Read Blind Justice for Free Online

Circle. Munroe remembered the James G. Blaine mansion from before he had lost his sight. It was a beautiful four-story Queen Anne style building with dark red brick, a large porte-coch è re, and a rooftop filled with intricate weathervanes. Munroe thought it a bit of a waste that Joey likely had his portion of the elegant and historic space filled with superhero memorabilia. He could always tell a lot about a person by observing the space in which they lived and worked. Even though he had been blind for over ten years now, it still bothered him that he couldn ’ t gather such information without help.
    “Where did you get this thing?” Joey asked, referring to the small flash drive that Gerald had retrieved from the battery compartment of General Easton ’ s clock.
    “Why? What did you find?”
    “I couldn ’ t access it. That ’ s the problem.” Joey ’ s voice had a slight North Jersey accent with a nasal quality that Munroe suspected to have come from an improperly healed broken nose. His office smelled of burnt coffee, dirty dishes, and Febreze air freshener with the smallest underlying hint of marijuana residue. “This is the first example I ’ ve seen of a new system that the National Reconnaissance Office is developing called Widowmaker,” Joey continued. “It ’ s protected by a sixteen character password with a single-error shredding failsafe. So, if you enter the wrong password even one time, the entire contents of the drive get wiped beyond recovery.”
    “Can you crack it?”
    Joey gave a throaty laugh that ended in a snort. “That ’ s funny. There ’ s no way to crack it. At least not with the resources I have.”
    “ So it ’ s worthless.”
    “Not entirely. There is something strange about the way the encryption is implemented. Normally when using a system like this, you ’ d encrypt the whole drive or just certain files that are sensitive. But on this baby, someone left the directory structure intact and encrypted all the files within into a single archive. So the entire top-level structure is readable.”
    Munroe rubbed his temples. “Joey, what you just said makes about as much sense to me as a driver ’ s seat on a wheelbarrow.”
    “Huh?”
    “What does that mean? And why would it be that way?”
    “ I don’ t know why anyone would structure it that way. But what it means is that we at least have some clue as to what info the drive contains.” Munroe heard the clicking of Joey ’ s keyboard. “The directory names are Compound 119, John Corrigan, Money Transfers, Site B, Trial Results, and Wyatt Randall.”
    Now things were starting to make sense to Munroe. Easton wouldn ’ t have hidden a drive for him if he couldn ’ t learn anything from it. But the General was also likely worried about someone else finding the drive and accessing the sensitive information that it contained. The directory structure was left as a list of leads for Munroe to follow.
    “That ’ s good, Joey. I need you to find out anything and everything you can about Wyatt Randall, Compound 119, and Site B.”
    “What about John Corrigan?”
    “I already have an idea about that one. I need you to book Gerald and I on the next flight to Leavenworth, Kansas. We ’ re going to pay John Corrigan a visit.”
    Gerald said, “You know the guy?”
    “I ’ ve heard of him. He ’ s currently on death row, and I believe his execution is scheduled for sometime within the next week. So the clock is ticking.”

CHAPTER EIGHT
    Deacon Munroe had visited the United States Disciplinary Barracks many times, although his visual memories of the place were from the original facility. The stone wall and brick castle had been replaced by a new building that he had been told was indistinguishable at first glance from the campus of a high school. But the USDB that he remembered and still held in his mind was a hard place with a medieval ambiance, well-worn stone, and brick walls. The original castle used prisoners for