It
is with great pleasure that we host talented author Tim Brost, the winner of our annual Captivating Opening
Contest, whose novel High-Rise Crew: Dirty Money
ticked all of Stef’s boxes – which
is quite an achievement given Stef’s curmudgeonly, picky nature (sorry, Stef).
The
Author: Tim Brost lives a
reclusive life in the Twin Cities, USA. Thirty years into writing as an
avocation, he will release three works of fiction in fall of 2016. His novels
blend research, personal experience and incredible stories gathered from
subject matter experts who specialize in cyber security/cybercrime and the
mechanics of managing violence in international conflicts.
He spent his youth behind a keyboard. Now, he is in
the hands of gangbangers, hackers and nefarious men hunting for shortcuts to
the good life. Everyone wants a piece of his talent.
Over
to Stef and Tim:
[Stef]
Welcome aboard, Tim. Now, nobody can accuse me of being savvy with all this new-fangled
technology nowadays – nor do I have a clue about apps or anything much cyber or
social media, but I found the structure and plot of Dirty Money easy to follow: did you intend to make your narrative
friendly for readers like myself?
[Tim]
Stef, thanks for having me. I’ve been around security experts for quite a
while, find the subject fascinating, but rely heavily on subject matter
experts. That will become increasingly apparent the deeper we travel into the
High-Rise Crew trilogy. Honestly, Stef, I don’t even write code. But to answer
the question directly, yes. I do my best to give the reader an informed view of
technology, without creating a manual. Thus far, readers seem pleased with the
blend of information and entertainment. Where I succeed, I’m an interpreter of
sorts, adding just enough industry-specific information to be interesting, but
not so much that it becomes a glossary of technical jargon that overpowers the
characters’ lives.
[Stef] I’m
quite surprised you’re not a techno-geek, given the authority the narrative
exudes. You mentioned a trilogy. How did you decide on that strategy?
[Tim] I
unwittingly wrote the final novel in the trilogy, first. It is titled High-Rise
Crew: God Rights.
I
could have rushed to market, but a big piece of the story was not present. I
decided to add what happened earlier in Billy’s life and of course this made
the story far to long for commercial viability, especially for a new author,
and certainly for print. After discarding a dozen chapters set in his teens, I
open High-Rise Crew: Dirty Money in
the month of Billy’s college graduation. Where every other student turns right,
Billy takes a hard left. He grew up behind a keyboard, so it takes him a minute
to find himself socially. His role models are mostly older powerful individuals,
albeit less accomplished technically. It’s an odd dynamic I see all the time,
where youth has the skill, age has the maturation, but there’s a disconnect.
In
some ways, High-Rise Crew: Dirty Money is a coming of age story, but for
many reasons I didn’t use that classification in sales channels. Let’s just say
that my protagonist is about to take a thrilling three-novel ride.
[Stef] And
who doesn’t enjoy a thrilling ride… So, where does the trilogy take us?
[Tim] The
arc of the trilogy spans black hat, grey hat, white hat. We begin with common
street crimes and a reasonably complicated attack on a financial institution.
The second installment explores corporate espionage and insider theft,
especially peered attacks. High-Rise Crew: Financial Insiders adds a layer of sophistication
to the attacks shown in Dirty Money. Corporations
spend billions on securing firewalls, but humans still run them. The reader
will encounter both technical and social hacks.
My
novels also delve into human nature. It would not be good fiction without unscrupulous
personalities lurking about, a sense of betrayal, and emotional vulnerabilities
conflated with self-examination. I like to think that in each of the novels, Billy’s
personal life leaps dramatically forward toward maturation.
I
won’t spoil anything for the reader when I say that an FBI cyber action team
and/or the Secret Service may enter, stage left, in High-Rise Crew:
Financial Insiders. This second
installment will be released in Q1 of 2017.
I mentioned the final novel in the trilogy a moment
ago. High-Rise Crew: God Rights brings us to the brink of nation-state
cyber warfare, and illustrates much of what keeps our security experts awake at
night. Since I wrote God Rights, a
lot has happened, both technically and politically. By the time the novel is released,
late in 2017 or early in 2018, a great deal of then current information will be
incorporated.
