Reaching over Phong’s shoulder, Tuniyaz pulled two color photos from the haphazard stack of papers in the folder. “Take a good look. You’re going to need to be able to recognize him on sight.” Phong made a mental list of the man’s features: short black hair, thin eyebrows, flat nose, thin lips. The only thing that stood out was that his eyes appeared rather sunken in, which may have given the bags under his eyes a false grandiosity.
“When were these photos taken?” Phong asked.
“Four and a half months ago.”
Phong closed the folder and gave it back to Tuniyaz.
“Aren’t you going to look through the rest of the information?” Tuniyaz said.
“Don’t need to. I’m going to approach him as Charlie Zheng, a Shanghai-born American entrepreneur. My cover identity, Zheng, is not going to know much of anything about Pei, and I’d prefer not to know anything either. I think it’s better that way.”
“What is the rest of your cover story?”
“Zheng has an old childhood friend who he grew up with in New York. But this friend and his family were deported back to China when they were both still very young. Phong has been searching for his friend to try and help him, and for sentimental purposes. He is here in Shanghai trying to locate him, when he discovers his old friend, a few years later, had voluntarily utilized the trafficking organization to make his way back to New York.
“Coincidentally, at the same time, Zheng and his business colleagues have been trying to get the seed money they need to start up a new company, but they’ve been unsuccessful. Zheng discovers through his informal investigation as to his old friend’s whereabouts, that a man called ‘the deity’ is a high level manager or possibly a financier of the trafficking organization. Zheng comes to believe, because this individual has so many connections throughout the Chinese business community, that he may have the money and the willingness to lend it that they are looking for. Zheng decides to try and find this man to help him with his start-up venture.”
“Why would this man help an American, even if he is Chinese-born?”
“Why would he not?” Phong said. “The list of companies he’s associated with, at least in our informal searches, include multiple companies founded or headquartered in the west, particularly Western Europe, a handful in the United States, and one even in Hong Kong. The only thing this guy is motivated by is money, and that motivation seems to transcend geographical and political boundaries.”
Phong stayed silent for a moment, but Tuniyaz didn’t say anything. “What about you? Do you think he would be willing to help an American?”
“I think it’s impossible to say either way,” Tuniyaz said. “Most Chinese these days are driven by money. Many of China’s wealthy have been leaving China for western countries, but I believe they usually retain their loyalty to China. Do you not think you will be able to pass as a native Chinese?”
Phong inhaled a long breath. “I don’t know. I’m a second generation American, and my parents came from North China, not Shanghai. I’m not sure it’s worth the effort to try to pass for a native.”
A creaking from the stairs interrupted the conversation. A halting feminine voice said, “Can I get either of you any more coffee?” Tara had timidly descended into the room.
Tuniyaz said, “Mr. Phong?”
“No, thanks.”
“We’re fine, Tara,” Tuniyaz commanded gruffly. Once Tara had retreated back up the stairs, Phong said, “Do you have information as to where I can find him? He’s in the port somewhere?”
The old man stroked the gray hair behind his ear, took another drag from his pipe, and said, “Their main offices are located inland in central Shanghai, but their operations managers are housed in their offices in south Shanghai near the waters of Hangzhou Bay, which is the deep water port. I have a map with some instructions for you.”
Tuniyaz plucked a manila folder from an end table perched next to the recliner and handed it to him. Phong examined its contents as the old man shuffled back to the recliner. In the folder was a color map of Shanghai that had been folded into quarters and a separate set of written instructions. Phong slid the map out of the folder and opened it. It was large enough that he had to hold it with both hands, like a sheet of laundry. He refolded it and examined the instructions, which were written in Mandarin. He had also included a separate copy of the two photos of Pei.
The ethnic conundrum presented by Tuniyaz re-entered Phong’s restless mind and he decided to inquire further. “May I ask if you are Chinese?”
The old man drew again from his pipe and let a stream of smoke escape from puckered lips. “I don’t reveal any information I don’t have to,” Tuniyaz said. “Force of habit.”
Phong fell silent for a moment. “I’ll be on my way then.” Phong rose abruptly. “Is the girl going to guide me back to my hotel?”
Tuniyaz let loose a sharp whistle as he rose from the recliner. A few moments later, the staircase door opened and Tara descended. “Tara, please make sure Mr. Phong makes it back to his hotel in one piece.”
“You were right about my Alaskan heritage,” Tuniyaz offered as they waited for another sampan to appear. “I’m a native Aleut.” He drew again on the pipe. “We Aleuts share a mongoloid ethnic lineage with certain parts of the Chinese population, which has allowed me to pass as an ethnic minority here for the better part of thirty years.”
“Thirty years?”
Tuniyaz nodded and bowed slightly.
Phong followed Tara onto another sampan, as a cool breeze swept across his exposed face. He focused on the old man as the river guide pushed them away from the shanty safe house. He followed the path of a few stray burning flecks of used tobacco from the old man’s pipe as they floated in a random motion until another sharp breeze caught them and hurtled them up into a slight crease between the safe house and a neighboring shanty. He wished he could follow them up into the milky blackness, back out over the East China Sea, and over the vast Pacific Ocean. Back to his wife and son.
