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There is a long list of ways to remove from a bank money that isn't yours. Fortunately for the tellers, managers, and associated account holders in the First Atlantic on Bayshore Drive on the 24th of March, the people who ended the day $1,769,448.52 richer than they started it chose one of the least messy ways possible: the lights flickered, and then came back full before anyone could ask.
Someone laughed, in that nervously relieved way you do when you're not sure whether something happened, but no sir, I wasn't worried. While that released everyone to move again, lines stayed amazingly straight. There was even more chatting than grumbling after the tellers said it would take a minute or two for the system to recover, so if you wouldn't mind waiting...
That calm was sure to fracture, though, once the people in the lobby caught on. Which they would, because the bank's senior managers were good, but they were not good enough to fully hide the panic on their faces as they gathered around yet another computer that insisted on displaying for them screen after screen of very empty accounts.
Michael Westen wasn't happy. Michael was, in fact, building up a good head of justified irritation that, in an unusual twist, had nothing to do with either money or getting burned.
"Stop glaring, Michael. I didn't do it deliberately."
"Kinda hard not to, Fi. Conscious choices involved every step of the way, there."
Fiona huffed, and recrossed her legs. "You were supposed to bring back more," she told him.
Michael let out a sharp laugh. "And why would I have done that?"
"Because you needed more," she said reasonably.
His eyebrows rose. Fiona shrugged. He pushed off from the counter behind him and she shifted on his bed, examining him while he slowly crossed the room.
"Did I need more when I left?" he asked in a low voice when he stood over her.
"Well, there was only the one."
His eyes closed briefly, just longer than a blink and just long enough to reassert patience, before he asked, "Do I regularly stop for groceries every time I've spent an entire afternoon convincing my mother that she really doesn't need a dog?"
Fiona bit her lip, but a little chuckle escaped. "Is that what--"
All his teeth showed in his smile. "Not the issue."
She sobered, then leaned back on her elbows again and sent him a dark look. "You're an unpredictable man, Michael."
"But I always -- always -- have yogurt in my refrigerator," he pointed out.
Her eyes widened, one bare foot rising to run lightly up his thigh. "It's like maaaagic."
The growl that rose in his throat wasn't all that loud. Still, no one with any brains would ever mistake it for playful.
In a swift move, Fiona hooked both her heels behind his knees. His hands came up and braced him easily when he tipped forward, as they should. He would have gone for her wrists, not being new at this, but she threw her arms around his neck and grinned up at him.
"Let's go shopping!"
"Your treat," he said immediately.
The pout was magnificent. Amusement lightened Michael's eyes, but he shook his head.
"Fine," she sighed. "But we're taking your car."
When Sam Axe comes toward you through a public parking lot at something more than an amble -- even if it was with at least a glance spared for every female he passed -- it's safe to assume that there is something seriously wrong.
When he raises a hand and calls, "Mike!" the moment he's in ear-range, the proper response is to ignore Fiona's muttered comments about old feds and new speeds, and ask through a forced smile, "Yeah?"
"Hey, wow, am I glad I caught you," Sam said as he came up even with the Charger, his breathing likewise just a little bit too fast.
"Is there something aimed at any part of my body?" Michael asked, the smile unchanged.
"What?" Sam darted a look around, then waved off the question. "No. I just...it's a little lady trouble."
Fiona snorted as she yanked her door open and slid into the car, not bothering to hide the smirk that said almost every word she was thinking about Sam coming to Michael for advice in this area. Michael had learned the Speeding Sam Lesson, though, back in '94. So while he shifted his grip on the grocery bag in his left hand and swung the bag gently onto the back seat, he was watching Sam's face carefully when he said, "Care to share?"
"Oh, you know..." Sam grimaced, scratched his neck.
Michael also hadn't forgotten a single signal ever worked out with a partner in his life. "Beer's getting warm," he said, jerking his chin at the car. "Wanna tell me about it over a cold one back at the loft?"
Sam's wide grin flirted with slyness. "Only way to do it, Mikey. Not just the best -- the only."
