The Zaanics Deceit (Cate Lyr #1)

by Nina Post

  “There’s no need to worry,” the woman said into her headset. “Well, if you don’t believe that I’m the best one to do this, then you can bring in someone better.”

  There was no one better, and both of them knew it. She had dedicated the rest of her life to making sure of that. But it was still a risk. She tucked her silver-blonde hair over an ear then lit a cigarette. A terrible habit, but one she indulged in now and then. Talking to the group’s gelnivoh, especially when he was worried, was one of those times. They didn’t speak that often, and it always unsettled her.

  “No, Hans is the Fleurier Forger,” she politely corrected in response to one of his inevitably numerous questions. In asking her this question, she understood the gelnivoh agreed she should stay in her current position and she relaxed slightly, relieved.

  “That’s what they call him.” Her eyes flicked around the street geometrically, missing little.

  “Hans is not in the thick of Hævli Hætrisi,” she replied. “He operates with considerable latitude in Val-de-Travers, Switzerland. He’s been trying for years to duplicate what they believe is the one true book. No, they don’t know which it is. My agents tell me he has duplicated each one many times.”

  He asked her another question and she paused to exhale a plume of smoke. He had a lot on his mind. “She is never out of our sight.” That much was true. “Our eyes are always on her. We would know. No, they haven’t decoded the poems. They haven’t even started.”

  She lied to him easily. She’d been nothing but lies to him, was a lie herself, but gave him enough truth, too, spun like filaments around the untruths.

  “The oldest sister, however, has visited a computer science company in Mountain View to attempt to get the first book translated using a mathematical model.”

  The gelnivoh demanded more. He called her rarely, and during those interactions, he wanted to know everything. In between, her agents — other members — sent him their reports. Over time, she had built up seniority.

  “A woman in Gochu Cherdaþi rescued the Severn patriarch from certain death. Yesterday. No, it was the middle Lyr sister and her husband, who is now deceased. Yes, I believe the woman from GC did, with the assistance of a second member. No, I don’t know who helped her.”

  She paused, tapped the ash, looked at the sky. It was overcast with a sheet of dark gray clouds and a layer of white at the horizon. She rather liked the woman, Capri, though she would never admit it. She was sympathetic to GC’s cause, though admitting that would mean certain death.

  The three sects had been warring for centuries, but since the youngest daughter left Istanbul and the oldest daughter put her plan in motion, the group redoubled their conflict. Even HH were coming out of their isolation, and there could be sub-groups she wasn’t even aware of. These things had the habit of splintering under dissension. A war was brewing, and Cate would be right in the center of it.

  “Yes, I absolutely will.” She disconnected and felt the tension leave her back, face, and shoulders.

  There were strong forces working against Cate, including the most radical and isolated sect of all. There were also forces working for her, but they were so often a step behind.

  She did everything she could, but her constant fear was that it wouldn’t be enough, that the parts of the machine grinding into motion would overwhelm her efforts.

  And then there was the family, who had threatened time and again to be even more dangerous than Dregutchoh Niijevec.

  Chapter 17

  Noah’s father was hooked up to machines. A thick white bandage covered his eyes, leaving only his mouth and the top of his head visible.

  When he was old enough to know that his father chose him over his older half-brother to learn the Yesuþoh, and old enough to know what that meant, Noah accepted the obligation without any fuss. As the years passed and he read the lists out loud with his father, he neglected his own priorities in favor of meeting his father’s high standard.

  “Didn’t I have enough credibility with you?” he asked his sleeping, heavily medicated father. “Was Jude really that much more trustworthy?”

  Noah sat down in the chair facing the door and put his head in his hands. “Crêpes Suzette,” he cursed softly. He hoped Cate showed up soon.

  “Excuse me,” he heard behind him. He didn’t recognize her at first, then felt stupid — it was his father’s housekeeper, Capri, a square-jawed woman with brown hair thick enough to pull horses or act as a maypole. Her light brown eyes shone with tears.

  “I’m so sorry.” Capri put her hand over his father’s hand. Noah wasn’t certain which one of them she was addressing.

