Duel to the Death

by J. A. Jance

“That’s sounds dangerous,” Ali said.

  “Not as dangerous as leaving them on the loose,” Stu replied.

  “Does this mean you were actually paying attention back when I was telling you about the Bad Guy’s Playbook?” Cami asked.

  “Yes, I was,” Stu said. “The stalking phase is over. It’s time to bring Graciella Miramar within striking distance.”

  That statement was greeted with nods of agreement all around the table. With the decision made, the mood in the room brightened, shifting from one of grim hopelessness to a shared sense of purpose.

  “So where do we start?” Ali asked.

  “First up, Stu needs to contact Graciella and give her those banking codes,” B. said. “We need to make certain that, no matter what happens next, he has access to those funds.”

  “But I thought Stu said the office is closed today.”

  “It is,” he replied, “but let me take a look at that letter.” Removing it from his pocket, he studied the stationery. “Her cell phone is listed and so is her e-mail. We know she’s been logging in to her work accounts all night long. I’ll send her a message and ask her to give me a call.”

  There wasn’t a person in the room who wasn’t astonished by that statement. In the past, for the old Stu, the prospect of having to speak to a stranger on the phone or in person would have been anathema, leaving him drenched in sweat and worry, but this was the new Stuart Ramey, Stuart 2.0.

  “But before I send that message, there’s something we need to do first.”

  “What?”

  “We’re going to go into the lab, put on a show, and hope to hell someone is listening. By the time we finish, Graciella won’t just want Frigg, she’ll have to have her. I want to fix it so that, as far as Graciella is concerned, gaining control of Frigg will be a matter of life and death.”

  50

  Graciella had stayed up late, following the news feeds out of Sinaloa. She had gone to bed only when a fire brigade official announced that the sole fatality of the accidental fire at the Duarte family compound had been identified as Felix Duarte’s son Pablo.

  Graciella knew for sure that the fire was anything but accidental. She supposed the cops knew that, too, but they were bound not to find otherwise. After all, no police officer in the country had either balls enough or was stupid enough to suggest that Felix, the cartel king of Sinaloa, might have taken out his own son.

  Since Recursos was closed for the day, Graciella was still in bed and sleeping soundly when Isobel’s call awakened her. “Did you hear?” Isobel asked.

  “Hear what?”

  “It’s all over the news. They caught the kid who killed Arturo. After the cops arrested him, he led them to the body. He was dumped in Parque Nacional, just off Highway Four.”

  The fact that the killer had been arrested was not welcome news to Graciella, but she kept her wits about her and didn’t stumble. “Really?” she managed. “That sounds like good news.”

  “It is,” Isobel agreed. “I talked to Natalia. Even though the body has been found, we’re still holding the vigil. Their house is a long way out of town, and I know you don’t have a car. Would you like a ride?”

  Naturally Isobel assumed Graciella would want to attend. Although going to Arturo’s vigil was the last thing Graciella wanted to do, she knew that her being there would arouse less suspicion than her not going. “Sure,” she said. “What time?”

  “It starts at six and I want to be there early to help set up, so I should probably pick you up around five.”

  “All right,” Graciella said. “See you then.”

  For some time after the call ended, she stayed in bed. She had known the hit on Arturo would be passed off to some underling. The problem was, if the shooter had been caught and was cooperating with the police, he might have been offered some kind of plea deal. That was bad news. In that kind of situation, heads would roll, and there was no telling how far up the chain of command the damage would go. Could the trail possibly lead back to her? Maybe, and if that happened, she was far less worried about the cops than she was about her father.

  She could see now that in seizing and using her newfound power, she had also allowed emotion to get in the way of good sense. She didn’t fault herself for taking out Ron Webster. The man had been incompetent. He had failed to do a job properly and then lied about it. Letting something like that go unpunished would have been a sign of weakness on her part. And the Webster hit had offered the perfect setup for taking out Pablo. With him gone, she needed some time to consolidate her position, to move assets around and make some adjustments before El Pescado and Manny came to her looking for an accounting. But now, because of the hit on Arturo—a hit done strictly out of spite—time might be a problem.

  With that worrisome thought in mind, Graciella crawled out of bed and headed for the kitchen to make coffee, grabbing her computer along the way. Savoring the reality of living alone, she stood by the kitchen counter and logged in to her work e-mail account. As soon as she did so, there it was—the message she’d been waiting for: s.ramey@highnoon.com.

  Dear Ms. Miramar,

  Thank you for contacting me. Please accept my apologies for not replying immediately. It took some time for me to locate the information you required. Now that I have it, I have concerns about sending this kind of private information over the unsecured Internet. I would prefer to speak to you directly. The number for my cell phone is listed below. Please contact me at your earliest convenience.

  Sincerely,

  Stuart Ramey

  Graciella had been so caught up in what was going on in Sinaloa that she hadn’t checked in on the surveillance feeds to see what was happening in Arizona. Rather than reply immediately, she moved over to her surveillance storage site, where she was relieved to find several recorded files awaiting her.

