Unallocated Space: A Thriller (Sam Flatt Book 1)

by Jerry Hatchett

SASHA MASLOV

  MAX WAS WAVING around a piece of paper as if Sasha could know what was on it. "Why has the income from the casino machines stopped?" He shoved the paper at Sasha.

  Sasha took the paper and looked it over. It was a printout of the computer operation's harvest for the past week. The harvest from SPACE had dropped to zero. "I've been busy, Max. I don't know. Do you need me to investigate?"

  "No, I will pursue this," Max said, launching a stream of spittle halfway across the room. "I will handle this."

  Sasha nodded, then waited while Sultanovich switched topics. He threatened, humiliated, and ridiculed Christine. In Sasha's view, Maxim Sultanovich was more animal than man. He had known him more than thirty years. In Sasha's line of work, he had seen a lot of cruelty from a lot of sadistic men (and a few women, too), but none like Max. He was a monster, plain and simple, and Sasha had long regretted the day he agreed to partner with him on occasional projects, no matter how much money he made. He wanted to grab the scrawny husk of a man and choke him until he stopped twitching. Not today, however. And not here, not in his home. He would wait, but in the past minutes he had made the decision that enough was enough.

  Max finally stopped talking, put his palms on his knees, and pushed himself to his feet. He walked across the room and toward the entrance foyer, his goons tethered to his old carcass like flies hovering over a pile of shit. Sasha did not follow and did not say goodbye. The cordiality and manners would have been wasted. Just before Max reached the door, he turned and motioned for Sasha to come. Sasha went, vowing that his time of being a dog on Max's leash was almost at an end.

  When he reached him, Max leaned toward him and in a soft rasp said, "Vbyty yiyi," then stepped through the door one of the goons had opened for him. Kill her.

  CHAPTER 33

  SPACE

  IT WAS NEARING 8 p.m. and I had covered an awful lot of ground that day, and I did it on little sleep following an all-nighter. My body ached and my mind hurt. I shut down and secured my work, then jumped into my email for a quick check before I headed to my room. I answered the messages that needed it, deleted the junk, and was about to close the lid on the laptop when I noticed a news headline that read NINE WOMEN ESCAPE CAPTIVITY NEAR TUNICA CASINOS. I clicked into the message.

  TUNICA, MS - 7:25 PM - In a sensational case sure to attract widespread attention, Tunica County Sheriff, Art Goodman, reports that nine women were rescued today following their escape from captivity in a hunting lodge near Casino Center. According to Goodman, the identities of the women, who range in age from 16 to 29, are known but being withheld at this time. Sources close to the investigation have said that several of the women are not American, speak little or no English, and appear to have accents consistent with Eastern Europe. It is also believed that at least one of the women is an undocumented Hispanic immigrant.

  "The females report that they were held captive in a lodge near the Mississippi River, some for as little as two weeks, and some for as long as two months," Goodman said during a hastily arranged press conference at the Tunica County Courthouse late this afternoon. "We have officers on the scene and I can confirm that early observations seem to support the narrative given to us by the females. I can also confirm multiple fatalities at the scene, presumably of the captors, although we cannot confirm that as of yet. Our investigation is ongoing and will be handled with utmost professionalism."

  CHAPTER 34

  SPACE

  I WOKE up the next morning with my daughter on my mind. Glanced at the bedside clock: 7:42 a.m. After brushing my teeth and readying myself for the day, I prepped and powered up the little coffeemaker, then grabbed my phone and dialed her number.

  "Hello," she said, her sleepy voice music to my ears.

  "Hey, baby."

  "Daaaaaddy, what time is it?"

  "Almost eight, shouldn't you be getting ready for school?"

  The coffeemaker gurgled and gasped its aroma into the room while I waited for her to respond. "Ally?" I said.

  More awake now: "Dad, it's Saturday."

  Crap. I sometimes forget other people don't work, or go to school or whatever, seven days a week like I do when I'm on a case. "Wow, sorry. My days run together when I'm on a case."

  I heard a long, exasperated sigh, the kind only teenage girls can do. "S'okay. What's up?"