  Cate came in, saw Capri, nodded in greeting, then went to stand next to Noah.

  “I was the one who found him, in the house,” Capri fussed with his father’s sheets.

  Time was moving thickly, with erratic clarity. Noah noticed the housekeeper’s delicate gold signet ring on her right ring finger, her attached earlobes, the shape of her eyebrows. He noticed Cate’s ballet flats, the glint of the hospital lights on her hair, her fine-boned wrist.

  “Was it an intruder?” Cate asked.

  Capri looked over her shoulder. “No. Romane and her husband Jason did this to Mr. Severn.”

  “Jason?” Cate said, squinting at Capri.

  “Are you sure?” Noah asked. Romane and Jason were the last people in the world he’d choose for a road trip companion, but to be capable of this? Romane had always seemed vicious, but her husband just struck him as a little strange.

  “I came back into the house because I had forgotten my phone, and found Mr. Severn in this condition.” Capri adjusted the sheets by his father’s shoulder. “Jason was holding the knife.” She took back her hand and paused a beat. “By the time the ambulance and police arrived, they were gone. I stayed to give the police my statement. I heard the police officers talking about how there was more than one blood trail but the tracks ended near the driveway.”

  “What happened between those two events?” Cate asked.

  Capri squinted. “I don’t understand.”

  “You saw Jason holding the knife, but then you skipped to the ambulance arriving. What happened in between?”

  “I was too late to stop it.” Capri took a deep, uneasy breath. “Jason dropped the knife and ran out a back door. Romane picked up the knife and came after me. I kicked her in the shin. Then we heard the sirens and she ran out, too.” She looked at Noah. “But I am glad you’re here. I heard him say your name, at the house. He was calling out for you.”

  Cate walked with Capri out of the room and closed the door most of the way behind her

  Noah pulled up a chair next to his father’s bed. Ten minutes passed in silence, then his father stirred.

  “Noah …” he heard and froze. Did he want his father to know he was there? It had been easy for his father to completely disconnect, to banish him without giving him the benefit of the doubt. That was five years ago, and though he wasn’t one to hold a grudge, his father hadn’t made any attempt to see or speak to him, so, no, he didn’t really feel like saying who he was.

  “Noah?” His father stirred, though the drugs were still trickling into his vein.

  Who could he be? His brother? Sure, if he could pull off being a smarmy jerk, he could be his brother.

  “It’s Jude.”

  “Jude?” His father sounded disappointed.

  Well, so was he.

  “Where is Noah?”

  “I haven’t seen him. How do you feel?”

  Gregory’s voice was dry and weak. “Sad. I’m sad.”

  Noah was surprised. Like most men of his generation, his father was ill-prepared to express himself.

  “Why?” Noah asked.

  “It fills me with sorrow that I listened to you,” his father rasped. “Blame myself. Never asked him.”

  “Don’t talk, you’ll overtax yourself,” Noah said, trying to sound like Jude. Smooth, masculine, with a core of contempt. But what did h
e mean — he never asked Jude, or never asked him? He blamed himself for listening to Jude, or to him?

  “So many regrets. Wasn’t the father I should have been.” He paused several seconds between each sentence he spoke. “I treated you,” the next few words were unintelligible, “… didn’t belong, and worked Noah too hard.” He turned his head slightly. “Where is Noah?”

  “He’s probably at the office. Don’t move your head.” Tears came to Noah’s eyes. He stared up at the ceiling and blinked. How could this have happened?

  “Can you bring Noah here?”

  “I haven’t been able to reach him.”

  “Oh.” His father’s voice was hollow. Noah felt a pang of guilt. He hated to be dishonest or to disappoint his father, but just couldn’t talk as himself.

  The nurse came in. “I need to increase his pain medication. He needs to sleep.”

  “Can I stay for a few more minutes?”

  The nurse hesitated, then gave a curt nod.

  Noah held his father’s hand, something he hadn’t done since he was a boy, and a very small one.

