Page 25 of Anarchy Missing

CHAPTER TEN - LULU

“What am I looking at?” I came in early this morning after spending an entire night foolishly imagining all the many ways in which Case Reider would make contact with me again—one of which included a romantic party that looked suspiciously like our night at the Debutante Ball—only to find a two-inch-thick file waiting on my desk, and Randy sitting in my chair, drinking that delicious-smelling coffee and talking on the phone. “This is… what?” I ask, looking up at Randy, who kindly vacated my chair and is now hovering over me. Jesus Christ, I need… “Cait!” I yell. “Can you please bring me a coffee!”

“It’s code,” Randy says.

I want to slap him, but I take a deep breath instead. “I can see that. Randy.” I hold the scowl in. Where is my coffee? “But what does it say? This isn’t a note. When you said note I pictured cut-out ransom letters. Or boxy Capricorn-killer print. What is it?”

“Are you OK?” Randy asks, squinting his eyes at me. “Did I do something wrong? Are you mad at me?”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” I mumble.

“Why are you so bitchy?” he asks.

“Sorry,” Cait says, appearing with my coffee.

“Thank God,” I say, taking it from her and slurping some down real fast. I give Randy an almost apologetic look and then point to the caffeine. “I just needed my coffee.”

“Got it,” Randy says, his words clipped. “Cait,” he says, and before Cait can escape the tension, she turns and smiles. “Make sure our princess here has her coffee waiting from now on.”

“Sure thing, Randy.” She gives me a wink and a smile, then leaves, closing the door behind her.

Randy pans his hands at me and says, “Take your time, Lulu. Drink up. You let me know when you’re ready to work, OK?”

I feel stupid all of a sudden. I was kinda bitchy. It’s really not like me. “I’m sorry,” I say, meaning it. “I just had a long night and didn’t get any sleep. And Case did not try to contact me. Our plan didn’t work.”

“Well… come on, Lulu. He’s probably being directed by those thug friends of his. Give it more than one night before you give up. And before you ask me again, let me show you the message we found in the code.”

He leans over my shoulder, so close to me I can smell his cologne. It’s not strong, not at all. But he’s very close.

“Hackers sometimes place messages inside their code. See this?” He points to a jumble of words and characters in the middle of the print out. “That’s it.”

“It doesn’t say anything.”

“It’s code, Lulu.” He says that like I’m a slow-learning five-year-old. “Which means you have to decipher it. And we did. The Feds had it since it came in yesterday and they sent it back with an analysis.” He lifts the printout up and yup, sure enough there is a detailed analysis from the Feds.

If I had just waited five seconds, I’m sure Randy would’ve told me about that little detail. But instead I flew off the handle and blamed coffee. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Randy says. “I’m sure all this is kind of overwhelming to you. Back in town after all these years. Then this big case, not to mention your ex-boyfriend might be involved. I get it. Just relax.”

I almost wish that little pep talk came with a sleazy offer of a shoulder massage and some inappropriate sexual innuendo, because at least then I could pretend he’s partly to blame for my behavior.

But it doesn’t. He’s being sincere.

“Look,” he says, pulling the analysis out for me to read. “They think this hacker is calling himself Bike Boy. And he’s talking to a guy named Red Robber.”

“These are… handles? Or something? Nicknames?”

“Yeah,” Randy says. “Online aliases. Red Robber seems to be the guy who actually carried it out, but it’s not clear yet. We think Bike Boy is Lincoln Wade.”

“Why?” I ask. “Why do you think that?”

“We went through Detective Masters’ emails and she refers to him that way when they are… flirting.”

“Bike Boy,” I say out loud. “Sounds kinda stupid. Who’s Red Robber?”

“We don’t know. If we didn’t already know that Bike Boy was Wade, then we’d have assumed he was the Red Robber. Because from what they could gather from this message, it appears this hack was all coming from Red Robber’s instructions.”

“Hmm,” I say, taking another sip of coffee. I’m feeling better. Maybe it’s really the missing caffeine that made me irritable this morning? “What else does it say?”