Just one day, he thought. One more day and this will surely be the end of this whole crazy scenario.
Brooklyn, New York
Tuesday, March 4, 11:27 a.m. EST
Lee adored the smell of Okoye’s books and found that her work on her informal investigation of the Brooklyn theft and abductions was all too frequently interrupted by spontaneous intellectual excursions into brief histories of northern Africa, an introduction to the philosophy of African politics, or the geographical diversity of the continent. She thought how great it would be to be rid of all of her current problems and hop a flight to Africa to ward off the cold of New York. She wondered, due to her current situation, whether she would even be allowed onto a commercial flight. She thought probably not.
Lee sighed deeply as she bit into a golden apple. She groped about in the dim lighting with her right hand, grasped Okoye’s HUD, and slid it on. Moving about as Okoye’s avatar, she moved along the central corridor until she came to a cluster of fern trees which formed an informal little floral alcove. She slid into it so that she was hidden away from the traffic. She didn’t want to be bothered by any of Okoye’s acquaintances, mostly because she didn’t want the stress of having to carry a conversation on his behalf.
She used her laptop keyboard to open a virtual secondary window and call up the directory she’d found earlier that contained the development files for the Chinese monastery. As had happened in her earlier attempt, when she attempted to open the files, a red notification message flashed, indicating that she didn’t have the proper credentials. She grabbed a slip of paper with a series of numbers and symbols written on it, numbers and symbols that were scrawled in Okoye’s tidy penmanship. She placed it next to her keyboard so she could read it and typed the characters into the virtual password field. The red notification disappeared, and she was cleared to view the files.
She pulled up the first file and examined its history. The creator had used a login id of dyzhang49. She cross-refer
enced this user id against the employee database and easily found that the owner of the user id was a man named David Zhang. His job title indicated he’d been a development intern for Brooklyn Venture Capital during the late spring and summer of 2007.
She brought up some editing software she had on her desktop that allowed her to see the files three dimensionally as they would appear in the portal, though she didn’t believe the files were active. The first few depicted a stunning rendering of a Chinese warrior from an ancient time. It was a series of files depicting the same warrior at different stages of completion. The sketch in the second series of files was that of a Chinese totem pole with a series of mythical creatures carved into it. The third series she recognized as the dragon’s head sculpted into the mountainside in the alpine scene she’d experienced in her last tour of the monastery.
She began to go through all of the files, one at a time. She eventually stumbled across what she thought were more pieces of the monastery: the circular fountain with the meditating Buddha on top, the stone grave markers, and parts of the brick terrace. She was studying the detail in the Buddha when she heard a thumping from her laptop speakers.
She slid the HUD off. Wang was instant messaging her through the old hacker site.
Pan-Ik: Get here, now! Meng clicked on your link. Everything went off great!
Lee gasped. She hurriedly typed out that she’d be there in twenty minutes. She threw on her winter shoes, gloves, and coat, climbed down the ladder into a circular sitting room, dashed down to ground level, and exited into the frigid Brooklyn air.
Chapter 35
Manhattan, New York
Tuesday, March 4, 11:32 a.m. EST
A frigid breeze greeted Reardon as he stepped out of his heated pickup truck, grabbing his leather briefcase as he went. The truck groaned as he shifted his weight off of it and slung the briefcase shoulder strap over his head. The ex-athlete, who had always been nimble for his weight, moved easily across the white gravel of the parking lot, and entered through the tinted glass doors of the command center in west Midtown. After passing through the security check, he made his way into the main room, which was busy with activity devoted entirely to Operation Crimson Shield. At the moment, the place was comparatively empty as most of the agents working the case were out in the field.
He slipped into the hallway running parallel to the east-facing side of the building, making his way to his temporary office. On his way, he waved a greeting to Rose who was sitting at his desk, speaking with someone on the phone. Reardon slid his briefcase onto his desk, and hung his coat on a rack before revisiting Rose’s office. Rose, who appeared his usual fatigued self with his graying hair askew and his shirt sleeves rolled halfway to his elbows, beckoned at him as he disconnected his cell phone.
“Milt, please come in.”
Reardon nodded a greeting.
Rose said, “Heard anything at all yet from Lyn Lee?”
“No, nothing. She’s a smart young lady. She seems to have done an excellent job of making herself disappear.”
“Is she receiving assistance from the Chinese?”
“Jillian and myself are working on it. As you know, we’re still getting the video feeds from the Imperial Empress, but we haven’t seen anything regarding Lyn Lee in the feeds. We’ve reviewed recent activity on her bank accounts and credit cards. She withdrew four thousand dollars in cash out of an ATM in Brooklyn just a half hour after she left the Ingenuity Ball. We haven’t seen any activity in her accounts since. We’ve spoken with her parents and friends, but nobody seems to know where she is. They are all worried sick about her and, to a person, deny she could have any involvement with the Chinese government.”
“You’ve followed up with the bank where Lee has her accounts?”
