Helen Hanson - Dark Pool (30 page)

The nap hadn’t been enough. She felt wilted.

“The first page I found showed gold on deposit and cash sitting in banks around the world. Forty billion dollars worth, Maggie. I figured there had to be more pages. The decimal places in pi go on forever without repeating, so I added the next digit to the URL. Bam. More information came up.”

The gleam in his eye worried her. He was teetering on the edge.

“I kept adding another digit to the URL until I hit a 404 error. “You would not believe what’s on those pages, Magpie. My head’s about to kerplode.”

She stood up with a sigh. “C’mon, tell me in the kitchen. This story requires more caffeine.”

“When Mom got sick, Dad spent night after night at the computer writing code. That’s when I first became really interested in programming. He’d let me hang out with him and stay up late asking endless questions.”

“You asked questions about everything.” She smiled at the fond memory. “He gave you just enough information to force you to the next logical question.”

“If I got that next question right, he’d let me ask another. But if I didn’t get it right, he—” Travis’ face blanked. “Hey. Dad set me up for this.”

“Set you up for what?”

“Don’t you see?” Travis wiped back his hair. “He planned this whole thing back when Mom was alive. He knew exactly what I’d do with these messages because he trained me like Pavlov’s dog.”

Maggie wasn’t sure if Travis was impressed or pissed. Their father always knew the next move. “Back to the story.” She poured out the old coffee and started a new pot. “Tell me about his programming.”

“I found all his source programs on the web pages. He didn’t want to leave them uncompiled at the hosting site, in case someone found them.”

Maggie spoke through a yawn, “What does the code do?”

“He wrote a monster program that crawls through websites, in this case, banks and stuff, and then it recreates all the pages it finds.”

“Like a fake PayPal page that tries to get your login information.”

“Exactly, a spoofed web page. People think they’re logging into the legitimate site and then they enter their account numbers, passwords, whatever. That’s how Dad stole O’Mara’s money.”

“You really think Dad took the money?”

Travis leaned on the counter. “Anytime O’Mara or a client checked his account, it went to one of Dad’s pages instead. They looked identical. It’s a classic middle-man hack. Meanwhile, Dad took everything.” He touched Maggie’s elbow. “Seriously, I mean everything. He even took their last can of Who-hash.”

Maggie smirked, but it seemed impossible. “What about the investors who cashed out? Lots of the early investors made serious money off O’Mara’s Ponzi scheme.”

“Dad saw every request for money in or out of O’Mara’s accounts. He’d put real cash in the real account, as needed, to keep the whole thing floating. He even spoofed O’Mara’s bank statements.”

News like this should hurt. It probably would later. Right now, she was numb. “But the actual cash transmissions would have been encrypted. Every time you buy something on the internet, the web page has that little lock at the top to show it’s encrypted with SSL. Decrypting that isn’t an easy hack.”

“It’s been done, but on an old revision. Dad faked the little lock too, when he needed it. But, I’ve read that the hard core traders rarely encrypt their trade transmissions. Encryption adds time to the trade even if the user wouldn’t notice the lag. We’re talking milliseconds. But those guys don’t want to wait that long.”

She poured a steaming mug of courage. “Okay, show me.” She trailed him to the laptop and pointed at a web page. “So Dad’s compiled program files only served up this page because you hit the right address.”

“Exactly. When we close this page, the information goes away.” He pointed to the number at the top of the page. $ 40,763,902,384.51. “Check it out, Magpie.”

The number was too big to believe. “Daddy really did all this.”

“Pretty freakin smart, eh?”

She lowered her eyelids at him. “Real smart. Look where it’s gotten him.”

“I know. It sounds bad.”

“Bad. You’re joking right? The SEC and the FBI and the XYZ will be crawling all over our shit.”

Travis’ glance sliced the room. “Do we have to tell them?”

She tried to think of a way to explain this to him. But every response turned into an insult. “Okay.” Maggie got up from her chair. “Clearly the rational portion of this conversation has concluded.”

The phone rang. She scurried to grab it on the first round. “Hello.” She caught a breath.

