by Dale Mayer
“If he went back to the US, then what would bring him back here again?” Taylor asked.
“No idea,” Laysa said. “My captor said the situation had changed, and he needed his insurance policy back.” She stared at the blackmail photos. “Is that what these are—his insurance?”
“It would make sense,” Kanen said. “But why now? Either he stopped blackmailing people and will start again or he knows someone is using these photos as blackmail and plans to do something about it.”
“And that will get even more confusing,” Taylor said, rubbing a hand to his forehead. “That last suggestion does make a kind of sense. But then you’re looking at this asshole as an almost good guy.”
“That is what’s wrong with this,” she said. “These are actual photos. He should still have the digital files.”
*
Kanen looked at her in surprise. “You’re right. If he gave these to Blake even a couple years ago, we had digital cameras back then—our phones took better photos than these—which means, chances are, these are quite old photos.” He looked at them to study the backs of several photos and said, “No dates are on them. That’s another odd thing. What kind of camera takes pictures without dating them?”
“A lot of the older ones did,” Taylor said. “We could assume these are old enough that they came from film that had been developed. There are still a few cameras like that around but not many. But what are the chances that this guy hasn’t digitized these photos? It would be easy enough to scan them in, so why wouldn’t he have already done that?”
“He would have done that,” she said in surprise. “No way this is the only copy you have and that you’d leave them with somebody and take off for other parts of the world without having a backup, would you?”
Kanen chuckled softly and sat beside her, patting her knee. “That’s the way to think. You and I certainly wouldn’t have done that, so I highly doubt your captor did either.”
“So then why does he care about these photos?”
The others looked at each other for a long moment.
Then Nelson offered slowly, “Maybe he’s lost the digital copy.”
“That can happen,” Taylor said. “We’ve all lost digital files. Supposed to be nothing safer but computer files get corrupt, files get lost, the hard drive fails, electronics get junked that shouldn’t have been, and you can never find the files again. Obviously, he should have taken very good care of whatever he had in a digital file, but maybe he wasn’t doing cloud storage back then. Maybe it was on a hard drive, and he thought it was safe, and then he dropped the hard drive, or it was corrupted in another way. Maybe he lost the thumb drive backup. It could be any of these reasons.”
The others nodded, deep in thought.
“That would imply,” Laysa said, “that he needs the insurance so he can get a digital copy again, and this is the only copy he has in order to either keep the blackmail rolling or to stop something or someone else.”
Kanen sat back. “So what’s our responsibility here? This guy wants his photos back. At least, let’s consider these are his for the moment. Is there any reason we can’t give them to him?”
“Yes,” she said, her voice strong, hard. “If these people in the photos don’t know he has these, no way I’m giving them back to him.”
Nelson grinned at her. “It’s nice to know you’re honorable. But do you realize that you’re pitting your life against these photos?”
Her stomach twisted with nausea. “Surely there’s another way than that.”
“Nelson is certainly stating the situation in a blunt way,” Kanen said. “He is just trying to make you understand how serious this could get.”
“There’s another option,” Taylor said. “We could scan these ourselves. It wouldn’t take long. At least then we could potentially contact these people to let them know what the photos are about and where they were taken.” At her frowning stare, Taylor answered what was probably her next question. “We’d use facial-recognition software to ID the people if possible. Then we’d use geodata to confirm the location.”
“Okay, and then what?” she asked. “If we can’t stop the blackmailer, having duplicates just doubles our problem. We could have the asshole after us and also the people in all these photos.”
Kanen interrupted. “Our theories are taking us down a very narrow path of possibilities. There could be other options, even if I can’t think of what they are at the moment.”
She frowned at him.
He laced her fingers with his. “All I’m saying is, keep an open mind.”
She pointed at the mostly nude couple in bed. “If that was me, I would want to know every copy of every photo was in my hands.”
“That’s the problem with the internet,” Taylor said. “You can’t guarantee that anymore. The internet sends out digital copies forever. It would be almost impossible to destroy these permanently.”
She nodded. “Which is the problem with us scanning them in to share with … one of your guys, I guess. Because then we’re duplicating the process, right?”
Kanen sat back and studied her face. “Do you have another suggestion?”
She shook her head. “No, not at the moment, but I wish I knew who these people were, so I could return the photos to them.”
“Or we could burn them,” Nelson suggested. “Then they don’t belong to anybody.”
“But what if these people are being blackmailed?” she asked. “What if they are being blackmailed and are paying for these photos and never get a copy? Maybe they’ve been shown digital copies, but these are the originals.” She tapped several of the photos on the coffee table. “Which kind of makes sense. These people being blackmailed might want the originals, even knowing the blackmailer could have digital copies still, and then it’s up to them to decide if it’s worth continuing to pay the blackmail.”
“Well, obviously the blackmailer didn’t send the damning photos via email,” Taylor mentioned. “Otherwise the blackmailer could get a copy of those photos from his Sent folder.”
