Private L.A. (29 page)

“We lost contact with both men, and they were and are presumed dead,” Carpenter said. “You two flew me into their area when the snow started thawing in the spring of oh-five.”

That sounded right, and I nodded.

Carpenter said it took him two weeks to find Cobb’s team, but he did, living in a box canyon deep in the mountains. He delivered an ultimatum. Cobb and his men could continue their lawless activities, be branded renegades, hunted, captured, court-martialed, and sent to Leavenworth for execution.

“Or?” Del Rio asked.

“Or they could leave the mountains with me, quietly, without anyone knowing,” Carpenter said.

“And in return?”

Carpenter cleared his throat. “They got immunity for their actions.”

“They took the deal?” Del Rio asked.

Carpenter nodded. “You two had crashed in the meantime, so you weren’t the ones to extract us. I brought Cobb’s team back to Kabul, where they were debriefed about their activities. The intelligence officers were horrified by what they learned. But Cobb and his men had immunity and no legal action could be taken. Illegal action was something else again.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

Carpenter pinched the bridge of his nose. “The way I heard it, secretly and at the highest levels of the US military and intelligence apparatus, a decision was made to punish Cobb’s team, to turn them into pariahs.”

“How?”

“By making them what they had become in Afghanistan, a team of savages that no longer existed,” Carpenter said. “Literally over the course of two days, the records of all six men were permanently expunged from all government databases. Their money was seized, their bank accounts erased. Their pensions were nullified and evaporated. All credit lines vanished as well. Their next of kin were notified of their deaths in combat, given generous bulk death payments and weighted coffins to bury.

“Then Cobb and his men were flown back into the mountains north of Kandahar and dumped, weaponless, deep inside Taliban-controlled country. Until you sent that set of fingerprints to me, Cobb, Johnson, and the others had not been heard from since. Everyone had assumed they were long dead.”

“ARE WE READY
, Mr. Watson?” Cobb asked. He was dressed in the olive-green uniform of the L.A. Standard Demolition Company.

“We are ready, Mr. Cobb.”

Watson sat hunched over the wireless keyboard, signed into an anonymous e-mail site based in Peshawar, Pakistan. On the right-hand side of the screen, a thin rectangular box overlaid the e-mail site. Six dozen codes were stacked in the box. Watson knew every one of them by heart.

Cobb believed he was about to witness a virtuoso performance on Watson’s part, the result of almost two years of work, two years of hacking his way into dozens of federal and state computer systems, learning how their digital security worked. For two years Watson had planned the route the ten million would take out into the financial ether, breaking into pieces, moving through bank accounts and on again, splitting and transferring a total of six dozen times.

Cobb allowed himself a rare smile, knowing that while the feeble law enforcement people chased the ten million they’d demanded, Watson would be going the other way on the digital stream, after a whole lot more.

He looked around at Nickerson, Hernandez, Kelleher, men who’d walked with him out of a war zone unarmed, men who’d killed with their bare hands, men who were disciplined enough to think long term and long range.

“Ready, gentlemen?”

They nodded. He glanced at the clock: 9:40 a.m.

“Our time is now,” Cobb said. “Send it, Mr. Watson.”

“AND WE’RE SUPPOSED
to believe the secondhand word of one man, some CIA spook we can’t interrogate for ourselves?” cried Sheriff Cammarata after I explained to the mayor, Chief Fescoe, and Special Agent Christine Townsend who was behind the No Prisoners murder and extortion scheme.

“
You
can believe what
you
want,” I snapped. “But those prints belong to Johnson. And I believe Cobb and the rest of his team are going to be on the receiving end of ten million dollars in about ten minutes or so, whenever you get the text, Your Honor.”

“Show them the picture,” Mo-bot urged.

Mo-bot stood in the background with several middle-aged women who, by their attire, looked more prepared for a yoga retreat than an extortion payoff.

I nodded, smiled at the ladies from Cal Poly, as Mo-bot had been referring to them, and then typed in a command on a laptop.

On the screen at the end of the conference room, up popped a grainy picture shot on a foggy spring day in the Afghan highlands. A group of battle-hardened men stood in the melting snow.

