Chapter 36

36

Teddy arrived in Berlin disguised as an unassuming, gray-haired retiree. From the airport, he took the S-Bahn into the city, then the U-Bahn to Potsdamer Platz. By the time he’d exited the station at street level, the sun had started to set.

He sent a text.

I’m here

Less than a minute later, Vesna appeared from around the corner of a building, carrying two cups of coffee.

When she reached him, she looked him up and down and said, “That is not a flattering look for you.”

“I feel as if I should take offense, but since that’s what I was going for, thank you for the compliment.”

“You are welcome.”

“Is one of those for me?” he asked, eyeing the coffee.

She lifted the cups. “Caffe latte or Americano?”

“Americano, if you don’t mind.”

She handed him one of the cups. “Has your hacker friend had any luck yet?”

Teddy checked his email and shook his head. “Still nothing.”

“Good. That means we finally get to do something fun.”

“We do.”

Vesna led him on a circuitous route to the rear entrance of a mixed-use building, several blocks away, then up the service elevator to an apartment on the seventh floor.

“Just so you know,” Vesna said. “My friend can be a little prickly.”

“As long as he knows what he’s doing,” Teddy said.

“That, he does.”

She knocked three times, paused, then knocked twice more.

The dead bolt clicked and the door swung open, revealing a wiry man with thin brown hair. He gave Vesna a nod, then walked back into the apartment without a word.

“I see what you mean,” Teddy said.

He and Vesna entered.

“Is there somewhere I can stow this?” Teddy asked, tapping the handle of his suitcase.

“Since you’re paying the bills,” Vesna said, “I am giving you the master bedroom, at the end of the hall. You are welcome.”

“Your generosity knows no bounds.”

“It is one of my best traits, don’t you think?”

Teddy put his bag away and returned to the living room.

Vesna was standing near the window where three chairs and a portable table had been set up. The man who’d answered the door was in the chair next to the table, working on a laptop. On the floor around him were several other electronic devices.

Teddy walked over and looked at the twelve-story, modernist building on the other side of the street. It was the reason this apartment was chosen. Occupying its top three floors was the headquarters for Braun Logistics and Security.

“This is Hans,” Vesna said, gesturing to the seated man.

“Hello, Hans,” Teddy said. “You can call me John.”

Hans made no sign that he’d heard anything.

“Hans,” Vesna barked.

He jumped and looked at her. “Ja?”

“Are you listening?”

“ Ja, ja . He is John. I am Hans.” He turned back to the computer.

“I swear he’s good at his job,” Vesna said to Teddy.

“Which is all I care about,” Teddy said.

“Hans, can you give us a status report, please.”

“I need a moment,” Hans said. When he finished what he was doing, he swiveled around to face them. To Teddy, he said, “You are the boss?”

“I am.”

Hans gave Teddy the same up-and-down look Vesna had given him when she’d met him. “You do not look like a boss.”

“I didn’t realize there was a type.”

Hans frowned in thought. “Maybe it is good you do not look like one. Can fool many people.”

“Hans,” Vesna said. “Status report?”

Hans pressed the laptop’s space bar, and the screen filled with a four-by-three grid of video images.

He pointed at the top and middle rows. “These are feeds from every side of the building.” The feeds were all wide shots from cameras hidden around the perimeter. He then gestured at the bottom row. “Front entrance, parking garage entrance, loading dock, and rear entrance. The last is next to the loading dock.”

“No luck getting anything inside the building?”

Hans scoffed, tapped the space bar, and a new set of feeds appeared. This time there were two rows of four. The top row were all feeds from inside the parking garage, while the bottom was split between feeds from the building’s main lobby and from inside three stairwells.

“Ground floor on the stairwells?” Teddy asked.

Hans nodded.

“Drones?”

The man pointed up. “I have five on the roof ready to go, when needed.”

“Any sign of our people of interest?” Vesna said.

“No sign of Wenz. But Braun left thirty minutes ago.”

“Driving himself or chauffeured?” Teddy asked.

“Chauffeured. Black Mercedes-Maybach. I have the license number. When it returns, I’ll put a tracking bug on it.”

“Only if you can get close enough without drawing attention.”

Hans’s face screwed up as if the question was ridiculous. “ I won’t be doing it personally.”

He picked up a hard-plastic box, undid the latch, opened the top, and removed a palm-sized drone. “This will do it for me.”

“How does it carry the bug and put it in place?”

“The drone is the bug,” Hans said. “I fly it under the car and attach it somewhere it won’t be seen.”

“Huh. I wouldn’t mind getting ahold of a few of those. Who makes them?”

“I do.”

“Do you take orders?”

“I have an online catalog. I’ll send you the link.”

“Please do.”

“Have you been able to get the blueprints for the building?” Vesna asked.

Hans brought up pdfs of the blueprints. There was a page for each floor, plus several detailed drawings of specific areas.