[Stef] Do you have any other work in (or out of) the
pipeline, Tim?
[Tim] I
do. The first two works of fiction in the Trade series are Trade: Bangkok and Trade:
Azerbaijan. They are inspired by the life of international arms dealer, Rod
McKay. Actually, most of the characters in the Trade Series are inspired by
real people.
In
Trade: Bangkok the protagonist, Tuck
(Web) Webber, and the operatives, shadow agents, technicians and lawyers that
make up his teams, are just months into a multi-year contract to improve
intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance capabilities in Thailand when crew
members are taken by insurgents. Reviews thus far acknowledge that this is not
your stereotypical arms dealer. Readers on both sides of the political spectrum
should set expectations aside and come to the read with an open mind.
Trade: Azerbaijan is
what Amazon calls a short read (around 35,000 words). It lives in time between
the novels Trade: Bangkok and Trade: Bishkek (Trade: Bishkek will be released mid 2017). This story gives
followers the opportunity to keep up with the team’s activities between novels.
I’m
considering a trial release of audiobooks later this year or early next. In
all, I’ve been, and will continue to be, very busy for the next year or more.
[Stef] It’s
a good strategy to work, work, work as an author. Not only does it build your
backlist but fans will not be left feeling empty when they are hungry for more…
Thanks for swinging over, Tim. Always a pleasure to chat to a salient author
such as your good self.
[Tim] Stef,
given your reputation, I am honored that you enjoyed Dirty Money. It is every author’s aspiration to be well received.
Thank you.
Dear Readers: Take a look at the opening of Dirty Money below and find out just why it captivated me so
strongly…
Chapter 1
“Seriously? Who packs lunch for a burglary?” Billy
says. He sits on the lid of a Coleman steel-sided cooler that Mack has stuffed
with Diet Coke, half a dozen ham and cheese sandwiches, wavy cheddar potato
chips and Russian sausage. A mega-thermos of coffee is lodged in the back of
the step van somewhere, possibly trapped now behind equipment they stole. In a
day or two he will deliver the equipment to his cousin for printing credit
cards.
Mack is behind the wheel of his underpowered
white-panel truck, which they call Joline. Evgeny rides shotgun. They’ve just
robbed a printing supply company in Kenosha, Wisconsin, and are headed back to
Chicago.
“You okay, kid? You never done nothing like this
before,” Mack says.
“Is good idea not to be on highways with cameras and
toll booths, etcetera, etcetera,” Ev says.
“We’re taking back roads,” Mack answers.
The men’s faces are raked by the light of another
streetlamp. Billy leans his lanky six-foot one frame forward, between men twice
his age. “You don’t have to say etcetera, etcetera, Ev. Just say etcetera,”
Billy says. The Russian immigrant is always good natured about Billy’s
corrections.
Mack turns his bearded face slightly toward Billy, but
keeps his eyes on the road. “Didn’t answer the question. You start looking all
long in the face, I get worried. This one was your job, right? You worried we
won’t be able to turn over the equipment or something?”
“That won’t be an issue,” Billy says. He doesn’t go on
to say that he’s only twenty-four years old and doesn’t want to spend time in
jail over something as stupid as stealing printing equipment.
As he rides in silence, Billy notices how the driver’s
seat of Joline has bent over the years under Mack’s considerable weight. Mack
carries himself well for a man over six feet two inches tall and easily three
hundred pounds. His bulk seems even more impressive now, behind the wheel.
Mack turns to Evgeny. “Drop anything?”
Evgeny taps his pocket. “Pick sets, tension bars,
etcetera, etcetera is all here.”
“He checked before we left,” Billy says. He catches a
glimpse of himself in the reflection off of the windshield and realizes he
needs a haircut.
“Check and check again, kid. That’s how we roll. You
want to become a pro or what?”
“I definitely need to stick with computers,” Billy
says.
