He wasn’t good at estimating the ages of people over about thirty but the man talking with Vanessa looked to be in the range that was usually selected for sports equipment and fast-car commercials. Certainly, he had the looks. His yellow hair was styled collar-length, covering the ears, eyes clear and candid, tanned features, fine and strong-lined. He stood loose-limbed and athletic, wearing a bright red short-sleeved shirt with white edging, and white, lightweight, casual slacks. He was scanning through the contents of the green folder and saying something about forecasts and percentages that Kevin didn’t follow.
The room itself, as Kevin had registered vaguely but not had time to think more about until now, was low-ceilinged, with round-backed chairs and a bulging couch, sculptures and art works set on tables or mounted in backlit niches, and carpeting patterned in black, browns, and gold. A marble-topped bar with mirrors behind stood below a long window at the far end, and across from it, a glass-fronted cabinet exhibiting sculptures and crystal.
“What do you make of this place?” Kevin asked Taki.
“I’m not sure. A pretty nifty kind of house. . . .”
“It looks like it should have pointy arches and snake-charmer music, somehow.” Then Kevin noticed that the window partly visible behind the half-closed drapes high on the wall opposite, through which he could see lights reflecting off water, was rounded at the corners.
“Wait,” Taki’s voice said. “What was that?—back to the right of where you’re looking now.”
“Where?” Kevin moved his gaze back to the right.
“Back a bit more. . . . There, on the end wall.”
There were two doors in the end wall, the right-hand one closed, the other open to what appeared to be steps going down.
Mounted on the wall as a centerpiece between the doors was a carved wooden crest in the form of a composition of scrolls and ropework framing the inscription Princess Dolores.
“It’s a boat,” Taki said. “Didn’t the guy say something about Bellevue? You must be up on Lake Washington somewhere.”
“This is wonderful, Vanessa,” the man in the red shirt was saying. “I hadn’t realized it could be worth so much.” He made a face, accompanied by an empty-handed gesture, and then smiled. “Will I still be able to afford you when you own all this?”
Vanessa moved close and pressed her head against his shoulder. “We’ll own it.” She looked up and murmured something close to his ear that didn’t come through on the audio, and the man slid an arm around her. Kevin watched with rising discomfort. At least, it wasn’t his natural mother, so he was spared having to deal with that. His strongest reaction was a feeling of indignation on behalf of Eric. Taki, discreetly, refrained from comment.
“Let’s go out to the bar on the fantail,” the man in the red shirt said to Vanessa. “I’ll mix us a couple of drinks. Then we’ll take a short drive. I think I know just the place.” He slipped his arm from her waist and took her hand. They moved to the end of the cabin bearing the carved crest. The man opened the door to the right that had been closed, and showed Vanessa through.
“You could try getting the mec down,” Taki suggested. “A bit of noise getting back into the bag won’t matter now.”
Kevin was thinking the same thing. Vanessa would find it later, of course. But she wouldn’t even need to know that it had been out of the bag. It would just be a case of something belonging to the boys having inadvertently found its way into her luggage. He turned to go back the way he had come. . . .
And that was when he became aware of a freezing sensation in his back, almost painful. He had been too preoccupied with events to notice it building up.
He flipped on the system menu and selected status. The mec’s charge was almost exhausted, pointer down in the red arc, which was pulsing. Almost certainly there wouldn’t be enough to get back down to the seat, then have to either fight up the outside of the plastic bag or cut through into it. He deactivated, and all of a sudden was back at the house, sitting in a coupler in the downstairs lab.