Net Force (30 page)

    The car shadowing him was one of those ubiquitous little sedan things, like millions of others on the net and in the Real World, and he wouldn’t have noticed it, save that he was doing a standard side-road loop-the-loop to check for just such problems. This was the third of his evasive maneuvers, and while he had not spotted the tail before, he had to assume it had been with him for some time. How long had he been under surveillance? That was merely the first of several questions, wasn’t it? Who was it? How had they found him? What was the best way to rid himself of them?

    He swung the Corvette back onto the main road. Best to pretend he did not see them. Better the devil one knew than the devil one did not.

    The gray car followed, maintaining a fairly long distance, but assuring him he was right. They would be gathering information generated from his vehicle-vectors, construction, code modules, all things that, in the hands of an expert, could eventually point to him. VR was a metaphorical place, but the images had real underpinnings. They could be recorded and perhaps traced-especially since if it was Net Force, they had enough computer power to brute-force their way through programmer profiles. The longer they stayed with him, the fewer possibilities they would have to sift. Before, he could have been one of tens or hundreds of thousands; now, every minute they stayed with him, that number fell. Every programmer had a style-and the best of them had styles that were as nearly as individual as fingerprints or DNA profiles. If they stayed with him long enough, they would suck his true identity out-or get so close they’d find him on a first or second pass through their strainers. It was a matter of knowing what to look for, of which questions to ask the search system.

    Damn!

    He was on the North EuroAsian Highway now, already through the Baltics and almost home. He couldn’t go there, of course, but a sudden course change would engender suspicion in his pursuers. Too, he had to assume they weren’t alone. There could be cars rolling ahead of him, others waiting at intersections for him to pass. If the little gray car was that of a Net Force or affiliated agent, then there almost certainly would be others around.

    All right. He could turn off on the India Highway a hundred kilometers ahead, lead them south and away from home. He could park the car, go into a restaurant, bail from the scenario-

    No, what was he thinking? That kind of panicky reflex would leave them the car and a possible way to trace it.

    Something else…

    It had worked once. Maybe it would work again. Maybe he could lose the chase car, take a side road, maybe duck other pursuit. Get away from this scenario and dump it.

    Certainly worth a try.

    He slowed, allowed the following car to draw a bit nearer. When he was ready, he drew the spikes from the pouch he carried, and with a quick and practiced hand, scattered them across all four lanes behind him, a sharp-pointed shower-

    The pursuer swerved, missed most of the caltrops, but still ran over a few.

    Aha!

    His bright flare of triumph went dark quickly. The gray car’s tires did not deflate, nor did it slow. If anything, it speeded up.

    Damn, damn! They must suspect who he was, at least in this persona and vehicle. They knew what to expect, had hardened their program against his defense. Unfortunately, he didn’t have much else in the way of armament-at least nothing that would stop people as good as these had to be. He had plenty of smoke-and-mirror programs, but they wouldn’t do the trick here.

    If he couldn’t shake them, he couldn’t lead them very far, either. They already knew too much. He could not take the risk they’d pull enough more information by osmosis to further narrow down their search. He wouldn’t be able to make the India Road.

    He had to get out of VR now!

    The damage-to-system warning light flashed on his computer, along with the vox: “Warning! System Failure! Warning! System Failure!”

    Plekhanov degeared and slapped at the power switch, killed the juice to his computer, not bothering with the emergency shut-down procedures. Data would be corrupted, the OS would be mangled and the VR was probably a total loss. None of that mattered when seconds counted for escape or capture.

    Damn, damn,
damn
! How had they found him?

    How much did they know?

    

    
Sunday, October 3rd, 3:10 p.m. Quantico

    Ahead of them, the Corvette exploded into a bright flash of light, then vanished.

    “Shit!” Jay said.

    “There he goes,” Tyrone said to Bella. “He spotted us and crashed out.” To Jay, he said, “You get anything useful?”

