Afraid of the Dark - James Grippando [120]
He was being facetious. Anything less than intelligence-grade encryption was no match for Chuck’s supercomputers.
“Does that mean we can view the files now?” asked Shada.
“No need,” said Chuck. “I ran them through my database. Part of Project Round Up is the cataloging of every single video file traded over the worst of the P2P networks. Trust me on this: The files that you copied from that creep’s computer are not the kind of things that any normal human being would want to watch.”
Jack was almost afraid to ask. “What kind of content are we talking about?”
“Some people would call it sexually explicit. I call it graphic violence.”
“Not against children, I hope.”
“No children in these videos. Interestingly, the violence is against grown men. By women.”
That took Jack aback. “Dominatrix stuff?”
“It goes beyond that. From a trading-frequency standpoint, the most popular video shows a woman ripping out a man’s pubic hair with her teeth.”
Jack squirmed at the thought, then refocused. “So are you saying that every single file that Shada copied has already been traded on the P2P networks?”
“All of them—except one.”
“Which one?”
“Jamal’s.”
Jack went cold. “What does that one show?”
“I haven’t watched it yet, and since it’s never been traded on the P2P networks, I don’t have the content cataloged. I thought I would pull it up now for the three of us to see.”
Jack and Shada exchanged uneasy glances.
“I don’t need to see it,” said Shada. “This may not matter to you, Chuck, but I feel bad enough for the mistakes I’ve made without watching these videos.”
Chuck didn’t bite, unwilling to acknowledge her contrition just yet.
“What about you, Swyteck?” he asked. “Jamal was your client.”
Jack wasn’t eager to say yes, but if Jamal’s mother was going to hear about this from anyone, he wanted it to be from him, not Chuck. “I should,” Jack said, bracing himself, “so I will.”
Chapter Sixty-four
Andie put her head down, pulled her wool scarf up over her nose, and walked into the wind. It was snowing in the Washington area. Tiny flakes fell from the night sky, flickered beneath the glow of streetlamps, and gathered on the wet sidewalk in front of her. No doubt some tourist was giddy with excitement over postcard-quality photographs of the illuminated Capitol or Jefferson Memorial. Andie wished she were in Miami. The Ritz-Carlton Hotel was right across the street, which made her think of Jack. He’d probably booked the romantic-weekend package a half-dozen times at the Ritz on South Beach, but something had always come up and forced them to cancel. “Something” was code for the FBI.
Sorry, Jack.
Andie still wasn’t convinced that it was safe to return to Vortex. She’d left the company heliport on Sunday with the definite impression that Bahena was having doubts about his trainee. But it wasn’t Bahena who had called to insist that she return tonight to discuss her “immediate activation.” The call had come from the top. From the CEO of Vortex’s parent company. From Sid Littleton himself.
“You’re close,” Harley had told her. “You have to go back.”
Andie knew her supervisor was right.
An inch of new snow blanketed the sidewalk, and it squeaked beneath each step. Commuters had been heading home since lunchtime in anticipation of the coming storm. Even so, a long line of glowing orange taillights streamed up the street toward the on-ramp to the expressway. There were few pedestrians—just Andie and a lone lunatic jogger. A woman, Andie noted as she trudged by her. A pregnant woman. Now that was dedication: In her sixth month, easily, and superwoman was out jogging in a snowstorm. She probably worked sixty hours a week at a major law firm, too. Dropped off her three older children at three different private schools on her way to work. Hit the gym every morning at five A.M., even if it meant getting up at four to put the cookies in the oven for the Cub Scout bake sale. Teleconferenced with teachers over lunch, organized charity events on weekends, sang the barking puppy to sleep at two A.M., always had her