Michael barely had the engine started before Fiona turned a raised eyebrow on him. He signaled for the upcoming right and only looked like he was ignoring her, which she might have figured out when he cleared his throat and said, "Soooo, that was..."
"All you've got in here is yogurt and frou-frou crackers," Sam said. Complained, really.
"Yeah, I--"
"The crackers are mine," Fiona said, pointing a finger over her shoulder without looking back. "Mine."
Sam's mouth twisted. "I don't want your cracked whole...whatevers," he sneered. "I want--"
"You know what I'd like?" Michael asked brightly. "An explanation. Yes, I think that'd be dandy."
"I didn't want to start talking money out in a parking lot. It's uncouth," Sam said, patting the air in a calming manner.
Michael's eyes narrowed in the rearview mirror. Sam met the look briefly, took a deep breath, then admitted, "Yeah, okay, it's Veronica's money."
"Enter the little lady," Fiona muttered.
"I know you don't have it all in your back pocket," Michael said. That indeed would be something seriously wrong, but it was highly unlikely, given the volume of the wealth in question. Unless... "Did you max out her credit cards?"
"No!" Sam reared up between the front seats. "I have-- I'm offended, Michael. Truly offended that you would think--"
"Bolivia," was all Michael said.
Sam sniffed and settled back into his seat, crossing his arms. "I care deeply for Veronica. Yeah, I'll grant you, her money doesn't hurt, and..." He paused and chuckled, leaning forward again. "You should see the car she's let me pick out. She's gonna be a--"
The delicate throat clearing came from Fiona. Sam twitched, then snapped. "Ours is a true relationship."
Fiona made a vaguely agreeable noise that might have been for the swirling red dress on the woman they'd just passed. Michael shook his head while Sam visibly held himself back from making a rude gesture at the back of her head. "So what's wrong, then?" he asked bluntly.
Sam's shifting on his seat was in danger of turning into squirming. "...she's afraid it's all going to disappear."
Michael's eyebrows shot up. "Like, poof?"
Fiona twisted around to eye Sam as he waved that idea off. "No, she's not crazy. She's just. She's got this friend, another 'lady of privilege'..."
Fiona tipped down her sunglasses. "Hot?" she asked.
Sam's head started nodding immediately. "Oh, yeah."
"Money. What about it?" Michael prodded as he pulled up in front of his loft.
"You know that million-plus that went missing from the First Atlantic last week?"
Michael finally turned and pulled off his sunglasses. "Yeah..."
"Well, about half of it was Veronica's friend's. And she came crying to Veronica, because apparently," he looked at Fiona, "that's what you all do."
"Yes," she said slowly. "All of us."
"Stop it," Michael warned them both. "And now Veronica is worried about her money. Because it's in the same bank?" he guessed. "Why doesn't she just move it?"
Earnestness at full throttle, Sam said, "That's just it -- it's not in the same bank. But this friend, she's got V pretty spooked. Convinced they targeted her, and that it only makes sense they're going after her friends next."
"Makes sense?" Michael coughed, which didn't do a damn thing to disguise his amusement. "Oh, Sam. So she wants you to...what? Keep her money safe? And what has that--"
"Not exactly." Sam broke eye contact to check out the shine of the leather on the back of Fiona's seat. "Which is where you come in."
Michael's mouth opened; nothing emerged. But Fiona's eyes lit up, and she reached over to hit Michael's arm.
"She wants you to find her friend's money!"
"Oh, no." Michael let out a strained laugh, shaking his head, and moved to get out of his car and away from this problem that was not his. "No. Been there--"
"And done that," Sam reminded him, climbing out of the back seat and following Michael toward the stairs with outstretched hands. "You got the money back, Mike. And I wouldn't ask, especially after all you did for Virgil and, well, for me, but..."
Michael spun on him. "Physical harm! You made me think that was the level of danger you were dealing with."
Sam's ingratiating smile got a snarl and Michael stomping up the stairs.
"There's an award," Sam called from below.
"Really?" Fiona chirped, completely ignoring how Michael was already at his door. "I can find money. Even when it has to be the same money."
