by Reece Hirsch
“It reads like a confession, doesn’t it?”
“I still think about Josh every day.”
Dylan’s features contorted. “That’s a very easy thing to say, but you should have been there in jail with him. It would have made it easier on him, and it probably would have reduced his sentence.”
“It was the biggest mistake of my life.”
“A mistake you never paid for.”
“The same could be said for you. You could have come forward.”
Dylan’s anger flared and he brandished the gun at Chris. “I was fourteen years old!” he shouted, and Chris suddenly recognized in the man the petulant boy that he had known. “I worshipped you two—especially Josh. I would have followed you into anything. When it came to hacking that DOD database, I was just tagging along. And after we were caught, I looked to you. They would have gone easier on me because I was only fourteen. I probably would have gotten probation, at most. But I couldn’t bring myself to put you behind bars. Not if you weren’t willing to do it yourself. Over the years, though, my attitude changed.”
“Even at fourteen you knew what we were doing.”
“You really want to pursue this avenue, Chris? Do you?”
“What do you want from me? I wish I could change what happened back then. I really do.” Chris felt an odd kinship with Dylan because they had both spent most of their lives cauterizing the same wound. He saw that Dylan was a pitiable figure, but he couldn’t afford to feel pity—not for someone who had killed so many people and was capable of killing so many more.
“I’ve followed your career. First, you prosecute cybercrimes for the DOJ, then in private practice you hunt down hackers on behalf of big corporations. Your life has been dedicated to punishing kids who are exactly like we were back in ’87. It’s an affront to Josh’s memory.”
“You talk about Josh like you know what happened to him.”
“He died eight months ago. And you killed him. That’s what brought me here.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Josh and I hacked together for more than ten years. He contacted me when he got out of juvie and I helped him get clean, got him into rehab. With his record, he couldn’t find a decent job, even after he was straight, so we started hacking for real. No more kid stuff, we were doing it for the money, and we did very well. It sure beat repairing crappy old desktops. Josh was his old self again. You remember what he was like.”
“Yeah, I do. But why do you say that I killed him?”
“It’s almost as if you killed him twice. The second time was about a year ago. You were investigating a fraudulent tax return scheme in San Diego for your client Firefly.”
Chris remembered the incident well. A client’s employees had sold thousands of Social Security numbers and other personal information to fraudsters who used it to file $5 million worth of falsified tax returns. The criminals collected tax refunds before the real taxpayers had an opportunity to claim them. The IRS made it all too easy for the identity thieves, because refunds can be mailed out as gift cards upon request. All the thieves had to do was submit fake returns and change-of-address forms for the taxpayers and wait for the funds to arrive in the form of highly fungible gift cards. Chris had led the client’s investigation of the incident, sharing the findings with the IRS and an assistant US attorney, who had prosecuted and convicted three members of the ring.
“So you and Josh had something to do with that?”
“It was one of our operations. Josh was one of the three convicted.”
That statement stopped Chris for a moment. “But I saw the information that we turned over to the AUSA. His name wasn’t in that file.”
“He created a new identity when we got serious about hacking. Just another firewall to protect himself. The feds eventually saw through it, but by that time you’d moved on. You never did go back to read the transcripts of the case, did you?”
“No, I’m not a prosecutor anymore. My job ends when I’ve helped the client deal with the threat.” He paused. “So what happened to Josh in prison?”
“Well, he was a stand-up guy to the end. He could have cut a deal and turned on me, but he didn’t. But he started using again almost immediately. He said that he’d gotten a big dose of reality, so he needed an equally big dose of his reality suppressant. Three weeks into his sentence he overdosed in his cell.”
“I didn’t even know it was him,” Chris said.
“You put him behind bars twice, and the second time it killed him. I couldn’t just let you walk away from that, could I?”
“If it hadn’t been me, it would have been someone else. You two were stealing from innocent people. You were bound to get caught.”
“Sure, it could have been someone else,” Dylan said. “But it wasn’t someone else, it was you. We were all friends once, and you don’t turn on your friends. I knew then that you had to pay for your sins.”
Chris wanted to keep Dylan talking. “One thing I don’t understand. Why would Sarah do this? And why wouldn’t she just cut a deal now that she’s been caught?”
“Sarah has her own reasons. She lost a brother in Afghanistan. An Afghan soldier that he was training turned a gun on him. They were close and she took it very, very hard. She blamed her brother’s death on wrongheaded US foreign policy. She thought it would be poetic justice to take a weapon of US intervention like Stuxnet and turn it back against its makers, sort of like what happened to her brother. Sarah is a zealot, maybe even more so than I am. She’ll never crack.”
“You went to an awful lot of trouble,” Chris said, leaning forward in his chair. “Planting Sarah at the firm. Framing me for the cyberattacks. Leading me to Europe and back. Was it really worth it?”
“After Josh died, I spent a lot of time thinking about what should happen to you. I figured that the worst thing I could do to you is ruin your precious reputation. You like to think you’re fighting crime, but that’s not really what you’re about. You get paid by giant companies like BlueCloud to do their dirty work.”
“No one likes to have their property stolen,” Chris said.
