Command Decision (13 page)

That could be faked, of course. Or his parents might be held in some private residence, in which case…he shook his head and called Green Hills with the same inquiry.

As the numbers came up, he had trouble keeping his voice steady in the Cascadian accent. The same originating code…the right sequence of communications nodes. He forced himself to finish the conversation with the clerk—so sorry, no, the date of the convention could not be changed to fit Green Hills’ only vacant slot—and closed the contact breathing hard. He closed his eyes briefly, willing himself to calmness. From here on, he must be even more careful.

The structure was listed as the Green Hills Conference Center, owned by the Green Hills Development Corporation. Who owned Green Hills? Rafe, flat on his belly on the edge of a vast grassy space, had not been able to winkle that out of the local databases without risking the question being noticed. He stared across the bowl to the cluster of buildings surrounded with shrubs and trees. One large, three stories at least, the cupola to a small tower peeking out of the trees. One with the extra-large ventilator hoods that suggested a large, institutional kitchen. Small buildings, hardly more than cabins, placed haphazardly around the margin of the wooded space. And beyond, surrounding the buildings, the mown grass. Clear field of fire, up to the tree line, where dense forest surrounded the facility. Here it was a mix of evergreens and deciduous trees now dropping leaves like flakes of gold and bronze with every puff of air.

Two roads in: the staff entrance a narrow, one-lane blacktop bordered by hedges—the only cover across the grassy circle. The public entrance, a generous two lanes edged with bedding plants, all copper and bronze at this season, ended in a small parking area. One vehicle sat there. By its thermal signature, it had been in place for at least six hours.

And the whole place was thick with detection equipment in all modes. If he had not found, and suppressed, one of the section command nodes two hundred meters back, not even his chameleon suit would have kept him safe. The command node’s instruction set was ISC security standard, proof that someone involved was ISC—or that ISC’s security had holes all through it, another depressing thought.

A white van came into view on the servants’ road. Small, any lettering or logo on its sides hidden by the hedges from his viewpoint. It moved at a moderate pace and disappeared behind the cluster of buildings. Rafe extended his probe into the security command net, careful not to tickle any of the internodes, but he could not reach anything useful. The elements within his reach could give him enhanced audiovisual of their detection arc direct to his implant, but nothing more.

The staff parking areas, he already knew, were surrounded by buildings, out of sight of the perimeter or underground. In a benign setting, this might be to keep any utilitarian objects out of view of customers who expected total elegance. Here, such caution seemed sinister. No legitimate enterprise needed this level of security, of secrecy.

Something moved; he saw sunlight flash…it was a glass door opening. Tiny figures exited the building, three of them. Two were in gray coveralls. Rafe increased the magnification in his eyepiece. Not just coveralls, but camouflage battledress, its surface now inactive. The third figure wore business clothes…but atmospheric instability made wavering patterns in Rafe’s eyepiece; he could not see the face clearly enough to be sure of an identity.

That third figure went to the parked vehicle and entered it; after a moment the vehicle moved, leaving by the public road. The two uniformed figures stood together, watching, then turned back to the buildings and entered the largest.

An hour later, another white van entered the area along the service road. He could still see no logo, thanks to the hedges. It—or its twin—reappeared quickly and stopped partway to the trees, blocking the service road. Rafe boosted his visuals; the sun was going down, and long shadows dimmed his view of the road. A short time later, a second white van emerged from the trees near the buildings, followed by a third. The first van moved ahead, on into the trees, followed by the other two; Rafe dared not tap into the perimeter security to see if it went all the way to the public road.

He lay there another three hours. Nothing moved in the compound; no lights came on. Were his parents still there? Had they ever been there? Were the three white vans benign—transportation for cleaning or maintenance crews prepping the facility for another conference—or something else?

By midnight, he was out of the woods, undetected as far as he knew, and back in Pittville, his disguise restored in the cab of the rental car.

“Did you enjoy your drive, Ser Ratanvi?” the doorman at the hotel asked when Rafe had turned the car in.

“It’s very pleasant country,” Rafe said. “Especially, I would think, at this time of year. The trees where I live are all evergreen.”

“You should see it in spring, when the trees are in bloom,” the doorman said.

The next morning, Rafe went back to Pilar’s office, and this time the receptionist smiled at him. “You are having a pleasant time, Ser?”

“Indeed, yes, though the resorts are all booked up for next year, as Sera Metris said they might be. I have just a few more questions for her, if she is free.”

“It will be a short time, but then, yes.”

Rafe pored over the local business directory, trying to think of some way to ask what he needed to ask without breaking character. There simply was no way that even his supple imagination could devise…

When they were alone. Pilar looked at him, one corner of her mouth pulled in, “Ser Ratanvi, I perceive that you are not entirely what you seem.”

“Lissa,” Rafe said, to see what she’d do.

“Lissa…was not my year. I didn’t have much to do with the younger girls.”

“No. You were younger.”

She scowled. “That time is over. I don’t talk about it.”

“Nor do I, but some things are never over.”

“So what do you really want, Ser Ratanvi-in-food-processing?”

“A name,” Rafe said. “Which an attorney might have.”

“And if I choose not to cooperate? If I think this is something for law enforcement?”

“Then my family will die,” Rafe said. “If they aren’t dead already.”

She gazed at him without a change of expression for a long moment. “You are serious.”

“Completely.”

“They…were rich.”

“Yes.”

“Powerful.”

“Yes.”

“And you think they’re in danger. Why?”

“I would rather not tell anyone who doesn’t have to know,” Rafe said. “I believe the danger is extreme.”

“You want to find them…rescue them?”

“I need to find a reliable person who does that sort of thing.”