    “Yeah, yeah, I think so. He was on the road to Central Asia-Russia, one of the CIS, maybe. He might have turned off at the India Road up ahead, or been going on through to the Orient, but if he was planning to head south, he should have cut that way a hundred klicks back. Besides, he doesn’t drive like any Japanese or Korean I’ve ever seen. I think he was going home, and I think he drives like a Russian.”

    “What is he talking about?” Bella said.

    Tyrone explained it to her, about programmers’ styles.

    “We’re gonna have to take what we’ve got home and study it,” Jay said. “Maybe we got enough to nail this sucker.”

    

    
Sunday, October 3rd, 3:23 p.m. Quantico

    Michaels waved his phone circuit to life. “Yes?”

    “Boss, Jay Gridley. We got something on the guy who has been giving us fits in Europe and Asia.”

    Michaels felt a quick stab of disappointment. Steve Day was higher up on his personal priority list right at the moment; still, the other business was more important for Net Force, even if his career did go down in flames. “That’s great, Jay.”

    “I’ll be in there as soon as I’ve tied up the loose ends,” Jay added.

    As soon as Michaels discommed, the phone cheeped again.

    “Hello?”

    “Hey, Dadster!”

    “Hey, Kidster.”

    “You sleeping late?”

    Three-thirty in the afternoon and she wanted to know if he was still in bed. He smiled. “Nope, I’m at work.”

    As a matter of course, Net Force had an agent keeping an eye on Susie, plus the local cops had been alerted, but there hadn’t been any signs of trouble so far.

    “Mom got the visual fixed. Scope it out.”

    The image of his daughter blinked onto his computer screen. She wore blue coveralls and a red T-shirt. Her hair was shorter than he remembered; she must have gotten it cut. What a beautiful child she was, a younger image of her mother. That was a totally objective thought, of course, her being beautiful. He grinned, tapping the camera control to send his visual to her.

    “Whoa, Dadster, you look like Drac’s old granny.”

    “Who is Drac’s granny?”

    “Come
on
, you don’t watch
Drac’s Pack
! It’s only the number-one entcom
anywhere
, Dad! Vince O’Connell is Drac, Stella Howard is his wife, Brad Thomas Jones is the son? The old granny is the mom from
Chunk Monks
’? Are you living on the moon?”

    He grinned again. “I haven’t had much chance to watch the entcom casts lately.”

    “It’s a great show, you should watch it. Anyway, you look awful. You’re not sick, are you?”

    “Nope. Just tired. Working too hard, not getting enough rest. But I got a dog, though.”

    “A
dog
! An
RW
dog, not a sim?”

    “Yep.”

    “What kind? When did you get it? Will you bring it with you when you come for my play? How big is it? What’s its name? What color is it? Is it smart?”

    He laughed. “It’s a toy poodle, his name is Scout and he’s about as big as a medium-sized cat. He’s pretty smart. I think he’ll like you.”

    “Too
shiny
!” She glanced off camera, then yelled: “Mom! Dad got a
dog
! He’s going to bring it when he comes to visit!”

    He heard his ex-wife mutter something in the background.

    “You think he’ll like me?”

    “I’m sure he will, sweetie.”

    Watching her, the thought about leaving Washington and moving out West came up again. It sounded better all the time. Of course, he would rather go out with his banner held high, not dragging in the dust. But still…

    Well. The clock was running. He needed to finish this, whatever else he did. Steve Day wasn’t going to be forgotten. No way.

    

    
Sunday, October 3rd, 4:00 p.m. Long Island, New York

    Ray Genaloni glanced at his watch. Traffic, even this far out on Long Island on a damned Sunday, was terrible. Of course, he was in the back of a limo with his driver having to deal with it, but even so, it pissed him off. Every minute he spent stuck in a crawl of cars and trucks was one more he wouldn’t get to spend with Brigette.

    It wasn’t as though he didn’t get out here once or twice a week. And it wasn’t as if Brigette was the best thing ever to pull off her skirt. He’d had better, a couple of times, actually. On the other hand, she was drop-dead gorgeous, ten years younger than he was, and willing to do anything he asked-stuff he would never
think
about mentioning to his wife, much less trying to
do
.

