The Book of Betrayals by Kevin Tumlinson

Author:Kevin Tumlinson [Tumlinson, Kevin]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Happy Pants Books
Published: 2020-02-13T22:00:00+00:00

7

After clearing with OKC police and returning to their hotel, Denzel and Kotler met in the lobby. Kotler had been given a clean bill of health from the EMTs who had arrived on the scene, but he still felt a little less than alright after the encounter. There were unwritten rules in combat, after all.

“How are the boys?” Denzel asked, stifling a grin.

Kotler was sitting on the cushioned seat of the booth they were sharing in the hotel's restaurant, holding a bag of ice in his lap, hidden by his napkin. "Present and accounted for," he said, wincing a little.

Denzel huffed, nodded, and then to Kotler’s eternal gratitude, changed the subject. “You said you’d fill me in on why it’s a good thing that those two got away with your phone.”

Kotler nodded. “First, all the data is backed up instantly, and I’ve already checked. Everything I’ve pulled together is saved online.”

"Good. I have my people tracking the phone itself to see if we can pick up its last known location."

“And I sent the signal to lock and wipe it,” Kotler said. “I tried finding it with the app but had no luck.”

Denzel nodded. “So why is it a good thing that they took it? And why did they want it anyway?”

"Gail is checking to see if I've solved the riddle. She probably has a team of hackers working to unlock it, so she can dive into the phone's memory. Maybe even hack my accounts."

“And that’s a good thing?” Denzel said.

Kotler smiled. “It is when I’ve been planting false leads in all the data.”

Denzel smiled. “Kotler, sometimes you’re as smart as you think you are.”

“A blessing and a curse,” Kotler grinned.

“So, what will these false leads do for us?” Denzel asked.

Kotler outlined what he’d been doing over the past several days.

Initially, he'd started by merely dropping in random speculation about the map and the artifacts, and what he suspected he would find. From there he developed a narrative. He crafted a story, told through "discoveries and revelations" as he and the FBI worked to crack the riddle of the map.

The trick was to craft the narrative so that he could include the actual data he and Denzel and Liz Ludlum had gathered as part of their investigation but skew the conclusions and outcomes of that data to lead Gail to some specific wrong conclusions.

It wasn't easy. Kotler had been forced to pull everything together without the use of his digital devices, memorizing faux facts as if they were real, and continually checking himself as he updated his notes. He had created a cipher of sorts, with false details standing in for their real-world equivalents.

Kotler suspected that Gail would somehow get her hands on this information. He hadn't quite expected that she'd need to physically steal the phone, but the effect was the same. He and Denzel had gone out of their way to encrypt and protect his devices and must have done a fair job of it, all things considered.

Denzel listened as Kotler explained everything, including details of the false narrative.

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