Page 13 of The Devil's Ransom

There was a link to another address, and a clock counting down.

Wolffe stared at the screen for a moment, then turned back to Creed, saying, “Surely we can do something. We have the best hackers in the world.”

“Sir, this is no longer a hacking problem. It’s an encryption one. I can’t do anything with this.”

“Can you find out where it came from?”

“Possibly. That might be something in the doable category, but it’ll end up in some country where we have no reach. And I could use some help to do it. Someone with skill at this.”

“Skill at ransomware?”

“Exactly. There’s a company called Second Day Solutions. The guy who runs it has government contracts and a top-secret clearance. He does this for a living.”

“Second Day Solutions? Why that name?”

Creed gave a small smile and said, “It’s a play on Zero Day vulnerabilities. When someone gets hacked, they always first try to solve the problem with in-house IT people to spare the embarrassment or loss of confidence in their business. By day two, they give up and call him.”

“Who is he?”

“His name is Dylan Hobbes. He was a coder for the NSA for twenty years, worked in TAO, helped stand up Cyber Command, then went out to the private sector. He’s very, very good. But we need to get on this quickly. Every minute is causing problems.”

“Can we stop it from spreading?”

“Yeah, if you get all of our cover organizations to shut down their systems. They can’t turn them back on until this is resolved.”

Wolffe turned to Blaine and said, “Call Alexander Palmer. Tell him we have an emergency and need the principals of the Oversight Council at the White House in the next hour.”

“Sir, I’ll try, but there’s no guarantee I can get them on short notice.”

The principals of the Oversight Council were the meat of the thirteen members, comprising the secretary of state, the secretary of defense, the director of the CIA, the national security advisor, and the president of the United States.

Wolffe said, “It’s a Sunday. We should be able to get most of them. Hell, half of them will be blabbing on the Sunday talk shows.” He went back to Creed and said, “Get to the comms center and start the chain of shutting everything down. Use a landline and explain what’s going on. Tell them to shut it all down. Then get me a status report of how much has been affected in the organization and how much we prevented.”

Creed nodded and started to leave. Wolffe said, “And get this Dylan Hobbes’s number. He needs to be at the Oversight Council meeting. Is he in DC?”

“Yes, he is. But a word of warning on him. He’s a little bit quirky. He doesn’t like politics at all. I mean he hates the political divide we have right now. He’s a little bit crazy about it, because he was routinely beat up by both parties for his work, solely for political points depending on who was in power at the time. He was the punching bag to tar and feather someone else. It’s why he left government service, so when dealing with him, don’t bring up any political stuff. It’ll just set him off.”

Wolffe nodded and said, “I got it. Nobody’s going to beat him up for doing this, no matter what happens. You two get on it.”

Chapter8

Wolffe pulled into the visitors’ checkpoint for the entrance to the West Wing, showing the Capitol policeman his driver’s license. The policeman checked his clipboard, ran through the names, stared at him like he was a criminal, and let him through. Wolffe parked outside the Rotunda and entered the vaunted West Wing of the White House, walking to a desk that monitored all who entered. He gave his name to the man and in return was given a neck badge with a ton of script and a largeVsuperimposed over the writing.

Vfor visitor, meaning an escort was required. Something that Wolffe had to endure every time he entered. It would have been very easy for President Hannister to give him a permanent White House badge, but in so doing, it would be recorded, and that, in and of itself, would be a seam the press or someone else could exploit.

Why does this guy from a supposed company called Blaisdell Consulting have a permanent White House badge? What’s he doing as a permanent White House person? Let’s start digging!

Because of it, he had to act like a visitor every time he entered the West Wing. It was a small price to pay to keep what he did secret, but it still got under his skin when he was treated like a lobbyist who was only out for profit.

He saw the national security advisor, Alexander Palmer, coming down the hallway and knew he was about to get grilled. Palmer was the gateway to the president, and as such, he didn’t like surprises, which this most certainly was. On top of that, Palmer didn’t really like Wolffe, and the feeling was mutual.

Wolffe shook his hand and started walking toward the Oval Office, saying, “How many did we get to show up?”

“You got them all. You’re lucky it’s a slow Sunday. What’s the fire?”

“What about Dylan Hobbes? Is he here?”

“Not yet, but he’s on the way; now what’s up?”

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