“I think I once told you the same thing,” Zoey added.
“The point,” Dylan said, nearly taking the bait, “is that if I let you live, you’re going to spend the rest of your life in a federal prison as a convicted terrorist. Even if I kill you right now, you’ll always be known as a terrorist.”
“The truth will eventually come out. It usually does,” Chris said.
“The truth?” Dylan said, nearly shouting. “You’re still talking about the truth like it belongs to you?”
Even in the gloom, Chris thought he saw Dylan’s face redden as he ran a hand through his hair. Dylan was growing increasingly agitated. He was working up to shooting them.
“I think you completely missed the point of my story,” Dylan said, squeezing the trigger.
The air in the room seemed to explode and Chris felt a searing pain in his thigh as he fell forward, landing hard on the carpeted floor, still bound at the hands and feet. He felt blood spreading warmly down his leg.
“I want you to tell me that you understand that you were responsible for Josh Woodrell’s death,” Dylan said, more calmly now. “Hey, that’s a lot of blood. I think I may have hit an artery.”
Zoey struggled violently against her ties, leaving red welts on her wrists. “Tell him what he wants,” she said to Chris.
“I understand,” Chris said through clenched teeth.
“What do you understand?”
“That I was responsible for Josh Woodrell’s death.”
“Thank you,” Dylan said with a touch of mock exasperation. “Now I have to get ready for our guests.”
Dylan helped Chris to his feet and pushed him back into the chair, a move that only highlighted their physical disparity. Chris was bigger and at least six inches taller than Dylan, but with a bullet in his leg and his hands and feet bound, he had little opportunity to use that physical adv
antage. He nearly passed out when he put just a little bit of weight on the injured leg.
Dylan backed away from Chris and Zoey, the gun and the flashlight still pointed at them. He entered the hallway, then produced a plastic card key and opened the door to Room 216 across the hall. Dylan set the lit flashlight down on the floor in Room 216, then returned to the hallway and shut the door. The flashlight was the only artificial light around and it cast a very visible glow through the gap beneath the door of Room 216.
Back in Room 217, Dylan went to the bathroom and returned with two white washcloths. He shoved the washcloths into the mouths of Chris and Zoey. Without the flashlight, the room was in absolute darkness, so Dylan opened the curtains and let a little pale winter moonlight into the room. As Chris’s eyes adjusted, he saw that Dylan was sitting on the bed in the center of the room, with the TEC-9 on his lap. From that position, he could target either them or the door.
The hotel was absolutely silent, with none of the sounds of a building that has electricity—no thrumming airconditioners, rumbling elevators, or chattering television sets. That made it easier to hear the low whispering of two male voices approaching in the hallway. Chris thought he heard a muffled curse.
The whispering stopped, but the footsteps continued. It had to be Hazlitt and Falacci. Chris could visualize them approaching the light emanating from under the door, both assuming that Blanksy was holding them hostage inside Room 216, when they were actually across the hall in 217.
Dylan stood up and approached the closed door. An automatic like the TEC-9 could blast right through the flimsy hotel room door. He raised his eyebrows at them in a way that seemed to say, This is exciting, isn’t it? He leaned in close to the door, listening intently for something, maybe the sound of a hand on the doorknob of Room 216.
As Dylan raised the gun to fire through the door, Chris swung his elbow and knocked a ceramic lamp off the table that sat next to his chair. To Chris, who had been straining to hear any sound in the silence, it was as loud as a grenade.
Dylan started to pivot toward Chris and Zoey, but then he thought better of it and began firing into the hallway. The sound was deafening as the TEC-9 punched inch-wide holes in the door of Room 217, sending a spray of splinters into the air like a wood chipper.
CHAPTER 50
Hazlitt lightly tested the door but, as expected, it wouldn’t turn. He knew the electric door locks would still be working, but he had to try. He could try kicking down the door after a few bullets in the doorframe, but there was no element of surprise there, and that wasn’t as easy as it appeared in the TV cop shows.
Hazlitt motioned for Falacci to get ready. But before he could make a move, there was a crashing sound from the room across the hall. Hazlitt spun around and ducked reflexively. An instant later, deafening noise in the hallway. Six or seven shots in rapid succession. Behind him, close at hand. Had they gone to the wrong room?
He saw Falacci put a hand to the wall, as if he had just been running and needed to take a breather. Then his partner collapsed in the hallway.
Hazlitt wasn’t thinking clearly. It was that feeling you get when you’ve just been in a car accident. Your neck has whipped forward with the collision and you are suddenly brought up short by how fragile you are.
He saw a small stain on the front of his shirt at the left shoulder and wondered if he had spilled something earlier. He touched it and felt a spreading wetness.
Then his knees gave way and he went down.
The side of his face was flattened into the hallway carpeting and he found himself staring at his partner’s right pants leg, which was directly in front of him. Falacci was not moving.
Hazlitt had been shot once before, in a convenience store parking lot in Portland, Oregon, five years ago. The simple thought that formed in his mind was the same one that came to him then as he blacked out, like a last air bubble escaping the lips of a drowning man: So this is how it ends.
