Jói?
Trouble was, she wasn’t sure she could trust Jói with what she had done. She had after all stolen bitcoin from their father. And it was clear Jói trusted Dad more than she did.
What about Uncle Eggert?
Dísa didn’t know Uncle Eggert quite as well as she knew Jói. But he was good with computers: he was always giving Jói computer stuff for Christmas back in Reykjavík, she remembered. Although he knew Ómar a little, he had no loyalty to him, whereas he was Mum’s brother. Dísa had heard he had invested in a bitcoin-mining company. Those companies must have figured out a way to sell their bitcoin legally. Maybe Uncle Eggert would know how, or could find out.
Her computer screen beeped. An email. She idly clicked to take a look. It was in English.
From: Krakatoa
To: Dísa Ómarsdóttir
Subject: Your theft
You have stolen 1962.41634 bitcoin from me. Please return it.
If you don’t return it within three days, someone close to you will die.
I am not bluffing. Your mother died. Now someone else will.
All you need to do is return my bitcoin and nothing else will happen. You have my wallet address.
You may reply to this email address within the next hour, after which it will become defunct. Then you should download the Telegram messaging app using the attached instructions and contact me using that. Otherwise, I will contact you in twenty-four hours from a different email address.
Don’t tell the police about this message, or you will die.
The easiest, most sensible thing to do is return the bitcoin right now.
Jesus Christ! Who the hell was Krakatoa?
K. Krakatoa must be K.
So, who was K? Sharp, probably. It was Sharp who was threatening her.
Who was the ‘someone else’ who was going to die?
No idea. But it would be someone close to her, important to her.
Dísa’s heart beat faster. What should she do?
Give the bitcoin back?
She really didn’t want to do that after the risks she had taken to get it. She had this one chance to make amends for what she and her mother had done, to rescue Blábrekka and the savings of so many of her neighbours in Dalvík. Giving up on that one chance would be cowardly — once it was gone, it was gone.
She had to redeem herself. Redeem her mother.
Should she take Sharp’s threat seriously? Maybe he was bluffing?
Killing someone was a very serious step. Threatening to kill someone less so. She could imagine Sharp threatening her. Could she imagine Sharp killing someone innocent? The ‘someone else’?
She didn’t think so. But the truth was she didn’t know him at all.
What about going to the police? Bad idea. Although Inspector Magnús had seemed sympathetic, helpful even, he hadn’t helped. She believed him that Icelandic politics had impeded his investigations, but that kind of bureaucratic obstruction wouldn’t step out of the way over some unspecified threat. Besides, all she would be doing was removing a threat to someone else with what seemed to be a more certain threat to her.
At least she had been given a couple of days.
And Sharp might be bluffing.
She took a decision. She wouldn’t respond to the email and she certainly wouldn’t download Telegram. She would figure out how to return as much of the bitcoin as she could and then tell Sharp or Krakatoa or whoever that the bitcoin was all gone.
And then hide. Or something.
She needed to act quickly.
Krakatoa was pleased with his email. If Dísa was sensible, then the bitcoin would be back in his wallet within the hour. Realistically, she would stew over it for a day or two, which was why Krakatoa had given her three days.
Dísa was sensible. So no one would have to die.
But. If she held out, then Krakatoa would follow through on his threat.
Twelve months before, an American employee named Cryptocheeseman had ripped him off to the tune of two hundred thousand dollars. It had been a very public rip-off, a humiliation in front of everyone involved in Thomocoin. An organization like Thomocoin, which ran outside the normal auspices of contract law, had to have an enforcement mechanism.
Krakatoa had hired Tecumseh on the dark web to locate Cryptocheeseman and deal with him. Tecumseh had visited Cryptocheeseman in a suburb of Charlotte, North Carolina, persuaded him to give up his private key and then silenced him. Krakatoa didn’t know how exactly, and he didn’t want to know how, but the local newspaper’s website that he checked to ensure Tecumseh had completed his task mentioned something about a stabbing during a street robbery.
No one in Thomocoin knew for sure what had happened to Cryptocheeseman. All Krakatoa had announced was that there was good news: the bitcoin Cryptocheeseman had stolen had been returned. The guys who worked for Thomocoin were smart. They now knew it was a bad idea to steal from Krakatoa.
Krakatoa had ordered the death of a real person. Yet giving that order hadn’t seemed at all real to him. It wasn’t just that the command had been transmitted in cyberspace, nor that the action itself had been committed on the other side of the world. It was also that the killer was Krakatoa. And that’s the kind of thing that Krakatoa did.
Helga’s death had been more difficult. Much more. But Krakatoa had really had no choice if he was going to stay out of jail. And, mostly, he had succeeded in convincing himself that it was Krakatoa who had ordered the killing. Not his real-life personality.
His phone rang.
He smiled when he saw the caller.
‘Hi, Dísa.’
His sister’s voice was trembling. ‘Jói? Do you have Uncle Eggert’s phone number?’
Part Four
Thirty-Four
Four days later, Tecumseh stood in the doorway of the small office building and watched the house fifty metres down on the opposite side of the street.
This was his second evening in that spot. The day before, the target had come back from the library at dusk and stayed in all night. He needed darkness to do his job, which meant he needed his target to go out after dark.
Krakatoa had been angry that he hadn’t acted the previous night. But the one thing Tecumseh never compromised on was his own security, and he wasn’t prepared to work in daylight. Not in a city.
He was an accountant by training, and that training meant he was careful. He planned everything meticulously, in code on his phone. He had a little spreadsheet app he found perfect for the purpose. With his lack of a relevant background, getting his first assassination gig on the dark web had been difficult. But he had received a good review on that first one, a cheating husband in Düsseldorf, and slowly, slowly business had picked up. The choice of Tecumseh as an online handle had helped, implying stealth and an ability to kill. His online reviews reflected his success: he was efficient, 100 per cent successful and a pleasure to deal with. He drove a hard bargain on the fee but always stuck to the deal once it had been agreed.
He tried to avoid organized crime if he could, although these days it was not always possible to tell the difference between an online drugs or arms market on the dark web and a violent crime gang. Krakatoa was the perfect customer. Internet savvy, concerned about his online reputation, ignorant of the market for killers. The North Carolina job had been satisfactory all round.