B Larson - Spyware

She wondered if their anonymous tipper had had a fit of remorse and also tipped Vance. Sometimes that happened. The truth was that all police work, even that of the Bureau with all its the fantastic resources, relied largely on informants. The police forces simply couldn’t cover all the bases, they couldn’t be there at every crime scene. But very often, someone was. Somewhere, somehow, a pair of quiet eyes witnessed most crimes. For an agent on the job, the informant was usually faceless, a disembodied, hushed voice on the phone. Of course, you never knew if you could rely on the information or not, particularly if the source was a paid one. It was a frustrating way to solve crimes.

The message blinking on her computer said that she had e-mail. She allowed herself a trip to the bathroom where she peed and fired up one of those dinky one-cup pots of coffee. Still in her underwear, she sat at the letter desk. Her machine had gone into sleep mode. She roused her machine by nudging the mouse.

She had mail , explained a cheerful, rotating icon. She had the volume on the sound card turned down or it would have told her aloud as well. The computer was still attached to the HUNTRESS account. She clicked twice and the message came up.

Agent Vasquez,

I’m sending you this to help you find my son. Whether you believe the case of the virus and my son are related or not, please take my input seriously. I believe the virus was written and released by John Nogatakei. His motives are fairly clear: he hates me and has a thing for my wife. I don’t know who took Justin yet, but I am doing my best to find out. I’m sure it wasn’t Nog who did the kidnapping, it isn’t his style, he has never been a direct, physical person. This indicates an accomplice, as yet unidentified.

P.S. Don’t bother to stake out this system. I won’t be using it or this account again. Use your time to find my son.

The system data at the end of the message indicated it was from an anonymous local address. The timestamp read: 12:31 A. M. He had sent it with a delayed delivery option, it had only arrived at five this morning.

Vasquez hammered her fist on her bare thigh. “Dammit!”She had blown it by grandstanding on the system and calling herself HUNTRESS of all things. She had stupidly underestimated Vance. She swore she wouldn’t do it again.

She got up to get her single cup of instant. Pouring it into the provided Styrofoam cup, she immediately started another brewing. Sipping and burning her lips intermittently, she reread the message several times. She thought about it while she showered and dressed. As usual, she received her strongest ideas in the morning shower.

When she was ready, she called Johansen for breakfast.

“Already had mine,” he said. “But I’ll sit with you.”

She frowned. He was the only partner she’d ever gone on a field assignment with who was always up and fully alert before she could even function. Doesn’t the man ever sleep? she wondered. She chalked it up as one more exhibit in the mounting evidence that proved their incompatibility.

She used her portable fax machine to make a hardcopy of the e-mail message and took it with her to breakfast. John Nogatakei. She supposed they would have to check it out, but it annoyed her to be getting tips from her prime suspect. What could be less reliable than that?

“Another tip came in last night,” said Vasquez, handing a slip of paper to Johansen. “He’s driving Brenda Hastings’ car around. I’ve got the plates and the make here. Could you call the local station and put out a bulletin?”

“Sure thing,” said Johansen, “Brenda took a chance on an accessory charge by doing that.”

“Well, at least he has friends that believe in him,” she said.

Johansen reached over the breakfast table to take the note from her. As he took it from her, he touched her hand for a lingering moment. It was just a light touch, but it went on for just a half-second longer than necessary. She felt a flash of heat across her face, then the contact ended. Without raising her head, she slid her eyes up to look at him. He appeared intent upon the note. She frowned and briefly wondered if he was trying something new, something more subtle. She forced such thoughts from her mind and tried to focus on the situation at hand. She forked the last sausage on her grand-slam plate.

The restaurant had the haunting and somehow reassuring familiarity of that every Denny’s possessed. Overhead, sputnik-like lamps that dated from the seventies hung suspended from a ceiling that was plated with beige acoustic tiles. Booths lined the windows and the counter was manned by an army of truckers and cops. On every table the napkin-dispenser huddled-up with its team of condiments.

“I received some interesting e-mail this morning,” she began. She quickly told him about the message from Vance. She was gratified that he didn’t laugh at her for getting caught by her own game.

“Hmph,” he said, munching on one of her pieces of diagonally-cut white toast. “Sounds like he spotted us first.”

“Exactly.”

“So what’s our next move?”

“I think we should press the wife for her help. Maybe she can talk him into giving himself up before he sinks himself more deeply into this. After all, if he’s innocent, he should give himself up.”

“It’ll only work if she thinks that we’re doing a good job of finding her kid,” said Johansen, “I get the impression that neither of them care about anything else right now.”

“Naturally enough,” she said, “but I think I can convince her.”

“Right. In any case, it’s better than just waiting around for one of the uniforms to pick him up by chance.”

She glanced at him again. He didn’t sound overly confident in her persuasiveness. “We’ll get her to come around, it might just take a few days.”

“Right,” he repeated. “In the meantime, what about this Nogatakei guy?”

“I suppose we’ll have to check it out.”

“Huh,” he said, “so our fugitive suspect is now feeding us leads. He’s typing them, no less.”

“The irony isn’t lost on me.”

“But is this tip just a red herring? Something to keep us busy while he works his own plans?”

“That’s what we’re paid to find out,” she said, sliding out of the booth.

Johansen stood up with her and picked up the check. On the way out the waitress, a gum-snapper in her twenties, gave them an up-down glance. Vasquez grimaced, having seen it before. Everyone automatically assumed they were a couple, and invariably people thought it odd to see that one of them was a good fourteen inches taller than the other. Not to mention a good deal more pale in complexion. At least the waitress had the good grace not to smile in amusement at them.

By a long-standing agreement between the two of them, Johansen always picked up the tab when they ate together. He said it was to keep a low profile as a couple, but she always suspected that he wanted to play the male role. Recently, she had begun to suspect he wanted more of that role than she had realized.

Following his towering form through the glass doors, she recalled his light touch. It wasn’t an entirely unpleasant memory.

Sarah hardly knew she was dropping tears into her breakfast until the doorbell rang. She blinked awake and dabbed her eyes. She glanced down at her cereal. The milk had sat too long in the bowl and turned rice squares to swollen mush. Then the doorbell rang again, and she got up to answer it. Her newly installed peephole revealed Mrs. Trumble’s permanently worried face. She opened the door.