“Look,” Dox said, “I’m not saying we didn’t have to adapt—”
“‘Adapt’？ If Manus had reacted a second earlier, that fucking sword he carries would have a new sheath. Your body.”
Dox grinned. “That’s why I had us hold hands. Told you it would work.”
Larison shook his head. Fucking Dox. There was just no arguing with him. It could be endearing, but it could make you crazy, too.
“I don’t know how to kick down doors,” Diaz said. “So I can’t help you. I would if I could. For what it’s worth, I say we call the marshals. I have a case and I want to prosecute. I’m not afraid of the risks.”
Larison looked at her. It would have been easier if he didn’t like her.
“You should be,” he said. “You have no idea how lucky you got yesterday.”
“You’re wrong,” she said. “I do know. I’m just not going to let it stop me.”
“Christ,” Larison said, “am I the only person in this crew who ever makes any sense?”
“Maya and Evie uncovered plenty more,” Dox said. “How about if I finish the briefing, and then everyone can offer somewhat more informed opinions.”
No one said anything, and he went on. “It turns out that yesterday evening Washington time, a series of text messages and emails were simultaneously delivered to a whole passel of powerful men. Captains of industry, politicians, Director of National Intelligence Pierce Devereaux, and—wait for it—our very own attorney general, Uriah Hobbs.”
“Holy shit,” Larison said. “The dead-man switch?”
Livia nodded. “It’s real.”
Larison looked at her. “What were the messages?”
“Nothing incriminating this time,” Livia said. “Just photos of empty rooms. Guest rooms. Maya matched them to archived real-estate advertisements. They’re all in Schrader’s houses. And a text, warning that the next message will have people in it, and will be widely disseminated.”
Larison tried to think it through. “The shot across the bow Schrader told Diaz about.”
“Exactly,” Dox said. “And the people who got those messages got the message. ‘You better get me out of prison right quick if you don’t want video of you raping little girls all over the Internet.’”
Larison considered. “We know who Schrader is threatening now. So we can infer—”
“Right,” Dox said. “My guess is, after Hamilton had her meeting with Hobbs, Hobbs went to Devereaux. Devereaux went to Rispel. And Rispel went to us—through Kanezaki, of course.”
That made sense to Larison. “Can Maya and Evie reverse-engineer the distribution? See what servers the videos reside on, that kind of thing?”
Dox shook his head. “I asked the same question. Apparently it’s architected in some super-distributed way, and routed through Tor.”
“Fine,” Larison said. “But look, this reinforces what I was saying before. The bad news is, the opposition is even more formidable than we’d feared. But the good news is, there really is a dead-man switch. Either Schrader gives up those videos, and we’re off the hook, or they get released, and we’re off the hook. What am I missing?”
“A conscience?” Livia said.
Mostly shit like that didn’t bother Larison. But that one did.
He looked at her. “You know,” he said evenly, “there’s a lot we don’t know about each other, Livia. The difference is, I don’t pretend to know. And I don’t judge you based on the pretense.”