if the tables have the data columns named in clear.”
“Nope, they don’t. They’re secretive about it, but you’re right, the data supports your theory. I think we got it. Now what?”
She sat on the bed, thinking. Her heart was pounding, adrenaline rushing through her blood. Now they knew what they had come here to find out. They knew what the attack was about, but it made absolutely no sense. She tried to calm herself down and think rationally. This was bigger than they had anticipated.
“Let’s think through this a little. It’s all clear now; they’re stealing our elections. That was indeed worth killing for. It all adds up.” Deep in thought and frowning, she continued, absentmindedly twisting the cap from her empty water bottle, “Let’s just validate my theory. Why would a software company from India give a rat’s ass who the next American President is? Malware or not, the President is still an American, right? In that case, is Ramachandran the UNSUB’s pawn? Or the orchestrator of this entire plan?”
“There are huge financial gains for India if the future President is pro outsourcing and pro Indian immigration. Billions of dollars worth of American labor goes offshore every year, and India grabs a lot of that dough.” He smiled when he saw her surprised gaze. “Just read an article about it, and I paid attention when Brian was explaining these things to us. So yes, I’d say a major Indian software company could have reasons to give more than a rat’s ass on who wins our presidential elections.”
“Hmm . . . You might be right, but let’s just assume there’s someone else behind this plan, just like we had initially suspected. I have no proof. It’s just my gut. It feels more logical to me. This is a pretty complex plan to have been orchestrated by a software CEO. You know how many of these software CEOs are in India? So why would this one be different? It just doesn’t feel right to believe that. Let’s focus on who the UNSUB could really be. This is one area where we’ve made very little progress and have zero leads to follow. Short of grabbing Ramachandran and torturing him, we have no way of finding out who’s behind this.”
“We could do that, if we really must,” Louie offered hesitantly.
“Ah, hell no,” Alex replied. “I’m hoping to live my entire life without having to torture someone, anyone, no matter how badly I want to sometimes. No matter how badly he deserves it. Nope, torture’s off the table. Pfft . . . ” She turned her head away, disgusted at the thought. “Sam said the guy in the limo was a known terrorist, right? So maybe there’s a terrorism connection behind this, and that’s it. That would actually make more sense, because we still don’t understand why terrorists would have political preferences strong enough to justify this type of action. It’s simply unheard of. There has to be a connection with interests back home.” She stood and went back to the computer, looking at the code some more. “You have no idea how much I hate being unable to anticipate this guy’s next move. Drives me nuts!”
“You think it’s just one guy? Behind all this?”
“Yep, that’s what I think. The plan has a certain elegance to it, a harmony, something you rarely see coming out of collective work. This is someone’s masterpiece, his vision, but we might not know all of it yet. It just doesn’t seem like Ramachandran is that man. He’s just too . . . superficial.”
“You still don’t want to confront Ramachandran?”
“Absolutely not. We play the game just as we did so far, pretending that we’re just minding our business. Then we sign off on the software and go home. But, in the meantime, we need to get the team up to speed and talk action and damage control. You do realize we can’t let this software be used on Election Day, and we have very limited alternatives. Not to mention limited time. Fuck . . . Just two more months, and these assholes are gonna stall us for another two or three weeks.”
“I still think it’s a mistake, not talking to Ramachandran directly, just to see what he has to say.”
She raised her eyebrow at him, and he caved instantly.
“What do you want to do?”
“I want us to spend Labor Day weekend in the Maldives,” she replied and winked at him. “You could tell Ramachandran that we want to explore