Mack and Evgeny both laugh. “Is smart. Picking computers
is better than picking locks,” Evgeny says.
“Picking computers. Nice!” Billy says. He’s never
thought of a rootkit or SQL injection that way, but sure. Breaching a firewall
for him is like breaching a padlock for Evgeny.
Whatever the metaphor, computing comes naturally to
Billy. Because of his father’s skills, guidance, persistence and competitive
attitude, cracking eggs for breakfast is more difficult. He breached his first
corporate firewall at fourteen. A decade later, a masters in computer science
days away, he drops code into vulnerable systems nationwide every week. Calls
training to hack the discipline, and the act of hacking the game. It started
with his father when he was twelve, a program they wrote together called
Awaken. Writing code is like jazz or anything else, he always says. In the
beginning it’s all about the notes, the licks, the chops. But only amateurs
stop there.
Thing is, Billy has never monetized the game. That
would be a punk thing to do, and risky. He does it for the excitement and to
see just how far hard work will carry him, a discipline his father ground into
him and one he has taken to the extreme.
“We rode the rail tonight, boys! Good work,” Mack
says.
Billy turns toward the stolen card printer, embosser,
dies and blanks in the dark of the van. “I just want it to be over,” he says.
Chapter 2
Mack backs Joline into the second bay of his
three-stall garage, which sits at the back of a small parking lot on the north
side of a randomly constructed building he calls the Enterprise. They shut the
garage doors and cart loot, over cracked concrete, into the workshop.
The garage and workshop are tacked onto the back of
his sprawling building. The retail shop up front reaches the city sidewalk of
this degraded neighborhood. He calls his retail business Mackentronics. The
garage, workshop and retail space form an L-shaped flat-roof maze around the
original rickety two-story wood-framed house where he lives. The second floor
of the house rises above the mess; 12/12 pitch roof that longs for new
shingles, double-hung windows and wooden lap siding in need of paint.
Billy inventories stolen equipment and supplies.
Saturdays are big days for Mack. In a few hours customers might arrive with
cash money, so they keep moving. Collectors will drive twenty miles for the
right vacuum tube. Mack hangs onto all that old technology. Has racks of analog
parts in a world of disposable digital everything. Mack calls all those old
schematics, resistors, switches and diodes his retirement plan. Billy smells desperation.
The ambiance of the place sometimes reminds him of rural gun collector shows
where tired men trade in overpriced relics.
Beneath the dust and clutter of the enterprise, there
lies something else. Hundreds of ideas, like bottles in a wine cellar, rest in
diamond-shaped shelves on the south wall of Mack’s large workshop. Some of
those ideas have turned to vinegar as new technologies replace the old. Even
so, it’s an amazing brain-dump, and Billy wants in on creating the next batch
of ideas.
When he turns over the equipment in a day or two, they
will have a little cash. Might have enough to get going on a prototype. It’s
why they stole the equipment and why he hangs out with Mack, but he can’t
focus. His brain returns to images of the printing supply caper they just
pulled and how Mack looked with the ass of those pantyhose over his beard. He
smiles at the thought and wants to relive the heist with his friends, but they
have already returned to who they are and will always be. For them, the excitement
is over. The routine of cutting Russian sausage and filling stained coffee cups
has returned. For Billy, this new trajectory is anything but routine.
“What time does your train leave for Minneapolis?”
Mack calls to him.
“A few hours. Why?” Billy walks toward Mack and
Evgeny.
“What’d you tell your folks this time? Job hunt or
girlfriend?” Mack says.
Billy laughs. He taps his hip pocket and wallet,
implying that the heartthrob picture of the woman he carries around is the
reason. Billy retouched an image he grabbed from the Internet and made prints
at Walgreens. Calls her Britney, sometimes Brit. Tells his parents she’s the
reason he spends weekends in Chicago. “If my mother doesn’t meet her soon, I
may have to get dumped. She can’t find Brit on Facebook.”
