Runaway Heart (22 page)

     
"I ran what you wanted through my secure contact in D.C. He
called back two hours ago and said Octopus is a black op computer lab."

     
"Really?"

     
"Yeah, he found only one mention of it, but it was in a
secure Pentagon computer. This lab is located out at Pepperdine University, in
room 212 of the Computer Science building, if you can believe that. It's being
supervised by something called Echelon which my friend tells me is like a
satellite spy network—real hush-hush."

     
"No kidding. That's what my client thought."

     
"Yeah. But that's all he could find on it. He said it was
buried under a layer of UP codes. That's Ultimate Priority. It's supersecure.
But here's where it gets interesting . . ."

     
"Good, 'cause so far that doesn't quite figure."

     
"An hour after my guy gives me this he calls back, and Jack,
I never heard him in such a panic."

     
Chick squirmed slightly in the brown leather chair, screwing his
ass in for better traction, then he leaned forward and said, "He tells me
to forget everything he just told me. Says, whatever I do, don't tell a soul.
He said his career is cooked if it gets back to anybody on his agency flow
chart that he gave me this. Apparently he wasn't supposed to be able to access
it, but because of his White House security number he leaked in. Big mistake!
The systems administrator traced the breach to him. It's called a back-finger.
Anyway, a team of federal hitters shows up in my friend's office twenty minutes
later and they put him through a half hour of bullshit. He tells these two
suits that he'd heard about Octopus, got curious, and was checking because he
thought it might be part of one of his drug cases—that it was all just a dumb
mistake. He doesn't think they bought it. They rattled him good, but he held
up, didn't tell them he gave it to me, and I didn't tell him I was doing this
for you. Whatever it is, Octopus is not supposed to see daylight."

     
After Chick finished, Jack poured the big cop a scotch to calm him
down. He slid it over, but Chick O'Brian just looked at the glass . . . stared
at it as if Jack had just rolled a live grenade across the desk.

     
"What?" Jack asked, slightly perplexed. Then it hit him.
It was Miro's glass and Chick was afraid it was crawling with herpes simplex
12, or dick fungus, or some other form of sexual leprosy. So Jack switched
glasses, handing his to Chick and taking Miro's for himself. He began sipping,
while Chick watched him with something between awe and disgust.

     
"You got guts, I'll say that."

     
"No, I'm just not a moron. You can't get a sexual disease
from a glass."

     
"Your dick falls off, don't come crying to me."

     
"Right," Jack said. "You'd be my first stop if that
happened."

     
They sat there for a long minute savoring their drinks.

     
"Computer lab, huh? Okay, look, is there any way to track
this thing from another direction? Find out more about it?"

     
"Don't you listen? This guy freaked out on me, and he's no
wuss. We did some doors together. He's solid, and he was scared pissless. I'm
telling you, Jack, don't mess with it. It's why I came over here in person to
warn you. Whatever it is, leave this Octopus thing alone." Chick stood,
put his empty glass back on the desk, then stopped and examined the shattered
lock. "What happened here?"

     
"These guys around here all find me irresistible," Jack
said, deadpan. "I'm thinking about not wearin' my Brut cologne anymore.
Fucks 'em up."

     
"I'm worried about you, Wirta," the cop's cop said over
his shoulder as he left.

     
"Me too," Jack said softly, wondering what the hell kind
of nightmare Strockmire had stumbled into.

J
ack Wirta met Herman Strockmire in the
paved lower parking lot off Seaver Drive at Pepperdine University.

     
It was strange, the way it happened. Jack arrived first, at 10:00
a.m.,
and waited. Twenty minutes later
Herman pulled into the lot in a silver Mercedes SL500 with a license plate that
read
funy grl.

     
Herman sat motionless in the car after he parked it, so Jack got
out of his sagging Fairlane and waved.

     
No response.

     
He walked a bit closer and stared right through the windshield at
the fat, unhealthy man sitting behind the wheel of Barbra Streisand's luxury
Mercedes. He waved again.

     
Still nothing.

     
He thought maybe Herman was just gathering his thoughts in there.

     
When Herman didn't get out, Jack walked over and tapped on the
window. Raccoon eyes turned to look at him, and only then did Herman Strockmire
Jr. attempt to move. He grunted and strained as he dragged his huge bulk out of
the car.

     
Finally, he heaved up, gulping mouthfuls of morning air, grabbed
his suit coat and shouldered into it, then slowly retrieved his briefcase.

     
"You okay?" Jack asked, concerned.

     
"Yep, tip-top. Piss and vinegar."

     
Herman certainly looked warm and yellow, but the vinegar was
missing.

     
In the distance over Herman's shoulder was the Pendelton Computer
Science Center, a large, multi-storied white stucco building with red tile
patios, arched windows, and a dormered roof.
     
Clustered around it were all the little Pendeltons: the Pendelton
Learning Center, the Pendelton Foundation Building, Pendelton Hall. The
Pendeltons had obviously dropped some big green on Pepperdine U.

     
The campus was spread across a rolling hillside, and they had to
climb two levels of concrete steps to get from the parking lot up to the
Computer Science Center. By the time they got halfway, Herman was leaking air
like a buckshot dirigible, wheezing and gasping, holding onto the stair rail
like somebody's ninety-year-old aunt.