“That’s them,” I said. “Cobb’s far left, then Clive Johnson, Peter Kelleher, Jesus Hernandez, Denton Nickerson, and Albert Watson, who our source says is something of a genius when it comes to weapons and computers.”

Everyone in the room studied the picture. Cobb and his men looked either stoic or harshly amused. You’d never know they’d committed atrocities and enriched themselves in the months before Carpenter took the photograph.

“This is what time frame?” Mayor Wills asked.

“April 2005, Your Honor,” I said. “They’ll look quite a bit older now.”

“But what do we do with this?” Cammarata demanded. “Can we put it out there when we have no way of corroborating that this is real, that these men are the ones doing the killing?”

“I see what you’re saying, Sheriff,” I said. “But we’re not getting any other files on these men. Other than burial records in their hometowns, they’re gone.”

“How did they survive?” Fescoe asked. “How did they get here?”

“We talked about that,” I said. “Our source’s theory is that they walked out of Afghanistan along the same trails the Taliban used to bring in supplies from Pakistan. Somehow they got to their stash of gold and black tar heroin, made their way to Peshawar or some other lawless place, and bought the necessary documents. Beyond that, we have no clue.”

The mayor’s cell phone buzzed. She stiffened, looked at it, breathed hard, said, “We’ve got ten minutes, an account number, password, and routing code.”

“Okay, ladies,” Mo-bot said. “You’re up.”

DRS. ESTHER GOLDBERG
, Lauren Hollings, and Katherine Clarkson—the ladies of Cal Poly—were all cutting-edge computer scientists. They went quickly to their laptops, gave them instructions, and within seconds the photograph of Cobb’s team disappeared and the screen split into thirds.

The center third showed a secure website inside the California State Treasurer’s Office. The right third displayed the Google Earth macrosatellite view of the globe. The left third of the screen featured a live feed of the face of Carlton Watts, the current treasurer of the State of California.

“Are we ready?” Watts asked.

“We are, Carlton,” Mayor Wills said, handing Esther Goldberg her cell phone so she could read the codes and routing instructions.

Goldberg quickly entered the information into the secure website, hit ENTER.

A moment later, Watts nodded. “Request is here.” He hesitated, appearing worried. “You’re sure this tracking thingamajob will attach on the way out?”

“As sure as I am that Einstein discovered the photoelectric effect,” Goldberg said coolly.

“You tell ’em, girl,” Mo-bot muttered.

“On your say, then,” Watts said. “I’m entering my password and the transfer authorization codes.”

We heard the clacking of his keyboard, then the snap of a return.

The center screen hesitated, jumped. Below the California State emblem, and along with an icon that looked like a slender green tube, the figure $10,000,000 appeared. The tube began to drain of green, and in less than three seconds it was gone. On the screen to the right, Google Earth zoomed in on California, showed a line from Sacramento to Los Angeles.

“Got it,” said Lauren Hollings, staring at her screen. “File and metadata are moving through our tracking software. Ticks embedding. Almost ready to transfer onto that bank account.”

“I’ve already got a jump on that, tracked it through the bank identification code on the SWIFT network,” said Katherine Clarkson. “The money’s heading to Banco Delta Asia Ltd in Macau.”

“And there she goes,” said Goldberg.

Up on the screen, Google Earth had retreated, showed the Pacific Rim, and another line speeding toward Macau. It was there in less than four seconds.

Mayor Wills said, “Can we contact this bank?”

“It’s not staying there,” said Goldberg. “They’re not that stupid.”

Sure enough, fifteen seconds after the ten million arrived in Macau, two lines burst on the Google Earth map and began to arc away from each other.

“Five million, five million,” Hollings said.

The first five million landed in a bank in India; the second I couldn’t tell, but it looked near England.

“The first is in the Bank of Rajasthan, New Delhi,” Clarkson announced. “Second in Conister Bank, Wigan, Isle of Man.”

“I’ll be a son of a bitch,” said Sheriff Cammarata. “It’s working.”

“What did you expect?” Mo-bot asked with a slight sneer.

Before Cammarata could reply, four lines burst from those locations, each heading out in one of the four cardinal directions. But when they had traveled only a short distance on Google Earth, they hesitated, stopped, blinked, and then disappeared.

