DeathWeb (Fox Meridian Book 3) (32 page)

‘How hard was it to get this appointment?’ Fox asked quietly.

‘I had to jump through several hoops,’ Deveraux replied. ‘I admit to becoming a little exasperated and I am generally quite patient.’

Okay, so Corrine lived up to her reputation. Dandridge’s image was the LifeWeb messiah, proselytising the benefits of an open, easy-to-use platform for social interactions which could allow the world to meet friends and break down barriers. Pretty much every picture Fox had seen of him had featured a smiling face. Kit had told her he was a shrewd businessman, a skilled politician, and adept at marketing, and he had pushed his friend, the man who had created LifeWeb, out of the company. So which was the real Leonard Dandridge?

After twenty minutes, Fox was starting to wonder whether she would ever find out. Corrine had apologised once and said it would just be a few more minutes, smiling diplomatically while she lied through her teeth. Fox had figured that Dandridge would see the annoying detectives when he was damn well ready to, and she was more or less right.

‘You’re late,’ Dandridge stated when they were finally shown into his office. Fox looked around while Deveraux smiled and made introductions. She was fairly sure that the UNTPP man was having to force the smile and decided she was not even going to try.

The office was plush. Wood panel walls, a drinks cabinet, real wood furniture… Hell, the desk was huge and looked like walnut. One wall was all window showing a view out over the Atlantic. The guest chairs were nowhere near as cushy as the huge, leather chair Dandridge was seated in. And he remained sitting in it, his face fixed into a neutral-to-annoyed expression as his guests sat down. Fox crossed her legs, sat back, and fixed her gaze on the man who was definitely
not
really the smiling face of LifeWeb.

‘What is it that the UNTPP wants with LifeWeb?’ Leonard Dandridge was an attractive man. Fox knew he was in his sixties, but he looked thirty. His hair was black, not a hint of grey, and he had clear, hazel eyes. There was not a wrinkle on his face and his body suggested sculpting more than effort. His nose was a little long, a little hooked, and Fox figured he would have had something done to that if it were not for corporate image: people knew that face, had done from when LifeWeb was a start-up, and changing it was not an option.

‘We are investigating a string of murders in three countries,’ Deveraux said. ‘America, South Africa, and Germany. You may have seen reports of the last victim, Lauren Mary Coolidge.’

‘I pay little attention to tabloid news,’ Dandridge replied. ‘What does this have to do with LifeWeb?’

‘They were all users. All of them used LifeFit and were kidnapped while running.’

‘I’d imagine that the police found the live LifeFit updates very useful in determining the kidnap sites then.’

‘Evidence has come to light that the “live” data was faked. These people were taken from other locations while LifeFit reported them as being on one of their old runs.’

‘Impossible,’ Dandridge said, dismissing the statement with a wave of his hand.

‘I assure you, Mister Dandridge, that this information is accurate. Indeed, some of the evidence comes from LifeWeb itself. Runners have been pictured in locations which LifeFit would indicate they were nowhere near.’

‘Glitches in the system, I’d imagine. These things happen, infrequently.’

‘Twelve times?’ Fox asked. ‘In precisely the same way, at the right time to cover a kidnapping in each case. Twice is coincidence, Mister Dandridge, twelve times is something else.’

‘And what is MarTech’s interest in this?’ Dandridge asked, his attention shifting to Fox.

‘Palladium Security Solutions,’ Fox corrected. ‘We’ve asked MarTech Technologies to consult on the matter, but Palladium was asked to investigate the case.’

Dandridge’s eyes narrowed. ‘By whom?’

‘You know him. Harper August.’

‘Harper’s granddaughter…’

‘The first victim. There were five more in New York, then two in Cape Town, three in Berlin, and the latest back in New York.’ Fox watched his face, looking for signs that he had connected the locations to Grant, but there was nothing. ‘And there was attempt on another, but we got lucky there. He missed.’ Dandridge seemed to be gathering his thoughts, so she pressed on. ‘There are two theories on the erroneous data. Either someone is changing it on the server, or the killer is hacking the LifeWeb software the victims are using.’

‘Any suggestion of a vulnerability in our software, client or server-side, will be met with a legal response,’ Dandridge snapped.

‘We are very keen to ensure that no such rumour is started,’ Deveraux said. ‘This is why we wish to have the software and security systems of your company audited by a neutral party.’