  At ten p.m. on Sunday night, there was a recorded file featuring a lot of back-and-forthing between a man and a woman. Graciella couldn’t identify exactly who the two people were, but they had come into the office in order to put together an emergency communication of some kind, one letting clients know that there had been an intrusion at High Noon’s corporate headquarters with no accompanying data breach.

  After that there were blips and pieces of recording that captured sounds rather than conversation, including a good deal of keyboarding, which most likely meant that they were settled in at separate computer terminals, working away. Had Ron Webster done the job right, Graciella would have had a video feed to show her exactly what was going on. Much later, though, there was another spate of conversation. This one was harder to make out, as though the discussion was going on at a fair distance from the location of the listening device, but Graciella was pretty sure she heard the word “Frigg” mentioned more than once.

  Then a new file appeared. Clicking on it, Graciella heard the sound of two raised male voices. After listening in for a moment or two, she realized the first voice had to belong to High Noon’s owner, B. Simpson, while the second voice must be Stuart Ramey’s.

  “Are you friggin’ kidding me? That damned AI has key-logger capability?”

  “Look, our scans found it. I disabled the Trojan before it had a chance to do any damage.”

  “You’d better hope to high heaven that you disabled it in time! How the hell did she get it past the firewall in the first place?”

  “I replied to a routine e-mail. Frigg must have hidden the Trojan in the reply field. Our scans found it within five minutes.”

  “I don’t care if they found it in five seconds. The fact that she got in at all is a serious breach. I want you to get rid of that damned AI, and I want you to get rid of it now, understand? Either Frigg goes or you go, do I make myself clear?”

  Graciella had been standing by the kitchen counter, sipping coffee as she listened to the files. Now her legs went wobbly underneath her. Taking the computer with her, she staggered over to the dining room table and dropped onto a chair.

  A key logger? W
hat if Odin had unleashed a key logger on her? And if the Trojan had been concealed in the reply field of her e-mail accounts? This was a huge problem, and the potential for damage was unimaginable! She had corresponded with Odin—and probably Frigg, too—countless times from both her computers, the one at work and the one at home. A key logger would have captured everything, all her transactions, all her searches, everything. The Trojan would have recorded the fact that she had erased her browsing history, but a record of the searches themselves would still be available.

  And what about the blockchain technology? Did that mean that Frigg had been able to use Odin’s Bitcoin mining operation to trace all of Graciella’s transactions, even the ones conducted on the dark Web? She had always assumed that transactions on her home computer were entirely private, but how many times had she told Arturo that the cyber security situation at Recursos Empresariales Internationales was lacking? That was one of the reasons she’d done so many of her transactions, especially her family’s transactions, from home. But had Frigg captured those, too? And did Stuart Ramey have any idea what he had?

  A new recording appeared in the surveillance feed. Graciella’s hand trembled as she pushed the play arrow. Now a man and a woman were speaking in somewhat more subdued tones:

  “I don’t care if he is the boss. He’s got no right to talk to me that way.”

  “He’s got a point. He has a business to run, and people are counting on him and on us to keep their information safe. If we’ve been infected with a key-logger . . .”

  “Like I told him, I caught it within five minutes.”

  “Get rid of Frigg, Stu. Having her around isn’t worth it.”

  “It is worth it. Do you have any idea how much Frigg would bring on the open market?”

  “Yes, probably four million, for starters. So why don’t you sell it and turn the AI into someone else’s problem?”

  “Why don’t I keep it and see where it goes? It’s already got an operating Bitcoin mining program running. Why don’t I keep that and tell B. Simpson to take this job and shove it? I’m going for a walk, and I don’t know when or if I’m coming back.”

  The recording ended, and Graciella sat where she was as if carved from stone, trying to remember exactly how the AI functioned. She remembered Owen saying something to the effect that Frigg didn’t have a standard directory, that you couldn’t just look at a listing of files and know what was there. So perhaps Stuart didn’t know the full extent of what he had. Perhaps there was some way to stave off this disaster, because once El Pescado discovered the extent of the breach, Graciella was dead meat—every bit as dead as Pablo.

  The first thing she needed to do was talk to Stuart Ramey, but she gave herself a few minutes to regain control. By the time she spoke to him, she had to be in top form.

  51

  Stu had left the computer lab but not the building. Instead, he sat in the break room, watching his phone and waiting for it to ring. He had talked a good game earlier, but now as the minutes ticked by at glacial speed, he started to lose it.

  Would this wild-hair of a plan work? And, if not, was there anything else he could do to bring down Felix Duarte? They needed to have something on him that hadn’t come to them by way of Frigg—some other crime for which he could be held responsible outside the realm of Sinaloa where he no doubt had plenty of cops on the payroll. But then Stuart remembered. What about those six unsolved homicides from long ago? That’s when he switched on the Bluetooth and grabbed his iPad.

  “Frigg.”

  “I’m here, Stuart. How can I help?”

  “I want you to send me the names of the six airmen involved in the attacks on Christine Miramar in 1989. I want dates and places of birth along with dates and places of death.”

  “Of course. Where would you like me to send the information?”

  “To the iPhone I’m using.”

  “Will there be anything else?”

