Free The Body of David Hayes by Ridley Pearson Page B

nine-eleven,” Witte explained, “we installedpalm scanners on our two hardware plants, the suites that house our major servers. Access is limited to a very select group of executives.”
    Including Liz, Boldt thought. “And can we determine if that security has been breached?”
    Witte said, “It hasn’t. It’s the first thing we checked when you called for this lockdown. The AS/400s are pristine.”
    Witte popped a stick of gum into his mouth and offered some to the others. Hartsmith took a stick. Boldt passed.
    “Cameras show anything?”
    “Your guys have already requested our pictures,” Witte said. “We’re making dubs, as I understand.”
    “I see a possible conflict,” Hartsmith said. That won both men’s attention. “We’re all digital here, Lieutenant. Security clearance, video surveillance, it’s all digitized information, and all of it is stored on one of the four UNIX servers.”
    Witte jumped in and explained. “That’s what I meant by making a dub. Our video surveillance is stored electronically to disk. Think TiVo. We can review it straight off the disks or dub it down to half-inch tape, or DVD, as we’re doing for you.”
    “And if someone got into these servers,” Boldt said, leading Hartsmith on.
    “That’s my point. You look at it that way, it’s a pretty fallible system.”
    Boldt could see Hayes having entered the building, and then the processing suites, but convincing the computer-controlled security system otherwise. Boldt suddenly wondered if that had already happened, if Hayes had come, gotten his money, and gone.
    “Can you put a guard, a human being, one of your security guys, on the doors to these processing rooms? Can we not rely on the technology so much?”
    “It would cost. I’d have to check.”
    “Check,” Boldt said. “And if you’re refused, let me know right away.”
    He looked for cracks in his reasoning, absolutely certain that Hayes used the money drop as a diversion, but stumped to prove it. Witte pulled himself out of a chair and left the small conference room. Hartsmith’s intelligent eyes stared off into space, deep in thought.
    “It’s problematic,” Hartsmith said. “A computer controlling its own security. But then again, it’s integrated. A closed system. You can’t get into the system to mess with it, because it guards its own door.”
    “But if you do get through that door…” Boldt could
see
Liz being forced to gain Hayes access to the servers, could feel her terror. Increasingly, it seemed to Boldt that if Hayes could not get her to cooperate, his only choice would be to kidnap her or someone else at the bank with the proper security clearance.
    “Then we’re toast. Yes. You erase any record of your visit, and you dump any video that captured you. It’s brilliant, really, except that it’s putting the cart before the horse.”
    “But how do we know absolutely?”
    “There is no absolute way. But if you’re asking if I think someone raided the AS/400s today, I’d put a good piece of change on that not having happened.”
    Boldt understood then that both Foreman and Liz were right: Hayes needed Liz for her palm print to gain access. Once inside the server suites, with access to the mainframes, he could not only steal his money back but eraseany record he’d ever been in the building, clear himself of any charges, and he could do it using the very same computers that were supposed to catch him. Perhaps today, using Liz to make the money drop, to distract bank security and the police, was nothing more than a dry run, a chance for him to inspect the place, to get a lay of the land and refine his plan. If so, they’d pick him up on the security video.
    Boldt caught up to Liz still being held in a small room off the bank’s branch offices located on the ground floor. He asked her to assemble a list of all WestCorp employees and executives with security clearance to the server suites. He intended to interview them all. He then