She nodded. “Yes, the attachments are always there. Unless he’s locked out of his account.”
“It’s more likely that he dropped off an envelope with a copy of the picture and his demands. Keeping it anonymous,” Kanen said. “The thing is, we have to find out if these are blackmail photos. Is your captor a blackmailer? Or does he need these pictures for another purpose, like to save his own hide?”
At that, he felt Laysa start. She turned, staring into his face, and asked, “Is that even a possibility?”
“He invaded your home. He held you against your will there,” Kanen said. “He beat you up in order to get information from you. But, if he was really dangerous, he could have killed you or shot you in the leg or wherever.”
“He threatened to kill me. But would he have done that before getting his insurance policy?” she asked, looking at the men, who largely remained silent. That made her worry even more. “Plus … he wanted you here, Kanen, so he could get this information. Maybe it’s more about Kanen and less about the photos. The fact is, I’m half expecting my attacker to walk through that damn door any moment. Something was really, really creepy about him.”
“He did break into your apartment, beat you and hold you captive. So he’ll seem creepy and scary and pretty damn evil in your mind for a while. To me, he’s just another piece of shit, trying to bend another person to his will. Whether he’s trying to save his own skin or trying to blackmail these people, it doesn’t matter to me. I’m going after him for what he did to you.”
He watched tears come to her eyes, and she smiled mistily up at him. He shook his head and wrapped his arms around her. “How can you think I wouldn’t be here to help you? Of course I’m pissed off at what he’s done. That’s not acceptable. But to batter and bruise somebody I know and care about, well, that’ll never go down well.”
“If you two are done reminiscing about how much you care about each other,” Nelson tea
sed, “potentially you could turn all that energy into figuring out how we’ll deal with this from here on in.”
“I still think we should scan these to use facial recognition software, so we can identify them,” Taylor stated. “Then we can contact these people and find out if they are being blackmailed. It’s possible these photos are being held for a future time. If any of them are political figures, then there might be better times in their careers to be blackmailed, to get something from them or to ruin their careers. Think about elections coming up or bills being passed. If you wanted to sway the political leanings of somebody, nothing like having some nice little photos in your possession to make them do what you want.”
She shuddered. “That’s terrible.”
The men just laughed.
“We deal with this on a global level,” Taylor said. “But it all comes down to one man who’s usually leading the pack, pushing from behind to get his wants met.”
Kanen had seen way too many democracies fall under the power of one man in third-world countries. It was usually about power. It was rarely about the people. He tapped the photos. “Okay, we’ll scan these. We’ll keep them in a zip file. Who can do the facial recognition?”
“MI6 or maybe Tesla,” Taylor said. “She is about the only one with that kind of software which we can access and keep it private. That’s if she’s available. These people might be too old now for that application anyway. I don’t know.”
Kanen nodded. He pulled out his phone and sent Mason a text, then glanced at Laysa. “Do you have a scanner at your house?”
She nodded. But she didn’t look happy about it.
“May we use it, if we promise this material will never fall into the wrong hands?” It still didn’t make her look much happier.
“You can’t promise that though, can you? Already you’re talking about sending it to someone, which means it’ll always be available on the internet.”
She was right, and nothing he could do would make her feel any better about that truth. But still, it was what needed to happen.
Chapter 6
She didn’t like Kanen’s plan, but it was the only one they had. They crossed the lobby of the hotel only to be suddenly surrounded by several official-looking men in suits.
“It’s barely eight in the morning. It’s too early for this,” Kanen grumbled to the guys.
Laysa came to a confused stop, looked up and said, “Gentlemen, may I help you?”
The three men she was with stepped up beside her, forcing the others to step back.
One of the strangers stepped forward, the other two behind him now, as he held up a hand and said, “We need to talk.”
Kanen stepped in front of Laysa. “Identification please,” he said, his tone hard.
The two suited men exchanged assessing gazes before the stranger in charge carefully pulled an ID card out of his upper chest pocket. He held it out for Kanen to look at. Of course nobody offered it to her. Kanen studied it, and she caught just the barest grimace cross his face.
She turned to look at the man and said, “I presume you’re some special government officer?”
The man chuckled. “We’re MI6,” he said in a lazy voice. “Julian Normandy, at your service. I understand you might be involved in something a little nasty.”
She nodded. “Maybe you can help.”
“We’re hoping we can.” He turned and motioned toward a big black vehicle, like a cross between a sedan and an SUV, sitting outside the hotel’s front door. “We’ll ask you to join us for a talk.”
She headed forward without hesitation. But obviously the three men with her weren’t too happy. She glanced at Kanen. “Is this a bad idea?”
He sighed. “No, but it’s a curtailing of freedom.” He motioned at the man whose ID he’d been given. “Julian has been sent to keep an eye on us while we’re here.”
“Both informally and formally, depending if you’re here officially or unofficially,” Julian said with a grin.
