Си Бокс - Dark Sky

Joannides said, “You’re forgetting I’m on your side. We all want to see Steve-2 pay.”

“You know,” Kirby said, “we’re kind of confused. You know why we want Steve-2. We want justice, after all. But why do you want him gone? That’s something we just don’t understand.”

Earl thought Kirby’s tone was just right. Reasonable and soft.

“There are a bunch of things,” Joannides said. “The guy is brilliant, but he’s also a sick fuck without any loyalty to anyone. He’ll screw over his friends and he’s ruthless to his enemies. He wasn’t always like that, but he’s completely changed. All his success has gone to his head.”

“What did he do to you, anyway?” Kirby asked.

“He personally fucked me out of billions of dollars,” Joannides said. “ Billions . See, we developed this app together. Fifty-one/forty-nine. I was the forty-nine percent. But rather than introduce it to the market and take the time that was necessary to build the brand, Steve-2 shopped it around behind my back and found a buyer. It was practically a done deal by the time he even told me about it. I didn’t want to sell, but he was the majority owner and he could outvote me. Then he bought me out for what I thought was a good price. I later learned that it should have been a hundred times as much.”

Joannides looked to Kirby with indignation, and Kirby clucked with sympathy. He didn’t seem as wary of them as he’d been earlier, Earl thought.

“I helped build Aloft,” Joannides continued. “I was there when we had to pool our money to afford a case of ramen noodles to eat in our dorm room so we could spend every minute writing code and dreaming. But when I came back to the company, he pretended all that never happened. He made me his lackey. It’s humiliating. People in tech think I’m washed up—that I’m only there because Steve-2 feels sorry for me. Like I’m his charity case. But I’m no one’s charity case. I know my own truth, and I know he fucked me. I swore I’d get revenge when the right opportunity came around.

“When we find him,” Joannides said, “remember to make it look like a hunting accident. That’s our deal. If I get back and play my cards right, the board may vote to have me assume the role of CEO. I’m the logical successor, after all, since I cofounded the company. I was with Steve-2 at the beginning . . . and at the end. That’s how I’ll play it.”

Earl looked from Kirby to Brad and back to Joannides.

“So you’re saying our tragedy is your opportunity,” Earl said.

“You’re twisting my words.”

“Am I?”

“Guess who he sold our app to?” Joannides asked Earl.

Earl shrugged.

“The PRC.”

“Huh?”

“The People’s Republic of China,” Joannides said, his eyes bulging. “The Chinese Communist Party—the CCP. They use it to track their own people. They use it to keep an eye on dissidents or anyone else they think might be a threat to them.”

“I do hate the Chi-Coms,” Earl conceded.

“Not Steve-2,” Joannides said, sensing he’d found an angle Earl could get behind. “He claims he has no idea what they do with the software, that it isn’t his business. No, Steve-2 is a fucking heartless tycoon.”

“I can’t figure out if you’re mad at him because of the Chinese or because he screwed you out of money,” Earl said.

“Either one,” Joannides said. “Either. Both. But that’s why we’re here today. We’re working together to take him down,” he said with triumph.

“Are we, now?” Earl asked.

“Of course. Why do you ask?”

Earl rubbed his chin through his beard. “Because I’ve been thinking about something. You knew about my complaints. You knew about my daughter and the situation she was in. But you didn’t tell Price. Instead, you sat on it until it was too late. Then you reached out to us. Do I have that right?”

Joannides’s face went white. He seemed to finally realize what Earl was driving at.

Rather than accept it, he said, “It wouldn’t have mattered if I told him, Earl. It wouldn’t have made a bit of difference, believe me. Steve-2 doesn’t think of people as people. He thinks of them as his users. Steve-2 refuses to accept any responsibility at all for what happens because of his technology. He didn’t care how the Chinese government was using our app. He just wanted it to work right and have no glitches. There’s a complete disconnect in his brain between tech and the real world where people live.”

“We’re not talking about Price right now,” Earl said. “We’re talking about you .”

“I couldn’t stop what happened to your daughter,” Joannides said.

“Did you try?”

Joannides turned to Kirby and dropped to his knees with his hands out, palms up. “Please,” he said. “Tell your dad we’re on the same side here.”

Instead, Kirby handed the reins of his horse to Earl and approached Joannides.

“What’s Price’s password?”

Joannides sighed. “It’s LISA2. All caps.”

“Spell it.”

“L-I-S-A and the number two.”

“What’s it mean?” Kirby asked.

“It’s a Steve Jobs thing,” Joannides said. “Steve-2 worships the man. Jobs named a computer after his daughter Lisa.”

Kirby took the satellite phone from Joannides and clipped it on his belt.

Joannides used the opportunity to lean forward and whisper, “Help me here, will you? Talk to your dad. We’re all on the same team. Tell him . There’s a lot of money in it for you if you do . I swear it.”

Earl couldn’t make out what Joannides said to his son. All he could tell, whatever it was, it caused Kirby to hesitate.

“ Tell him ,” Joannides urged.

Kirby thrust the bowie knife beneath Joannides’s chin and used both of his hands on the grip of it to jam it upward until the hilt pressed against the man’s lower jawbone. Joannides’s bloody body flopped over to the side in the snowy grass and convulsed. Kirby pulled the knife out and wiped both sides of the blade on Joannides’s high-tech parka.

“He was a snake until the end,” Kirby said to Earl. “Tried to offer me money to save his miserable life.”

Brad stepped forward with his shotgun over the body and aimed it at Joannides’s temple.

“No,” Earl commanded. “No gunshots. We don’t know how close we are to Price and Joe. I don’t want them to hear us.”

“She was my sister, too,” Brad said to Earl with an adolescent whine.

“Then go get your ax,” Earl said. “But hurry. Bring a shovel, too. We’ve got a lot of ground to cover before it gets dark on us.”

SIXTEEN

The tiny one-room log cabin was located deep in the heart of a lodgepole stand that fronted a steep granite wall. The last rays of the sun lit up the face of the rock formation and threw dark shadows into its folds and cracks. A single raven hugged the rim of the wall and flew in lazy, ever-widening circles.

The snow had stopped and the storm clouds had moved on, opening up the sky at dusk. Joe could already see a few stars winking through the dark purple. He could feel the temperature drop as he followed Boedecker across a bench and into the lodgepoles. Cold crept up his pant legs and down the collar of his parka. His knees stiffened, as had the carcasses of the pine grouse he carried, which had been warm and soft when he gathered them up.

“Not much farther,” Boedecker said over his shoulder.

“I see it,” Joe responded. The cabin was a black square within the spindly trunks of the trees. Next to the cabin was a sagging lean-to.

“It had to be a poacher’s cabin at one time,” Boedecker said. “My dad told me about it a few years ago, but I wasn’t sure where it was. It’s too hidden away for a line shack and too far up for lumberjacks.”