“Any idea how he managed to get his virus on Kartal’s computer?”
“For a guy with skills like Center’s, it would have been child’s play. The tough part about installing a virus is the social engineering — that is, getting human beings to do what you want them to do. Click a program, go to a website, give up your password, plug in a USB drive, stuff like that. Center and the Libyan knew one another, they had communication between one another, and, from the e-mails, it’s clear the Libyan did not suspect Center was spying on his machine, operating his webcam, going through back doors in the software to install files and delete the footprints he left. He had Kartal hook, line, and sinker.”
“Very cool,” said Jack. The world of computer hacking was arcane to him, but he recognized that in many respects, espionage was espionage, and many of the principles were similar.
Gavin sighed now. “I’m not finished looking through this drive. It might take another month or more. For now all we really have is an electronic fingerprint that we can tie to Center if we see it again. It’s not much, but it’s something.”
Jack said, “I need to have a meeting with Gerry and the other operators and let them know your findings. Do you want me to do it alone so you can go home and get some sleep?”
Gavin shook his head. “No. I’ll be okay. I want to be there.”
TEN
Todd Wicks had never done anything like this, but, then again, Todd Wicks had never been to Shanghai.
He was here in town for the Shanghai Hi-Tech Expo, and though this wasn’t his first international trade show, this was, without question, the first time he’d met a beautiful girl in the lobby bar of his hotel who made it abundantly clear that she wanted him to come up to her room.
She was a prostitute. Todd wasn’t the worldliest guy around, but he managed to figure this out pretty quickly. Her name was Bao, and this meant, she told him in her heavy but alluring accent, “precious treasure.” She was gorgeous, maybe twenty-three years old, with long, straight black hair the color and luster of Shanxi black granite and a tight red dress that was at once both glamorous and sexy. Her body was long and lean; when he first saw her, he thought she might be a movie star or a dancer, but when he caught her eye, she lifted her glass of chardonnay off the marble bar with delicate fingers and floated over to him with a gentle but confident smile.
It was at this point Todd realized she was a “working girl,” and she was working.
He asked her if he could buy her a drink, and the bartender refilled her wineglass.
Again, Todd Wicks did not do things like this, but she was so far beyond stunning that, he told himself, he would have to make an exception, just this once.
Before Shanghai, Todd was a nice guy with a nice life. At thirty-four years old, he was the Virginia/Maryland/D.C. territory sales manager for Advantage Technology Solutions LLC, a California-based IT company. He owned a nice-sized home in Richmond’s desirable West End, where he was dad to two good-looking children and husband to a wife smarter, better looking, and more successful in her field, pharmaceutical sales, than he was in his.
He had it all, he bore no complaints, and he had no enemies.
Not until that night.
Later, when he thought back on the evening, he blamed the vodka tonics he had been drinking since dinner with colleagues, and he blamed a slight light-headedness from cold medicine he had been taking since coming down with a sinus infection on the twenty-hour flight from Dulles.
And he blamed the damn girl. Bao, the precious treasure who fucked up his life.
Just before midnight Todd and Bao stepped out of the elevator on the eleventh floor of the Sheraton Shanghai Hongkou Hotel. They were arm in arm, Todd reeling a bit from drink and his heart pounding with excitement. As they walked to the end of the hallway, Todd felt neither guilt nor remorse for what he was about to do, only some concern about how he was going to hide the ATM withdrawal of 3,50 °Chinese yuan — more than $500—from his wife. But he told himself he’d worry about that in the morning.
Now was not the time to stress.
Her suite was the same as his, a king-size bed in a room off a sitting area with a sofa and a large-screen TV, but hers was illuminated with candles and scented with incense. They sat on the sofa and she offered him another drink from the bar, but now he was worried about his ability to perform while intoxicated, so he declined.
The small talk reeled Todd Wicks in every bit as much as the young woman’s beauty. A story about her childhood was disarming; her questions about him and where he grew up, about his brothers and sisters, and her asking him about whatever sport it was that he played that kept him in such peak physical condition — all served to further mesmerize a man who was already more than willing to throw caution to the wind.
He loved her voice; it was small and halting but intelligent and confident. He wanted to ask her what a nice girl like her was doing in a place like this, but it didn’t seem to fit. This was a nice place, and his lowered inhibitions made it hard for Todd to see anything wrong with what was going on. He couldn’t see anything, for that matter, past her sparkling eyes and her plunging neckline.
She leaned forward to kiss him. He hadn’t even handed over the 3,500 yuan, but he had the strong impression that she wasn’t thinking about the money right now.
Todd knew he was a catch, surely ten times better than any other john she’d been with. Bao was into him, falling as hard as he, Todd had no doubt in his mind.
He kissed her deeply, put his hands on either side of her little face, and held her for more.
In minutes they slid off the couch onto the floor, and in minutes more her dress and heels were still there on the floor of the sitting room, but the two of them had moved to the bedroom. She lay on the bed; he stood naked above her.
He knelt down, his moist hands slid up the outsides of her legs, made their way to her underwear, and he tugged on them slightly. She was compliant, and he saw it as more evidence of her lust matching his. She lifted up to allow him to remove her silk panties from her narrow hips.
Her stomach was flat and toned, her alabaster skin radiant in the soft candlelight of the room.
Though Todd was on his knees he felt them shake under him. He rose slowly and unsteadily, and then he lay down on the bed.
In moments they were one. He was on top of her, he was seven thousand miles from home, and no one would ever know.
He moved slowly at first, but only for an instant, and then he moved faster and faster. Sweat dripped from his forehead onto her clenched face, her eyes tight with what he took as ecstasy.
He picked up the pace even more, and soon his eyes locked on her beautiful face as her head rolled from side to side in orgasm.
Yes, this was a transaction to her, it was her job, but he felt her feel
She was awash with emotion just the same as he.
He kept up his movements for a short time more, but in truth his stamina was not what he had hoped, and he came quickly.
As he gasped and panted on top of her, their bodies now still except for the movement of his lungs and the pounding of her heart, her eyes opened slowly.
He gazed deeply into them; golden sparkles flickered in the candlelight.
Just as he was about to tell her that she was perfect, her eyes blinked and then refocused on a point over his right shoulder.
Todd smiled, turned his head slowly to follow her gaze.
Standing at the edge of the bed, looming over Todd’s naked body, was a severe-looking middle-aged Chinese woman in a matte gray pantsuit. In a voice like a knife being sharpened on a whetstone she said, “Are you
“What the fuck?”