CHAPTER 51
Dylan fired two more rounds and listened for any sounds of movement in the hallway. Then he picked up the gym bag, opened what was left of the door, and looked out to assess the damage.
Chris could see one body lying facedown in the hallway. His stomach turned when he saw it was Falacci. Chris couldn’t tell if he was dead or just badly wounded.
Dylan glanced about with quick, jerky movements, looking for the second body. Apparently, there wasn’t one.
A shot rang out in the hallway. Then another. Chris had a clear image in his mind of what he thought was happening. Hazlitt had probably taken cover at the end of the hallway after the hail of automatic weapon fire and was now advancing on Dylan, taking aim and steadily firing as he came. Framed by the doorway, Dylan was trying to fire back but his gun was jammed. Dylan only had a moment to decide what to do, and he decided to run. More gunshots.
Chris and Zoey had crouched down next to the bed to avoid stray bullets and stared at the empty, shattered doorway, not sure if it would reveal Dylan, returning with his TEC-9 blazing, or Hazlitt. Or maybe they were both dead.
After a long moment, it was Hazlitt who lurched into the doorway. The agent’s shirt was covered in blood and he gripped the doorframe with one hand like it was his primary structural support. Hazlitt looked into the room and saw that they were okay. He nodded and slipped down to the floor.
Chris was too badly injured to move in his bindings.
“I’ve got this,” Zoey said, managing to stand with her feet tied together. She hobbled over to the minibar and got her hands on a corkscrew, using it to cut the hard plastic zip tie. Soon she and Chris were free.
Chris and Zoey grabbed Hazlitt under the arms and dragged him into the room. Chris returned to the hallway to retrieve Hazlitt’s gun, alert in case Dylan returned.
“Where were you hit?” Chris asked. His shirt was so soaked in blood that it was hard to tell.
Hazlitt pointed weakly at his left shoulder, his left thigh, and his right hand. Chris opened up Hazlitt’s shirt and rolled up the left pants leg to examine the wounds. He was losing a lot of blood but he might live—if he got immediate medical attention. That was a big if on that particular night in New York City.
Zoey kneeled down next to Falacci and checked his wrist for a pulse. “It’s there, but it’s very weak,” she said.
Hazlitt lifted his head with what seemed like a great deal of effort. “He’s getting away,” he said.
Sensing Chris’s next question, Zoey said, “I can try to get medical help for them and treat their wounds. I can handle that.”
Chris didn’t want to leave Zoey alone to care for the agents, but he also didn’t want to let Dylan escape. Now that he had savored the chaos he had caused, Dylan probably had an exit strategy that would get him out of the country. If he had any sense, he would go to ground and not show himself in public again for months, if not years. He would be replacing Chris and Zoey at the top of every most-wanted list.
“Okay,” Chris said. “I’ll try to send help back here, but you’d better also make your own arrangements.” He knew there was a decent chance that he wouldn’t be coming back, and he didn’t want Hazlitt and Falacci to bleed out while they waited for him.
“But before you go, drop your pants,” Zoey said.
Zoey tied two pillow cases together then secured them tightly around Chris’s thigh where he had taken the bullet.
“Can you walk on that?” Zoey asked.
Chris put his weight on the leg to test it and still felt a stab of pain, but not so acute as before. “That’ll work. Thanks.”
Zoey reached out and touched his shoulder.
Chris retraced their steps down the dark hallway and descended through the stairwell to the hotel lobby. He gripped the railing with one hand and held Hazlitt’s gun in the other. He wasn’t sure how good a shot he would be if he caught up with Dylan. He doubted that Dylan was a good shot either, but you didn’t have to be with that sort of automatic weapon, which could empty an entire clip in sec
onds.
The hotel lobby was quiet and dark. The evacuation that had been proceeding earlier seemed to be complete. Chris needed to move quickly to catch up with Dylan, but he couldn’t move too quickly, in case he was lying in wait. Chris advanced through the lobby with his gun raised and entered the restaurant. He knocked over a chair in the dark and it clattered, badly startling him. He paused to listen for a responsive sound. If Dylan was waiting for him, then he’d lost any element of surprise. But the room was silent except for the faint crackling of the car fire outside, and Chris decided that he was alone.
Chris emerged through the smashed front door of the restaurant into Times Square. There were only a few people milling about. By now, most ordinary citizens had found a safe place where they could wait for the power to come back. Those who remained didn’t look like the usual tourists. They looked like natives and they were walking with a sense of purpose.
Chris scanned the square for a sign of Dylan. He didn’t have that big of a lead on Chris, but he could have taken off in any direction and disappeared down one of the many avenues that converged at Times Square. He wanted to get the police involved in tracking down Dylan, but, surprisingly, there were none visible on the street.
Chris hid the gun in his jacket pocket and walked around the hotel to the main entrance, where two doorman were still on duty out front. They watched him advance, smoking cigarettes to keep warm.
“I’ve got two injured people who need immediate medical attention,” Chris said. “They’re law enforcement officers—FBI agents.”
A beefy, red-faced doorman tossed down his cigarette and stubbed it out with his shoe. “Where are they?”