by Sam Cade
But he had a plan.
One hell of a plan.
36
Black Point, Alabama
January 3, 2019
ZEUS DIALED JUNG HAO THE DAY AFTER LUCKY AGREED to come on board. Jung, a partner in the venture capital fund Point Blue Capital, had been at his desk in Menlo Park, California for fifty-five minutes when his cell rang. He spotted the caller, smiled, and answered. He worked with Zeus for a year on Wall Street.
“Are you harassing me again about DataCage at what... 7:30 in the morning?” It was spoken jovially.
“Sorry, Jung. It’s just that I’m staring at a nice opportunity. So what’s your latest prediction on my equity stake?”
“Well, looking at our time frame, we anticipate an IPO two years from now. Barring anything wacky in the markets I think your shares should be conservatively worth $6 million, but more likely eight to nine. You did some damn good work on that company. Right now you guys need to keep your foot on the gas to grab market share. Don’t worry about profits just yet.”
“Need a favor, Jung. Can Point Blue front me $500k on that? Use my equity as collateral?”
“It’s bad business, but I can make it happen. But it will cost you eighteen percent per year. It’s not cheap money.”
“Not a problem. Email the contract. I’ll shoot it back to you signed with the bank account and routing number to wire the funds. And, man, I appreciate it, I really do.”
Zeus put in four years of afterhours time working as a long-distance coder and beta tester for a new venture named DataCage, a highly encrypted cloud data storage site impervious to cyber-attack. His remuneration was one percent equity in the company.
37
New Orleans
Two Days Later
ZEUS DROVE HIS SUBARU TO THE DESTINATION, spotted the house number, drove around the block and came back to a stop sign at Magazine Street. The neighborhood had a voodoo feel to it. No telling what kind of creeps watching him out of their windows.
He parked on the street, walked passed an antiques shop, a taqueria, and a vinyl record shop, jaywalked across Magazine, stepped up on a crumpled sidewalk, passed a muffuletta joint then a vintage clothing shop with a scrum of unique women standing in front of it chirping like they were plotting a flash demonstration of some sort.
He cut down a side street, spotted the address, twisted through a wrought iron gate and traipsed up three weathered steps to reach the warped wooden front porch of the faded blue Victorian house that serves as residence and office of Meg Zimmerman. The home, maybe one hundred years old, fit the neighborhood. It was comfortably shabby with vivid yellow gingerbread trim and two tropical sago palms flanking the steps.
Meg, early sixties and California slim, answered after the third knock wearing faded bell bottoms, a white men’s long sleeve oxford untucked, circular black-framed glasses, and was barefooted. A smattering of colorful beads jangled on each wrist.
“You must be Harrison, please come in. Okay, so I’ve got cold water, tea, Cokes, lemonade, beer, gin, rum, bourbon, and banana popsicles. What can I get you?”
“A popsicle with a side of ice water sounds great, thanks.” He wore a thickening dark beard and his hair was tousled, hanging to mid ear. In anticipation of a make-over, Zeus hadn’t shaved or cut his hair for a month
Meg extended her arm. “Have a seat in the den, right around the corner.”
Zeus admired the room, brightly lit with a wall of French windows looking out over a lush courtyard. The room had twelve-foot ceilings, white walls, and was filled with distressed wood furnishings painted in an airy palette of pastels. Two deep-blue vases of tulips emitted a soft botanical fragrance, and a smattering of eclectic art hung on the walls.
Zeus squinted across the room at a photo in a burnished silver frame. Brad Pitt in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. He knew it was filmed in New Orleans. Did Meg handle makeup? Damn.
“Here you go, Harrison.” Meg returned, sat on the opposite end of the couch, pushed the water glass in his direction. “Cheers, my new friend,” she said. Their glasses tinkled, they each took a sip, and she crossed her legs and sat back into the plush tea-stained cushion. They both peeled back the thin wrap covering their popsicles.
“Now, how may I be of service? I believe you said it was quite important and there was an urgency.”
Zeus found Meg on the web under searches for theatrical makeup artists. Thirty years in tinsel town landed her three Emmys and two Academy Awards and ample funds for retirement. She moved back home to aid in the care of her father, but still worked as an occasional consultant.
