My blackmailer’s noon deadline came and went over an hour ago. I’m fairly confident they won’t release my client names. Not yet. The instant they make their informationpublic, it loses all its market value. I’m certain, though, that another threat will arrive—probably before the end of the day.
I’m curious to see what else my enemy has found. I’ve reached out to Lyon Momentum and White Apple Systems a dozen times in the past week. No one’s returning my phone calls, emails, or texts. While I haven’t been formally fired, I don’t expect to be on either Christmas-card list come the end of the year.
Lynch taps his computer screen, pointing out a new line of business he’s picked up for his crew. He’s taken over sanitation for Baltimore; his men run the trucks responsible for collecting garbage within the city limits. He’s sloppy, though. His records are all over the place, assets and liabilities tracked a dozen different ways.
Lynch is trusting, too. He insisted on dragging me into the Canton Crew, on my marrying Kate, but nothing’s official yet. I could walk away tonight, his retainer in my bank account, his data in my brain, and the only recourse he’d have is his hired guns. They’d never track me down, if I decide to leave the country. They might not get me if I stay right in the heart of Georgetown.
But most of all, Lynch is stupid. He’s measured his wealth by dollars and cents, completely overlooking his most substantial asset: Kate herself. There’s no reason for him to pay my outsize retainer. Kate is absolutely capable of doing everything he’s asking me to do.
I know that. I’ve seen her code. I watched, just two nights ago, as she powered through a Snow Star challenge in Winter Reckoning. Kate’s a prodigy; she has a gift for solving the most complex problems in the world.
I created Winter Reckoning specifically to find talent like hers.
It’s taken a couple of years to build the game’s reputation, but now it routinely attracts the best hackers around. They’relured in by the easy bits, the equations they can solve in their sleep. They stick around for the real challenge—the Snow Stars.
And I get first dibs on acquiring premier programmers. Lone Wolf only has a handful of employees, but I’ve pulled every one of them from Winter Reckoning. I reach out to the players who’ve stuck around the longest, the ones who accumulate the most points.
Kate Lynch currently tops the charts.
I’ve known the Red Cap Raiders were on the game platform for the past three years. But I only realized that Kate is my number-one ranked Snow Star player after the botched attack on Banque Wagner. Studying her code from the inside, I finally gleaned her internet address, skipping past all the bells and whistles she used to hide her identity.
Last night, I reviewed her in-game statistics. She’s made more kills than any other player. She’s completed the most Snow Star projects too. And she’s done it all while limiting in-game damage to her avatar. She doesn’t take unnecessary risks.
But Lynch doesn’t know any of that. He doesn’t understand Kate. He just sees a girl he can sell, a bride to foist off on some unsuspecting schmuck—me—so he can build clan connections with his far-more-biddable younger daughter.
Idiot.
Lynch finally finishes guiding me through the computer landscape I’ll be reshaping for the better part of the next year. I know he’s through because he leans back in that chair, ignoring the squeal of tortured gears predicting that the next time he reclines might be his last. Putting his feet up on his desk, he searches for his cigar, which he’s long-since reduced to a pulpy stub.
“Let me ask you a question,” he says.
I wait.
“This cryptocurrency shite. Someone’s brought me a deal, says it’s a sure thing. A new currency I can buy before it breaks big.”
“Who brought it?” There are a thousand scammers out there. Hell, Shannon would have launched her own coin, if she was still kicking.
Lynch gets a crafty look on his face. “You may be family, son, but I don’t share all my secrets.”
I hold up both hands, letting him have his way. But I ask, “What’s the name of the coin?”
He doesn’t want to tell me, but he likes being the smart guy more. “StarCoin. My source says there’ll only be ten million coins—no more, not ever.”
“That’s how these things work. Early investors make money distributing the coins. Once they’re gone, decades down the road, money’s made on transaction fees.”
I can’t actually blame him for looking confused. Crypto is complicated. But that’s an excellent reason for newcomers not to pour a fortune into it.
Complications make people lose a lifetime of savings to grifters. Folks buy Florida real estate when they’ve never been south of the Mason-Dixon line. They invest in North Atlantic wind farms without learning about seasonal changes in the price of energy.
Lynch squeezes a raspberry sound past his lips. “I don’t care about the details.”
He should.
“I just want to know if it’s a sound investment.”
I think about telling him to give the project to Kate. Let her see what she can find. But I know that isn’t what he wants to hear, and I’m always reluctant to alienate a client the first time we meet in person. “I’ll look into it,” I say.
He nods, satisfied. “Now, there’s one more thing,” he says. “I have some accounts down in the Caymans. But I keep hearing about Georgia—the country, not the state. It’s supposed to be the newest tax haven around, and the best for?—”