THERE WERE GASPS
from the various law enforcement officials present.

“Where’d it go?” Mayor Wills asked.

“I don’t …” Goldberg began.

“I knew it,” said Sheriff Cammarata, spitting the words like they were tobacco juice.

People began to argue among themselves. State Treasurer Watts cried, “What’s going on down there?”

“Your money’s gone bye-bye, Carlton!” the sheriff shouted.

“It is not bye-bye!” Goldberg shouted emphatically. “They’re not stupid, they found the tick and stripped it.”

“What?” Chief Fescoe said. “I thought—”

“But the ladies from Cal Poly are smarter,” Mo-bot said. “Or actually, Dr. Hollings is smarter.”

The youngest of the computer scientists beamed.

“What are you talking about?” Cammarata demanded.

“She thought of putting an easy-to-spot tick on the transfer, and another virtually impossible to spot,” Goldberg said with great satisfaction.

Mo-bot poked me in the ribs with her index finger, whispered, “Told you they were good.”

Hollings, meanwhile, had given her computer more instructions, and almost instantly the lines on the Google Earth screen ran on, dividing and moving, dividing and moving, until within no more than a minute the satellite view of Earth looked loosely strung in almost every direction. I was focusing on the dizzying complexity of the transfers, barely aware that the center third of the screen, the one still linked to the account within the California State Treasurer’s Office, was now blinking.

“We’re out to sixty-four different accounts,” Goldberg announced. “And they appear to have stopped. We know where every dollar—”

She stopped, stared up from her laptop screen toward the large one on the wall, her mouth gaping. “What’s going on?”

The center screen showed one of those green tubes, then three, then ten. Beside each was the figure $15,000,000. They began to drain.

“What’s happening?” I demanded.

Mo-bot had lost all color. “Someone’s looting that account.”

“What?” State Treasurer Watts yelled. On the live feed, he was frantically typing on his keyboard. “No. Goddammit! It won’t stop! What the fuck!”

The tubes emptied. The screen blinked. The numbers went to zero.

“Holy shit,” Goldberg said, her hands across her face.

Watts looked like he’d been hit with a left hook.

“How much did they get?” Mayor Wills asked in shock.

“A HUNDRED AND
fifty million!” Watson crowed, and slapped the table inside the garage in the City of Commerce.

Cobb threw his hands in the air, then hugged Watson. Nickerson, Kelleher, and Hernandez were celebrating too, throwing high fives, doing little jigs of victory.

“You are a goddamned genius, Mr. Watson!” Kelleher cried.

“Thirty million apiece,” Nickerson laughed. “Thirty million untraceable.”

“I’m seeing Venezuelan women on a beach,” Hernandez said, eyes closed, doing a slow dance.

Watson beamed. “I’ll e-mail you the various accounts where your money will land.”

“Gentlemen,” Cobb said. “Once again, I have to tell you what an honor it is to have served with you.”

“Hoorah,” Nickerson said. “Hoo-fuckin’-rah.”

Hernandez opened his eyes, stopped dancing, and said, “That mean we’re cool to go now?”

“We still need to strip this place down, pack up,” Kelleher said.

“We’re in no hurry,” Cobb said. “That money is far, far from here and they have absolutely no idea where we are, or who we are. We can be gone by eight, nine at the latest. In the meantime, anyone interested in lunch? I’m starving.”

“I could go for a burger,” Hernandez admitted. “Though what I’d really like is a prime New York steak.”

“No big spending in the next few weeks,” Cobb cautioned.

“I’ll pass on the burger, start getting my gear together,” Nickerson said.

“Double cheese with bacon with a large order of onion rings sounds like the right thing before packing up,” Kelleher said.

“You three go ahead,” Watson said. “I want to get the account numbers to you as quickly as possible. Look for them on your phone. I’ll be along right after.”

Cobb gazed at him for a long moment, then nodded. “We’ll save you a seat,” he said. “Outstanding job, Mr. Watson. Absolutely outstanding.”

“THE GOVERNOR IS
going to fire me for gross incompetence,” moaned the state treasury secretary. “A hundred and sixty million? Are you kidding? That money was just transferred in here from the Franchise Tax Board!”

Mo-bot was white as a sheet. “How did they do that?”