The In Death Collection Books 16-20 - J. D. Robb [426]
“I’ll take that,” McNab volunteered. “Working on a cobbler rush.”
“Get started. I’m going to check on Sparrow, see if he’s coherent and I can dig anything out of him. Feeney, I’m leaving you and Roarke on the machines. If Reva’s backed out and Tokimoto’s busy patting her head, you’re going to be short-handed.”
“Another tanker of coffee ought to keep us in the game.”
“You may want an update before you rush off, Lieutenant. We’re retrieving data from Kade’s unit. It’s encrypted, but we’ll get through that.”
“Great, good. Let me know when—”
“I’m not finished. Each of Kade’s units was corrupted, but not through a networking worm. They were burned individually.”
“So what? Look, this is EDD territory. All I need is the bottom line. I need the data.”
“You don’t give electronics enough respect,” Feeney stated.
“And neither, I’d venture, does Bissel.” As Eve hadn’t touched the glass of chilled juice Peabody had brought her, Roarke picked it up and helped himself. “The potential worm’s import is its theoretic ability to corrupt an entire networking system, however small or large, however simple or complex, with one stroke, to corrupt and shut down, irretrievably. That’s not what we’re dealing with. It’s a shade of that, an early version perhaps, but not nearly as powerful as we’ve been led to believe. It’s been relatively easy to clean and retrieve from the units we’ve got.”
“Relatively.” Feeney rolled his aching eyes. “It’s nasty business, but it’s not global security shit. What it is, is smoke.”
“Which means he doesn’t have what he thought he had—what he was going to parlay into a nice retirement fund. But maybe someone else does, or maybe . . . Son of a bitch. He wasn’t trying to take me out.” She tapped her fingers absently over her bruised eye. “He hit his target. Aim was a little off, but he hit.”
Roarke inclined his head as his thoughts marched with hers. “Sparrow.”
“It’d help to have somebody on the inside, somebody with some juice who could adjust or create data in-house. And provide protection. Sparrow. He’s the organized thinker. The planner. Look at Bissel. He’s not brave, he’s not very smart, he hasn’t been able to work himself up in the organization. Just a delivery boy. And here’s a big opportunity, handed to him from one of the brass. The big score. Little scores all along. The corporate espionage. Could be, just could be, some of that was outside Homeland, a little personal partnership. Bissel though, he can’t capitalize. Just a screwup with money. I bet his partner’s done better. A hell of a lot better.”
“Why not just kill Bissel then?” Peabody asked.
“Because you need a contingency. You need a fall guy. He set the putz up. Still the delivery boy. Bissel goes to deliver the worm disc to the high bidder, and it’s not the deal. He gets the shaft. Now he’s a dead man, a desperate one. He’s running, he’s hiding, and at all costs he has to stay dead. Our friend from the HSO wants him to stay dead, too, and he’s ready with the company line about global security when the investigation doesn’t turn the way he anticipated.”
“I imagine he planned to make an honest man out of Bissel by turning him into a dead man,” Roarke said. “Quietly, at some point.”
“Should’ve moved on that sooner rather than later, and he wouldn’t be in the hospital. I think he forgot to factor one vital element into the equation. When somebody like Bissel starts killing, it gets easier every time.”
She pulled out her communicator. “I want a block on Sparrow. I don’t want anybody, not even the medicals, talking to him until I get my shot. Start reeling in that data.”
“Hook up that tanker of coffee,” Feeney reminded her, then headed out.
“I need a moment, Lieutenant.” Roarke glanced at Peabody. “A private one.”
“I’ll wait outside.” Peabody slipped out, shut the door.
“I don’t have time to go into personal business,” Eve began.
“Sparrow