One hand on his doorknob, Michael closed his eyes.
"Isn't this better?" Sam asked. "Cold beer in the hand, cold yogurt in the fridge...what more could a man ask?"
"Any number of things," Michael said from his stiff stance on the far side of the counter. "Tell me that you have someplace more concrete to start than a missing one-point-eight, and I won't list them."
"Okay, okay." Sam pulled out a piece of paper from his back pocket, waving it with more than a little flourish as he sat opposite Fiona and kicked up his feet on the low table. "Made some calls."
Money that goes into a bank doesn't stay in that bank. It's one of those cruel facts of life that you learn sometime after getting your first savings account: the dollar bill that you wrote your tiny initials on in the most indelible ink you could find...well, there's a chance that bill is coming back to you, but it's not a good one.
Money that's in a bank virtually from the start is even easier to play with. A button here, an electron there. The security protocol has yet to be written that someone can't poke a hole in just big enough to drag those dollars through.
So only part of the problem when it happens is "how." The "who" is the interesting, other part.
The First Atlantic bank, you can be assured, was already working on the "how" in this particular case.
Which made things much simpler for anyone with a personal interest in the "who."
For all that she will take every opportunity to laze around, Fiona is all for doing things. Getting out there, being the one on the front line, proving that she knows more and can do more than, say, the poor sap she's twisting around her strong little finger.
If they believe she's a helpless female, so what? Sometimes they learn that she's not, and that's pretty satisfying, too.
This time, though, the saps needed to stay unaware. So Fiona went in, simpering, convinced that because they'd just had that awful robbery, this was the safest bank in the world to keep her money, since everyone knew that old saying about lightning striking twice. But, now this is silly, but she'd feel so much better if she could see for herself what they were doing to make sure nothing like that ever, ever happened again.
Even the most highly trained contractor can slip up, turn their head, when Fiona's on. And cheap, multi-gig flash drives, these days they're made to look like just about everything. If they had any sense, data security conscious companies -- such as a financial institution -- would at least put a plastic plate over all the USB ports on their systems, so your average Jane can't sit down for a rest after all this walking, and stick any old thing in there. Thirty seconds, and someone who knows what they're looking for, and your network has been very helpful, thank you.
"It's too easy, sometimes," Fiona sighed and stretched her hands over her head, her feet kicking where they hung off the end of the bed. "I like to be challenged."
Bent over his computer sifting through layers of data off the lipstick-camouflaged flash drive, Michael didn't say anything. His face -- easily visible to someone positioned on the main level below him -- said plenty, though.
"Oh, like you don't get off on a good scam," she scoffed.
"It's not a scam, Fi, it's a--"
"What? An operation? Please, Michael, what you do is no different, no matter how many names you come up with. And what makes one truly satisfying is not the ease of pulling it off."
Michael's lips twitched. "Sorry. Next time you can be the one drinking the password out of the assistant manager."
Fiona snorted. "Like that was a challenge for Sam."
"I was playing to your strengths," he murmured. "Ah."
She stopped plumping the pillow and peered up at him. "Took you long enough."
"The report was easy to find, even among all the many files that you grabbed."
"I wanted to be thorough."
"Oh, you were." He pushed back from the desk and rolled his shoulders. "The problem is that the report only goes so far, because they've only gotten so far. What it turned out I needed was the company providing their connection."
That made Fiona sit up. "Not an inside job?"
"Nope."
"Well." She stood, and quickly started up the stairs. "How interesting."
Michael nodded. "Seems they like a challenge, too. I have to call Sam."
Some people collect stamps. Others, dead butterflies. Sam's collection is one that could command top dollar and then some on the open market, provided the buyer didn't mind the upkeep that comes with the entire package. And when he's putting it at your disposal, it's an awesome thing to behold.
The results are sometimes less than awesome, however. Parts of them, at least.
Pulling up in front of the house of one John Thomas Kelley, Michael cocked an eyebrow at the vehicle taking up all the room in the driveway.
"That's quite the van."
