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The three of us sent up a cheer, not caring that other customers were turning to stare.

It worked! It really worked!

Back then, some phone companies had a number you could call to get the accurate time. I punched in 213 853-1212 and put the phone down on the table. All three of us heard it together, that recorded lady’s voice saying, “At the tone the time will be…” My phone was now successfully making outgoing calls as a clone of Lewis’s—and the cell phone company would record these calls as having been made not by me but by Lewis from his own phone.

I had social-engineered Novatel and gained huge power. I could make phone calls that couldn’t be traced back to me.

But had I just fallen off the wagon for this one hack… or was I back into hacking all over again? At that moment, I could not have said for sure.

What I did know, though, was that I had achieved invisibility.

Mystery Hacker

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You look amazing.”

She answered, “You look amazing, too.”

What a boost to my ego! No one had ever said anything like that to me before, not even Bonnie. And certainly not an extremely hot chick like this one, with a body, face, and hair that made me picture her on stage in a casino somewhere, strutting in high heels and a skimpy costume. Or half a costume.

She was pumping on a StairMaster 6000, hard enough to work up a sweat. I climbed onto the one adjacent and struck up a conversation. She was friendly enough to give me hope. It didn’t last. She said she was a dancer with Siegfried and Roy—that pair of famous magicians who were doing large-scale illusions and working with live tigers in their act.

Wouldn’t I love to know how they did some of their tricks! Any magician would. I started asking questions. She gave me this cold “fuck you” look and said, “I had to sign a confidentiality agreement. I can’t tell you anything.” She was nice about it, but firm. The “Go away” message was all too clear.

Damn.

My cell phone rang, providing a handy escape from the embarrassment. “Hey, Kevin,” the voice said.

“Hi, Adam.” My half-brother—the person in the world I was closest to who wasn’t a hacker. In fact, he didn’t even use a computer.

After we had chatted for a bit, he said, “An ex-girlfriend of mine knows this big superhacker named Eric Heinz. She says he knows some phone company stuff you might not know about, and he told her he really needs to talk to you.”

And then he said, “Be careful, Kevin. I don’t think this girl is trustworthy.”

My first reaction to Adam’s call was to blow off the whole thing—just not follow up. I’d had enough problems even hacking with guys I had known for years and felt I could trust.

But resisting temptation had never been one of my virtues. I called the number Adam had given me.

The phone was answered not by Eric but by a guy who said his name was Henry Spiegel, which he pronounced “Shpeegel.” Spiegel was one of the most colorful characters I’ve ever run across, and my list includes, besides Ivan Boesky, people like famed palimony attorney Marvin Mitchelson, convicted of tax evasion, and ZZZZ Best scammer Barry Minkow. Spiegel was a case all his own, a guy who had a reputation for being on the periphery of everything from bank robbery to porno to ownership of a hot new Hollywood nightclub, one of those written-about places where young actors and wannabes line up outside every night.

When I asked Spiegel to put Eric on the phone, he said, “I’ll get him for you. I’ll have to page him and then conference you in. He’s really cautious.”

“Cautious”? I was cautious; this guy sounded way beyond that, more like superparanoid.

I waited. What was I doing, anyway? If this guy was really into hacking, even talking to him on the phone was a bad idea for me. The terms of my release said I couldn’t have any contact with hackers, and associating with De Payne was risky enough. One word from this Eric Heinz guy could be enough to send me back to a prison cell for up to another two years. Except for the Novatel cell phone hack, I had been mostly playing