‘Out of the question.’

‘Sir, if we are required to go through legal channels to obtain a warrant–’

‘Good luck with that. NAPA will–’

‘NAPA are just as keen to catch this man as we are,’ Fox interrupted. ‘The idea of coming to you like this was to
avoid
having NAPA go through all the steps required. If they have to sort out a warrant to look at your systems, it will take weeks and it
will
result in the information becoming public. Very few people know about this possibility right now, but the more who know, the more chance of someone gabbing to the media.’

There was enough of a pause that Fox knew Dandridge was considering his options. ‘No. If this information leaks, we
will
sue everyone involved and we will
not
allow people into our code without a court order. I believe you have wasted enough of my time now.’

Deveraux stood, trying hard to keep the scowl off his face.

Fox got to her feet, stepped forward, and put her hands on Dandridge’s desk, leaning over to stare at him. ‘Mister Dandridge, I have people investigating this. If they uncover a vulnerability in your software and work out how to exploit it, out of respect, we will report that to you so that it can be fixed. But we are talking about murder. Twelve people have died and more will follow. If you don’t fix this problem in a timely manner, we
will
go public, and it won’t be with a rumour.’

‘Don’t threaten me. I’ll–’

‘I don’t threaten people. That’s what you do. Fix this, Mister Dandridge, or the next body that turns up naked, raped, tortured, and murdered will be on your head.’

~~~

‘He’s cute,’ Terri said, keeping her voice low so that Deveraux would not hear her. ‘Blonde, and there’s the accent. Made for you.’

‘Don’t you start,’ Fox grumbled. ‘Kit’s been trying to set me up with him too. I’ve said I’ll ask him out for a drink or something.’

‘Fuck that! More specifically, fuck him. As soon as you can, get his well-fitted pants off.’

‘Terri!’

‘What? If you don’t grab him, I might have to check him out myself.’

‘You’re up to the base of your strap-on with Helen. Keep your hands to yourself.’ Terri was mostly into girls, it had to be admitted, but she experimented and Fox was coming around to thinking that Deveraux might be worth a try. ‘I’ll ask him. Now, pour the drinks and let’s get to business.’

After their meeting with Dandridge, Deveraux had made some comment about needing a drink to get the taste out of his mouth. Fox had suggested killing two birds with one stone by getting an update from Jackson along with a drink. Jackson, it turned out, was in a business meeting, but Terri knew enough to brief them and they had retired to the solarium to talk.

‘The view is quite spectacular, Miss Martins,’ Deveraux said.

‘Sure is,’ Terri replied, not looking at the park which could be seen through the window. Fox considered hitting her. Terri handed Deveraux his glass: brandy, which Fox happened to know was aged and very good.

‘What’s the news on the software, Terri?’ Fox asked.

Terri sat down on a lounger while Fox sat on the other, beside Deveraux. Terri’s lips twitched, but what she said was, ‘Slowly. You know much about computers, Captain Deveraux?’

‘Enough to use them,’ Deveraux replied.

‘Just like Fox, okay. Modern software is encrypted to avoid decompilation.’

‘Even I know that,’ Fox pointed out.

‘Good. So that means we can’t just take the code we extracted from Marie’s implant, pull it apart, and examine it. What we can do is execute it under controlled conditions on a special kind of processor which logs exactly what it’s doing, and then reverse engineer it.’

‘You can’t just break the encryption?’

‘Yes…’

‘But that would be illegal,’ Deveraux pointed out.

Fox gave a grunt. ‘Okay, fine, go on, Terri.’

‘Reverse engineering is borderline. To be honest, it’s not illegal because it takes forever and ensuring you’ve persuaded the code to run every execution path is next to impossible. We’re bombarding the LWOS instance we have with all sorts of data, hoping we’ll see something we aren’t expecting. It takes time. A
lot
of time.’

‘So we’re nowhere.’

‘Um… Yeah. Sorry. Really, we need LifeWeb to do something about this. They have the original source code.’

‘They want a warrant issued to get it done, and they’ll obstruct that in any way they can, including a load of gag orders to avoid anyone hearing about the problem.’

‘Fox is right,’ Deveraux said. ‘Dandridge appears far more concerned about rumours of a problem with LifeWeb than with murder.’

‘He
might
start something himself,’ Fox said.