"Isn't it," Sam said, a fond smirk softening his mouth. "Always wanted one, myself."
Michael's eyebrows climbed higher. "Always?"
"Most of high school." Sam shrugged, then added, "And some of college, too. But by then, it was less for the lady on the outside, and more for the ladies I could've gotten inside."
"Right." Michael stepped out of the Charger, looked at its black sheen, then at the paint extravaganza on the van. Then he closed the door and walked around to the sidewalk, one hand sliding along the slope of the hood. "And how old is this kid?"
"Nineteen." Sam stepped up next to him, eyes still on the van. "Doing pretty good for himself, it looks like."
"Looking to do better, apparently," Michael observed as they walked toward the front door together. "Maybe if he learns to bury his tracks a bit more thoroughly..."
"Oh, he did fine." Sam got to the stairs first, and he was the one who reached out to knock. "I'm just better at digging than almost anybody is at burying."
Michael's mouth tilted on a soft chuckle. "That you are."
"Didn't hurt that underneath it all, he used his own computer," Sam admitted. He shrugged and straightened his tie. "First-timer mistake."
There was a clatter behind the door, drawing twin frowns from both. They shifted slightly to the sides: Sam on the hinges, Michael by the doorknob. When the door swung quickly inward -- yanked open, one could argue -- Michael took another half-step back.
"Ohmygodareyoucops?" gasped the...child?
"No," Michael said, because besides being the truth, anyone would respond in the negative to the fear in the voice and eyes of the girl standing there with tears streaking her cheeks.
She drew in a shuddering breath and managed a shaky smile, but that disappeared when she whispered, "You gotta help us," and wavered, her body swaying, fighting the idea of stepping outside even as she pleaded with total strangers.
Sam shot a confused look over her head. Michael didn't respond; all his attention on the girl -- young woman, they could actually see now that they were paying attention to something more than a lack of weapons -- who was still fixed on him.
Before she could make up her mind, a large hand latched onto her arm, and she jerked and stumbled over her feet in surprise. Sam reached out toward the door, determination settling on his face. But then a male voice hissed, "Is that-- Mandy! What're you doing?" and she broke free with a loud sniffle.
"They're not cops, Dan, and we need--"
The voice choked, then, "Like they're gonna tell us if they're cops! You're such a--"
Sam's eyes narrowed and he slapped the door open, nearly knocking over the gangly male stuck between boy and man who had been bent almost in two getting in Mandy's face. She glared up at Dan, undaunted, and the kid was backpedaling. That was probably because of the look on Sam's face, though.
"Well, I'd tell ya, Dan," Sam said as he advanced, lip curled in distaste. "Just so I could arrest you and maybe teach you some manners."
"Yeah, okay, whatever, old man," Dan threw back, his chin held high enough to make him taller than Sam.
Michael had followed quietly, taking in the generally clean and orderly state of the entryway -- and the lack of any other sound from the rest of the house reacting to the disturbance. Now he said, "Dan." Then he repeated the name when Dan wouldn't break off the staring contest. It took a fourth time before Dan's attention moved from Sam, which was when Michael finally asked, slowly and clearly, "Where's John?"
Another wet sniffle from Mandy, and Dan's bravado crumbled.
Remember that part about "anyone" with an interest in who had managed to get away clean with almost $2 million?
And Sam is really good, but sometimes, as has also been covered previously, he's not really all that quick.
"Well, at least they weren't throwing the money around, attracting attention," Fiona pointed out. "Pizza. That's a pretty normal thing for kids that age to order, right?"
Michael took the screwdriver from between his teeth before answering. "Yes, Fi, it's normal."
Her head tilted far to one side, one foot lifting behind her in apparent sympathy while she watched him place a new microphone in Mandy's cell phone. Dan's had already been dealt with, and lay next to Fiona's hand on the counter looking like many other teenagers' flip phone: a little battered, and with more extra sharp and shiny edges than it originally had.
"Did you?"
"Hmm?" Michael didn't look up, focused entirely on nudging his electronics into the slim electronics that proclaimed Mandy more interested in flash than features.
