Fast and Loose by Fern Michaels Page A

girls! I have news. We need to talk. Let’s meet at the Cat & Cradle on Friday. Noon. My treat. I think we got good old Dix right where we want him, and no, he doesn’t suspect a thing. And before you can ask, the answer is a resounding no. He’s throwing everything he has at me to get me to take off my clothes, but I’m making him work for it, just like you all instructed.
    â€œWell, well, well! What have we here?” Philonias muttered to himself. He moved the chair he was sitting on across the room and placed a big X on Friday’s date. Normally, he didn’t eat lunch out on Fridays or any other day, but two days from now, he would make absolutely sure that he was dining at the Cat & Cradle downtown. Because, as everyone knew, information was power, and Philonias Needlemeyer was all about information and power. Information and power were his two best friends in the entire world.
    * * *
    â€œWe need a plan,” Jack said. He looked over at Charles, their in-residence plan maker, as Cyrus scoured every inch of the suite for all the strange scents he was picking up.
    Charles picked up the ball. “Abner, on a scale of one to ten, how sure are you that your friend RC is the one helping himself to the casino money? Based, of course, on what little we know at this point in time.”
    â€œAs sure as I know I need to keep breathing to stay alive,” was the snappy reply.
    â€œThen we need to up our game and set a trap for Mr. RCHood. What are the chances that you could enlist the aid of your fellow hacker, PIP? How could you go about that without RCHood knowing what you’re doing?”
    â€œAlmost impossible. Short of a face-to-face with her, I wouldn’t know where to start. Even if we made that happen, there’s no guarantee she would help us. Like all the others, she’s afraid of RC.”
    â€œThen how did your pal RC ferret out your own background? How did he do it? Is there a program? I’m not up on this hacker stuff, but if he did it, then as his almost equal, you should be able to do it,” Ted said.
    â€œYeah, you would think so, but I tried. These people use encryption, double passwords, and sometimes they change them hourly. Their servers are all over the world. I know for a fact that RC can and does use satellites to aid him. I told you, the man has no equal. Everyone is fearful of him, including yours truly. His reach is limitless.”
    â€œNo one is that good,” Dennis snorted. One look from Abner made him clench his teeth.
    â€œI have an idea,” Snowden said out of the blue. “Do you think you could describe PIP? Espinosa is a good sketch artist. If he could get a good sketch, we could run it off some face-recognition software and see what we come up with. Maybe we could track her down that way.”
    â€œYeah, sure. It’s been a few years since I’ve seen her, but I don’t think she would have changed that much. But I have to ask, to what end? How do you think she could help us?”
    â€œAt this moment I don’t know,” Snowden said, “but checking it out is better than doing nothing. She might have paid more attention to RC than you did. As you well know, women have a different mind-set than men. You focused on RC’s hands. Maybe she focused on his smile, his eyes, or his nose. I think it’s worth a shot, since we have so little else to go on.”
    Espinosa pulled a small sketch pad from his duffel bag and moved back into the main part of the suite, with Abner in tow. Snowden moved off to Charles’s computers and sat down to check out his software. Thirty minutes later, he was satisfied with what he had done, just as Espinosa waved a picture under his nose.
    â€œIt’s the best I could do, Mr. Snowden. It’s been a few years since I’ve seen her, but what you’re looking at is as good as it’s going to get,” Abner said as he stared at a plain-looking woman he