“Your father is safe as long as you follow my exact instructions.”

The words landed like a punch.

“I want two million dollars transferred to my account in the morning.”

She tried to find her voice. “You have my father?”

“Expect a call in exactly eighteen hours. You and your brother better be ready to move the money, or be ready to bury him.”

He didn’t expect anyone to answer the doorbell. Both beagles loudly objected to his presence on the other side of the threshold. A movement at the curtain revealed an eye peering out at him. The height of its appearance told him it was Travis. The young man opened the door with apprehension.

“Maggie’s not here.” He glanced over his shoulder as if to make certain.

“I called earlier, but thought I’d take a chance to see if she was home. I’m so sorry to hear about your father.”

“Yeah. Me too.” He kept the door within an easy slam.

Travis’ entire demeanor had changed since their last meeting. Before, he was the one who seemed amenable to Kurt’s involvement—even sympathetic—while Maggie wanted him stretched across the rack. This trip, Kurt seemed to cause Travis’ discomfort.

His father was missing, but it had to be more than that. The kid knew Kurt wasn’t involved. Maybe it was O’Mara’s money. The last time Kurt mentioned that money in this house, his spidey senses were a-tingle.

Opportunity was closing along with the door. “May I have one minute of your time? I promise, you want me gone after sixty seconds, I’m out of here.” Travis wore something that resembled suspicion.

“Leave the front door open. I won’t go past the foyer.” Kurt squatted down to rub a beagle face. “You can sic the wild animals on me if I do.”

Whatever was working on Travis, Kurt wasn’t the threat. He stepped back far enough to let Kurt in and keep some personal space. His arms lashed across his chest and one of his feet danced. “What do you want?”

“Your sister called me. Do you know why?”

Travis hesitated.

Kurt expected the next words to be measured.

“We spent all night looking for my Dad. She was really upset when she called.”

And that didn’t answer the question. “Did you hear that Patty O’Mara died?”

Travis reached for one of the dogs. “It’s been on the same newscasts as the ones reporting my father missing. They caught the woman who did it today.”

“I heard. Did she work at the chocolate store?” Kurt knew the answer, but he wanted to keep the kid talking.

“She got the job after she lost her retirement money. When she found out O’Mara was still buying expensive chocolates, it wrecked her head.” Travis didn’t make eye contact.

“It’s been tough working with some of these people. Their entire savings wiped out overnight. I sure don’t condone murder, but the anger these people feel is entirely justified.”

The kid continued to play with the dogs. He didn’t seem to be in a hurry for Kurt to leave.

“Did your father know Patty O’Mara?”

Travis stared at Kurt. “No, and I think your minute is up.”

“Did you know there’s a big reward for finding that money?”

His eyebrow rose and fell quickly. He sniffed at the air as if to cover his interest. “I hadn’t heard.”

Kurt was certain. The kid knew plenty. “I’m being paid a lot of money to find O’Mara’s pot of gold. If I’m the one who finds it, I’ll get the finder’s fee, too. It’s sizable. Of course, if someone else finds the money, then that person could claim it.”

He locked his gaze on Travis until the kid eased away to comb one of the dogs. An intentional move that completely telegraphed the kid’s next play. Kurt almost felt bad. The kid was big but so young. Kurt knew exactly what the kid’s question would be. How much?

Travis took a while in responding. The dog’s grooming seemed to keep his interest far longer than it warranted. He stood to his full height and closed the front door behind Kurt. He bent a knee and leaned back to rest his left foot against the wall. Finally, he broke the silence. “What if someone didn’t want the reward?”

Now all of Kurt’s senses were tingling. “Why wouldn’t someone want to claim the money?”

Travis fastened his intense green gaze on Kurt. “Hypothetically?”

Whoa. Kurt had underestimated this young man. There was only one way to play this game. His way. “By all means, hypothetically.”

“Well, the reason doesn’t really matter. Say the money found its way back to the investors. Hypothetically.” He nodded at Kurt. “The SEC wouldn’t really have a case anymore, would it?”