"Order pizza," Fiona prompted. Then she caught her lower lip between her teeth and peeked up at Michael's dark look. "Oh. No, by that age you'd left your mother and brother behind for a life of--"
"Don't," he warned, putting the phone and screwdriver down with deliberate care. "I thought we were past this."
Fiona dropped the act and put her hands on her hips. "Your mother is still calling me, Michael. Answer your phone once in a while. Unlike many other things and people, it has no desire to kill you."
She spun and ducked quickly behind him to get around the counter, snatching up Dan's phone before heading for the door. Michael let out a heavy sigh. "Where are you going?"
"To relieve Sam." Fiona draped her bag over her shoulder and one foot started tapping. "It's almost three. Are you done?"
Michael fired Mandy's phone across the room. It slapped into Fiona's palm, and she slid it into her pocket.
"This should be fun," she said with all the enthusiasm of a chicken for a deep fryer.
With a huff, he said, "Mandy and Dan know what to say the next time they get a call. Sam's been coaching them. So just sit tight, watch them, and keep the firearms out of sight."
She blinked at him, innocence shining as overly bright as ever. "Until I need them. Of course."
"If you need them--" Michael started, breaking off as she waved at him and stepped out into the sunshine.
"I'll call."
"You'd better," he said to the closed door.
The first call didn't come from Fiona, but from a heavily accented and heavily modified voice through Dan's phone. John, it seemed, might have been stupid enough to pull off one of the slickest electronic thefts in Miami history, and then get nabbed off his front steps in order to be forced to do it again, but his smarts weren't entirely geek-based -- now his nabbers were demanding Mandy's "necessary" help.
"It is necessary!" Dan insisted while Mandy sat next to him on the couch looking torn between blushing pride and gut-twisting anxiety. "John never would have been able--"
"Whatever," Fiona said. "Michael?" she asked into her cell.
"We've got a location. You stick there, okay? Don't leave their si--"
"Yeah, yeah," she said, and hung up.
Mandy and Dan were sitting very close to each other now, almost touching, after hours of glaring from opposite ends of the couch. Fiona turned away. She didn't go far, though, while she muttered, "Two hours ago. They could've called then. Sam was here. Sam could have stuck."
Lady friends with lots of money who don't mind knowing that part of your love for them is a great appreciation for that money, are usually fairly pragmatic.
They also tend to pick up a guy like Sam for some very understandable reasons.
"Um, you might want to wipe off that lipstick from your ear before we go into the restaurant," Michael advised with a finger waving the general direction of Sam's head.
"Oh." Sam pulled out a handkerchief and scrubbed at his left ear. Michael pointed toward his right and Sam switched, smearing the red further before wiping it clear. "Yeah," he laughed sheepishly. "Veronica was, well, she was appreciative, let's just say that."
"Yes, let's," Michael said with feeling. But then he put a hand on Sam's arm, holding them back. "She does know that we didn't really do anything, right? Those kids were only hanging onto the money long enough to prove that they could; they were going to return it in another week, anyway."
"That's what I told her, Mike," Sam said, nodding.
Michael held his gaze another moment. "But you still got the award from her friend, didn't you?"
Sam grimaced, but was still nodding.
"Share?" Michael asked with a pointed grin.
"Just waiting for us to wrap all this up," Sam assured him.
"Mm-hm." Michael let go of Sam's arm, though. It wasn't like he could afford to turn down the generosity of ladies with lots of money, either.
The reason there are suspicions about spies and journalists is because people aren't stupid. Posing as a journalist makes it easy to ask questions and push for access, and just because someone wonders doesn't mean they're sure. When they discover they're right, though, it's good to be able to run real fast.
Which is probably why Michael went that route, while Sam went into the warehouse first as a concerned citizen looking for the delivery guy who's fender he might have kind of dinged the fender when he parked out front.
Or, at least, that was the plan.
