John Grisham - The Associate

“Relax, Kyle,” Bennie said with a fake smile. “This is a piece of cake. You’ll do fine.”

“No alarms, Kyle,” Nigel said. “My software is too good for that. Trust me.”

“Would you please stop saying that?”

Kyle walked to a window and looked out at the Manhattan skyline. It was almost 9:30 on Tuesday night. He had not eaten since he and Tabor had enjoyed a fifteen-minute lunch in the firm cafeteria at 11:30.

Hunger, though, was only a minor concern on a long, sad list.

“Are you ready, Kyle?” Bennie called from across the room. Not a question, but a challenge.

“As ready as I’ll ever be,” he answered without turning around.

“When?”

“As soon as possible. I want to get it over with. I’ll stop by the room a few times tomorrow, check the traffic. My best guess is that it’ll be about eight tomorrow night, late in the day but with enough time to download, assuming I don’t get shot.”

“Any questions about the equipment, Kyle?” Nigel asked.

Kyle walked stiffly back to the workstation and stared at the machines. He finally shrugged and said, “No, it’s pretty straightforward.”

“Super. One last thing, Kyle. The blue box has a wireless signal so that I know precisely when you’re downloading.”

“Why is that necessary?”

“Monitoring. We’ll be very close by.”

Another shrug. “Whatever.”

The blue box was still in the center compartment, with Nigel handling it as if it were a bomb. Kyle then added the materials from his own briefcase, and when he grabbed the handle and lifted it off the table, he was surprised at the weight.

“A bit heavier, Kyle?” Nigel quizzed, watching every move.

“Yes, quite a bit.”

“Not to worry. We’ve reinforced the bottom of the Bally. It’s not going to drop out as you’re walking along Broad Street.”

“I like the other one better. When do I get it back?”

“Soon, Kyle, soon.”

Kyle pulled on his trench coat and made his way to the door. Bennie followed and said, “Good luck, Kyle. It’s all come down to this. We believe in you.”

“Go to hell,” Kyle said, and left the room.

The briefcase grew heavier during the short, sleepless night, and when Kyle lugged it out of the rear of the taxi early Wednesday morning, he half-wished the bottom would indeed fall out, the blue box would crash onto Broad Street in a thousand pieces, and Nigel’s precious home brew would be sent down the gutter. He wasn’t sure what would happen after that, but any scenario was far better than what was planned.

Twenty minutes after he rode the elevator to the thirty-fourth floor, Roy Benedict entered the same elevator with two young men who were undoubtedly associates at Scully & Pershing. The signs were obvious. They were under thirty. It was 6:35 in the morning. They appeared to be fatigued and miserable, but they wore expensive clothes and carried handsome briefcases, black. He was prepared to see a familiar face, though felt it unlikely. It was not at all unusual to see attorneys from other firms in the building. Roy knew half a dozen partners at Scully, but with fifteen hundred lawyers arriving for work, he figured the odds were slim. And he was right. The two zombies riding up with him were just a couple of faceless souls who would be gone in a year or so.

The briefcase in Roy’s hand was also a black Bally, identical to the one Kyle bought back in August, the third one required for this mission. He left the elevator alone on the thirty-fourth floor and walked past the vacant reception desk, down a hall to the right, four, five, six doors, and there was his client, sitting at his desk, sipping coffee, waiting. The exchange was brief. Roy swapped briefcases and was ready to go.

“Where are the feds?” Kyle asked, very softly, though no one was in the hall and the secretaries were just getting out of bed.

“Around the corner in a van. They’ll do a quick scan to make sure there are no tracking devices. If they find one, I’ll bring it back in a sprint and we’ll concoct a story. If not, then they’ll take it to their lab in Queens. This thing is heavy.”

“The blue box. Specially designed by some evil geniuses.”

“When do you need it?”

“Let’s say 7:00 p.m. That’s twelve hours. Should be enough, right?”

“That’s what they say. According to Bullington, they have a small army of geeks just itching to unwrap it.”

“They can’t screw it up.”

“They won’t. You good?”

“Great. Do they have arrest warrants?”

“Oh, yes. Wiretapping, extortion, conspiracy, lots of good stuff. They’re just waiting on you.”

“If Bennie is about to be arrested, then I’m a motivated young man.”

“Good luck.”

Roy was gone, leaving behind the Bally with the same scuff marks and name tag. Kyle quickly stuffed it with files and legal pads and pens and went to find more coffee.

TWELVE LONG HOURS later, Roy was back with the second briefcase. He took a seat as Kyle closed the door. “So?” he said.

“It is what it is. It’s a customized computer built along the lines of those used by the military, everything is heavy-duty. Designed for nothing but downloading. Two hard drives, with 750 gigabytes each. Basically, enough memory to store everything in this building and the three next door. Highly sophisticated software that the FBI geeks have never seen before. These guys are good, Kyle.”

“Tell me about it.”

“And there is indeed a wireless signal so they can monitor you.”

“Dammit. So I have to download something?”

“I’m afraid so. The wireless signal cannot indicate what you are downloading, or how much. It just lets them know that you’re inside and that you’ve started moving the database.”

“Shit!”

“You can do it, Kyle.”

“That seems to be the consensus.”

“Do you know where you’ll meet these guys?”

“No. It’ll be a last-second notice. Assuming I download without setting off alarms, I’ll call Bennie with the happy news, and he’ll tell me where to meet. I’m going to the room in an hour, and I plan to quit at nine, regardless of the download. So, by nine fifteen, if I’m lucky, I should be on the street.”

“I’ll stay at my office. If you get a chance, please call. Pretty exciting stuff, Kyle.”

“Exciting? How about terrifying?”

“You’re the man.” With that, Roy exchanged briefcases again and disappeared.

For sixty minutes, Kyle stared at the clock, did nothing but bill Trylon for an hour, and finally made a move. He loosened his tie, rolled up his sleeves, tried to look as casual as possible, and took the elevator to the eighteenth floor.

Sherry Abney was in the room, and he had to say hello. From the looks of her table, she’d been there for hours and the research had not gone well. Kyle chose a station as far away from her as possible. Her back was to him.

Despite his bitching and moaning, he foresaw little danger of being noticed by another member of Team Trylon. All ten chairs faced the outside walls, away from the center, so that while doing research, he could see nothing but the monitor, the computer, and the wall behind it. The danger was up above, lurking in the lenses of the video cameras. Still, he preferred to have the room to himself.

After fifteen minutes, he decided to visit the men’s room. On the way out, he asked Sherry, “Can I get you a coffee?”

“No, thanks. I’m leaving soon.”

Perfect. She left at 8:30, a nice breaking point that always made billing easier. Kyle placed a legal pad on top of the computer, then a couple of pens, things that could roll and slide and need retrieving. He scattered a couple of files beside the monitor and in general made a mess of things. At 8:40, he knocked on the locked metal door that led to the small printing room, and there was no answer. Then he tried a second metal door that led to places unknown, but he suspected it was the room where Gant hung out and secured things. He saw Gant occasionally and figured he worked close by. There was no answer. At 8:45, Kyle decided to plunge ahead before another associate arrived for one last hour of work. He walked to his table and bumped the legal pad on top of the computer, sending the pens flying against the wall. He threw up an arm, said “Shit!” as loudly as possible, then leaned over as if to retrieve things. He found one pen, couldn’t find the other, but kept searching. On the floor, behind the monitor, under the chair, then again behind the computer, where he deftly inserted the tiny transmitter into the USB port just as he found the missing pen and held it up so the cameras could see it. Settled down now, composed, not cursing, he took his seat and began clicking away at the keyboard.