“That scenario sure would leave them scratching a collective head. Especially now that O’Mara is dead.” Kurt eyed the kid in a new light. “But I don’t know that there would be a reason to continue the case, especially if there were no clear tracks back to the investor accounts. Hypothetically.”

“Tell me about Daryl Betts.”

The name hit like a shock wave. “Daryl Betts.” Kurt tried to compose himself. “Uh, he was an investigator for the SEC who died a couple of years back. He lost control of his motorcycle and hit a tree.”

“Was he investigating O’Mara?”

SEC Chairman Catharine Boson fiercely guarded this secret. Kurt only knew because an informant from the DC case told him in confidence. If the news leaked, she’d lose her job. And while she deserved to, how the hell did Travis hear about it?

“I don’t have any first-hand knowledge that he was.”

Travis’ lips curled into a lopsided grin. The nuance of Kurt’s non-answer wasn’t lost on this young man.

Travis nodded several little nods before he spoke again. “Is there a class action lawsuit for the case?”

This kid was fascinating. “Absolutely.”

“Is the list publically available? Hypothetically?”

With all the blood thumping in his head, Kurt’s hearing felt wired for surround sound. “It’s a legal proceeding, so the names of all the litigants are part of the public record. If you know of anyone, hypothetically, who might want this list, I’d be happy to get a copy to you.”

“I don’t, but it sounds interesting.” He moved his foot back to the floor. “You can send a copy if you want.”

“I have someone who’ll be out this way in about an hour.” He hadn’t, but he did now. Kurt stuffed his hands in his pocket and found the The Rockstag Group party list from earlier. He took it out and unfolded it. “Will you still be here?”

“Yeah.”

“I’ll send a lady named Stephanie. You can’t miss her. Squeaky voice, spiked hair, and a really bad memory of any task I give her.”

“She sounds nice.”

“You know, Travis, I have another list that might interest you. It’s from a party given by The Rockstag Group a few years back.”

The kid’s face went cloudy. “Oh.”

“I know you’ve had some issues with these people.” He handed the pages to him. “All this talk about Patty O’Mara reminded me I had this. Seems he helped pay for this party. Even invited quite a few of the guests.”

This got the kid’s attention. He scanned the first page. “Who invited the Governor?”

“The CEO of The Rockstag Group. Apparently they’re quite friendly.”

Travis shot an angry glare. “My attorney told me the judge had gotten some pressure from the Governor to make an example out of me. I wish I was old enough to vote against him.”

Maybe the kid was framed. “So, hypothetically, someone who might want to move some money might have to use a computer.”

“I guess he or she would.”

Kurt looked around. “This sure is a nice beach you live on. How’s internet access?”

“Screaming good.” Travis glanced up from the party list. “According to Maggie. I don’t use it since my trial.”

“Are you supposed to stay off computers?”

“Thanks to Governor Williams, it’s part of my re-integration into society.” He turned the page. “I need to get my mind right, you know. I’m not so interested in computers these days.”

“Your sister must have one though.”

“Maggie has an old laptop that she uses. Fortunately—” Travis’ smile went to high-beams. “Her skills compensate for its deficiencies.”

Kurt grinned back at him. The kid was enjoying this. But his smile faded, and he handed the list to Kurt. “Some celebrities too. It’s nice to know the guys who framed me have connections. I bet they get fifty-yard seating at the ‘Niners’ games.”

“Maybe in the press box.”

“No one said life is fair.” Travis pushed the stray black hairs from his face.

Kurt stood in awe. He wasn’t sure what the next step was in this wild game of poker. He wanted to find out what cards the kid was holding, but he had to walk away from this hand. The kid owned the pot. Then Kurt remembered. He had a small ante for the next deal.

“Thanks, Travis. If anyone asks, I stopped by because I thought I’d seen your father, but unfortunately, it wasn’t him.”

“I appreciate your coming.”

“Wait here one minute.” Kurt held up a finger. “I have something for your sister.”

Travis was hanging on the door when Kurt came back from the car. “Here.” Kurt handed him an unmarked box containing the computer Stephanie bought. Travis wore a puzzled look when he took it.

Kurt winked at him. “Some flowers for Maggie.”