"That I assure you won't happen," Kyrah said. "If they attempted to stop this, I'd post it privately."
"Well yes, you could," April admitted. "But privately posted claims are rarely given the confidence the news services get. People privately posted the story we were attacked with nuclear weapons by the US last year and they were dismissed as nut cases."
"So you are asserting that was true? Could you release documentation of that? No one has shown video or eye witnesses to really verify it."
"I'm an eye witness. I saw them on our boards launched from North America and then on radar come back around the curve of the Earth chasing us. Then they blew up far behind our track, well above the atmosphere. But I won't give you video, because it would show who intercepted them and I feel obligated to protect them from your government's wrath."
"Home didn't intercept them?" She asked, genuinely surprised.
"No. We might have succeeded in doing so. Even probably would have. We were starting to try, but we got a little help from a friend with an exotic weapons system we don't have, or know how to build. The world is a far more dangerous place, full of more secrets than your government wants to tell you. But that's all we have time for today Kyrah. Give me that card in your hand and perhaps we'll talk again."
* * *
"That seems to have dispelled the black cloud, that was hanging over your head all morning," Lin said, looking at her funny.
"Yes, working is good for you. I needed to get my mind off my brother for a little bit. It was cycling and cycling the same thoughts and not getting any resolution. I don't think there is any resolution. I can't stay locked in that mental rut forever, like a computer wasting most of its capacity in the background on an endless loop."
"You were suffering from a bit of survivor guilt?" Lin asked gently.
"Very much so. My brother and I had a breach just before I left. I withdrew from doing business with him. But when he died, I was informed he left everything to me in his will. I have to wonder if my words precipitated his crazy risk taking. I couldn't answer my Grandpa what should be done with our business holdings yesterday. I will text him and Eddie, to let them know what to do. I still don't want to have to talk to them about it out loud. I might start crying. We have two new ships that need to be expedited and when they have the courier service covered, my friend Heather needs the Happy Lewis to support a startup she has going."
"Did your leaving the business stress your brother, because you withdrew support he needed to keep the business going?"
"Not at all. I actually just walked away and handed the ownership to him, after he refused six million dollars USNA to buy him out the other way around. I left in place licensing he needed, at no charge for the time being. I'd have worked that out with him too, when I got back."
"Well, that hardly sounds mercenary," Lin scowled. She thought about it a bit before she said more. "I have some years of experience you don't," Lin pointed out. "Not to make too much of a big deal about it, but given what I have seen of human nature over those years, your brother did not suddenly change everything he was doing and rush to his death from one small confrontation with you. I'd say the events that led to his death were months, if not years in the making, even if you never know the details. There were other players and events in this story."
"Yes, you are probably right. At least one of the players was a man named Del, who worked for the yard that services our ships. I didn't like him and worried he was a bad influence on my brother. His boss told me he suppressed his dislike of the man, because he didn't have a solid enough reason to fire him. I very firmly resolve not to make that sort of mistake myself. If I have a gut feeling somebody has character faults, I'm not going to keep them."
"Oh my dear, you are so right. This is a thing my mother taught me, when I was still living at home. If you have a servant who makes you uneasy, you let them go. No apologies needed to them, or the other servants. You may give then a severance or some other help, to make the point you are not harsh, but you move them out completely and don't allow them back on the grounds to socialize, or visit working for a new employer."
"Do you think the interview will get air time?" April asked, when they went back out for their vehicle.
"I don't know," Lin admitted. "It's a little strange to see someone calmly spooning French Vanilla ice cream and telling how they could rain death on you. People know the software just tells you what a person believes. It doesn't tell you if they are correct in that belief. At least some of them will quickly conclude you are just delusional, because they don't want to believe."
‘I'll keep that in mind," April agreed.
* * *
When they got to gravel roads Lin pulled off the edge, flipped off all the warning sensors, walked around and said, "You drive." April strapped in, fired all the systems up and looked down the road both ways. She was as nervous as taking the Happy out the first time. She pulled out slowly and ran it up to the velocity the sign indicated was legal and rolled along. She gave the wheel a little pull right and left and made the truck veer a little inside the lane to get the feel. She looked in her mirror and nobody was behind, so she braked to a stop feeling how it reacted as she pushed harder and harder. They stopped with a little bit of a lurch, but Lin didn't complain. When they started again she gave it a lot more power and the tires spun on the road with a rubbing sound.
When she got to the cross road where Sam's store was, she stopped at the octagonal sign like you're supposed to and turned the wheel to go around the corner. However she found the truck still turning after she was done and ready to go straight. A little frantic wheel turning got them back on track, before they were too deep in the ditch to climb out. The military was gone. Their yellow tape was missing and the fence back in place and the plate across the ditch gone with nothing left to show anything had happened but some matted down grass and tracks. There were trucks again in Sam's lot, now that the military was gone. April just missed trying to join them, by a shortcut across the ditch. Even this big truck probably wouldn't have made it. The ditches here were made to carry major storm runoff and deep.
