Winner's Curse: A Lynn Dayton Thriller (Lynn Dayton Thrillers Book 4) by L. A. Starks

Author:L. A. Starks [Starks, L. A.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Nemaha Ridge Publishing Group, LLC
Published: 2024-08-20T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 18

Dallas and Chicago

After she left, Rowan Daine couldn’t get Lynn’s impertinence off his mind. Worse, she was zeroing in on his wastewater disposal business as she chased the Bradshaw acquisition.

His customers had always appreciated him keeping his costs—their costs—low, and many did not question how he had done so. When he could, he tried to palm too-curious employees off to other oilfield companies. He’d had a handful of employees who had continually raised questions, until they didn’t.

At the big Park Cities mansion TriCoast was renting for him in Dallas, Daine pulled out his private cell phone, not the official TriCoast model he’d been given.

“Rowan, it’s the middle of the night in London, or did you forget?” Henry Vandervoost sounded sleepy.

“I didn’t forget. I’m having problems with Lynn Dayton.”

“Didn’t I tell you?”

“Sure. Bonus points for that. I need something to distract her. TriCoast supplies gas to Chicago?”

“Yes. So does my son. Bradshaw Energy.”

“Could be a two-fer, then, a way to make his company more affordable for you. We’re going to Chicago. Lynn wants me to meet TriCoast’s customers there. You need to find a hacker who can get in and shut the Chicago gas down, at least part of it. A ransomware deal if it’s the cover he needs.”

“You overestimate me, Daine. I can’t just put up a hacker job listing online.”

“Henry, you can find someone. I have faith.”

“Sounds like the two of them are bugging you.”

“Sounds like you’re in the same boat, or is Lynn your new bestie?”

“Give me a day or so.”

“Has to be soon. Time it for when we’re visiting Chicago, at least a test run.”

❖

It became apparent to Henry that with the right credentials, a bit of time, and enough money, many of the so-called ‘white hat hackers,’ had never given up their black hat business and were available for special projects after verifying he was not with law enforcement. He corresponded with several to determine who could work onsite in Chicago, then hired a pair of Romanian brothers who would readily blend in with the city’s Polish, Ukrainian, and Lithuanian populations. Using encrypted apps, Radu and Tihomir—at least those were the names they gave, no last name of course—agreed to insert malware into the utility’s control system code. Extra because they had to go to Chicago to do so. Half up front. Nonpayment by Henry would have serious consequences.

Henry agreed.

One day and an international flight later Radu and Tihomir were “visiting relatives” in Chicago. Their destination that night was not the utility’s downtown Chicago headquarters but a nondescript building housing gas distribution and pressure step-down equipment for part of the city. Cohorts they knew only by text had left them a locked car with directions to the keys in a snowy neighborhood on the north side of Chicago.

At 2 a.m. they parked near the distribution facility and donned the masks and black bloc antifa had made so useful for criminals. They climbed over the fence.

It was a cold night, so the security guard had stationed himself inside past an unlocked door.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.