  "Just wanted to talk to you a minute. You haven't answered my voicemails or texts over the past few days. We okay?"

  "Why wouldn't we be?"

  "I don't know. You usually answer me, so I wanted to be sure."

  "Just busy. I'm in this new school and they're giving us a stupid amount of work to do."

  Her new school was a magnet school for gifted math and science students, and I'm sure she wasn't exaggerating about the workload. "How you like it?"

  "Fine, lots of nerds."

  "Like you?" I said.

  "Daddy!"

  I laughed. "Hey, just calling it like it is, baby girl. Be happy, nerds make all the money and end up running the world today, especially beautiful ones like you."

  "I give that recovery a six," she said.

  "Six? At least an eight! Three separate positives."

  "No way. You called me a nerd. Seven, tops."

  "I can live with that."

  "Hey, Daddy?"

  "Yup."

  "Did you talk to Mom yet? About me getting to see SPACE for real?"

  "Not yet, but I will as soon as I wrap up this case. And hey, let's get together again in the next day or two, okay? We'll find something fun that has nothing to do with casinos."

  "Sure. When will you finish the case?"

  "Not sure, no more than a few weeks."

  Another teenage-girl sigh. "O-kay. Listen, I really gotta go to the bathroom."

  "Okay, sweetie. You go. I'll talk to you later."

  "Love you!"

  "I love you too," I said, and ended the call.

  LIVING outdoors most of the time, with a horse and without a car, presents some logistical challenges. Thankfully, I have Charleen "Charlie" Papa to handle these things. She has a little company—little, as in it's just her—that provides "personal concierge" services, helping out folks who don't have the time or means or desire to take care of life's pesky details but who do have the money to hire her. In my case, she serves as quasi-accountant, errand runner, and some other things. I pay her well because I trust her. I dialed her up.

  "Velvet Glove," she said when she answered.

  "Is this my favorite paid flunky?" I said.

  "I'm your girl, handsome. Anything for a buck." She laughed. I laughed. Then she got down to business. "What can I do for you today, Sam?"

  "You near a computer?"

  "You know it."

  "Pull up my accounts."

  I listened to her click and type for fifteen seconds or so.

  "Done," she said.

  "What's the balance in the main business checking account?"

  "Let's see, Sammy boy, looks like…a hundred and twenty-four thousand and change."

  "Can you get me two bars and put them away?"

  "You got it. Anything else?"

  "Yeah, can you go to the stables and check on Johnny?"

  "Now that's something I'd love to do."

  "You rock, Charlie," I said. "Later."

  "Damn right I do. See you."

  I hung up and touched into the Kitco app I use to track the price of precious metals. I don't trust our currency these days, paper that's backed by nothing, and worse, paper that our government keeps printing with abandon. I also don't like having all my assets tied up in bank accounts that may be vulnerable to the shenanigans of a troublesome FBI agent with her panties in a bunch. If that sounds paranoid, chances are you haven't dealt much with today's federal government.

  So I keep most of my money in gold and silver. The two kilobars would set me back about $84,000, leaving me plenty of cash on hand if I had a quick need. Charlie would make the necessary calls and transfers, then tak
e physical possession of the bars and stash them in a safe deposit box for me. Like I said, I trust her. A lot.

  Business handled, I left the room and headed for my forensication chamber, ready to chase bits and bytes and the bad guys behind them. The day was just starting and I had already talked to my daughter and arranged for a couple more shiny ingots. This was going to be a good day.

  CHAPTER 35

  CRIMEA, UKRAINE

  CHRISTINE GAMBOA

  CHRISTINE STRETCHED, opened her eyes, and looked at the clock on the nightstand. Thankfully, numbers were the same here. It was almost 3 p.m. She couldn't believe she had slept that long, even though she had been exhausted from the long flight. Even more surprising was the fact that Sasha hadn't expected her to sleep with him. He had shown her where everything was, brought her upstairs to this room, said good-night, and left. She had undressed, gotten into bed, and fallen asleep instantly, not taking time to notice anything about the room.