“It’s delicate, Ms. Zimmerman. And embarrassing and heart breaking at the same time. It’s about my wife.”
“Oh, dear. But please, call me Meg.” She reached down to an antique silver bowl full of colorful gummies on the coffee table. “I think I need one of these, something a friend sends me from a little shop in West Hollywood.” She plopped a red one in her mouth, chewed. “Mmmmm, sweet. I’m about to be infused with a delightful patina of THC coating my spirit.” She held the bowl out to Zeus.
“Thanks.” He took a green one, tossed it in his mouth.
After swallowing, Zeus said, “Meg, I don’t want to go into it too deeply because I’ll get emotional. I hate to cry in front of someone I’ve just met. Here’s the deal.” Zeus leaned in with earnestness. “My wife is having an affair with a coworker. She denies it, but it’s just one of those things you can feel, you know it in your insides. All closeness we had has vanished, poof. I feel a disdain from her towards me, but I have no idea what I’ve done. The worst part is we have two kids, four and six.” He looked down, shook his head.
“Oh my, I’m so sorry.”
“I’ve confronted her about my thoughts and she completely denies anything. I’ve suggested counseling. If there’s anything I’ve done I want to correct it. I’ve even told her if she wants a divorce, I will make it quick and amicable. She comes back at me asking if I want a divorce. I tell her hell no; I want us to be a happy family. But all she says is nothing is going on and she’s happy. Well, something is going on and I’m not happy.”
Meg picked up the silver bowl again. “Please, Harrison, have another. This is a two-gummy story.” She ate another herself.
“Thanks. These things are mellow. Feeling better already.”
“Not sure a makeup artist is what you need.”
“Meg, I’m not looking for marital advice. I have a plan I want to carry out. I just can’t go on like this and I don’t want to hire private detectives for thousands and go through all that crap. I’m going to do the snooping myself. And I’m going to confront her.”
“Okay.”
“Here’s what I need. I want you to transform me into a man in his fifties. I want a disguise so perfect that I could stand right next to her and not have her recognize me. She’s going on a business trip to Chicago for a week and I’m going to be there. My parents know all of this and they’re going to keep the kids.”
Meg took a sip of water, stuck her remnant popsicle stick in the wrapping, glanced out at the courtyard, looked back at Zeus, and nodded.
“Fairly simple task, really. Glad you don’t want to be younger. That’s difficult. I’ll tell you what’s easy. I can make you older, heavier, and taller. I’ll turn you into a meek wallflower of a guy, layered into gray and browns, a nondescript nobody that people wouldn’t take a second look at.”
“That’s it exactly, Meg. A nondescript nobody.”
38
Manhattan, New York
Wednesday, January 9, 2019
THE 7 TRAIN, PACKED TIGHT AS A CATTLE CAR, SCREECHED to a halt at the Times Square-42nd Street subway stop causing its captives to hold on, fight off the inertia forces. The doors slid open signaling every man for himself into the funnel of humanity racing to the steps to reach street level.
Zeus emerged, checked his watch. It was 5:15 p.m. Fifteen minutes early.
His navy suit ballooned ou
tward with the fat padding around his trunk providing a distinct middle-age paunch under a white dress shirt accessorized with a red tie. He was now six-feet two-inches tall thanks to dark slip-on three-inch elevator loafers. His forehead is carefully shaved and waxed into receding male pattern baldness while the rest of his dark hair had been thinned and insinuated with strands of gray. His cheeks were bulked up with acrylic plumpers inside his mouth connected to a new configuration of upper anterior teeth. His unruly beard was now trimmed into a circular goatee infused with a smattering of gray dye creating the salt and pepper appearance of a distinguished man.
He began walking with intent, not looking anyone in the eye, feeling a jittery anxiety settle in about the impending meeting.
Found this person on the darknet. This guy wouldn’t be a Boy Scout.
He followed four women with rolling luggage into the lobby of the Sheraton Midtown Hotel. He stopped, glanced around the lobby, thinking. This could be a huge mistake. He was instructed to wait to receive instructions via text.