“Hostage extrication,” Pilar said. “Very dangerous, very much a specialty. There are three firms I know of, assuming you don’t want to go to the authorities—since you haven’t, I’m safe to assume.”

“That’s right,” Rafe said. “If their disappearance isn’t public knowledge, there’s a reason, and the authorities could be involved.”

“You have asked me if I will serve as the local contact should your association decide to hold its annual conference here,” Pilar said. “That is all you have asked me. I asked for a retainer. You paid it; you will pay it when you leave. A name you might know: Gary.”

Gary. Rafe remembered exactly one Gary they had in common, the older boy who had made his life hell for two years of his incarceration at the school.

“The best reputation on the planet,” Pilar said. “It’s a respectable company providing general and special security services.”

“Gary?”

Her mouth quirked. “As it happens, I have his personal contact numbers. Here.” She scrawled something on a plasfilm strip. “And now, I believe our business is finished. My receptionist will be glad to take care of the retainer.”

“Thank you,” Rafe said.

Pilar shrugged. “Lissa was kind to me, and to Colleen. And I have to admire someone who cares about a family who dumped him into that hellhole. Mine can rot, for all I care.”

In the outer office, Rafe paid the retainer. He decided to wait until he was away from Pittville to call Gary…in fact, he would call while in transit to his next stop. He caught the afternoon train back to the coast, then the night train to Balcock, the nearest city with a commercial airport. The night train had a full directory; Gary’s firm came up, with an office number instead of the ones Pilar had given him. And the firm’s office was in Balcock…why there and not Central, he wondered. Which number to call? Well, Ratanvi would have no reason to call a security services firm…he called the private number. He was not surprised when the link icon lit a security bubble.

“S’Gary,” said a male voice. It didn’t sound like the old Gary, but it had been fifteen years at least.

“Pilar gave me this number,” Rafe said. “Lissa mentioned me to her.”

“I don’t play games,” Gary said. “Whatever you’re—”

“The door to the steam tunnel could be opened from the other side only with a key,” Rafe said. The worst night of his life had been spent on the wrong side of that door. Silence, now. Finally, a gust of air huffing out.

“This wouldn’t be that rich boy, would it?”

“Yes,” Rafe said. “I need to hire an expert.”

“Expert in what?”

“Retrieving stolen valuables.”

“Where are you?”

“On a train to Balcock.”

“You know where our corporate HQ is?”

“Yes.”

“Don’t go there. Check into a hotel—the Dorset Arms or the Seaview. Name?”

“Genson Ratanvi.”

“Good…grief. Cascadian, by your accent. Well, Ser Ratanvi, we’ll meet tomorrow to discuss your business. Shall we say ten of the clock?”

Rafe left the station in the morning crowd, and didn’t notice anyone following him. He checked into the Seaview—which, despite its name, had only one narrow slice of sea view, and that only from rooms on the right front corner. His room, fifth floor back, looked out onto a parking lot and the blank wall of another building. That suited him. He had slept little; his mind kept churning through the possibilities, most of them grim. He forced himself to eat something for breakfast.

Promptly at ten, the deskcom buzzed; he told the desk clerk that yes, he was expecting a visitor and please send him up.

Despite himself and the years between, Rafe’s stomach tightened when he opened the room door and faced Gary. Whatever he’d been doing in the intervening years, Gary had not let himself go: he was as fit and muscular as he had been in his late teens. Almost a head taller than Rafe, massive shoulders in a well-fitted suit, he looked like the tough he was. Or had been. He looked Rafe up and down after Rafe closed the door behind him.

“I hope that’s not your real belly,” he said.

“I am here in the person of Genson Ratanvi, food service manager,” Rafe said, in his Cascadian accent. He let one of his knives slip into his hand and turned his hand so Gary could see it. “But underneath…”

“You’re the same snaky kid you were before. I suppose that’s good.” Gary moved to the room’s easy chair and sat down. He opened his briefcase and pulled out an array of gear that Rafe recognized as scan detection and stealthing equipment. For a moment or two, Gary said nothing as he set this up and turned it on, Then: “So…what do you need?”

Rafe settled into the desk chair. “My parents and sister—my whole family—have disappeared. I can’t find my sister’s husband. She may be pregnant, or she may have a baby—I’ve been away for years; I’m not sure of the date she was due. The house is empty but not looted, and there’s a police guard out by the gate. The private house line has a trap on it. My father’s private number is supposedly out of service. There’s been no word publicly…I think they’ve been abducted; I don’t know by whom. Or for sure, where they are, I think I know where they were until the day before yesterday.”

“And what do you want from me?”

“I want to find them and rescue them, of course. Pilar says you’re the best on the planet. I want you to help me. I was going to do it myself, but if something went wrong—”

“You’re crazy,” Gary said. “No one person—no two people—can extricate hostages if the captors are at all competent. And from what you say, they’re professional quality.”

“I have to—”

“You have to use your head, Rafe. You asked my advice. Listen to it. You’re talking three, four hostages, right? Two seniors—”

“They’re not senile!”

“I didn’t say they were. But they’re not going to be as resilient, as physically capable, as younger people. And a young woman who may or may not be pregnant, may or may not have a child—”

“I don’t know—”

“And that’s a problem. And you also don’t know if any of them were injured in the original snatch, and you don’t know why law enforcement isn’t on this loud and clear. It’s serious gray, if not black, and you aren’t qualified to know what it’s going to take.”

“I—”

“Rafe. Sit down and listen. This is my specialty; if it were yours, I would know that. So it’s not. You know covert stuff, I’ll grant that; I have no doubt you’ve done things on the dark side. I have no doubt you’re brilliant with any kind of communications or surveillance gear. But you do not know what it takes to extricate hostages, and I do.”