She turned to The Major. “Find out if those wiretaps on Detective Sebeck’s phone and computer lines have gone through. If they haven’t, fast-track them.”
The Major nodded and immediately bolted down the center aisle and out the front doors with a bang.
Sebeck watched the man leave, then turned to Philips. “You think Sobol will call again?”
“Maybe. He’s most likely manipulating you.”
“He definitely wants me to do something.”
Philips stared. “Don’t. In fact, we’ll prevent the press from communicating with you or any members of your family.”
Ross raised his eyebrows at that. “That’s to prevent him from inadvertently triggering a new Daemon event?”
“Precisely. There’s no doubt it’s reading the news. So you’d be advised to stay out of the headlines.”
“You’re quarantining me?”
“Only for a little while. At least until we can reliably monitor Sobol’s communications. You’ll be very useful in that regard, Sergeant.”
Two suited agents double-timed it up the dais steps. One whispered in Philips’s ear. Her face displayed momentary shock before she regained her composure. She glanced at Sebeck and Ross. “I have to go, gentlemen. Sobol is up to something.” She and the agents scurried down the steps of the dais. Several other darkly suited men converged on her from far-flung corners of the chapel.
Ross called after her. “Do you still need a guide, Agent Philips?”
She didn’t turn around. “I’ll contact you soon.” She and the other agents banged through the doors and out of the chapel.
Ross gestured to the door swinging closed in her wake. “Doctorate in mathematics from Stanford, and she’s a graduate of the Cryptologic School at Fort Meade. That woman is sharp as hell. I think I’m in love.”
Sebeck chuckled to himself.
“What?”
“Good luck with that.” He started for the front doors.
Chapter 21:// Hotel Menon
For Immediate Worldwide Release:
From: Matthew Andrew Sobol
Re: Back Door in Ego AI Engine
The Ego AI engine used in more than a dozen bestselling game titles was designed with a security flaw that opens a back door in any computer that runs it. Using this back door, I can take full control of a computer, stealing information and observing logons and passwords.
The Republic of Nauru was the smallest, most remote republic in the world. A spit of coral in the South Pacific, it was barely ten kilometers long and half as wide and had all the topographical complexity of a soccer field. Nauru was basically a phosphate mine that convinced the U.N. it was a country.
Dominated first by the Germans and after World War II by the Australians, the Nauruans had come to accept the fact that their chief industry was selling off the ground they stood on. With their phosphate deposits nearly exhausted by the turn of the millennium, the interior of the island—what the locals called “topside”—was now a ravaged, strip-mined wasteland carved down to the coral bedrock. Fully 90 percent of Nauru was a lifeless expanse swept by choking, talcumlike dust. The place had been so systematically scoured of life by mining equipment that the Nauruans considered buying a new island and physically relocating their entire country—leaving a forwarding address with the U.N. However, after most of the tiny nation’s wealth evaporated in investment scandals, the Nauruans had to face a grim reality: they were here to stay.
The entire population of ten thousand South Sea, islanders now lived on a narrow band of sand and palm trees ringing the island—a quarter of which was taken up by an airfield—and tried to ignore the ecological nightmare of the interior.
Anji Anderson had never toured an entire country in twenty minutes before. Afterward she realized there were only three things to do on Nauru: drink heavily, lament the past, or engage in international money laundering. Judging from the private jets at the airport and the forest of satellite dishes, the latter was Nauru’s future.
The community of nations officially took a dim view of money-laundering centers with lax banking and incorporation laws and powerful privacy regulations—but then again, at some point every government had need of such things. The Daemon had directed Anderson to an informative Web page prior to her whirlwind tour of offshore tax havens, and it opened her eyes. Tax havens were tolerated—and in some cases facilitated—by powerful nations and global corporations. Intelligence agencies needed to wire untraceable money to informants or to fund operations in various troubled or soon-to-be-troubled regions. Corporations needed to incentivize key people without interference from investment groups and regulators. All of this was possible in areas far from the public eye. At twelve hundred miles from the nearest neighboring island, Nauru was both incredibly remote and, due to decades of mining, physically unsightly. And tourists and journalists weren’t allowed: Nauru issued only business visas. No rebels could take to the hills here, either, because the Nauruans had sold the hills years ago.
Anderson smiled as she lay soaking in the sun, poolside at the Hotel Menon—one of only two hotels on the island. If she kept her chaise lounge pointed in this exact direction, she could avoid seeing rusted derricks as she looked out over the ocean.
Evenings were the best time. The sunsets here were huge pyrotechnic displays with towering clouds that melted into the distant horizon. It almost made up for the rusted ruin of the place and the fact that the air was so humid that standing in the ocean breeze was like taking a shower. But in the time she’d been employed by the Daemon, her world had taken on a dimension of true adventure, and this was part of it. Forget Machu Picchu or Prince Patrick Island—that was soo bourgeois. She was in a country probably none of her well-traveled and educated friends had ever heard of, much less been to. One that was not on any commonly used map. She laughed to herself from behind her Lemon Drop martini. She had just left the Isle of Man two days ago—the Nevada of the British Isles—and she had no idea where she’d be going tomorrow. She didn’t care. She didn’t have to. She felt oddly secure for the first time in her life. A kept woman. As a well-paid consultant on retainer to Daedalus Research, Inc.—no doubt owned by the Daemon—she was making more money then she’d ever made in her life. All her travel expenses were being paid on an apparently bottomless company credit card. Her airline tickets were all first class, and she had a chartered private jet for this little jaunt out to Nauru. She was bewildered and excited. Every day was filled with surprises. What a change from the network affiliate. Her new boss was an undead automaton from hell, true, but no job was perfect.
Anderson listened to chatter in a dozen languages at the poolside tables around her. She felt eyes upon her in her relatively modest bikini. There were few other women about, but no one was making a move—unsure of which underworld figure she belonged to. She smiled to herself. Her man was about as underworld as you could get….
The Hotel Menon looked like an upscale Motel 6. Casa Blanca in stucco and plywood. Most of the people conducting business here never had to physically set foot on the island, so appearances didn’t matter much. Those who did make the journey typically came to the edge of the world just to exchange briefcases. Most of these transactions were technically legal, but they weren’t the sort of thing participants wanted on the evening news back home.
Pale-faced, tubby Russians in impeccable Armani suits sat with Arabs in robes so white it hurt to look at them. Ruddy-cheeked Australians and Nipponese in silk suits looked down through their sunglasses to examine the spotty glasses before drinking to the health of their business partners. Most tables sported two or three expressionless Terminator types scanning the patio for trouble and thumbing the handles of metallic briefcases. Anderson was finally doing serious journalism. If only her friends knew.