft voice.

  “I am so sorry, man,” he said, looking up from whatever he was working on. His eyes were red, and his face showed the hurt caused by what had happened.

  “Yeah, I know. I’ve seen it before,” I said, trying to comfort him, with no visible effect. “You gotta be careful.”

  He just nodded, semi-lost in a miasma of pain and anger.

  “Is this the woman?” I showed him her photo on one of my burners.

  “Yes… that’s her.”

  “What about these two guys? Do you recognize them?”

  He looked at the photos of two men I was sure were the handlers from Siroco. They were way too focused on what their agent was doing with Ziv, who was at the bar with the woman. The men were seated at a table, just the two of them, across the dance floor. They were in suits and ties, the only ones in the club dressed like that. But it was clear they were watching her moves. When Ziv led her outside to smoke a joint, one of them picked up a cell phone and started talking and nodding like all was good. She was probably wired, and they knew the hook was in deep. They got up and left as Ziv and the woman stepped out, and had probably waited outside in their car to continue to monitor her progress.

  “No. Never seen them, have no idea who they are.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Yes, I’m sure! Don’t do that to me, man, I’m devastated by this.”

  “Okay, right.” I touched his shoulder. He batted my hand away, a reaction without thought. He was all but bleeding in pain. I needed this guy to be part of the team effort. I let the physical contact slide.

  “Let me know if anything weird comes up. And be careful. Not just on your computer. Out there,” I said, pointing to the real world.

  “No problem now. ‘The truth shall make you free,’ as they say.”

  I understood his shorthand. Who would use the CIA motto?

  * * *

  I got in my car and drove out of the Sabra parking lot. Two different guys, Florida shirts, jeans and boots, bulges at the waist, but different guys. Heightened alert here. I was pleased to see that.

  It was about a thirty-minute drive from Sabra in Coral Gables to South Beach for my meeting with the reporter. I asked Alexa to get Lauren. I heard it go to voicemail. Strange, I thought, Lauren not available.

  “Hi Lauren… It’s me, the guy from last night. Thanks for playtime. Hope to see you tonight. Have a good one.”

  “Alexa, call Olivia,” I said next. I had input her number into my directory. Voicemail there, too. “Olivia, Derek, on my way, I’ll be there by two. See you at Joe’s.”

  Should I try someone else, go three for three? I decided to pass and just navigated Miami lunchtime traffic over to South Beach.

  * * *

  Joe’s Stone Crabs was a nationally known seafood restaurant in Miami, so it had a large parking lot and several valets. I parked at the valet stand and gave the guy a twenty. Are all of the parking valet guys in Miami blond and young and thin and tan? “Keep it close.”

  He just nodded as he gave me the parking receipt, unfazed by the bill or the car or me.

  I walked through the front doors with my briefcase. Large room, beautiful wood floors, waiters in white shirts and black pants moving around energetically. I immediately noticed that all of the waiters were older people, men and women, probably experienced experts in dining protocol. The place was full. I saw Olivia back on the right side of the room near the windows, discussing something with a guy in a black suit and tie, who was towering over her. I approached. Her body language was not comfortable.

  “I want to sit here,” I heard her say as I got closer.

  “Sorry, that table is reserved,” he responded. It appeared to be the only open table in the place.

  “Olivia, hi,” I said as I tapped her on the shoulder. “We’re all here, sir,” I informed him. “Is there a problem with our reservation?”

  “I’m sorry, she doesn’t have a reservation. This is the famous Joe’s Stone Crabs. People reserve months in advance. You’ll have to wait for a table. Shouldn’t be long; people are finishing up lunch. Maybe an hour.”

  “Can I speak with you privately?” I asked him, indicating somewhere away from all the guests who were watching the drama. He pointed to a corner of the room. “Wait here,” I said to Olivia.

  As I followed him, I reached in my poc
ket for the universal solution. At a corner of the large room, he turned to face me. I palmed a hundred-dollar bill and offered to shake his hand so that he could see it.

  “For two of those, you can have that table,” he said like it was just another Thursday. I got out another one, shook his hand to seal the deal, and followed him back to Olivia.

  “Sorry about the misunderstanding, ma’am. Please be seated.” He pulled out a chair and signaled for her to sit down. “Your waiter will be right with you.” He walked away slowly. I saw him glance at his palm, probably checking to see that I hadn’t switched the bills.

  “A lot of friction in your life,” I noted as I placed my office phone on the table and adjusted it appropriately; she did the same with hers.

  “You have no idea,” she sighed as she checked the menu.

  * * *

  As we ate a variety of well-prepared seafood, I guided her through some small talk. She had been with the Miami Herald for three years. Always worked the Business beat. Had won some local awards, mainly about local corruption, workplace deaths from OSHA violations, and some immigration issues concerning city businesses. She was around my age and had been a journalist since high school. She had Cuban grandparents, was born in Miami, and made it a point to emphasize that she was in a committed relationship, about which I didn’t ask anything further. I assumed this was her way of warding off sexual predators… or just the sexually curious.

  “What are you doing with Siroco?” I asked.

  “You understand this is all off the record. Don’t mess with me! No sources, nothing. You better give me something real!”

  “Okay, I get it. Agreed. Now, what are you doing with them?”

  “They’re criminals in suits. I’m hearing stuff that’s scary. They have three real estate developments, which are all underwater or in trouble. Their money is dark. And I hear that they’re running drugs. They didn’t exist three years ago.”

  “Glade Preserves?”

  “Yeah, that’s one of them. You know about that?”

  “A little. What else?”