“Some other time, then, I guess, Kevin,” Patti said. “Okay, I’ll settle for a raincheck.”
“We’ll have it working better next time, anyway. You wait. I’ll see you, Patti.”
“Take care, Kevin.”
Kevin followed Corfe out of the lab. They walked a short distance along the main second-floor corridor to Corfe’s office. Corfe waved Kevin inside and closed the door. “I got a call from Michelle today,” he said. “She told me about this business with Vanessa.”
Kevin was taken aback. “She told you about that? I thought it would be kind of confidential. I don’t understand.”
“It’s okay. I went to see her about what’s going on with DNC—we talked about it that day we were working on the boat.” Corfe’s manner was conciliatory. “Now, I understand—I don’t want to go dragging personal things up where they’re not needed, either. But if it involves a person whose interests, to put it mildly, don’t exactly coincide with the well-being of this company . . .”
“You mean Payne?”
“Yes, exactly. Well, in her position, Michelle has to know.”
There was no escaping the reality now that sooner or later this was going to blow up in Eric’s face. Kevin sighed, felt bad about it, but still couldn’t see that he’d had any other choice. The only alternative would have been to do nothing. And one of Eric’s own favorite sayings was that many decisions in life were made automatically when the alternative was unacceptable.
“Okay. So what do you want me to do?” Kevin asked.
“She says you’ve got some kind of tape.”
“Right. It’s a video from a mec that accidentally got into one of her bags when she was leaving for that seminar in town last weekend. Taki and I activated it to try and find out where it was. It turned out she was with Payne on his boat—that one you said you worked on a couple of times.”
Corfe looked puzzled. “Payne keeps the Dolores at a private dock behind his house in Bellevue. How could you activate a mec at that distance?”
“Taki made a local relay pack. It was in the same bag as the mec.”
Corfe raised his eyebrows, thought about that, and nodded to himself, looking impressed. “I’m going to have to take a look at that.”
“Sure—assuming mom gives it back.”
“She’s still got it?”
“I guess so. But the mec’s still in the boat. It was almost out of juice.”
Corfe showed his hands. “Well, there’s not much we can do about that now. But in the meantime, Michelle needs to see this tape. Where is it now?”
“I’ve got it at home.”
“Uh-huh.” Corfe nodded as if that was what he’d thought. “I don’t think we want to go showing it here or at the house. So how does this grab you as a suggestion? I drive you to the house now, and we pick up the tape. Then we go into town and run it for Michelle at her office. After that, if you want, you could leave it with her and forget you ever saw it.”
Kevin squirmed uneasily. “I was going to ride back with Dad tonight. . . .” he began. But it didn’t say much, really. He and everybody else changed their plans constantly. Eric, if anybody, was worst of all.
Corfe shrugged and recited the explanation for him. “So I had something to do in Seattle, and you decided to come for the ride. Hell, it’s true. You’re not telling any lies with that.”
“Couldn’t I just give it to you at the house?”
Corfe seemed to give the thought some consideration, but then shook his head. “Not really. If it’s a mec video, it’ll need some interpreting. And if you were working the mec, you saw more than what’s on the tape. You know that.”
Kevin nodded resignedly. “Okay, Doug. Whenever you’re ready.”
Corfe picked up the phone. “I’ll just put in a call first, to let her know to expect us.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Martin Payne’s home, referred to by his friends as “The Mansion,” was a multimillion-dollar piece of waterfront real estate in the hyper-select Medina division of Bellevue, opposite Seattle on the east side of Lake Washington. It had been bought with the proceeds from what was still an explosive growth industry, where the rewards went to the quick, the shrewd, and the bold, and the rest rapidly became wall fodder.