Poisonfeather (Gibson Vaughn #2)(72)

“How long have you known him?”

“Including today? Three weeks.”

“That’s it? Would have gotten that one wrong.”

“How’s that?”

“You act like brothers.”

“Brothers? Are you incredibly high right now?”

“Oh, come on. The guy worships you.”

“Now I know you’re high.”

“He’d wear a Gibson Vaughn mask on Halloween if they sold them.”

“Is that why he keeps pulling a gun on me?”

“Keeps? That wasn’t the first time?” Lea pondered that tidbit. “Well, sometimes bad attention is better than no attention at all. Trust me. Maybe pointing a gun at you is the only way he knows to get it.”

“Well, it’s not working.”

Swonger’s Scion pulled into the clearing alongside the van, which brought a welcome end to the conversation and allowed Gibson to get back to work.

A few minutes after three, Parker texted that Merrick was on his way to the library. Lea let out a scream, and Swonger’s feet came pounding back to the van. There was general high-fiving while Gibson pretended to be surprised that they’d gotten lucky on their first day. He powered on the Stingray and watched numbers scroll down the laptop as phones within range began connecting. The fisherman hadn’t been wrong—close to five hundred phones attempted to connect within the first sixty seconds. Not all could be from the prison, of course, but the Stingray couldn’t differentiate, so Gibson started by eliminating all the numbers that had connected so far, narrowing his search parameters to more easily spot Merrick when he inserted his SIM card into the guard’s phone.

“He’s in the library now,” Lea relayed from her phone.

They crowded around the screen. Over the next few minutes, seventy-two new phone numbers connected and then disconnected from the Stingray. On a second window, Gibson watched to see if any of them made calls. One did to a West Virginia number, which was a very good sign. It was a text:

5616.kl B10K@MKT;4398.kl B50K@MKT;3675.kl S150K@LMT160;2212.kl B100K@MKT;4536.kl B200K@MKT;2301.kl S75K@MKT;1320.kl H100K;1102 H250K;2424.kl H50K;6676.kl H75K;1506.kl H210K



It went on and on like that, line after line, fifty-six texts in all. The Stingray enabled them to read only Merrick’s outgoing texts, so any replies were lost.

“What is that? Some kind of code?” Swonger said.

“No,” Lea said with a grin. “It’s stock notation—‘.kl’ means he’s trading on the Bursa Malaysia. Those are buy and sell orders. The four numbers is the stock. B is buy. S is sell. Not sure about H. MKT is market price; LMT is a limit order. Ten thousand shares at the market price. And so on.”

“Wait,” Gibson said, the hairs standing up on the back of his neck. “So he’s selling one hundred fifty thousand shares of whatever LB is at a hundred sixty dollars a share? How much is that?”

“Twenty-four million,” Lea said quickly.

“Holy shit,” Gibson said. “How much money does he have?”

“If it’s dollars,” Lea cautioned.

“Been saving his pennies like a boss,” Swonger said in an awed whisper.

“Why Malaysia?” Gibson asked.

“Malaysia went dark,” Lea explained. “It doesn’t share financial information with the United States. Perfect for someone who needs to invest without our government interfering.”

“Gangster,” Swonger said.

“Can you send all that to me?” Lea asked. “I want to figure something out.”

Gibson nodded as Merrick sent a final text:



Confirmed. This will be our final communication prior to my release. When I reach secure location, I’ll send for you. Sit tight but be ready. Stick to the plan. You’ve done well.



And that was it. Merrick’s number vanished from the Stingray’s list. They all sat back in relief and disbelief.

“Is that it?” Swonger asked. “We’ve got it?”

Gibson nodded that they did. The question was what to do with it.




“West Virginia ain’t Texas, but it ain’t your backyard either.”

Swonger had been arguing about the relative size of West Virginia for a while now. After their success at the prison, they’d returned to Lea’s apartment above the Toproll, where a debate raged about what to do now. All three had strong opinions about next steps, and with no one willing to roll over, they were at the stage of an argument where they simply reiterated earlier points at ever-increasing volume. This is how her parents had always fought, neither budging an inch, and it made Lea uncomfortable to be a part of it. She looked over the table of empty beer bottles that pointed to the growing futility of continued discussion.

In the bathroom, she splashed water on her face. This was getting them nowhere.

It boiled down to this: Charles Merrick’s contact used a West Virginia cell phone, but that didn’t mean he was in West Virginia. The phone could be in Barcelona for all any of them knew. But why get a West Virginia cell phone if you weren’t local? And hadn’t the last text said to “sit tight”? Didn’t that suggest that whoever it was had to be close? Most likely, but it might also mean they were meeting somewhere else—like Barcelona. And so the debate raged on regarding whether or not to call the number. Gibson agreed it might be possible to social-engineer the person at the other end, perhaps get them to give them something that would narrow their search. But he also cautioned it could go the other way, that they could spook their targets and cause them to shut down for good. They’d get only one shot at it.