Chapter 30
Back at the house, Lin led her in a back way April had not seen. Ducking through a greenhouse full of exotic smells and strange shapes, that fascinated April. They ended up on the patio by the pool, without traipsing through the house proper. It was mid-afternoon and Papa-san was on a lounger, with what looked to be a lemonade and a paperback book. He was in shorts and a gauze thin shirt unbuttoned in the front and he looked happy to see them. What was markedly different, was there was a long black weapon lying on a towel beside his chair. The first she'd seen any such equipment in the household. It had a thick heavy barrel and a tiny bore opening. The stock was a dull black composite, with a rough surface to grip and a scope with an enormous front lens. He saw her looking at the rifle.
"We had another drone come hover and I took the liberty of dispatching it since you weren't here. Too bad, because I'd have liked to see the laser engage it."
"Does that mean the military is going to be tramping around on your land?"
"Oh, no. It wasn't military. It was local TV for the Disney Channel. They were even foolish enough to show a little of what it transmitted, before I wrecked it. So my lawyers will be yelling at their lawyers, until they offer a settlement for invasion of privacy. They'll have to, because they were clearly in the wrong by our law."
"We photographed it all and kept a few labels and equipment plates, then my man is taking it all down to an auto wrecker he knows and they will compact the whole thing into a cube about a half meter on a side and we'll send it back to them by freight. They cost about a million and a half for a high end civilian drone like that, so it won't make them too happy. I also had cook give Li a chicken out of the freezer, to put in the middle when they compact it. I thought that would give them a nice message in about four days."
"You are an evil and nasty man and will come to a bad end," Lin predicted.<
br />
April suspected it was a formula response, because he didn't even acknowledge it.
"Perhaps I shouldn't hang around too much longer," April told them. "I don't like the idea of making your household a target."
"What are you talking about? I haven't had this much fun in years. Do you have any idea how quiet things have been around here? The help is all excited about having someone that is totally clueless and they can run back and forth swapping gossip about you every day. They've extracted every nugget of new about us long ago. If you need to move on, go, but don't do it as a favor. We're tickled to have company again. You'll probably drag Adzusa off with you and we haven't had her here this long in years."
The sudden change on his face was like a cartoon light bulb went off above his head, as he got a new thought. "In fact," he said, "this is one of the nicest areas you could find in the islands. We researched extensively before buying. If you want to find a little place of your own, to have a vacation home, why don't you take a look around here? You'd make a swell neighbor and it may stay your hand, when you bomb the crap out of North America after the election and we'll come through sweet as can be on the island."
"I take it my CNN interview has been on already?"
"Oh yeah. The talking heads are all yelling at each other. One trying to say it's a bunch of bull and another to start digging a shelter right now. You know, Kyrah posted a veracity percentage for each distinct statement you made and not a one of them fell under 95 %. I predict when you are my age your certainty will drop off a little. But it is refreshing to see right now. And the fact that the experts sitting arguing over your statements both ways, won't allow their statements to be run through the meter is not unnoticed by the public. They have people flooding the mail and phones saying the experts should allow verification, or shut up and go home."
"Excuse me boss, one of Papa's young men came up. We have a UPS truck at the road, wants to deliver packages for Miss Lewis. Is that expected?"
"Yes she went shopping this morning with my wife. Have him off load on a push cart and do a sniffer, a portable x-ray and MNR standard level down there and unpack them for her if it looks OK."
"See what I mean?" April said freshly alarmed. "If you have to do such extraordinary security because I'm here, that's really not good." The idea of them being in danger because of her, just made her stomach twist in knots. She had become attached to all of these people quickly. Not just the family but their help also. How would she feel if they were hurt because someone wanted to get at her?
The young man looked at her funny. "Missy, excuse me, but we do that with everything. I even do the groceries like that when they come," he went off without expecting a reply.
"Ex-spooks got enemies?" she asked.
"Ya just never know," Papa-san admitted.
They sat silent for a little, April sorting that all out and she remembered Lin's invitation to use the pool. It looked mighty inviting right now in the heat of the day.
"Do you wash off before you use the pool just like a bath?" April asked Lin.
"Yes dear, that would be nice of you," she turned to her husband and started telling him about her morning. She stopped when he had a sudden stricken look that she couldn't place.
She looked where he was looking and April had stopped at the chrome shower head that stuck out of the building on the other side of the pool and dropped her clothing in a pile. She was soaping herself up unhurried, doing a very thorough job too. Lin turned back and her husband was biting his thumb back on the big knuckle trying very hard not to smile. He was losing the battle and knew he was in a no win situation with Lin.
"This is my fault," she said quietly, chagrined. "I knew she didn't have any other clothing and never suggested she needed a swim suit and she thinks of us as Japanese, so she knows we have a history of communal bathing. I didn't even add it up when she said none of her friends wear underwear. So I should have figured it out. Damn."
