“Are you making yourchoices these days?”
“My choice right now is to have my office to myself, to do my work, outside politics–”
“Oh, come now!”
“–to have Grant do his. To enjoy my life…”
“Will you? Enjoy it? And areyou outside politics?”
That did it. He smiled with his father’s own false warmth, right back at him, and something ticked over deep in his makeup that could be cold as ice–something he didn’t damn well trust, but right now it felt like an asset, not to have himself out of control with this man who had all the buttons. “I don’t know, Dad. I haven’t a clue who’s had a go at me or who’s reshaped my psyche during Denys Nye’s tenure–there are things I don’t actually remember. But I’m actually pretty happy these days, and I lately find I haven’t any stake in your game, whatever it is.”
“You think you haven’t.”
“I know I haven’t. I don’t give a damn for what happened twenty years ago and if you plan to live here in Reseune, I really hope you’ll just let it all go. So enjoy your dinner. I plan to.”
“Justin, Justin, Justin, you really believeyou’re not in it.”
“Won’t work, Pop. Really won’t work.” He took a sip of wine. The rich tastes were sharp, solid, complex. Where Jordan wanted to lead him was complicated, too, the wrong end of Jordan’s ambitions, whatever they currently were, and he discovered, since the last fight, he truly failed to give a damn, tonight, and decided not to subscribe to Jordan’s list of problems.
“You have your own agenda,” Jordan said. “You think it’s in your practical interests to keep your own counsel. And you don’t want to share. I can respect that.”
“Thanks for the analysis.”
“You’re waiting. You plan to have influence in the great someday. Yanni’s not any younger and she‘s not old enough, not as old as she needs to be. So you’re going to be the stopgap. What kind of position will that put you into? You know, you could parlay your connections into the Directorship, what time the little dear doesn’t hold that post herself. Maybe Councillor for Science. And are you ready for that?”
He took another drink of wine, a deliberately small one, thinking: God, no. And said, “ You’rescared of her. But not scared enough. Watch it about trying to read me. You could make a mistake. You’re locked in what was. And things just may not be the same after twenty years.”
“You think I can’t read you, down to the fine print? I do, believe me, I do, right down to the fact you’re running scared of the little dear, same as you did her predecessor. I know all the twitches.”
“I know you owned the geneset first. But genesets are only part of the story. Weboth know that, don’t we? But do we both actually believe it? I wonder.”
“Oh, programming can do wonders,” Jordan said. “And you’ve been Worked for all those years. How many sessions did you have with Giraud Nye’s people, before you had one with little Ari?”
“Arrests, you mean?” He kept his tone light. “Oh, a few. But you were in one long detention, yourself, over on Planys. Do you find that makes a psychological difference? I’d say so.”
That actually caught Jordan just a little by surprise. Or maybe it stung, for reasons he hadn’t, until now, guessed. “So you won’t like having me in your office,” Jordan said, flank attack and redirect. “You don’t trust me.”
“Living the life I’ve lived, I don’t trust anybody. You think they didWork you over when you were arrested? Or aren’t you sure of that?”
Jordan avoided his eyes. In a psychmaster, that was a devastating flinch. And that avoidance hit him right in the heart, reminding him of his own little sojourns with interrogators. Ricochet, he thought, feeling the pain. Damn. And he didn’t look at Paul. He hadn’t invoked Paul’s name, or queried him. Paul wasn’t looking at him. But the shots didn’t go just at Jordan.
Salads arrived. They ate while Jordan sat and had more wine. They managed small talk, catching up on who was sleeping with whom, who was married, who had procreated. One of the many Carnaths had given natural birth to a daughter, opting to skip the birthlabs. It was the talk of the offices. Crazy, no few said.
“There’s a certain merit in it,” Jordan said. “Think of all the thousands who don’t have access to a lab, or don’t have it government‑subsidized. Fargone. Pan‑Paris. All those poor women doing it the hard way…those poor childless men with no other recourse…”
Justin didn’t often imagine Fargone, or Pan‑Paris, waystations in the dark which touched his personal world very little. He was glad not to have to imagine them, steel worlds orbiting stars whose planets, if any to speak of, were good only for mining. “We’re spoiled, I suppose.”
“Spoiled as hell,” Jordan said, more cheerfully. “Though there’s Planys, if you ever want not to be spoiled.”
Right back to the bitter edge.
And it didn’t pay to go there. “Rather not. Hope never to.”
“So how’s your apartment? Nice, I’ll imagine, being where it is.”
“Nice. Yes.”
“Bugged. Naturally.”
“Naturally.”
Main course arrived. Gratefully. Another service of wine. Jordan took a refill. He didn’t. Nor did Grant, nor Paul.
“Ever think of moving back to Education?” Jordan asked.
“I think about it.”
“You could come and visit me. But I can’t get into your restricted little paradise.”
“I know. I’m sorry about that. I really am.”
“Can’t do anything about it, can you?”
“I know it’s not going to last.”
“Isn’t it? Got a date when they’re going to stop bugging my apartment? Got a date when I can go into my son’s extravagant palace?”
“You know I don’t. Maybe, to a large extent, Dad, that depends on you.”
“Right next door to the little princess. Convenient for sex. Is that what you do for your keep?”
He said nothing, speared a bite of his dinner, and ate it. The spiced shrimp was curiously tasteless, and he resisted the impulse to lay his fork down and leave. Or have another wine. His pulse rate was up. Jordan always did that to him. And another wine would be deadly. He decided on a redirect, and had another bite of shrimp. “Paul?”
“Ser?”
“Ser, hell. I’m Justin. Remember?”
Paul’s face was generally somber. It remained that way–with good cause, tonight. “I remember.”
“Grant,” Jordan said, and Justin felt his heart kick up another notch. He couldn’t help it. And he resented that, resented Jordan having anything to do with Grant these days. “Are you taking good care of my boy? In every respect?”
“No problems, ser.” Grant’s voice was perfectly light and smooth, not a twitch. “Thank you.”
“You came through all the troubles in good shape.”
“Absolutely, Ser.”
“Have you ever needed a supervisor, beyond what you have?”
“Damn it, Jordan, just enjoy your dinner.”
“I was just asking. Concerned.”
“The hell.” Grant’s welfare and their relationship and the number of times Grant had needed a supervisor wasn’t a topic he wanted opened up. The past wasn’t. He didn’t want to list the things that had changed his relationship with Grant into a sexual one. He didn’t want Jordan’s commentary on their existence. They all ate in prickly silence for a space, except that Paul asked how long they should have to wait for Library access, which seemed a fairly minor request.
“I’m sure I don’t know,” Justin said patiently. “That’s something you might legitimately ask Yanni.” He couldn’t stop himself from charitable impulses. “Or I can. I will.”
“One often thousand little nuisances,” Jordan said. “I need my own past articles. I don’t think I’m going to blow up the laboratories with information I’d find in my own damned articles, would I?”
“We do have an inquiry going in Yanni Schwartz’s office,” Paul said, “but that’s had to wait for him to get back.”