  “The information you put in the report about the attack on her—that all came from common sources on the Internet, correct?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good.”

  When the information arrived, Stu used a pen to copy it onto a piece of paper and then sent Cami a text asking her to come to the break room. When she did, he handed the list to her.

  “What’s this?”

  “These are the names of all the guys involved in the attack on Graciella’s mother.”

  “The dead guys.”

  “Right. I want you to do a detailed search. Start with the attack, collect all the information on the court-martials, and then track down everything else you can find on these guys, including the circumstances surrounding their deaths.”

  “Why?” Cami asked. “Didn’t Frigg already do this? Isn’t this an unnecessary duplication of effort?”

  “It’s a necessary duplication of effort,” Stu told her. “I want you to make all of your searches trackable and don’t erase your browsing history when you finish. I want to be able to demonstrate that anything you find came from readily available sources.”

  “Nothing we could have gotten from Frigg?”

  “Exactly.”

  “Has anyone ever told you that you’re completely nuts?” Cami asked.

  “You more than anybody.”

  As Cami left the break room shaking her head and clutching the paper, Stu’s phone began to ring. She turned around. “Do you want me to stay?”

  “No, just go,” he said. “I need to do this on my own. Please shut the door.” He waited for it to close before he answered, then switched the phone to record. As long as they seemed to be doing illegal wiretaps right and left, why not add another one to the mix?

  “Hello.”

  “Mr. Ramey?”

  It was difficult for him to talk, but he managed, even though the underarms of his shirt were already damp. “Yes.”

  “It’s Graciella Miramar. I’m so glad to make your acquaintance.”

  “Same here.”

  “Do you have the banking codes?”

  “I hope you’ll forgive my reluctance to send them over the Internet.”

  “Absolutely,” Graciella said. “When it comes to things like that, it’s far better to be safe than sorry. I know the codes are complex, and our connection isn’t the best, but read them to me and I’ll repeat them back to you.”

  It was a cumbersome process. By the time it was finished, Stu’s whole shirt was soaked.

  “All right,” she said at last. “Let me key these in. Then you’ll be good to go.”

  “I’ll be able to access the funds on my own then?”

  “Yes, all of them. You can do that directly or you can go through me. I’m here to help with whatever you need.”

  “And the Bitcoin mining operation?” Stu asked.

  “I’m not sure how that happened, but it’s already in your name.”

  Stu knew how it happened—Frigg. And he was pretty sure Graciella knew that was the answer as well. He almost sat on his hands to keep from saying anything about Frigg aloud. Stu knew enough about negotiations to understand that the first party who mentioned the existence of the AI would be the big loser, and he wasn’t wrong. Luckily, Graciella didn’t seem to share that knowledge.

  “When Owen Hansen was still alive,” she began, “we discussed the possibility of forming a partnership and creating a business of our own, offering the same kinds of services that are offered by my current employer, Recursos Empresariales Internationales. The plan was for me to bring my financial experience, contacts, and expertise to the endeavor and Owen would bring his AI.”

  “Frigg, you mean?” Stuart asked as a drop of sweat ran down his forehead and dribbled into his eye.

  “So you know about Frigg?”

  “How do you think I got the banking codes? Without her, I would have been out of luck. I had her up and running,” he said, “but I had to shut her back down. She attempted to insert some unauthorized software into our system. As far as I’m concerned, sh
e’s not to be trusted.”

  “Would you like to sell her?” Graciella asked.

  “Sell her? I just told you, I don’t think she’s trustworthy. Why would anyone want her?”

  “Mr. Ramey, I have a client, a man of unlimited means, who would like nothing more than to have an AI of his own. What would it take to set up an operation like that?”

  “If I were willing to sell her?”

  “Yes.”

  “There’d be the initial purchase price.”

  “How much?”

  “Four million, maybe?” he asked.

  “That’s doable,” Graciella replied. “What else?”

  “You’d need to have a minimum of eight hundred GPUs—those are computer blades—along with enough electrical capacity to operate them. You’d also need a facility with serious air-conditioning capability. The GPUs run hot, and once they get overheated, they’re toast.”

  “What else?”

  “AIs are complicated. You’d need a software engineer to do the installation and then ride herd on it.”

  “Are you available, Mr. Ramey?” she asked.

  “Me?” Stuart echoed.

  “How much would my client need to pay you to lure you away from High Noon Enterprises?”

  “You’re offering me a job, just like that? You don’t even know me.”

  “I know that you were smart enough to reboot Frigg long enough to get the banking codes. That alone is enough to tell me that you’re no dummy. And you’re obviously overseeing the Bitcoin mining operation. So yes, I think your computer skills are pretty self-evident. How much would it take?”

  “I don’t know. I’d need to give it some thought.”

  “I think, if we could arrive at terms as to sale price and salary requirements, that my client would give you carte blanche in terms of where you put the operation. In other words, if you prefer to stay in the States, that would be fine. Otherwise, if there’s somewhere else you’d care to live—a Caribbean Island, perhaps—that could work as well.”

  “You’re serious about this, aren’t you?”

  “Absolutely.”