"Heeeey," Michael said, a drawl easing the word out as calming as he was holding out his hands. "So this ain't the place where I'm supposed to be meetin'--"
"I don't know who you were meeting, or what y'all are doin' here, but one more person comes through that door, I'm gonna start not worrying 'bout that," said the large man who definitely didn't look bright enough to make off with $1,769,448.52 on his own, and who had a gun centered on Sam's chest.
"I just, oh my god, I just came in to find the guy," Sam stammered. His hands were shaking in the air above his head, and the large armed man and his friend -- the man looming over a bruised and terrified kid, who was most likely named John -- kept darting glances at him. A spooked civilian is about as dangerous in a situation like this as a garden snake in a sorority party, and unlike some folks involved in this mess, Sam wasn't a first-timer.
Michael casually stepped forward when Sam flinched at a sharp movement from Looming Guy. Then he drew their attention to him again. "I don't know what's goin' on, but I am more than willin' to be on my way. No story is worth being shot, I know that."
"Story?"
Both of them were locked in on him, now. Sam's hands stopped shaking quite so much.
"You're here for-- What are you?" Gun Guy demanded. "You some kind of reporter?"
"'Some kinda reporter,'" Michael scoffed. Projecting wounded pride while Sam curled away, moving closer to Looming Guy and the kid as he did, Michael took another step forward. "I am Dade County's finest, I'll have you know."
"God, now we've got the fuckin' papers here." Gun Guy spat into the ground at Michael's feet, and Michael stopped just out of arm's reach. "Barry, call Bob and find out where he's at with that girl, and we gotta do about--"
It might have been the half-turn Gun Guy took as he spoke to Barry, or it might have been what he said, but right then, Michael's arm snapped out, leading with the backpack he'd had over his shoulder, and Gun Guy suddenly no longer had a gun. The guy bellowed in pain, because a single, thin disk of metal, say, cut out of a soda can, is capable of doing quite a bit of damage when sliced across human flesh.
"Lou!" Barry called, and charged, and Sam fell to the ground, rolling. He rolled right into Barry's legs, and tall and looming means high center of balance, which meant that Barry tipped right over to smack face-first into the concrete floor.
"Ow," Sam commented, then stuck a knee in Barry's back, which didn't get even a twitch. "Now that's gonna smart in the morning."
When he looked up, Michael had Lou on the floor, too, but Michael's arm was drawn back with his fist ready to strike again.
"Bob?" Michael asked in the cold kind of voice that most people hope never to hear.
Lou spat blood.
Michael's smile, if possible, was even colder than his voice. "Considering how you guys operate, if you like Bob, you'd better tell me what he's planning to do with that girl, and then start praying that I get to him before Fiona does."
"You've really got to stop," Michael said tightly as they pulled up behind the van. "Seriously."
"But I'm so sorry," John said again.
"Yeah, we got that," Sam grumbled. He was looking around, though, not paying much attention to a freaked-out kid when there were more pressing issues at hand. "I don't see any obvious damage," he said to Michael.
Michael was out of the car and heading for the house before Sam finished the sentence. Sam heaved a sigh, snapped, "Stay," at the back seat, and went after him.
"She wasn't answering," Michael said once they were around back.
"Bad reception."
"Right."
Sam rolled his eyes, but didn't suggest any more impossibilities. "Okay, you going up?"
Michael nodded.
"Wait two minutes. I'll go knock at the front," Sam offered.
Michael's head came around and he finally looked at Sam. "You don't have to--"
"I'll go knock," Sam said.
Michael took a deep breath, which Sam apparently took as consent. He moved off, and Michael crouched down by the lock on the cellar door.
Exactly two minutes after Sam left, Michael had the door open and was moving swiftly and silently up the dark stairs. He was almost at the top when the phone in his pocket buzzed, and his foot missed a step while he pulled out his cell and flipped it open.
"Sam?"
"Now that was fun," Fiona said.
Michael stopped, his eyes closing.
"I'm going to need a new phone, though," Fiona continued. The door at the top of the stairs swung open and Michael opened his eyes, squinting in the sudden light. "My old one has a bullet hole in it," she said, holding it up as evidence.