She was ushered into the middle seat in the sedan with Kanen on one side and Nelson on the other. It was almost a limo with three rows of front-facing seats. Taylor was in the last bench seat behind her with the two men who had been with Julian. MI6 had a driver waiting in the car, and Julian climbed in to take the front passenger seat. By the time they were all packed inside, and the vehicle was on the move, she turned to Julian and asked, “How did you know we were in trouble?”
“Charles, in a roundabout way.”
She frowned. “I don’t know Charles,” she said hesitantly.
“I do,” Kanen said. “But I didn’t expect him to call in the reinforcements.”
“No, but I think he found something he thought made the two of us meeting up a good idea.”
That was unnerving. She stared out the window. “Are we going to Charles’s place then?” she asked hopefully. “We really have a situation we don’t know how to handle.”
Kanen stiffened at her side, but she ignored him. She didn’t live in his world of ugliness, and she knew her husband hadn’t either. Whatever was going on now was foreign to her, and that made it a very uncomfortable and uneasy place to be. Any help would be appreciated.
“Would you care to explain?” Julian asked.
“My husband died just under a year ago,” she said slowly. “Apparently sometime before he died, he was asked to hold something by a man he knew. And he did so without letting me know. Now this person has come back looking for it. He broke into my apartment and held me captive while he searched. He couldn’t find it, so he slapped me around to try to get information as to where it was.”
At that, Julian crossed his arms and glared at her. “And you didn’t call the police?”
She didn’t like his tone. She stiffened her back and gave him a hard look. “I was a captive at the time, so I could hardly do it then, could I?”
“But you did get free. Why didn’t you call for assistance then?”
She widened her eyes in a look she had perfected a long time ago and said gently, “I did. I contacted Carl, who is in law enforcement. Not to mention at the hospital, the local forensic techs collected DNA and took photos. My assailant had forced me to contact Kanen. So, of course, I had to contact him again when I got free. He’s a good friend, so I turned to him for help.”
Julian looked at her in surprise, turned to look at Kanen and then back at her. “You’re living in England. You have law enforcement all around you. You have government law enforcement all around you. And yet, you call an American to come over here and help you? You didn’t want to wait for this Carl person to get in touch with the right people?”
“Kanen was already on the way after the first call from my captor. Of course, when Kanen arrived, I followed his lead. It’s what he does. He’s also a friend, so that was the best thing for me to do.”
Julian stared at her in disbelief. “That’s not a normal thing to do.”
She crossed her arms over her chest, almost imitating him, and leaned back. “I trust Kanen. He was my husband’s best friend too. He’s also a navy SEAL, although that’s not for public knowledge. He and his buddies handle this kind of stuff all the time. If there was anybody I could count on to help me, it was him. My captor insisted I call Kanen because the asshole figured, if I wasn’t holding the material, then Kanen would be.”
“That makes more sense. Did you ever meet this guy?” Julian turned to ask Kanen.
Kanen shook his head and picked up the story. “Her attacker wore a mask, so we have no facial features to go by. Laysa didn’t recognize his voice but noted he was short for a man, and yet, very muscular with extremely wide feet. So, no, I don’t believe I’ve ever met this guy. But we haven’t found him, so I can’t confirm that yet. And you can bet that, when I do, he won’t be talking much.”
*
Julian’s frown deepened.
Kanen shook his head. “Don’t give me that look. This guy holds a single woman hostage in her apartment and beats her up for
information she doesn’t have. Surely you expect me to at least break the bully’s jaw.”
Julian appeared to think it wasn’t worth arguing about. “Did you find out what it was he was looking for?”
“Possibly,” Laysa said cautiously.
“And that’s where I’m supposed to help?” Julian asked, raising one eyebrow.
“No, the only help we need is a ride back to her apartment,” Kanen snapped.
Julian glared at him.
Just then Kanen’s phone rang. He put it to his ear. “Mason, I’m in an MI6 vehicle, taken to an undetermined location. If you don’t hear from us in the next twenty-four hours, you know we’ve been sunk deep in the ocean.”
Mason’s lazy voice rolled through the phone and into the vehicle. “I presume that will not happen. Julian, is that you?”
Kanen hit the Speaker button so everybody in the vehicle could hear.
“Hello, Mason. You could have told me yourself what was going on.”
“I would have if they had brought me up to date on any of it,” Mason said. “But it seems to have all just happened, so I couldn’t update you, could I? But I presume Charles has been kept in the loop somehow.”
“Yes,” Kanen said. “I gave him updates as we were moving about Ipswich, just in case something went south.”
Laysa stared at him in surprise. “I think I’d like to meet this Charles.”
Kanen laced his fingers with hers. “He’s a very honorable ex-military benefactor. He’s helped a lot of men.”
Julian laughed.
“That’s not a bad way to describe him. And he is, indeed, the one who called me,” Mason said. “Did you send him a photo?”
“Yes,” Kanen said. “I took a picture of one of the photos we found and sent it to Charles, hoping he could ID the man.”