Frank yawned.
"I think we should pull over for the night," Vanessa said. "There's a motel up ahead."
Frank opened his mouth to argue and yawned again. They were in the middle of Washington, only about three hours from Seattle, but Frank saw Vanessa's point. They wouldn't be able to solve the case with their truck wrapped around a tree. There also wasn't much to do in Seattle if they arrived at two in the morning.
Frank pulled into the parking lot of the dingy roadside motel.
"Rooms are sixty a night," the bored-looking teenager behind the counter said.
"Whatever you've got with two beds," Frank replied, handing over his last hundred-dollar bill.
"All our rooms are queen beds only," the kid replied. "I'll hang onto this until morning as a deposit. You can get your change then. Can I see some ID?"
Frank shook his head. "We lost our wallets. Is that going to be a problem?"
The kid sighed. "Welcome to Sprague, Mr. Smith."
"You can have the bed; I'll take the floor," Frank said as they walked into the room. He grimaced at the water-stained ceiling and faded carpet.
"Don't be a baby," Vanessa replied, checking the sheets for signs of bedbugs. "It's big enough for both of us. I promise to behave."
Frank was too tired to say anything in response. He collapsed onto the bed and was asleep within seconds.
Frank awoke with a start. In his dream, Tortoise had knocked on the motel door. When Frank opened it, Tortoise morphed into the bomber and kidnapped Vanessa. Trapped in the netherworld between nightmare and reality, Frank was gripped with horror. He reached over to the other side of the bed to find it empty.
"Vanessa?" he grunted. In a panicked fugue state, Frank tore around the motel room as fast as he could. He barreled into the steam-filled bathroom. A woman's scream filled the air.
"Vanessa?" Frank shouted.
"Get out!" Vanessa yelled.
Slowly, Frank came to his senses. "Sorry," he called out to the other side of the shower curtain before retreating, mortified, back to the hotel room. When Vanessa emerged a few minutes later, Frank gave her a sheepish look.
"You better have a good explanation," Vanessa said, crossing her arms.
"I had a nightmare that you got kidnapped and didn't fully wake up until you screamed." Frank admitted, not able to meet Vanessa's eyes.
Vanessa sat next to Frank on the bed. "I guess I believe you." She smiled at Frank who couldn't help but grin back. "Although if I was kidnapped, why would they take me into the bathroom?"
Frank opened his mouth to answer but couldn't come up with something that made sense. He closed it a few seconds later. He looked over at Vanessa. Even though her hair was wet, and she wasn't wearing any makeup, she had never looked so beautiful. Frank felt himself leaning closer. Vanessa responded, her eyes closing as her lips met his in a kiss that quickly deepened.
"Let's hope your evening was more productive than mine," Joe said as he entered the hotel room.
Callie looked up from stacks of papers that looked much more organized than earlier. "What did the police say?"
"We didn't call the police," Joe said, taking a seat next to Callie. "My dad contacted the Gray Man. He's there with him now, combing the apartment."
"You didn't want to help?"
"I did, but the Gray Man didn't want me there. I decided not to push it. Forensics isn't really my thing anyway. Dad will fill me in on anything important. What'd you find?"
"Okay," Callie said, scooting closer to Joe and showing him her notebook. "The three hedge funds that made the suspicious transactions all had the same M.O."
"That stands for modus operandi," Joe pointed out, wanting to impress Callie for some reason.
"Yes, I know. They all purchased $20 million worth of stock on the Wednesday before the incident and then sold it the following Wednesday after the price jump due to the good news."
"So all three are likely the same people," Joe said.
"Exactly." Callie smiled smugly.
"We already knew that. How does this help?"
"Because," Callie said, tapping the bottom of her notebook. "It happened four times."
"I thought Dad said it happened three times?"
"It happened three times where hedge funds purchased large amounts of stock, but the most recent suspicious transaction wasn't a purchase of stock."
"What was it?" Joe asked, now engrossed in Callie's story.
"Have you ever heard of shorting a stock?"
Joe squinted. "Wasn't Frank talking about that one time? Something to do with video games?"
"Right, Gamestop. It was a big deal in the news last year. Normally, you buy a stock if you think the price is going to go up and then sell when it increases."
Joe nodded. "Buy low, sell high."
"But what if you thought a stock was going to go down?"
Joe scrunched his face in thought. "I'm going to guess you do something called shorting."
Callie smiled and patted Joe on the head. "Good job."
Joe swatted her hand away.
"Stock shorting is the opposite of normal trading," Callie continued. "You sell it first and then buy it later."
"Wait," Joe said, holding up a hand. "How do you sell something before you buy it?"
"Basically, you find someone and borrow some stock to sell at current market prices. Then later, you buy some more and give it back to the person you borrowed it from at the market price at that time. If the price has gone down, then you make a profit."
"But if the price doesn't go down, you're hosed."
Callie nodded. "Right. Actually, shorting a stock is even riskier than normally buying a stock for two reasons. First, when you buy a stock, you can choose when to sell it. If there's a price dip, you can wait it out and hope it goes up eventually. Stock shorting means you're locked into a sale date. Second, your liability is unbounded. If I buy 10 shares of $100 stock and the stock goes to zero, I only lost $1,000. But, if I short 10 shares of $100 stock and the stock goes to $500, I lost $4,000."
"And there's no limit to how high stock can go," Joe interrupted. "I'm guessing someone's been shorting stock."
Callie showed Joe some papers covered in a slew of meaningless numbers.
"We were looking for more trades like the first three, that's why we missed it. The short position of Ducroy Airlines has a massive spike one day last week. Guess which one it was."
Joe raised an eyebrow. "I'll bet it's Wednesday."
"You're a winner. I think it was probably related to something I overheard in the legal department. Two people were talking about a merger between Ducroy and a company called Northwestern Air. No one thought it was going to go through until the government approved it last Thursday – probably including our leaker."
Joe's face went white, and he grabbed Callie's wrist. "Do you know what this means?" he croaked.
Callie was confused. "It means we have another data point we can use to find the leaker."
"No," Joe said, "think about it. You're a hedge fund that just put in a huge bet that Ducroy stock was going to plummet when the government rejected the merger. Then, the next day, the news comes out that the merger was approved. Ducroy stock jumps up. You're about to lose everything. You need something drastic. Something that's going to crater Ducroy stock."
"Oh no," Callie whispered, covering her mouth with her hands.
"That's right." Joe looked Callie in the eyes. "You blow up a plane."