Zeus paid no attention to a mid-50s man in large glasses wearing a brown hued bowling shirt over gray slacks reading the colorful USA Today. He sat in a chair in a far corner of the lobby. His cell phone had a text ready to send to the burner Zeus carried. He pushed send. Go to room 3321. He watched Zeus glance at his phone and move towards the elevators. As the elevator door closed, the man texted another message to a different number. In the elevator.
Then he watched the lobby to see if anyone appeared to follow Zeus.
As Zeus exited the elevator onto the 33rd floor he encountered a woman with a messenger bag over her shoulder. “We’re not going to 3321. Follow me.” They entered a cold, dank stairwell and walked down two stories to the 31st floor. Walking down the stairs he noticed she was wearing latex gloves. That was not reassuring. She took him to room 3312, placed the keycard in the lock, and entered.
Zeus swallowed hard crossing the threshold.
Reaching the middle of the room, she pulled a Garrett metal-detecting wand from her bag. “Stand still for me, please. Let’s make this quick. Do you have a cell phone?”
“No.”
“A wallet with ID?”
“No.”
“Any type of weapon or recording device?”
“No.”
“Last chance to change that answer and remain friends. Anything?”
“No, nothing. Just the money.”
She switched on the Garret, then scanned over every inch of Zeus. Beeeep. It went off as the wand went over the left forearm. “Roll up your sleeve.”
Zeus exposed the watch, a cheap older Timex.
“I’ll take the watch.” She looked at it, shook it, pulled the time-set wheel in and out, spun the hands. She dropped it to the tile floor in the bathroom. Crushed it with her heel. Flushed the parts down the commode. “We said nothing. A watch is something.”
The woman squatted, started patting up each of Zeus’s legs. Ran her hands up and down each arm, patted his trunk front and back, thoroughly inspected Zeus’s crotch and ass.
“Clean gloves. Open your mouth.” She took her little finger and pulled open each cheek, looked around.
“Prosthetics. Smart. Cash stored in the fat pad?”
“Yes.”
“Follow me. Let’s go meet the man.” They left the room and she made for the stairwell.
Their steps echoed off the gray, musty concrete walls as they walked down an additional six floors, holding the metal pipe handrail as they traveled.
Great place to get your ass kicked. Or killed. Bad idea. All of this.
They exited the stairwell and walked midway down a carpeted hallway that smelled of clean linen scent carpet powder.
The prosthetics left Zeus’s mouth feeling dry, or maybe it was cottonmouth from nerves. He thought about the darknet ad that got him to a Manhattan stairwell with who knows what coming at him around the corner.
The website was NuYu.onion, a site to be opened only with the TOR browser. He’d found it on Hidden Wiki, a directory of TOR.onion URLs, the place bad people lurk on the web.
NuYu
The Finest Document Reproductions in The World
Your Face and Background on Anything Known to Man
EXPENSIVE-Guaranteed Satisfaction-EXPENSIVE
Tommy Xerox
They stopped midway down the hall. Room 2514. The woman knocked twice.
Zeus’s stomach knotted into a ball. He thought, damn, five thousand in hundreds on him and not one soul knows where the hell he’s located.
The hotel room door swung open. “Good evening, sir. Please come in. I’m Tommy Xerox.” No handshake. Tommy swung his arm, “Come have a seat.” Tommy pulled two chairs up to a small table that held a 9 X 11 manila envelope, a couple of Bai drinks and one Vitamin Water. He closed the blinds, shutting off the view to the Manhattan buildings that were now coming alive with lights.
Zeus saw an ordinary sized man, maybe 5-foot-10, not more than 165 pounds, late sixties by the look of him. He wore a beard and glasses, jeans and black loafers. An English driving cap matched his tweed sport coat. An elaborate latex mask covered his face, but Zeus had no clue. Tommy Xerox looked nothing like Wesley Gunterson, the man’s real name.
Thirty-three years ago, Gunterson caught a help wanted ad in a Phoenix newspaper. State Department Needs Artists. European Travel. Sounded much more interesting than his job doing technical drawings for defense contractor Martin Marietta.