Mack laughs every time he hears Billy talk about his
scam. “You’re crazy, kid. Speaking of pictures, I found a few of your old man
from our Navy days. Got one of him just after induction and a couple with
friends of ours. Crazy times.”
Mack served with Mikhailo (Halo) Chownyk before he
married, before Billy was conceived, before Halo became a US citizen. They let
him into the Navy on a green card and because he was a talented programmer.
Czechs, at the time, could get more out a few lines of code than US codesmiths
could get from a page. Got citizenship while in the service and has lived in
the States ever since. Billy gets his green eyes from his father and his olive
skin from his mother.
“Pics of my old man? Nice! I want to see them,” Billy
says. He sits at the table and opens a sandwich bag, expecting Mack to sit
also, but Mack climbs the interior set of wooden stairs toward his kitchen and
living quarters.
“Your father is interesting man,” Evgeny says. Ev has
devoured a half-pound of meat and a quarter pound of cheese since they
returned. Cholesterol be damned.
“You’ve met?” Billy asks. He’s surprised that Evgeny
knows anything at all about his father, even more that they’ve met. Then again,
Mack and his father were apparently very close at one time.
“I am meeting him two times. Is good man.”
“You met him two times.”
“Is what I said! Two.”
Billy smiles. “I suppose he’s all right, in an
annoying sort of way.”
“Every father and son is the same. The boy looks up at
father. The father looks down at son. So happy. Now eye to eye, things become
different. Is natural way.”
“You’re a smart man, Ev. I’ll be right back,” Billy
says, and walks up the stairs into Mack’s apartment. Mack is in the back corner
of his living room rummaging through a paper bag stuffed with photos. Billy
stops in the doorway between the kitchen and living room to see that Mack has
three photos in hand and is smiling, distracted and unaware of Billy’s
presence.
“Find them?” Billy asks and steps forward. Mack gets a
curious look on his face, as if he’s embarrassed. He says, “On second thought
I’ll find them later. I need a cup. Let’s head back to the workshop.”
Billy looks at the bag. Mack pushes the photos back
into it, sets it aside and brushes past Billy, heading toward the kitchen and
the stairs. The thought crosses Billy’s mind to pick up the bag and look
anyway, but Mack calls to him. “You coming?”
Billy follows Mack to the workshop but can’t resist
making a comment “What just happened?”
“Nothing just happened,” Mack says.
“Cut the shit. You changed your mind on me. What’s up
with that?”
Mack has a wry smile, which says he’ll never tell.
“When are you heading back to the Twin Cities?”
“You already asked that.”
“I made a card skimmer. Pretty slick. I was thinking
we might go end-to-end, see how all this shit works,” Mack says.
“You sure you didn’t just change your mind about the
pictures?” Billy asks.
Mack doesn’t answer. “Whatever,” Billy says. “Let’s do
it.”
Mack skims one of his own credit cards, loads the data
onto a flash drive, and hands that drive to Billy. They plug in all the
equipment and load toner and dies.
Before they attempt to replicate Mack’s credit card,
Mack turns to Billy and says, “I don’t ever want to get between you and your
old man. Dangerous place to be. Let’s just leave it at that.”
Chapter 3
What happens in the Navy stays in the Navy. Mack built
his career around circuitry, transistors and exotic electronics. The Navy took
him off the street as a troubled kid, yanked him out of high school and saved
him from jail time, but even the Navy can’t cure bad judgment.
Billy offers bribes of real Kona coffee and a dozen
custard donuts if Mack will show him the pictures of his old man and tell more
stories. It doesn’t happen. Mack laughs off the requests and tweaks settings on
one of the stolen machines. Billy asks what he can do to help. “RTFM,” Mack
says. “Read the fucking manuals. They’re on the lunch table.”
“Can we alter serial numbers?” Billy asks.
“What would that accomplish? I can take a whack at it,
I guess, but why?”
“I don’t know. If it’s easy, do it. Could slow down an
investigation,” Billy says.
Evgeny joins them in front of the printing equipment
smelling of garlic. “I think maybe we keep equipment, print cards here. Better
monies.”
