“Wait here for us,” Korbin told the driver.
Savanna walked with him up the street of the south Denver neighborhood. Adam lived in an apartment building. Entering the lobby, no one was around at this hour, after ten. They had the elevator to themselves and passed only one person in the hall on the way to the door. Korbin pulled out something from his jacket pocket and began working on the lock.
“You break into buildings, too?”
“Only when I have to.”
The door unlocked and he entered first. It was a small comfort to know Adam was at the cocktail party. She didn’t like thinking what would happen if he came home early.
Korbin found a laptop on a desk in the living room. The apartment wasn’t large, but it was nice and clean. He booted up and began typing several attempts at a password. He rummaged through the desk, looking in drawers, finding files and reading through those before going back to the password attempts.
Savanna wandered around the apartment. Adam had a so-so view of the Denver Tech Center, slashed by a busy highway. Unless he had maid service, he was somewhat of a neat freak. The bathroom was spotless, impressive for a man. The apartment had two master bedrooms, one of which had nothing in the closet. The other looked occupied, with the day’s clothes thrown onto a chair. The closet light was on. She went in there and saw a safe with the door partially ajar. Not wanting to touch anything, she went out to the living room where Korbin was growing increasingly frustrated. He’d never guess a fellow hacker’s password.
“There’s something in the bedroom,” she said.
He looked up at her. “What is it?”
“Come here.” She went back to the room and showed him the safe.
He knelt and dug through there, coming out with a leather notebook. It was a contact book, but she saw that it also had a list of passwords. He found the one he needed and went back to the computer. As soon as he was on, his fingers tapped rapidly. Several windows came up, most of them showing code Savanna didn’t pretend to understand.
After scrolling through several lines, he finally slowed, interpreting the code with a deepening brow.
“This code is complicated but I think I can slow them down,” he said, typing away.
“What is it?”
“It will enable them to steal the identities of all employees at each organization where Tony placed contractors.”
“That’s it?” That seemed off to Savanna. Why go to all the trouble to employ people when all they had to do was use a virus or something? “It can’t just be that. Those places are too important to our economy and our way of life.”
“I agree.” He paused, reading the code he’d inserted into a portion of Adam’s. Then he began typing again. “Adam is probably only one piece of this. Tony must have other contacts, other computer hackers working this.”
Savanna thought a moment. “One who will design a virus for the emergency systems company. One who will either contaminate or destroy the water treatment plants. That type of thing?”
“Exactly.”
She rubbed her arms against the chill that prickled her skin.
He closed the programs he’d opened and then the computer. Standing, he started for the door. “Let’s get out of here.”