The Next President by Joseph Flynn Read Free Book Online Page A

charming Ms. Ellison soon.
    J. D. was also sure he had unseen minders, but they remained invisible as his Lexus meandered through the Westside of L.A. and into Santa Monica.
    When he was positive nobody was actively tailing him, he turned off San
     
    Vicente Boulevard at 7th Street and dipped down into Santa Monica Canyon.
    The house he had leased sat on a rise at the rear of a cul-de-sac. It commanded a view of any traffic that might approach its front door. Behind the pool and the garden out back, the wall of the canyon rose at a nearly vertical pitch. The owner had named the place El Refugio. The Refuge. J. D. could only hope.
    He put the car in the garage and entered the house. As he walked into the kitchen he looked through the sliding glass doors to the figure seated outside at the table near the pool. The slightly built young man with the long blonde hair stared fixedly at the screen of a laptop computer. His name, truly, was John Smith. But J. D. thought of him by his trade name: Pickpocket.
    Pickpocket was a hacker who lifted wallets at high-tech gatherings in the hope that he would find computer passwords among their contents. His batting average in this regard hovered around the .500 mark. Once he had the information he wanted he replaced the wallets, and the unsuspecting victims went on their way, cash and credit cards in place, never knowing they’d been relieved of their true valuables.
    J. D. had caught Pickpocket with his hand on J. D.‘s wallet.
    It happened at a Mac World Expo in San Francisco. The little thief had been disguised as a Japanese businessman, complete with black wig and horn-rim glasses. Pickpocket had immediately offered J. D. money to let him go without a fuss. Nobody in the busy hall had yet noticed their little drama.
    When Pickpocket saw that mere lucre held no appeal for his captor, he offered something much more useful a favor.
    “You make that sound like it’s three wishes,” J. D. had replied, grinning.
    “You a genie?”
    “Next best thing.” Pickpocket had quickly whispered who he was and what he did.
    “Let me go quietly, I’ll get you into any computer system in the country.”
    At the time J. D. had no desire to become a data-bank robber, but, having founded his own fortune with stolen money, he had a personal aversion to dealing with the cops. He let Pickpocket go. Then, in character with his disguise, the little thief pressed his personal business card on J. D. “I owe you one,” he said, and disappeared into the crowd.
    J. D. had forgotten about Pickpocket for three years. But he’d kept his card. And when the time came that he thought a brass-balled pocket-picking computer hacker might be just what he needed, the little thief had answered his call.
     
    J. D. slid the kitchen door open and asked, “Any Inck?”
    Pickpocket held up an index finger, telling J. D. to be patient a moment longer. The hacker’s hands flew over the keyboard, and he looked at the screen as if expecting to see the meaning of life revealed thereon. But what ever appeared, it was less than expected.
    “Fuck,” Pickpocket muttered. Then he looked up at J. D. and said, “Not yet.”
    The little thief stood up and stretched, various joints popping audibly.
    “I’ve got to get out. Away from the keyboard and the screen. I need to look at the big picture for a while. The real world, not the virtual one. Maybe I’ll get some inspiration that way. You know anyplace within walking distance where I can get a bite to eat?”
    Pickpocket was a native of northern California and not familiar with the local environs. J. D. told him there were several cafes on the Third Street Mall and gave him directions.
    “I’ll be back in a couple hours,” Pickpocket said. With a mock salute, he was off.
    J. D. noticed that the little thief had left his laptop on the table near the pool. It sat there waiting for J. D. to probe its contents. On the face of things, this would be a perfect time to snoop on