“Yes, the bank has confirmed that the wire transfers into her accounts are legitimate and they originated from Chinese banks. They showed us the video footage of her when she visited the bank to initiate the transactions. It the young woman on the video isn’t her, it certainly bears a striking resemblance. We’ve asked the bank to check into the possibility that they were hacked, which presumably had to have happened if the transfers were completed without her authorization. If it’s not her, the Chinese have done a heck of a convincing job of the illusion.”
Rose nodded. “I know you two will find her sooner rather than later.”
“I have another piece of bad news, unfortunately.”
“Yes?”
“The lead we’d generated on the van that was used in Jonas Craig’s abduction appears to have been a false lead.”’
Rose frowned and scratched his nose. “How so?”
“As you know, we took Xinyuan Ai’s van into custody. Forensics hasn’t been able to find any evidence in the van linking Craig, although it does appear that it has been professionally cleaned since Craig’s abduction. They’ve had plenty of time to clean it out. We’ve made an exhaustive search of Ai’s home in Williamsburg, including an audit of his personal computer and electronic communications. We have yet to find anything at all that would link Ai to this case.”
Rose shook his head. “There’s gotta be something out there. I feel like we’re getting close. Something has to give at some point.” Rose’s cell phone rang again. Rose plucked it from his pocket, checked the caller ID. “It’s Lorren. I’ve got to take this one. Keep me up to date.”
Reardon grunted an acknowledgement and made his way back to his office to check in with his agents out in the field.
Brooklyn, New York
Tuesday, March 4, 12:38 p.m. EST
Lee’s heart beat rapidly from her rush to North Brooklyn. She rapped on Wang’s door as she slid her hat and gloves into her purse.
Wang was grinning when he appeared before her in the entryway. “Come in,” Wang said. “It’s cold out there.”
Wang’s thin, bony frame sagged against the doorframe. His eyes were bloodshot, his hair askew.
Lee said, “You look exhausted. Have you been up all night?”
Wang sighed and adjusted his glasses. “Yeah. It’s taken me a while to get everything in order.”
“What do you mean? I thought all we had to do was get Meng to click on one of the links to install the software?”
A wry grin spread across Wang’s face. “It’s never that simple.”
“What have you been doing all night?”
“Once the installation software is downloaded, it takes a while to establish the connection and then make it permanent, so it can survive a system reboot.”
“And you succeeded?” Lee asked as she tossed her coat and purse onto his sofa.
“Oh, yes. Nothing has gone entirely as I planned it, but it rarely does. The initial download failed but, fortunately, Meng clicked on that pdf we made that I injected the installation code into. We struck out on the first try, but the backup worked.” Wang paused for a moment. “I also got the rootkit installed as well as some remote access software I helped write. That’ll allow us access to Meng’s computer for as long as we need it, unless he or his system admins discover our presence. I think I’ve managed to get everything buttoned down pretty well, though. I even managed to crack the password to the mail server, which will give us access to all of his email. I thought that might prove useful.”
“When did Meng click on the link?”
Wang checked his watch. “A few hours ago.”
Lee hugged him. “Thanks for your help with this, Kep.”
“No problem. Let’s go see what we can find on Meng’s computer.”
Lee slid in front of one of Wang’s computers. Wang showed her how to enter and exit Meng’s system and gave her a diagram he’d started of its general layout.
“I’m so glad this worked out,” Lee said. “I wasn’t looking forward to having to talk to Meng again.”
“You may have to speak with him again at some point. To buy time.”
Lee was silent as she began searching through Meng’s system.
Wang said, “You remember my friend, Qi Luo? He took a call from Meng yesterday.”
Lee looked toward Wang, who had a smirk on his face. “Are you serious? How’d it go?”
Wang shrugged. “He thinks it went fine. Meng just asked a few general questions. Luo said he was taken aback by the pricing.”
Lee smiled. “That was the intent, right?”
“Exactly. Hopefully he’ll just go away.”
Wang let Lee work in silence. She wasn’t used to working without a graphical user interface, and it took a long while for her to adjust to working with a command line. Wang patiently helped her through it. Eventually, she was navigating Meng’s files and applications with ease and sorting through his email. Wang continued working on higher-level activity, investigating Meng’s system for any vulnerabilities in software, open ports or other internet connections, and the presence of any other company-owned servers.
Lee’s first apparent break came at the discovery of a series of emails between Meng and a man named Zhang Qianfang. She immediately recognized the Zhang surname from David Zhang, the creator of the monastery files in the portal. From the footer in his emails, she learned that Zhang Qianfang was the CEO of a firm called Far East Marketing and Media Solutions. After an exhaustive internet search, she discovered the company was based in Shanghai with offices in New York. She also retrieved a five-year-old article in an obscure Chinese business journal that indicated that Nuo Zhang was Qianfang’s son.
To this point, Lee noted that the emails were business related. Zhang’s marketing team was working with Meng to figure out a marketing plan for one of his clients. Thus, the emails were benign in their content in that there was no direct reference to anything related to Brooklyn Capital or to theft of information or to the abductions. However, they did provide a sorely needed link between Meng and Brooklyn Capital.
The Thought Cathedral Page 45