State Department? Common ploy. Over 30 years, Gunterson became the head of the Documents Department in the CIA’s Technical Services Division. He also was a case officer on the street running spies in every corner of the world. He retired. His wife got cancer. Their savings went up in smoke trying to save her. She died leaving him depressed, lonely, and largely broke. So he did what he knew how to do.
Tommy appraised Zeus who sat across from him. “You’ve got some balls, you know that? Meeting someone in person from a darknet contact.” Tommy shook his head. “Carrying cash, too. Likely ninety percent of those people would kill you and go on their merry way with your money.”
“I have a crew tailing me.”
Tommy harrumphed. “No, you don’t. One thing I can guarantee. My boys and girls can spot a tail. Anywhere, anytime. You’re alone, but no worries. I won’t kill you.” Tommy pointed to the envelope. “That’s what you ordered. Take a peek.”
Tommy grabbed a Bai Peach tea, wrenched off the cap, and took two huge swigs. “I swear I’m hooked on this stuff.” He didn’t offer any to Zeus, on purpose.
Tommy felt sure no cop would go undercover on a meet like this without backup. If the lobby lookout had a sniff of police, Zeus wouldn’t be in the room. So, Tommy wondered, who the hell was this guy?
Zeus dumped the contents over the table. U.S. Passport, Kentucky driver’s license, social security card, birth certificate, utility bill from LG & E matching the Louisville address of the driver’s license. The photograph on the documents matched the man sitting across from Tommy Xerox. The name was Edward Thomas Hurley.
Zeus fingered the documents, studied them closely. Same high-tech passport paper. Raised document seals. Holograms. “Wow. Looks real.”
“Sir, those are real,” said Tommy. “If you like them, I’ll gladly take $5000 from you tonight. But I do believe you mentioned multiple items.”
Zeus pointed a finger at the Vitamin Water. “You mind?”
“Please help yourself, sir.” Yes, my friend, get your grubby fingerprints on the bottle, thought Tommy.
“That’s right, Tommy,” said Zeus. “I need 125 different sets. Different information, same photo.”
Tommy Xerox flung his head back, whistled at the ceiling. “Wow. $625,000.”
“Nope. Dealing in volume now. Time for a price adjustment.”
Tommy rubbed his chin, looked at Zeus. “Very curious about that, 125 copies, but I won’t ask. How do I know you’re not the FBI?”
“I don’t think the FBI wou
ld be looking at a buy that outrageous, do you?” said Zeus. “Too many red flags.”
“Wouldn’t think so, no.”
“So, here’s the deal,” said Zeus. “I’ll give you $1000 per set. And I want to see where you make the documents.”
Tommy shook his head, looked at Zeus. Thought a moment. “That’s amusing. First, last, and only counteroffer. $2000 per set, total of a quarter million, and under no circumstances do you see where we make the sausage.”
“Well, I don’t know.” said Zeus.
“Okay, sir. Close your eyes. Use your imagination for a moment. My document room is pristine, like a pharmaceutical lab. Bright white enamel painted floor, stainless steel work counters, daylight-bright LED lighting, daylight wavelength lighted magnifier lamps on the tables, Halo-Neutrodine air filtering machinery to eliminate contaminants from the air.”
“I use Gemalto security papers out of Amsterdam like most of the world governments. They’re stored at a perfect temperature in a dark, airtight room. I use the world’s finest printers, Leibinger, from Germany. I also employ Evolis holograph card printers, used worldwide and throughout the U.S.”
Zeus heard the story. He had precision evidence in his hand. “Okay, Tommy, let’s do it. Bitcoin works for you?”
“Preferred, actually.”
Tommy took his Vitamin Water and Zeus’s empty water bottle and threw them in the trash. Looking back at Zeus, he said, “I know you’ll be very pleased with the product. And I thank you for the business. Please wait here with my colleague for fifteen minutes before leaving. Have a good evening.”
Tommy Xerox left the hotel through the kitchen to a waiting van in the back alley.
Tommy’s female associate was reading the Times on her laptop when a timer sounded on her phone. “Well, okay, now. I guess we’re done here. Good luck on your endeavors.”
Ten minutes after Zeus left she collected both plastic bottles from the lined trash container, placed them in a freezer bag and placed that bag in her messenger bag. She wiped down the table and door knobs and was on her way.