“Not going to happen. All this stuff is spoken for,”
Billy says.
A look passes between the older men. “Ev has a guy.
You should hear him out,” Mack says.
“Yuri can help. No problem. Good connections in
Ukraine, Bulgaria and Balkan states. We can print cards for all these guys.
Steady incomes.”
The stain of rough places and shady deals is evident
in every decision Ev and Mack make for the crew. There is always a guy they
know ready to do whatever it is needs doing, including theft, break-ins, the
acquisition of favors and now identity theft. Many of their connections go back
to days on the water.
“One of your Navy friends, Ev?” Billy asks. Both Mack
and Evgeny went straight into the Merchant Marines after service, Mack out of
the US Navy, Ev from the other side. They left at about the same time and ended
up in Chicago.
Mack answers for Evgeny, “Yuri is Ev’s nephew. You’ll
like him.”
Billy is unsure of how adamant he can be without
showing blatant disrespect to his elders. He defers all the time because these
men have a long history together, but not today. “We’re not getting into
printing. Not me anyway. That’s how amateurs get busted. Your nephew’s
connections sound interesting but not for this project.”
Evgeny and Mack look at each other again, information
passing through the twist of the bushy graying eyebrows on Mack’s face to the
tilt of a ball cap atop the Russian’s head. Mack says, “No better man in a
scrap and I’ll tell you something else, kid, he’s not just connected, he is
very connected. Know what I mean? He knows people.”
“Is former Spetsgruppe Vympel,” Evgeny says.
“So is that like a military tech?”
Mack laughs. “Close. Russian version of the Green
Berets.”
Billy doesn’t mention that he has bartered with
numerous scurrilous Eastern Bloc hackers, including Russians and Ukrainians.
One of his best connections goes by the name Toucht and is extremely well
connected with that part of the world. They met at a hacker convention in Vegas
when he was eighteen. That single meeting, won by an exchange of code he and
his father worked up together, led to many additional online encounters and
dozens of amazing resources. Toucht is likely one step removed from the
communities Yuri says are connections, which places him only two steps away.
Even so, the discipline keeps Billy from sharing
anything with anyone that can’t reciprocate. He says, “I hear a lot of nasty
stuff comes out of Russia these days. No promises, but if your nephew ever
comes to the States I’d be willing to meet.”
“Is here! Is in Chicago!” Evgeny reaches for his phone
and steps away to place a call. Billy doesn’t stop him.
Mack continues talking as he opens a stolen box of
toner. “Yuri can hook us up with the kind of people who turn identities into
plastic and plastic into cash.”
“But we’re not carding, Mack. Do what you want. Not
with this equipment. If I don’t deliver, I’m fucked. We’re not talking about it
anymore. Seriously!”
Mack holds his hands up in surrender. “All I’m saying
is you should listen to what the man has to say.”
“Is good man,” Ev says.
Billy folds his arms.
Mack signals Evgeny with a quick finger across his
throat, and Ev places his phone back in his pocket.
“Another day, then,” Mack says.
Chapter 4
Billy has never understood why it takes forty minutes
less for Amtrak to haul him from the Twin Cities to Chicago than it does to
return, but today the trip doesn’t bother him. A chapter in his life has
closed.
Halfway through the trip he checks an assortment of
Facebook pages. His friend Derrick has posted another cartoon. Cartoons on this
particular site mean Derrick has another package. Billy logs into Facebook as a
fictitious character named Karen. Karen likes Derrick’s cartoon.
Billy has never used even one of the hundreds of
stolen identities he’s collected to pilfer money. Looks down on anyone who does
and says to anyone who knows his skill that the discipline will not allow it.
But he has, in his own vernacular, messed with people who deserve it. It can’t
be helped.
The train crosses the St. Croix River at the Wisconsin
border. He smiles as he recalls an incident from the week before. A breached
firewall in Atlanta led to owning the network of a small business there. If he
wanted to do so, he could take administrative control over dozens of networks
just like that one, but he doesn’t do it.