‘If you scared him enough.’

‘Yeah, that.’

‘You put the fear of Fox into him?’ Terri asked, smirking.

‘Isn’t that supposed to be God?’

Terri shook her head. ‘Fear of Fox is much worse. Tell me, Captain, are you married?’

Fox considered it evidence that God was, at the very least, taking a nap since the ground did not open up and swallow her when she really wanted it to.

14
^th
July.

‘She is coming, right?’ Dillan said, again.

‘She said she was coming,’ Sam replied. ‘This place is a little harder to find than I expected. Maybe she’s having trouble finding us.’

‘She’ll be here,’ Terri said.

‘She’s very reliable,’ Marie added, ‘and that outfit is amazing, Terri.’

Terri looked down at herself. She was wearing a black, latex coat-like dress, fixed with press-studs at the front and low cut. The wide skirt was entirely open at the front, but the bodice descended in a point to cover her crotch. Her long legs were clad in fishnet hold-ups and she was wearing high-heeled, soft ankle boots. It was a new outfit, fabricated that day because of their destination.

‘Thanks,’ Terri said. ‘You’re in one of Lucy Graves’s outfits, right?’

Marie was in a plazkin tube dress in yellow and bright pink. The yellow panels at front and back were translucent. Her boots were gold with silver platforms and high-heels, the bodies of them being a criss-cross web of glittery plastic. Again, this was in keeping with the theme.

‘You sure she just didn’t look up this place and decide a fetish club was not to her liking?’ Dillan asked. Her own outfit was a little less risqué being a black tank dress with mesh sides, black high-heeled pumps, and fishnet hose.

‘She likes a challenge,’ Sam replied, resplendent in leather slacks and black mesh T-shirt.

‘I am now, officially, out of the North American Police Agency, and I’m going away to the Moon tomorrow.’ Dillan looked thoughtful for a second and then turned to Terri. ‘You will take that dress with you, right?’

Terri smirked at her. ‘I could be persuaded.’

‘Anyway, it’s my last day and I’d like Fox here.’

‘She’s here,’ Marie said, her voice sounding slightly dull. Everyone turned to look toward the door from the cloakroom lobby.

Fox was standing there looking around. As befitted one of New York’s newest niche clubs with a fetish theme, the Sheela Na Gig had quite subdued lighting in its lounge area, but the doorway was spotlit so Fox was quite visible. She was in black, high-heeled thigh-high boots with fishnet hold-ups visible above them. Her black, plazkin micro-skirt was barely long enough to cover her crotch and above that was a black and silver waist cincher. Hiding under the skirt and cincher was a barely there mesh teddy, which was the only thing covering her breasts aside from two crosses of black tape over her nipples. There was a collar of seven silver and black rings around her throat, narrowing from her collarbones to her throat, and silver hoop earrings with black spikes at the bottom in her ears. Her nails were jet black, her lips a deep red, and she had black arcs of eyeshadow on.

‘I didn’t know she could look like that,’ Dillan said.

‘She’s punishing me for sleeping with Sam,’ Marie said.

‘I think she’s punishing me for sleeping with you,’ Sam said.

‘No,’ Terri disagreed, ‘she’s punishing
me
for teasing her about Captain Deveraux.’

‘Okay,’ Dillan said, ‘so she’s punishing all of you lot, but what’ve
I
done?’

Fox moved out of the light a little and immediately spotted the group standing by the door. She raised a hand and waved, and then turned around to look behind her. Deveraux came through the door in a loose, black silk shirt and leather slacks. It was not
very
fetishistic, but it met with the criteria the club stuck to on its more public floors. They walked over, a distinct strut in Fox’s stride.

‘A fetish club, Sam?’ Fox asked, smiling. ‘Didn’t you learn your lesson from the last place?’

‘No memetics, no subliminals,’ Sam replied. ‘They only use v-tags in some of the upper-level rooms where things get a little kinky. And we wouldn’t have got to see you in that outfit if we hadn’t come here.’

Fox’s smile broadened. ‘Just something I threw together.’

‘If I beg
a lot
,’ Terri said, ‘would you let me kiss your boots?’

‘Only,’ Fox replied, her expression shifting to a disdainful, slightly bored one, ‘if you’re
very
good.’ She grinned again. ‘Everyone, this bemused-looking gentleman is Jason Deveraux. Jason, this is Marie, Sam, you’ve met Terri, and Helen here is the reason we’re all in this place.’