     
Susan had been right. Jack was actually beginning to feel a little
guilty. They should get this guy hooked up to an IV bag fast. Herman started up
the last, steep flight of stairs.

     
"Don't you want to wait for your daughter?" Jack said,
looking for any excuse to give the guy a little longer to rest.

     
"Susan isn't coming. She's at the Registrar's office at
UCLA," he answered, turning to face the last flight. Jack thought the
twenty-step climb would surely kill him.

     
He grabbed Herman's arm and stopped him. "How come? What's
out at UCLA?"

     
"She's going to law school there."

     
"Wonderful," Jack said, thinking how much he hated
lawyers.

     
"She's worked hard, took prelaw in night school. She went out
there this morning to see if she could qualify for academic aid." Herman
looked wistfully up the final flight of stairs like Sir Edmund Hillary at the
last base camp on Everest. Then he grabbed the rail again and heaved himself
up.

     
Jack moved along with him, trying to slow the pace. "Man,
slow down. These stairs. . . I'm a little out of shape," Jack lied.

     
But Herman just lumbered along.

     
Room 212 was on the first floor, despite its two hundred number.
They looked through the open door. It was a large computer lab. There were
fifty or sixty work stations, but only ten or twelve of them were being used.
College-aged boys and girls were dressed in baggy, saggy plumber jeans.

     
As they peered into the computer room, a tall, rather good-looking
blond man with a Vandyke beard and tweedy sport coat materialized behind them.

     
"Something we can do for you?" He used the pronoun
"we" as if he took up more intellectual space than just one ordinary
person. He was also one of those guys that Jack ran into occasionally who he
hated on sight. His bullshit meter was instantly redlined.

     
Jack took a step back and studied the man while Herman reached
into his wallet for his card. Jack intercepted the process before the card got
into the man's possession.

     
"Uncle Charles," Jack said scolding. "I don't think
the man wants to buy insurance." Then Jack looked at the blonde man and
smiled. "My uncle has frontal-lobe dementia. He thinks he's still at
Aetna." Jack looked at Herman to see if he was going to play along.

     
After a moment Herman smiled and said, "Sorry. Forgot."

     
Vandyke replied, "How can we help?"

     
"My kid sister, Paulette, is thinking of coming here next
year," Jack said. "She's amazing with computers, and over at
Administration they said we shouldn't leave without seeing the Pendelton
Computer Science Center, so here we are."

     
"This is a closed lab." Then he actually reached past
Jack and pulled the door shut. "I'm Dean Nichols, head of the computer center."

     
"Oh, just the man we should be talking to," Jack
enthused.

     
"I'm afraid I can't talk right now. This is my class. Call my
office for an appointment." He re-opened the door and pushed past them
into the room. Jack used the moment to again look inside and scope out the
students furiously
pounding
keyboards and clicking mouses. Then he was looking at polished pine, as the
door was slammed in his face.

     
"Frontal-lobe dementia?" Herman said, scowling.

     
"Listen, Herm, you don't go around passing out the little
Institute cards. Don't forget what happened to Roland. Somewhere hiding in this
cheese souffle is a madman with acute homicidal mania."

     
Yeah . . . yeah. You're right. Thanks." He heaved a deep
sigh. "I didn't think of that. What now?"

     
"We wait in the quad for class to be over. I spotted a few
kids that looked worth talking to."

     
"You mean just then, while he was going in?" He seemed
impressed.

     
"Yep. You've hired class-A help here."

     
A bell rang, doors opened, and it seemed as if two million teens
wearing more or less identical outfits flowed into the plaza. All were carrying
the same oversized, stuffed backpacks, the same CD headsets. They overran the
Pendelton Center patio.

     
Jack caught a glimpse of one of the girls he had spotted in the
lab: yellow CD player, backpack, plumber bib overalls, curly red hair, and
thick glasses. Nerd.

     
Nerdy girls were good, because they don't get hit on too often, so
they don't get pissy when you talk to them. Jack followed her and Herman
caboosed along behind, wheezing and grunting.

     
"Excuse me," Jack called out. "Excuse me,
Miss."

     
She looked back at him, a puzzled frown on her freckled face.
"Huh?" She didn't remove her headset.

     
"Hi, I wonder if I could ask you a question?"

     
Nothing.

     
"My kid sister, Christine, wants to major in computer science
at Pepperdine. She's a senior right now, over at Pali High. I was wondering if
you could tell me if you're enjoying your courses here?"

     
"Huh?" She was proving to be a conversational treat.

     
"I was wondering if you get a lot of computer time in the
labs, if the terminals were state of the art, that sort of thing . . . if you
had good job opportunities upon graduation. Do companies come on campus and do
job-placement interviews?"

     
"Oh."

     
"What I mean is, do you like it here?" Getting one
simple sentence out of her was tough as animal dentistry.

     
"Huh?" She looked at him, then added, "You mean do
I like it here?"

     
We have ignition,
Jack thought. "Yeah, that's what I
was wondering."

     
"What's not to like?"

     
"Right," Jack said. "What's not to like? But could
you be slightly more specific?"