  The bedroom was huge and lavish, like something out of a fairy tale. She had stayed in five-star hotels before, but none compared to this. Her bed, far larger than king size, was covered with a silky blue canopy with metallic gold stripes woven in. Sasha was obviously big on the Ukrainian national colors of blue and gold. She stepped out of the bed and her foot sank into carpet that seemed to caress her feet as she walked to the bathroom. It was an expanse of white marble, lit by gentle indirect lighting hidden in a valance at the top of the walls. On the counter she found a variety of toiletries, everything she could possibly need, and more.

  She showered and put on a fresh T-shirt and pair of jeans from the tiny bag she had brought along for her failed escape. No makeup. Nothing or no one here warranted the trouble. When she descended the stairs, she found Sasha in the living room, pacing back and forth with a phone stuck to his ear. She went to the kitchen and put together a plate of fruit, then returned to the living room and curled up on a sofa with her food. After about five minutes, Sasha finished his call and sat down beside her. His face was heavy, his eyes bloodshot.

  "You okay?" she said.

  "Chrissy," he said, "we must to leave here. We must to leave here now."

  She stopped eating. "Why? I thought I'd be safe here."

  "You think I was expecting to come home to find Maxim Sultanovich? In Sasha's house? No!"

  Now she was worried, because she saw something in his big face she would not have thought possible twenty-four hours earlier: He was scared. "What's going on, Sasha?"

  "Maxim is telling me I must to kill you."

  Tears flooded her eyes and the few bites of fruit threatened to come back up. She had originally thought Sasha meant to kill her. Then she had started to think she was wrong, starting to believe he really did want to help her, starting to relax, the terror of her situation beginning to wane a bit. Now it all came back in a rush.

  "Do not to cry, Chrissy. I will not to kill you. Sasha will not let the old man to kill you. We must to leave. We must to leave now."

  CHAPTER 36

  SPACE

  BY NOON, I had identified most of the hack targets on the portal. This wasn't a multimillion dollar operation. This was a billion-dollar operation. These people, whoever they were, had systematically identified, cracked, and tapped a staggering array of electronic cash sources. Toll roads. Public utilities. Parking facilities. If there was an enterprise out there built on huge numbers of transactions, an enterprise likely to have vulnerabilities, they had targeted it. Plus SPACE, which was still a solitary outlier. There were a few links that led to things I couldn't yet identify, but I would. For now, it was time to write an update report for Jacob Allen.

  I had pondered how to handle the issue of notifying law enforcement. My lawyer brother had called after he researched it, and said he felt confident that I was under no legal obligation to go to law enforcement myself. His suggestion was to notify my client, in writing, of what I'd found, along with a clear suggestion that the authorities should be notified. And that was how I would handle it. I didn't want an unnecessary battle on my hands with my client. More importantly to me, I wanted them to think I had put the rape videos behind me. Let them think that. Let LVPD think that, too. But it wasn't true.

  Those videos would not leave me alone. I couldn't get past the idea that these girls were alone, terrified, savaged. What if my own daughter were in a situation like that? The videos haunted my dreams. They haunted my days, hanging back in the black recesses of my soul, niggling at me like a single fly in a large house. Always there. Even when they weren't front and center, they were there, in the blackness, calling me to join them in the shadows.

  CHAPTER 37

  CRIMEA, UKRAINE

  SASHA MASLOV

  IT HAD TAKEN hours for his people to get it, but after trying a hundred times to call Max's son Mikail, Sasha finally had a phone number for Benjamin Zuyev. He was not ideal, but he was all Sasha had if Mikail was missing. According to Sasha's contacts, Zuyev was a wily old Muscovite who had become Max's chief lieutenant in the United States by way of attrition when Mikail killed Dmitry. The contacts all seemed to agree that Zuyev's reputation was one of competence. Sasha dialed the number, then stuck the phone back in its cradle. The sound of the ringing came through the car's speakers. When the call was answered, he said, "Benjamin?"

  "Who is this?"

  "Benjamin, is Sasha Maslov. Please to speak in English so my companion can to understand."

  "I am speaking in English. What you want, Maslov?"

