The Millionaires - Brad Meltzer [142]
“Is this Matthew?” I say, pouring on the panic.
“No, it’s Steven.”
“Steven who?”
“Steven Balizer. In the Support Center.”
“It doesn’t make any sense,” I say, ramming forward. “Matthew said it’d be on there, but when I went to pull it off, the whole presentation was gone.”
“What presentation?”
“I’m dead…” I tell him. “They’ll eat me as an appetizer…”
“What presentation?” he repeats, already swinging to my aid. It’s Disney training. He can’t help himself.
“You don’t understand,” I say. “I’ve got fifteen people sitting in a conference room, all of them waiting for their first look at our new online subscription service. But when I go to download it off our Intranet, the whole thing is gone. Zip. Nothing. It’s not there! Now everyone’s looking at me—the lawyers, the creatives, the finance boys…”
“Listen, you have to calm down—”
“… and Arthur Stoughton, who’s sitting red-faced at the head of the table.” All it takes is a single drop of the boss’s name. That one I learned from Tanner Drew.
“You said it was on the Intranet?” Steven asks anxiously. “Any idea where?”
I read off the exact address where Duckworth’s account was stored. I can hear young Steven jackhammering away at his keyboard. It takes an underling to know one—we’re all in this together. “I’m sorry,” he eventually stammers. “It’s no longer there.”
“No… don’t say that!” I plead, thankful we picked an outdoor payphone. “It has to be! I just saw it!”
“I already checked twice…”
“This is Stoughton we’re talking about! If I don’t get his presentation up there…” I breathe heavy through my nose, trying to sound like I’m fighting tears. “There’s gotta be some way to get it back. Where do you keep the backups?” It’s a bluff, but not a risky one. Every sixty minutes, the bank’s computer systems run an automatic backup to protect it from things like viruses and power failures. Then we store the copy somewhere else, purely for safety purposes. A company the size of Disney has to do the same.
“In the DISC building… in the North Service Area,” he says without even thinking. “That’s where they keep all the long-term stuff.”
“Forget long-term—I need what was there three hours ago!”
There’s a pause on the other line. “The only thing I can think of are the tapes in DACS.”
I hate techno jargon. “What tapes?”
“Data tapes—the tapes we back up the site with. Since DACS makes a copy every night, that’s my best guess to where they should be.”
“And where’s this place DACS?”
“In the tunnels.”
“The tunnels?” I ask.
“Y’know, the tunnels,” he says, almost surprised. “The ones below the Magic Kingd—” He stops and there’s another pause. This one’s longer. “What department did you say you worked in?” he finally asks.
“Disney Online,” I quickly counter.
“What division?” he challenges. In the background, I hear him once again clicking at his keyboard.
I don’t have an answer.
“What’d you say your name was again?” he adds.
That’s my cue. Abandon ship. I slam the phone in its cradle.
“What’d he say?” Charlie asks.
“Are there backups?” Gillian adds.
Ignoring the question, I look up toward the blinding sun in the sky. I have to squint to see it. It’s a few minutes past two. Time’s running out. But I finally see the end in sight. The tapes don’t just show reality—they show a reality that Duckworth invented… and that Gallo had clear access to. “Let’s get out of here,” I say.
“Where to?” Gillian asks.
“Is it far?” Charlie adds.
“That depends how fast we drive,” I reply as I run toward the car. “How long does it take to get to Disney World?”
68
What?” Gallo asked. Pinching the cell phone between his shoulder and ear, he and DeSanctis raced up I-95. “Are you sure?”
“Why would I lie?” his associate asked on the other line.
“You really want me to answer that?”
“Listen, I already said I was sorry.”
“Don’t bullshit me with sorry,” Gallo hammered. “Did you really think we wouldn’t see you? That you could just sneak in without us getting a good look?”
“I wasn’t sneaking anywhere. We were just reacting as fast as we could. We threw it together