Page 3 of Between Love and Honor

“Keep the Crown safe tonight, Agent Lockett,” the director ordered, referring to the White House by its Secret Service code name.

“Always job number one.” Adam saluted them before disappearing.

“The guests will be arriving shortly.” The director indicated Ben should precede him down the few steps leading to the briefing room.

Ben hesitated briefly. When he woke up that morning, the only stressful thing on his agenda was making sure his thirty-five-foot sailboat was secure ahead of the line of nasty summer storms predicted to pass through the nation’s capital this evening. But then his dark web alias had received a very troubling message. One that required a speedy intervention.

“Make way for the president,” Director Worcester murmured sharply, prodding Ben into action.

As the men and women assembled at the table rose to their feet, Ben hurried to one of the two empty chairs lining the walls directly behind his boss, the Secretary of Homeland Security. She nodded toward Ben confidently as the president seated himself at the head of the table. The others followed suit amid a chorus of, “Good evening, Mr. President.”

President Conrad Manning acknowledged them with a weary sigh. “Diplomacy is difficult enough without having to battle severe weather and a known terrorist hacker trying to crash dinner.” He unbuttoned his tuxedo jacket and leaned back in his chair. “We’re taking a huge political risk letting him through the front door. Tell me we have the intelligence to identify this guy before he gets into the State Dining Room.”

“We have no idea of this person’s actual identity, only his online alias,” the Secretary of Homeland responded.

“He’s been visiting multiple terrorist outposts boasting of his apparent prowess in hacking into various entities’ computer systems and holding them for ransom. Our sources indicate he’s working with someone here in Washington to perpetrate a cyberattack against the US.”

“This is a big country,” the president said. “Can’t your sources get more specific than that?”

“Only that we believe he is the leader of a ring of cyber hackers who have been taking over banks worldwide. His success would be catastrophic to the US economy, sir.”

The Secretary of Homeland’s words settled over the room causing most of those assembled to shift uncomfortably in their seats.

President Manning pinched the bridge of his nose. “All of this based on some chatter on the dark web? What the hell is the dark web, anyway? A chat room for a bunch of terrorists and criminals? Can we believe anything that even goes on there?”

The NSA director cleared his throat. “With all due respect, sir, we’ve been monitoring this individual’s activities via multiple channels in addition to the dark web. Based on this, we concur that the intel the Secret Service provided is viable.”

Damn right it’s viable! Ben tried not to jump out of his chair at the NSA director’s snarky tone. The man hated that Ben was always able to put the pieces of the puzzle together quicker than his own staff.

“We’d be committing diplomatic suicide to exclude an entire delegation from the dinner based on our assumptions,” the Secretary of State interjected. “It’s better to let him through the door as long as we can catch him before he meets his contact.”

“And then what?” the president demanded.

“We continue our search for his contact,” the Secretary of Homeland replied matter-of-factly.

The CIA director spoke up from the end of the table.

“Our sources indicate our unwanted dinner guest is a member of the prince’s entourage. All we have to go on, however, is a dimly lit photo our operative was able to shoot during one of this guy’s marketing visits.”

Everyone looked toward the screen at the end of the room where a photo popped up. It was dark, but Ben’s pulse sped up at the challenge the grainy image presented.

He was confident VOYEUR, the facial recognition software he’d spent close to ten million dollars of taxpayers’ money refining, would be able to identify the suspect quickly. His fingers twitched around the handle to his laptop case housing the VOYEUR software.

“As you can see, his profile is heavily shadowed,” the CIA director continued.

“Our suspect will be enjoying dessert before any artificial intelligence can identify him from that photo,” the NSA director announced in disgust.

“Not necessarily.”

All eyes turned toward Ben. He’d been impertinent by speaking up, that much was evident by the look on the Secretary of Homeland Security’s face. But they didn’t have time to get into a turf battle with NSA. The artificial intelligence NSA used would take time to pinpoint the suspect. VOYEUR had passed all the field tests demonstrating it could work more rapidly than the technology other agencies were using. It was time to put the system to work.

“You seem confident you can pull this off, Agent . . .”

The president looked at Ben as if he was trying to place him.

“Segar, sir. Special Agent Ben Segar. I’m a friend of Dr. Benoit’s.”

“Ah,” President Manning said, recognition dawning as he motioned for Ben to continue.

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