    When he got to Brigette’s place-a little house he’d bought for her on a cul-de-sac in a quiet neighborhood among far bigger and more expensive houses-Genaloni sat in his car until his guards in the car in front of his got out and did a quick check of the area. When he came out here, he always had two or three guys in a car in front of the limo, and a couple more in a car behind it. They stayed outside until he was done, even though nobody had ever tried to follow him out here as far as he could tell.

    He rang the bell, and his mistress opened the door, dressed in a transparent black silky thing that went from her neck to the floor but hid absolutely nothing. Her grandparents had come from Sweden or Denmark or somewhere like that, and she was big, busty, and fit. You could also see she was a natural blonde. She had two glasses of champagne in her hands, the glasses still frosted from the freezer.

    “Hi, handsome. My husband is out. Want to come in and have a drink?”

    He smiled. Sometimes they played games. He took a glass of champagne and stepped in past her. He knew she was giving his bodyguards a show, and he liked that.
Suffer, boys
, he thought.

    As soon as she closed the door, he slid one hand underneath the silk thing and cupped one of her breasts. No silicone here, just smooth, warm boob.

    “Well. If that’s what you want, we’d better hurry before my husband gets home.”

    “He can wait his turn,” Genaloni said.

    

    
Sunday, October 3rd, 2:01 p.m. Las Vegas

    Even in the airport, there were machines: slot machines, poker machines, keno machines, electronic beggars lined up to take your money as you walked to your flight. The walls were plastered with giant viewscreens showing dazzling stage magicians, wild-animal acts, and showgirls clothed only in glitter.

    Ruzhyo watched as the Snake stopped and fed a dollar bill into one of the slot machines, then cranked the big handle and waited expectantly. The machine whirled its bright colors, then clicked to a stop. Grigory the Snake shook his head, grinned, shrugged. He was not a winner.

    “Don’t know when to quit, does he?” Winters said.

    Ruzhyo did not speak to that, though it was certainly true. In three days here, Grigory had lost at least five thousand dollars gambling. His one small winning streak at the blackjack tables had ended quickly. In addition to his losses, he had probably spent another two thousand dollars on whores. Of course, it was his money, and he was well paid by Plekhanov; still, seven thousand dollars would provide food and shelter for an average family back home for, what? Nearly two years? Grigory was a fool, a waste of oxygen.

    “I have a call to make,” Ruzhyo said. “Let him spend whatever he wants until the plane leaves. We have more than an hour.”

    “I’m gonna mosey on over to that gift shop, pick up a magazine.”

    Ruzhyo nodded. He moved to a bank of public telephones, clamped a one-time scrambler over the mouthpiece and dialed the emergency number. The call took a few seconds, since it was being rerouted five or six times around the world on its way. He was not worried, at least not much, but Plekhanov had missed the last two scheduled calls, on Friday and Saturday, and this was the procedure in such a case.

    “Yes,” came Plekhanov’s voice. It was terse.

    “All is well?”

    “Basically. There has been an unexpected glitch. A small thing, but a bit worrisome.”

    Ruzhyo waited to hear whatever it was Plekhanov wanted him to hear. It was not long in coming.

    “That… engineering matter you began has not been completed to my satisfaction.”

    Ruzhyo knew they were speaking of the action to divert Net Force’s attention-the assassination of its leader, the dragon’s teeth sown to put that organization at war with the criminal group. He said, “It is early, yet.”

    “Nonetheless, we need to bring that matter along. The small glitch of which I spoke has arisen from that direction, and requires an earlier completion date for the overall project.”

    “I see.”

    “An attempt was made to, ah, duplicate your first experiment. By someone in the employ of the Italian company. They were unable to match your end results.”

    So. The Genaloni organization had tried kill the new head of Net Force and failed. Most interesting. He had not seen anything on the news about this.

    “And you want me to take care of that?”