In this case he took control of cameras and
microphones on one of the manager’s laptops. Best reality television available.
As an employee the man bored Billy, but in his dick role as a husband, every
episode became more compelling than the last. His wife is pregnant. He sleeps
around. The wife and husband watch television at opposite ends of a sofa almost
every night, open laptop on a coffee table in front of them.
The episode that bothered Billy took place on a Monday
night. Billy expected to see the married couple at home again. Made a bet with
himself that they would be eating pizza, but what he encountered was the
manager’s secretary bent over his desk. It was hilarious viewing. Billy would
have done nothing about it except the dick told his secretary how he wanted to
ditch his wife before the kid came. Made Billy angry. He rolled video. Using
the man’s own email account he sent copies to the guy’s wife and boss.
As the train passes Stillwater, Billy sends text to
his father, Halo: Don’t worry about me. I’ll take a cab.
Halo replies immediately that he’s already at the
depot. He adds a second text that they should have a drink. Texts that they
have things to talk about.
Billy: It’s late. Sorry. Maybe another day.
His father doesn’t reply so he tucks his phone away.
It hits him again how he’s turned a corner, a bona fide thief in a bona fide
freaking crew. At least for the moment, it feels good to be an outlaw, to have
a secret life. He smiles at the now-frozen image of Evgeny picking the lock at
the back entrance of the printing supply. If his parents find out about his
nefarious activities it will break their hearts, but that won’t happen.
Absentmindedly he says, aloud, “one and done.” The hipster in the seat in front
of him turns his head slightly.
Billy sees Halo’s Lexus inching toward him through
waiting cars and the departing crowd of riders. He opens the back door and
carefully lays his bag on the seat.
“Good trip?” Halo asks.
Billy enters the SUV and straps in. “Didn’t expect
you, Papi. Yeah. Good trip. Didn’t want to come back this time.”
“She’s that hot, huh?” Halo says, idling away from the
depot. “You should dip the old wick for a while, if you know what I mean.
Relationships can come later.”
Billy laughs at his father’s tired and incessant
innuendos. He doesn’t know how a father figure is supposed to behave, only that
Halo is not it. “She is hot and no. I don’t want to be tied down right now.”
What Billy doesn’t go on to say is that his chosen lifestyle, temporary as it
is, doesn’t allow time for romance.
“All I’m saying is you’re hung like a horse, so get
busy. She give good head?” Halo says.
Billy should be shocked, but nothing his misogynistic
father says about women surprises him anymore. “You don’t know anything about
my package.”
“Changed your diapers for years. You should be happy!”
“You know how disgusting you are right now? For real.”
“Get over it. What will it be, coffee and a cigar, or
a couple beers? I can go either way.”
Billy shakes his head no. Derrick will be waiting for
him at his apartment. “It’s finals week, Papi. Give me a rain check on this
one.”
Halo practically begs. “I just need a few minutes.”
Billy recognizes a rare side of his father, almost
needy. Even so, he doesn’t commit. They ride in silence to the Whittier
neighborhood of Minneapolis. Derrick’s red jeep is parked across the street and
a few doors up from his apartment.
Before he opens the car door to get out, Billy hits
send on a text to Derrick. Billy asks his father if they can’t connect the next
day, maybe sit at Spy House for a while with coffee and cigars. “Whatever is so
important will have to wait. Sorry,” he says.
“What do you think, ten o’clock? Not much going on at
work this week. Bring your laptop.”
Billy is surprised. For years nothing has been more
important to his father than work, and work means many different things. Halo
has been on golf outings and late-night drunks that he called work. Anytime he
wants to be away from the family is called work. “You should just give up,
Papi, but sure. I’ll bring a laptop. You’re so on.”
Billy gets out of the Lexus and gingerly lifts his
luggage to the curb. He taps on the top of Halo’s car and waits as Papi drives
away. When he’s staring at tail lights, he turns toward the jeep and
acknowledges Derrick’s presence with a nod of his head. Derrick gets out of his
jeep and hustles two massive duffle bags in his direction.
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