“This is way out of our league,” he said, without the slightest change in expression. “I mean, I only have half-a-dozen people in my group. We chase down industrial espionage and petty theft, for the lord’s sweet sake, not kidnappings.”
George knew how well Astro’s security team chased down petty theft. The Lunar Underground lived on small “borrowings” from corporate storerooms.
“Dan said we should go to Stavenger,” said George.
Nodding cheerfully, Blyleven turned to his desktop phone and asked for Douglas Stavenger.
When George and Blyleven were ushered into Stavenger’s office, up in the Grand Plaza, a fourth man was sitting in front of Stavenger’s broad, glistening desk. Stavenger introduced him as Ulrick Maas, director of security for Selene. Maas looked like a real cop to George: muscular build, dark, suspicious eyes, scalp shaved bald.
“You realize that this may be nothing to get alarmed about,” Stavenger said once all four men were seated. “But Kris Cardenas isn’t the kind of woman who suddenly goes into hiding, so I think we ought to try to find her.”
“She’s in Humphries’s place, down at the bottom level,” George said flatly.
Stavenger leaned back in his desk chair. Maas stared at George through narrowed eyes; Blyleven looked as if he were thinking about much more pleasant things. Through the office windows George could see the broad expanse of the Grand Plaza. A couple of kids were flying above the greenspace like a pair of birds, flapping their brightly-colored rented plastic wings.
Grimacing, Stavenger asked, “You’re certain of that?”
“It’s Humphries she was scared of,” George replied. “Where else would he stash her?”
“That area down there is the property of the Humphries Trust,” Maas pointed out. “Selene doesn’t have legal authority to go in and search it.”
“Not even if her life’s on the line?” George asked.
Stavenger said to Maas, “Rick, I think you’ll have to initiate a search.”
“Of Humphries’s place?” George asked.
“Of all of Selene proper,” Stavenger said. “Humphries’s place is a different matter.” He turned to the phone and asked it to connect him with Martin Humphries.
“Dr. Cardenas?” Martin Humphries said to Stavenger’s image on his patio wallscreen. “You mean the scientist?”
“Yes,” said Stavenger, looking strained. “She’s missing.”
Humphries got up from the chaise longue on which he’d been reclining while he reviewed his father’s holdings in Libya.
“I don’t understand,” he said to Stavenger’s image, trying to look puzzled. “Why are you telling me about this?”
“The security office has initiated a search for her throughout Selene. I’d appreciate it if you allowed them to search your premises, as well.”
“My home?”
“It’s just a formality, Mr. Humphries,” Stavenger said, with an obviously false smile. “You know security types: they want to dot every eye and cross every tee.”
“Yes, I suppose they do,” Humphries replied, smiling back. “I suppose someone could hide out in the gardens, couldn’t they?”
“Or inside the house. It’s rather large.”
“H’mm, yes, I suppose it is—by Selene standards.” He took a breath, then said reluctantly, “Very well, let them send a team down here. I have no objections.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“You’re welcome,” said Humphries. He snapped his fingers to shut down the connection. Then he went into the house, walking swiftly to his office.
He snapped his fingers as he entered the office. The phone screen lit up. “Get Blyleven down here on the double. I’ve got a job for him.”
MARE NUBIUM
The tractor plodded slowly along the bleak, empty expanse of Mare Nubium, heading away from the ringwall mountains that marked Alphonsus and the site of Selene.
Kris Cardenas fought to keep the terror from overcoming her. She could feel it, trembling deep inside her, crawling up into her throat, making her heart race so hard she could hear its pulse thundering in her ears.
“Where are you taking me?” she asked, her voice muffled by the helmet of the spacesuit they had put her into.
No response from the driver. Of course, Cardenas thought. They’ve disabled my suit’s radio. A neat, high-tech way of gagging me.
The two goons who had picked her up the night before had brought her down to Humphries’s extravagant place in Selene’s lowest level. Martin Humphries had not deigned to meet her, but she knew whose place it was. The servants had been very polite, offering her food and drink and showing her to a comfortable guest suite where she’d spent the night. The door to the corridor had been locked, of course. She was a prisoner and she knew it, no matter how sumptuous her cell.