"Thank you," he said simply.
She smacked him over the head with the paperback he had laying there.
"It's nothing we didn't do on the beach with our friends years ago," she admitted. "But what about the help? It can be demeaning to your help to act like it doesn't matter if they see you nude, like their feelings and sensibilities don't matter."
"Actually, the help have been skinny dipping in the pool in the wee hours of the morning, without turning the lights on for a long time. Adzusa will join them if she's home. I just never told you."
"And you didn't join them yourself?"
"I'd never do that without coming and waking you up to join in. And you get cranky when you're woke up." he accused. "They might have been uncomfortable we caught them anyway."
"Oh what the hell," she said and walked around the pool, stripped and started soaping up herself. She was very pleased to see Papa-san was smiling and watching her as much as April.
"House get me a maid on the intercom," Papa-san said.
"Yes sir?"
"Would you please bring a light change of clothing from our guest's room and a change for Mother and put them with towels on the bench by the pool?"
"Certainly," she said unsurprised.
"Thank you, dear."
Chapter 31
"This is a quaint little starter home," the Realtor, Violet, said driving up the gravel access road. "Most of the homes in this area are on large lots and the builders almost always overbuilt, thinking if someone can afford the land they must want a lot of house too. But I understand many people want a smaller, simpler house, that doesn't require a staff. Lord knows I don't want all the headaches and expense of having help. A lot of these houses built back around the turn of the century have disappeared. People would buy two or three of them and consolidate the lots, or just buy one and build a big-foot house on the lot that just leaves enough room around it to maintain the building without any real grounds. And there just aren't many come on the market fee-simple. They're almost all leases."
April had learned a new language in the last few days. She had also been insulted and furious the woman wanted proof she had funds before she would show her homes. She had a hard time believing it wasn't ugly prejudice against her, as a young person and a foreigner. Vi had invited her to call any other Realtor on the islands and ask if it wasn't standard procedure to pre-qualify, but even after she verified it she let the woman know how tacky that seemed to her, standard behavior or no. Vi had been surprised when instead of producing a mortgage commitment letter she just displayed a bank account on her pad to the woman showing she had a bit less than thirty-six million Euro and a handful of other currencies.
She still had that much, because Eddie hadn't reclaimed the funds he'd advanced her to buy Bob out. Lin had come out with her to see a couple places, but Adzusa was with her this afternoon. Quaint worried her. That usually meant obsolete. But at least it wasn't a doll house, or handyman special. She shuddered at the memory of what those had been like.
The road ended in a large looped turn around, that meant the road was a dead end wide enough to park. April didn't mind that. In fact she liked it. Someone was maintaining a landscaped island in the middle of the loop, which April admired. It had that look of a private project instead of commercial landscaping. The road was on top of a ridge and ended where the shoulder of the ridge dropped off. So the view from the mail boxes was magnificent. The houses were all down from the road and hers was right off the end, with neighbors on both sides but the curve of the hill set them back so you had a full hundred and eighty degree view.
The property was terraced, with a garage roof just below the road level, with a very short drive that curved down to it. Below was a sort of artists workshop and below that the main house. Even further, but not visible, hidden by the house was a pool. She had seen it in the photos before they drove up but it was in too close to see behind the house. There were a lot of trees and a few nice palms. The house was sixty years old, but it seemed well maintained. The roof was metal
in dark strips with what looked like solar panels between the seams.
"How much is this place?" April asked again.
"It's offered at twelve, two-eighty USNA$," the lady said.
"Is there room to build another terrace below the pool?"
"She pulled a survey map out of her portfolio and looked at it. "You could get a flat of another eight or ten meters if you put a sloped retaining wall right out to the property edge, but what would you want down there, that much of a climb down and back up from the house?"
"I was thinking of a landing pad for an aircar," April told her.
That didn't produce any reaction. A well used Rutan or Daimler aircar cost about two million and flew on four ducted fans with counter rotating props. The older ones had eight engines and the new four, since they were now reliable enough. Old or new they cost a lot to operate. There were a few hundred on the island and probably no more than ten thousand in use in the whole country. If she bought one she'd have it converted to Singh power and do whatever was needed to make it quieter. She'd had a ride in one a couple days ago and it was quietly comfortable inside, but standing watching it come in to land April suspected she knew what a tornado sounded like now.
They made their way in without a bunch of chatter and found a great deal of the house was one huge room that actually hung over the end of the pool, which was larger than she expected from the pics. Adzusa and she unlocked a sliding door and leaned on the rail, looking down on the pool which someone was keeping clean. There weren't even any leaves or debris on the surrounding patio. There was a stiff breeze across the balcony she liked too.
"How long has this been empty?"
Vi checked her pad again. "The widowed lady who lived here died last year. It took awhile for the legal work to allow it on the market. It has actively been back for sale for three months."
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