Maddie wasn’t too versed in the many interstices of the dark web, but her friend Ellen was. Ellen made her living helping people evade the algorithms for a few hours, a day, sometimes—and that was expensive—a week. Kinda like playing hooky without the teacher knowing you’re not there.
“I need to get all the info I can get on Frank,” she said after Ellen opened the door for her.
“I told you so,” Ellen said, but she didn’t dwell on being right. Good to have a friend like that.
Ellie put an app on Maddie’s phone that could worm itself into Frank’s phone. Once active, his life would be an open book to her. The downside was that her phone had to be almost touching his to make the near field comm connection and transfer the hack. That meant she had to meet up with Frank. A revolting thought, but easy to do.
Maddie knew he’d be at the Carambolage in Northeast Portland that evening. She dressed up, or better, down, to fit into the nouveau trash theme of the club. There was something profoundly sad about rich people dressing up like the homeless, and, worse, spending a lot of money on customized rags, while the real homeless stood outside the club, staring and seething. The advent of the cashless economy had hurt the homeless most. No more dollar bills to ask for. Panhandling was now more like bartering. Macrame pot hangers for joints. If you were lucky, someone’d toss you a credit chip with a buck or two left on it.
Maddie paid the cover. The number on her chip took her breath away. There went a day’s worth of bot recoveries. The luminescent wristband she got to go inside didn’t make up for that.
The Carambolage, true to its name, looked like a pileup on the interstate if you substituted tables and chairs for cars. VIP patrons actually sat on chairs on top of tables. A waiter on stilts served them.
There was a bar at the far end made from dented antique chrome bumpers. A cage hung from the ceiling with two DJs and a load of equipment. A pounding beat pushed against her chest like a jackhammer. Colored lasers vaguely in sync with the music bounced through the room. They showed clumps of patrons dancing, standing, sitting, in a stop-motion sort of way. Not an easy place to find anyone.
Fortunately, Frank was streaming live updates and her phone told her that he was holding court near the bar. Maddie pushed her way through the throng. She saw his brilliant smile, but she wasn’t falling for it anymore. She elbowed her way to the bar and hollered for the bartender. The commotion got Frank’s attention. From the corner of her eyes, she saw his face freeze as if someone had hit his pause button.
She ordered a beer, the cheapest drink available, and looked in Frank’s direction. His face changed to that leery expression of someone sitting next to a gas leak and worrying about sparks. Maddie did her best imitation of a smile, waved coyly with her right hand. “Oh, hey Frank. Didn’t know you come here. How’ve you been? You’re looking good.” She had to shout to get through to him.
The five women crowding around him turned to check out the interloper. They looked like clones of each other, long blond hair, slinky rags and pouty mouths. They saw right away that she wasn’t a threat to them. She’d distressed her least favorite outfit just to look the part. It was no match for their custom rags and professional makeup jobs. They turned back to Frank.
Their astonishment was visible when he shouted back, “You’re looking fine yourself. What’ve you been up to?”
Despite his big smile, she saw his defensiveness. He seemed ready to bolt at a moment’s notice. She put on her cute face that radioed I’m just so sweet on all frequencies.
“Oh, you know. Busy. Landed a new job. Got a few things cooking, one of them is gonna pay off really nice. Give it a couple of weeks.”
Any sentence with the words pay and off would get his attention.
“That’s great,” he said. “Can you tell me more, or is it all hush, hush?”
Maddie pushed past his five admirers and casually put her phone on the table next to his. She gave him an apologetic shrug. “Sorry, no can do. NDA. You understand.”
Being bound by a non-disclosure agreement was the gold standard of deals. Frank’s eyes got as big as plums as he processed the news. It meant big bucks were in play and, unlike dealing smuggled Chinese party drugs, the play was legit.
“Come on, you can tell me,” he said, his leeriness now gone like dew in the morning sun. “I got great connections. Whatever you’re into, I bet I can push it to the next level.”
Maddie shook her head. “Nah, I’m good. Thanks.”
“You sure?”
There was a quizzical look on his face. She could tell he was putting two and two together and it didn’t add up to four. Last he knew she was stuck at some distant gas station with her van disabled and her credit maxed out. But here she was, talking NDAs and rejecting his help.
“Frankly,” she said and hesitated. Her phone needed at least another minute. “Ah, never mind. I’m good. See ya.”
His expression changed to surprise. “Wait, what were you gonna say?”
“Nothing, really. It’s out of your league anyway. That’s really all I can say. NDA, remember?”
She turned as if to leave the Carambolage.
“Maddie, Maddie, don’t walk away from me like that. You know I can make a lot of things happen these days. Let’s partner up. You don’t want to swim at the deep end alone. Think of me as your life preserver.”
That’s the last thing that’d come to my mind.
But Frank was right where she wanted him.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I can’t break the NDA.”
Frank squinted. “Okay. I understand. Just let me come along to the next meeting. I can persuade your partners to let me in.”
Maddie started shaking her head. But she stopped. “You got a car, right?”
“You bet. A nice ride, too.”
“Okay, pick me up the day after tomorrow at ten in the morning.”
She grabbed her phone and sent him the coordinates for the rendezvous and waved good bye. His five admirers looked crestfallen.