  Gaelen knew her employees were watching her and loved it when they scuttled out of her way. But she was enraged that she’d wasted all that time sending materials to the linguist. Billet made the gigantic mistake of presuming she was a pushover who could be kept on the line with feckless excuses — and that she was someone who would pay in exchange for nothing at all.

  “Ms. Lyr!” A pasty-skinned employee blocked her path in the narrow hallway. “Ms. Lyr, you wanted me to find another vendor for the music in the lobby? I have a few good options for you to look at when you have the time.”

  If she had tasked this person with finding a vendor, he must have some authority, but she didn’t remember him at all. Gaelen squinted, and though she didn’t show it, was pleased to see the employee agitated. Where were the smart people? This was San Francisco. Surely there must be at least a smattering, but none of them seemed to work at Lyr Logistics.

  “I don’t have the time,” she said in her quiet voice. “Do you know why? Because I am running a multi-billion-dollar family enterprise. If I give a task to someone, I expect them to complete it, not push it back to me.” She took a step away then halted and held up a finger. “You know what? I’ve changed my mind about the music. Replace whatever we have now with “No Motherland Without You,” by the KPA State Merited Choir, and loop it continuously. Got it?”

  “Uh … okay?”

  Gaelen smiled and the employee looked like he lost control of his bladder. If he had a modicum of intelligence and self-preservation, he would delegate the task to his most annoying co-worker or his top enemy in the company.

  “Great,” she said, and deftly stepped around him. She made it to her office without another unwanted interruption. Didn’t these people have any idea how much pressure she was under? The level of performance required to run a business like this?

  “Ms. Lyr!”

  Her assistant sprung out of his chair and practically leapt in front of her door before she got there.

  “What is it, Yuji?”

  “Gregory Severn is in the hospital.”

  “For what?” She sifted through the mail on his desk, then unlocked her door.

  “He’s been,” Yuji paused a moment and winced, “blinded.”

  She hung up her coat on the rack inside her office. “What?”

  Yuji sighed in confirmation.

  “Who’s blinded?”

  “Gregory Severn.”

  Gaelen pressed two fingers to her forehead. With strained patience, she said, “I meant, this is the United States of America. Who’s blinded except in the plays of ancient Greece?”

  Yuji shrugged helplessly. “They think it was your sister.”

  She laughed. “Cate did this?”

  Yuji wrinkled his forehead. “No — your other sister, and her husband, who are both missing.”

  Romane, you stupid, stupid bitch. You give someone a task …

  “I see. No pun intended.” Gaelen lifted her coat off the hook and locked her office door behind her. So much for that.

  “Who told you that Mr. Severn was in the hospital?”

  “Uh … Mr. Severn’s housekeeper,” Yuji told her.

  Gaelen thumbed her purse strap onto her shoulder. “Oh? Do you two talk often?”

  “She gave me a casserole recipe once. Maybe twice. But no, we don’t talk often.”

  “Did she call you?”

  “She called your office, yes.”

  “Why?”

  “To let us know what happened,” Yuji said.

  “We’re not his family,” Gaelen said, suspicious.

  “Maybe she couldn’t reach his family. Or perhaps there was a question about the insurance? I sent you the name of the hospital.”

  Gaelen strode toward the elevator and Yuji followed her down the hall. “Speaking of insurance,” he said, “you have a meeting in thirty minutes with the general counsel to discuss whether the existing D&O policy will be sufficient now that the management team has changed.”

  She stabbed the elevator button with a finger. “I’ll reschedule it.” At a ding, she entered then turned, facing out.

  “Oh, and HR wants your comments on the proposed revisions to the pension plan by Thursday!” Yuji nearly yelled as the doors closed.

  On the way down, Gaelen’s mind spun. Romane was far too impressionable, too easily led by her impulses. Romane had always idolized her, and of course she did: Gaelen knew she was the smartest, the most shrewd, the most gifted. She was born that way, but years of learning VZ, not to mention her personal sacrifice, annealed it.

  Romane should have to come to her first before doing anything to Severn. But Jason was the one in charge in that relationship. There was no doubt in her mind that Jason was the one who lost control. And that weak-willed sister of hers, perfectly-suited for the Milgram experiment, put her at risk — put everything at risk.

