Nick Stephenson - Panic

“You can’t just hack in to someone’s private account.”

“Actually, I can,” said Leopold, punching Hank’s details into his cell phone. “I have a contact who can look into this sort of thing. I’ll send everything over. Shouldn’t take long.”

He hit the send button, ignoring the sergeant’s protestations, and turned his attention back to Hank’s body.

“We need to keep looking,” said Mary. “There must be something here that can explain what happened that doesn’t involve us breaking about fifty federal laws.”

“We can start with the laptop in the bedroom,” said Jerome. “There’s probably something on the hard drive we can use.”

The bodyguard led the way into the bedroom and pointed out the laptop, shoved into a corner of the bed and partially obscured by the pillows. The bedding and furniture was old, but the room itself had been recently redecorated, like the rest of the apartment. Leopold picked up the laptop and turned it on, taking a seat on the bed. The others peered in over his shoulder.

“This is definitely Christina’s laptop,” said Leopold, “judging by the number of college papers on here. Looks like she’s left her email open.”

He scrolled through the emails and noticed that among the unread messages, one sender kept jumping out.

“Cupid,” said the consultant, jabbing the screen with his index finger.

“Who?” said Mary.

“Christina has received at least a dozen emails from someone calling himself ‘Cupid.’ Looks like an anonymous sender.”

He opened up the latest message for them all to see. The message read:

I know what you did and I’m going to tell. You can’t hide from me any more. You’re going to get what’s coming to you.

Senator Logan sat at the desk in his bedroom, staring intently at the bank of slim computer monitors in front of him. Stark couldn’t quite make out what the text read from where he was standing in the doorway, but it looked like a list of banking transactions.

“You asked to see me sir?” said the colonel, knocking softly on the open door.

“Yes, I need an update on Blake,” said Logan, turning off the monitors.

“They found Hank, sir. He’s dead.”

The senator turned his desk chair to face his chief security officer, a look of deep concern on his face. “This is very disturbing news,” he said. “Do they know what happened?”

“My team’s surveillance equipment picked up most of their conversation. Blake is saying Hank was murdered. They’ve also found a lead on Christina’s computer; it appears that someone was sending her threatening emails.”

“Threatening what?”

“We don’t know, sir. But we understand they’re going to try and track down the computer the messages were sent from.”

“Good,” said the senator. “Keep an eye on them. If they find anything, let me know immediately. I can’t afford any more delays.”

Stark nodded, and the senator turned back to his monitors, signaling the end of the conversation. The colonel left the room and closed the door behind him. He paced across the thick carpet and entered one of the empty guest bedrooms, a large room with an immaculately prepared king-sized bed against the far wall. Facing the fireplace on the opposite wall were two leather armchairs, arranged either side of a mahogany coffee table. Satisfied he couldn’t be overheard, Stark took a seat and patched his comms system through to Dolph’s earpiece.

“Your orders, sir?” said the blond.

“Keep an eye on Blake and don’t underestimate his bodyguard.”

“Yes, sir. Have the senator’s plans changed?”

“No, we’re still on track.”

“And if Blake finds anything?”

“If the plan is compromised, make sure you use the German. He’s in the vicinity if we need him. Don’t take any risks. We can’t have this traced back to us.”

Stark turned off his earpiece. Thanks to Blake’s bodyguard, it would be almost impossible to follow them much further without being spotted, and Dolph would have to drop back and risk losing them in the crowd. Without an audio link, it would be difficult to keep track of Blake’s progress. No matter; in a few hours the game would be over. And Stark always won.

“So how do we find Cupid?” asked Mary. “I can think of a few questions I’d like to ask this guy.”

“We’ll start with an email trace,” said Leopold. “Jerome has a contract in place with the same company that handles data sniffing for the CIA, so this should be a piece of cake. I just need to log in to their database and run the program.”

He isolated the email’s source code and opened the text in the web browser. Accessing the online database, he copied in the code and hit confirm once he had finished. Less than a minute later, he received an email with a file attachment.

“Okay, let’s open it up,” said Leopold, downloading the file.

The computer screen showed a two-dimensional map of Manhattan, with a pulsing red dot indicating the origin of the email and a green dot showing their current location. The message had been sent from just a couple of miles away. He zoomed in to street level.

“That’s strange,” said Leopold.

“What is it?” asked Mary

“According to the tracer, the email originated from a computer somewhere on the Columbia campus, but according to the maps, there are no buildings within at least a hundred feet of its location.”

“So maybe the tracer is a little inaccurate. Or maybe someone just used a laptop. At least we know someone at the University has been threatening Christina.”

“Actually, this software is cutting edge and accurate to within three feet,” said Leopold, scrolling through a long text file that had accompanied the tracer results. “According to the data here, the email was sent from a machine hooked up to a hard line, so it couldn’t have been a laptop or cell phone. It would have to be a computer linked up to the University’s own physical network via cable.”

“Wouldn’t a machine like that be inside?” asked Mary. “There’s no buildings there.”

“That’s the problem with two dimensional maps,” said the consultant, frowning. “They can’t tell you anything about elevation. The computer we’re looking for must be underground. The University keeps its storage and archive rooms beneath the main campus, and plenty of areas will have been sealed off over time. We just need to get down there and take a look.”

“How do we get in?” asked Mary. “Most of the campus is closed to the public.”

“Thankfully, I’m not a member of the general public. According to rumor, Columbia has a series of underground tunnels that connect most of these rooms together,” said Leopold, drawing a line on the map with his finger. “If we can get into the secured areas of the University, we can use the tunnels to get around unnoticed. Do you think you can turn on the charm if we run into security?”

“Of course,” Mary smiled, and batted her eyelids to emphasize her point.

Leopold smiled back. “Good. Let’s get moving, before Cupid works out we’ve accessed his machine and makes a run for it.”

“What about the other evidence? We should catalogue it and keep it secured.”

“Spoken like a true police officer. It’ll still be here later. Right now we have to get hold of Cupid before he slips away for good. You need to put in the call to the precinct and have someone you trust come down here and seal off the apartment.”

“No problem,” said Mary, pulling out her cell phone.

“And make sure they don’t touch anything,” said Leopold. “I’ve got enough to worry about without finding doughnut powder over all the forensic evidence.”