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“Those documents look like the ones we found at Preston Cummings’ house,” Thayne said. He pointed to the ones in front of Leo and several of the agents started murmuring. When the screen changed to a series of photos of people who appeared to be in various stages of poor physical condition, everyone shut up.

“Well, those weren’t included in what we found,” Max drawled.

“Definitely not,” Leo said, leaning forward as Max did the same beside him. He pointed to the screen. “Where’d you find these, Noah?”

“These were hidden on the encrypted laptop you all found out there, Doc,” Noah replied. He continued to type until a picture of an elderly woman holding a cat popped up onto the screen. “This is…was…Doctor Cummings’ mother…and—I assume—her cat. It’s the only photo on the computer at first glance but all these photos were hidden inside it. Further, the data files were hidden within each picture.” Photographs of paperwork that looked exactly like what Leo had been showing them moments before appeared on the screen as Noah continued to type.

Max pointed to the screen. “So those files are the ones you gave to Thorne and are the same ones we found in the filing cabinets?”

“Well, I haven’t seen what you found in the filing cabinets,” Noah said. “Does it look anything like these data files?”

“Yeah,” Max said. “With the exception of the photographs.”

“How’d you find all that information inside one picture on his laptop?” Lincoln asked. His brows were furrowed as he stared at the screen.

“Steganography. It’s simple coding for hiding a file within a picture which simply appears to be a picture to an average user,” Noah said. “You don’t have to be a sophisticated hacker to do it and in fact, you can learn how to do this on YouTube. It leads me to believe that the doctor probably learned how to hide these files and data himself.” He chuckled for a second before clearing his throat.

“What is it?” Snow asked.

“Sorry. I say that he must have used something like YouTube because he was the very definition of low tech. He named his mother’s picture ‘Mama with Gus’ and the files hidden within it are named ‘Hidden Files’ and ‘Nothing to See Here.’”

“That’s kinda cute,” Carter said, squinting up at the screen.

“Yeah…but not cute cute,” Jarrett replied.

FBI Files Series

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