“Can you show us the BLS floors?” Teddy said.

Hans did so, starting with the tenth floor.

On the top floor was a large office labeled President/Ceo . That would be Braun’s office.

“Forward that to me, please,” Vesna said.

Hans clicked several buttons, then Vesna’s phone vibrated. She checked her screen, then forwarded a copy to Teddy.

They spent several minutes studying the camera feeds to familiarize themselves with the building.

“I’ve seen enough for now,” Teddy said. “Why don’t we get out of Hans’s hair.”

Vesna nodded, then said to Hans, “Keep us updated on Braun’s movements.”

“Sure, sure.”

“And let us know if Dieter shows up,” Teddy threw in.

Hans waved a hand in the air, dismissing them.

Teddy and Vesna left the apartment and took a stroll around the BLS building, wanting to get a firsthand look at it.

When they finished, Vesna took Teddy to a quiet café, where they studied the blueprints and talked through options as they ate dinner. By the time their plates had been removed, they had a plan for how to sneak into BLS’s office, where they hoped to find out which client had ordered the vendetta on the Golden Hour team.

“Still one big question, though,” Vesna said.

“Security system,” Teddy said.

She nodded.

The blueprints contained a notation that BLS had its own system installed, followed by a fourteen-character alphanumeric sequence and nothing else.

Teddy pointed at the characters. “You’re sure this doesn’t ring any bells?”

She studied it for a moment, then shook her head. “Sorry. Maybe your friends at the Agency will know.”

Teddy grimaced. “I need to think about that.”

“Ah, right. The mole.”

He nodded. While Lance’s people might know what the sequence meant, asking them could alert whoever had been leaking information about Golden Hour. Teddy couldn’t risk that.

He did know someone else he could ask, however.

“We’ve got a big day tomorrow,” he said. “Let’s go back and get some rest.”

“You don’t have to tell me twice.”

They returned to the flat, and once Teddy was in his bedroom, he called Kevin.

“Dude,” Kevin answered. “I told you it might take several days.”

“I take that to mean no joy yet?”

“None whatsoever.”

“Unfortunate, but that’s not why I’m calling.” He explained the issue with the security system, then read off the character string.

“Oh, yeah,” Kevin said. “That’s the system identifier.”

“Does that mean you know what type of system it is?”

“Yeah.”

Teddy waited, but Kevin remained silent.

“Care to share?” Teddy said.

“It’s trouble.”

“Is that a brand name?”

“Ha. You’re funny. It’s a modular system made by a Finnish company with a name that has too many vowels for me to pronounce.”

“So, why is it trouble?”

“Next to top of the line in the dictionary is a picture of this system.”

“Not sure you understand how dictionaries work, but I get what you were going for. Can it be bypassed?”

“No,” Kevin said firmly. Then after a beat, he added, “Well, yes, but…”

“But what?”

“You need the right piece of hardware and someone who knows how to use it to hack in.”

“Where do I get either?”

“Lucky for you, the answer is from me.”

“For both?”

“You bet.”

“How does all this work?”

“The hardware is basically a souped-up thumb drive. I can talk you through where to install it. Once that’s done, it’ll give me access to the system, and I can tweak the security settings however you’d like. When do you need this done?”

“We’re going in tomorrow night.”

“Wow, okay. And where exactly are you?”

“Berlin.”

Teddy could hear keys clacking, followed by a curse and more tapping. After another curse, Kevin said, “Uh, more bad news.”

“And that would be?”

“The soonest any commercial courier could have it there would be by seven p.m. tomorrow.”

“That would be cutting things awfully close.”

More typing drifted over the line. “There are some private courier services that could get it there sooner. Basically, a person carrying it on a flight and hand delivering. Yikes. Expensive, though, plus the cost of the flight. Damn, maybe I’m in the wrong business.”

Teddy highly doubted that Kevin-the-courier could make anywhere near the amount that Kevin-the-hacker did from the comfort of his basement, but it did give Teddy an idea.

“Are there any flights to Berlin leaving tonight?” he asked. It was barely evening where Kevin was.

Kevin worked his computer, then said, “Yeah. Several, actually. Looks like most have a few open seats.”

“Perfect. Book one for yourself.”

“What?”

“Send me the details and I’ll have someone meet you at the airport when you get here.”

“Hold on. I don’t do house calls.”

“Do you have a passport?”

“Um…”

“That’s a yes, isn’t it?”

“Maybe.”

“Grab it, pack a few clothes, and get a move on.”

“But…but—”

“I realize this is an unusual request, but I think it’ll work out best if you’re here. And if it helps, I’ll make sure you get a bonus.”

“But I don’t want to go to Germany.”

“Your mom is always telling you to get out more.”

“How would you know that?”

“That’s classified, but I’m happy to call her and see what she thinks about you going on a trip.”

“Please don’t!”

“Then buy your ticket and get on the plane. Don’t worry, you’re going to love it.”