  "Benjamin. I believe we can to help each other."

  "How?"

  "We can to go to FBI, make deal."

  Zuyev laughed, a long and guttural affair, before saying, "Have you lost your Ukrainian mind, Maslov? Why would I do that?"

  "To live."

  "What the hell are you talking about? You really are insane, no?"

  "Max ordered Mikail to kill Dmitry," Sasha said, although it was highly unlikely. Max would come closer to killing his own son before Dmitry. "And Benjamin? He has also to ordered him to kill you."

  Now there was a long pause, then: "I do not believe this."

  "Is true, Benjamin."

  "Why? Why would Max want me dead?"

  "FBI knows about operation. Preparing to arrest everyone. Max wants no one alive to talk, but if we make deal with them, we live and not much time in the prison."

  An even longer pause. Sasha looked over at Chrissy and winked again.

  "And why you want to help me?" Zuyev said.

  "I want to live, and I want my friend to live. Max has to ordered us killed, also. With what I know, and what you know, and what my friend knows, we can to make very good deal. We can to blame Max for everything. He will go to prison forever. We make deal, not much prison."

  "I don't believe that is possible."

  "You listen to my friend Christine. She is smart, like genius. Okay?"

  "I am listening."

  CHAPTER 38

  SPACE

  LIKE EVERYONE ELSE, I've seen plenty of casino security operations on TV and movie screens. Huge walls of monitors in a dark room with an army of eagle-eyed experts watching. Hollywood got it wrong. The security operations center of the largest casino the world had ever known, was maybe half the size of a typical convenience store. Maybe. There were monitors, of course, but not a sea of them. And there were watchers, but here's where you're gonna be tempted not to believe me. I counted seven people, each seated at a computer desk with two monitors. At least there was a wall with one giant screen on it.

  Shortly after I arrived, a sturdy man of about fifty with a definite military bearing walked up with his hand extended. "Mr. Flatt, Hank Dobo."

  I shook his hand. Hank had a great handshake, strong, just long enough. "Good to meet you. Please call me Sam."

  "You got it, Sam." He gestured for me to follow him and said, "Come on, let me show you my little kingdom." He walked through the door from which he had appeared. I followed and he talked as he went. "Figure it'll
be easier for me to help you once you understand what we do and how we do it. Okay with you?"

  "You bet. Looks fascinating," I said.

  "Won't argue with you on that, Sam.”

  We stepped into what was obviously a server room, and it put Jerry Rose's (impressive) IT fiefdom to shame. This room was huge, and most of it was occupied by a glassed-in area with enough racks of servers and equipment to run a country. Dobo walked up to a glass panel that looked just like all the rest and pressed his splayed hand against it. The entire panel flashed green and slid to the side. A blast of cold air hit us and we stepped inside.

  "Now I'm impressed," I said, following him around to the back of the racks.

  He pointed at the line of racks, where thousands of cables glowed green as they snaked out of the floor, up the racks, and plugged into the backs of the servers. "Everything feeds in here, all the cameras. Self-monitoring. If there's a problem anywhere—" He walked about twenty feet down the line and pointed at a single cable, glowing red instead of green. "We can pinpoint it at a glance."

  "How many cameras are there?"

  "Seven thousand and change. All high-def, ten-eighty minimum. About a quarter are four-K." I'm sure I looked bewildered, because Dobo said, "Question?"

  "Yeah. I counted seven guys out there watching video. How are they keeping up with a thousand cameras a man?"

  He smiled. "We'll get to that." And Hank Dobo kept walking and talking, and I kept following and listening as he walked me through the techno-flow of his remarkable system. When we arrived back in the operations center, he said, "Here's where the technology really shows off."

  "Obviously," I said.

  "This is the same basic setup you'll see in just about every up-to-date casino in town. Each technician is responsible for a patrol zone, or group of cameras. Maybe five hundred of the cameras are on the general grounds, meaning they're not in the casino. Typical surveillance. The rest are divided up among the various gaming areas. Our guys watch a rotating sample of cameras, as opposed to sitting and staring at a camera waiting for something to happen."