It had scared him. It had gone unfunny right there. "Don't even think about it," he had said, because if there was such a thing as a worm and they designed one that would work, thinking about it could be dangerous; and it was Grant's own set Grant meant. Grant had his own manual.
Grant had laughed, with that wicked, under the brows grin he had when he had tagged his CIT good.
"I don't think we ought to do this," Justin had said, and grabbed the notebook. "I don't think we ought to mess around with it."
"Hey, there isn't any such thing."
"I don't want to find out." It was hard to be the Authority for the moment, to pull CIT-rank on Grant and treat him like that. It hurt. It made him feel like hell. Suddenly and glumly sober, Grant had crumpled up his design-start, and the disappointment in Grant's eyes had gone right to his gut.
Till Grant had come into his room that night and waked him out of a sound sleep, saying he had thought of a worm, and it workedwhereupon Grant had laughed like a lunatic, pounced on him in the dark and scared hell out of him.
"Lights!" he had yelled at the Minder, and Grant had fallen on the floor laughing.
Which was the way Grant was, too damned resilient to let anything come between them. And damned well knowing what he deserved for his pretensions to godhood.
He sat motionless at the keyboard, staring at nothing, with a dull ache inside that was purely selfish. Grant was all right. Absolutely all right.
The intercom blipped. He summoned up the fortitude to deal with it and punched the console button. "Yes," he said, expecting Ari or Ari's office.
"Justin." It was his father's voice. "I want to talk to you. My office. Now."
He did not dare ask a question. "I'm coming," he said, shut down and went, immediately.
He was back an hour later, in the same chair, staring at a lifeless screen for a long while before he finally summoned the self-control to key the project-restore.
The comp brought the program up and found his place. He was a thousand miles away, halfway numb, the way he had made himself when Jordan told him he had gotten a call through to Merild and Merild had given a puzzled negative to a coded query.
Merild had gotten no message. Merild had gotten nothing at all that he would have recognized as the subject of Jordan's inquiry. Total zero.
Maybe it was too soon. Maybe there was some reason Krugers had held Grant there and not called Merild yet. Maybe they were afraid of Reseune. Or the police.
Maybe Grant had never gotten there.
He had been in shock as Jordan had sat down on the arm of the office chair and put his arm about him and told him not to give up yet. But there was nothing they could do. Neither of them and no one they knew could start a search, and Jordan could not involve Merild by giving him the details over the House phone. He had called Krugers and flatly asked if a shipment got through. Krugers avowed it had gone out on schedule. Someone was lying.
"I thought we could trust Merild," was all he had been able to say.
"I don't know what's going on," Jordan had said. "I didn't want to tell you. But if Ari knows something about this she's going to spring it on you. I figured I'd better let you know."
He had not broken down at alluntil he had gotten up, had said he had to get back to his office, and Jordan hugged him and held him. Then he had fallen apart. But it was only what a boy would do, who had just been told his brother might be dead.
Or in Ari's hands.
He had gotten his eyes dry, his face composed. He had walked back through the security checkpoint and into Ari's wing, back past the continuing upset in Jane Strassen's staff, people trying to get a shipment out on the plane that was going after supplies, because Jane was so damned tight she refused to move with anything but a full load.
He sat now staring at the problem in front of him, sick at his stomach and hating Ari, hating her, more than he had ever conceived of hating anyone, even while he did not know where Grant was, or whether he himself had killed him, sending him out in that boat.
And he could not tell Jordan the full extent of what was going on. He could not tell Jordan a damned thing, without triggering all the traps set for him.
He killed the power again, walked out and down the hall to Ari's office, ignoring the to-do in the hall. He walked in and faced Florian, who had the reception desk. "I've got to talk to her," he said. "Now."
Florian lifted a brow, looked doubtful, and then called through.
"How are we?" Ari asked him; and he was shaking so badly, standing in front of Ari's desk, that he could hardly talk.
"Where's Grant?"
Ari blinked. One fast, perhaps-honest reaction. "Where's Grant? Sit down. Let's go through this in order."
He sat down in the leather chair at the corner of her desk and clenched his hands on its arms. "Grant's gone missing. Where is he?"
Ari took in a long slow breath. Either she had prepared her act or she was not troubling to mask at all. "He got as far as Krugers. A plane came in this morning and he might have left on it. Two barges left this morning and he could have been on those."
"Where is he, dammit? Where have you got him?"
"Boy, I do appreciate your distress, but get a grip on it. You won't get a thing out of me by shouting, and I'd really be surprised if the hysteria is an act. So let's talk about this quietly, shall we?"
"Please."
"Oh, dear boy, that's just awfully stupid. You know I'm not your friend."
"Where is he?"
"Calm down. I don't have him. Of course I've had him tracked. Where ought he to be?"
He said nothing. He sat there trying to get his composure back, seeing the pit in front of him.
"I can't help you at all if you won't give me anything to work on."
"You can damn well help me if you want to. You know damn well where he is!"
"Dear, you really can go to hell. Or you can answer my questions and I promise you I'll do everything I can to extricate him from whatever he's gotten into. I won't have Krugers arrested. I won't have your friend in Novgorod picked up. I don't suppose Jordan's phone call a while ago had anything to do with your leaving your office and coming in here. You two really aren't doing well this week."
He sat and stared at her a long, long moment. "What do you want?"
"The truth, as it happens. Let me tell you where I think he was supposed to go and you just confirm it. A nod of the head will do. From here to Krugers. From Krugers to a man named Merild, a friend of Corain's."
He clenched his hands the tighter on the chair. And nodded.
"All right. Possibly he was on his way on the barges. It was supposed to be air, though, wasn't it?"
"I don't know."
"Is that the truth?"
"It's the truth."
"Possibly he just hasn't left yet. But I don't like the rest of the pattern. Corain isn't the only political friend Kruger's got. Does the name de Forte mean anything to you?"
He shook his head, bewildered.
"Rocher?"
"Abolitionists?" His heart skipped a beat, hope and misery tangled up together. Rocher was a lunatic.
"You've got it, sweet. That plane this morning landed over at Big Blue, and a bus met it and headed off on the Bertille-Sanguey road. I've got people moving on it, but it takes a little organizing even for me to get people in there that can get Grant out without them cutting his throat They will, boy. The Abolitionists aren't all in it for pure and holy reasons, and if they've played a hand that blows Kruger, you can damn well bet they aren't doing it for the sake of one azi, are you hearing me, boy?"
He heard. He thought he understood. But he had not done well in this, Ari had said it; and he wanted it from her. "What do you think they're after?"