  Gaelen blasted out of the elevator into the parking garage, slid into her car, then roared out onto the street, causing a number of taxicabs to lay hard on their horns.

  The sharp, assertive heel clicks down the hall of the ICU told Cate that Gaelen was coming. Gaelen looked like a sexy wasp, if a wasp could manifest a kind of sublime hauteur. Even though Cate had never felt close to Gaelen, she couldn’t help but marvel at the spectacle as she leaned against the wall in her tennis shoes, jeans, striped tee, and parka. Gaelen’s black-cherry hair was pulled tight in her usual ponytail, and her lips and designer sheath dress were as dark red as the blood in the bags hooked to the passing carts.

  Her sister, who had drawn nearly every pair of eyes she passed, brought her slim legs to a stop in front of her.

  “Here to finish the job?” Cate said.

  Gaelen raised her chin and looked down at her. “What are you doing here, little enifitche?”

  “They needed a close match: a brain for Romane and a heart for you. I’m here to suggest they use a vanoh.” A vulture’s heart.

  Galen smirked. “Not bad. Where is my sister?”

  Cate smiled. Gaelen could have her. “Wherever she is, I’ll bet she’s wearing your clothes like a drag queen.”

  “What about Jude?”

  “Escorting, no doubt.”

  Gaelen’s nostrils flared. “Severn’s housekeeper? Where is she?”

  Cate shrugged, a micro-movement.

  Gaelen made an exasperated sigh and went into Severn’s room, where Noah looked up in surprise. She leaned over Gregory’s bed. “Is he asleep?”

  “Yes,” Noah answered.

  She slapped Gregory on the cheek. “Gregory!”

  Noah lunged forward. “Stop it!”

  Gaelen didn’t look at him, just held out a hand at the right time to thump against Noah’s chest. “Gregory! Wake up!”

  Gregory stirred. “Noah?”

  “Who did this to you?” Gaelen asked Gregory.

  “Who — ?” he mumbled.

 
“Who did this to you?” she repeated.

  But Gregory Severn didn’t wake. Gaelen whirled around to leave and Noah got in front of her. “Capri said it was Jason,” he said.

  Gaelen’s husband Philip, who was wearing a light gray suit and lavender tie, came to an abrupt stop in front of the room, soles squeaking on the waxed floor. He looked at everyone there, then stalked over to Gregory Severn’s bed.

  “My God.” Philip looked over his shoulder with a wide-eyed expression of horror. “How did this happen?”

  Gaelen’s phone rang again. She grimaced but picked it up. “Yes. Yes, it is. Mm-hm. Yes, I’ll be right there.” She rolled her eyes and put her phone back in her bag. “It’s like a global conspiracy to prevent me from getting any work done. Jason is dead. They weren’t able to reach Romane and I was next on the contact list. I have to drive to the morgue and identify the damn body.”

  “You will explain yourself first,” Philip demanded of Gaelen.

  Cate got comfortable in the chair by the door.

  Gaelen raised her sculpted brows. “Excuse me?”

  Philip pointed toward Gregory. “You knew about this … this … barbarism.”

  “Don’t be absurd,” Gaelen said. “How could I know?”

  “Your sister doesn’t wipe her ass without your say so!” Philip yelled, attracting the interest of passing staff. “That husband of hers brings out the worst in her, but she’s your myrmidon.”

  Gaelen got to within inches of her husband’s face.

  “Prepare evacuation procedures,” Cate muttered. “Sound the klaxon.”

  “Romane has a pathological inferiority complex,” Gaelen said. “Cate here is a total pushover — ”

  “Maybe if pizza is involved,” Cate said under her breath.

  “— but Romane is looking for authority wherever she can find it, whether that’s me, or that crazy asshole she’s married to, or a squirrel eating a nut on a tree. Whatever’s closest.”

  Noah leaned over. “I don’t think Gaelen and I know the same Cate.”

  “You can’t worry about what your former family thinks of you,” Cate said.