Tristan cocked his head to the side. One last chance. “I’m not sure this is the best business deal for me.”
Sergey bulldozed on, “We will have own coding consultant examine the algorithm when it arrives to make sure there are no deviations from algo out in wild. We want exactly as you have written and is currently circulating. It is thing of beauty you have created, Mr. Tristan King. It is truly work of art. We have great faith in your algorithm.”
Tristan said, “If you already have it, you don’t need me.”
“Ah, but we do not have all of it. You made lovely software that runs around in bits and pieces—bit doing this part, piece doing that—and that is how it evades detection. Our CS people are telling us that we are needing whole thing, all at once, compiled together for it to work. Bits and pieces are no use separately.”
Yeah, they understood it. “And what’s the timeframe for this transfer?”
“Why, as soon as possible, of course. We have great plans for your marvelous piece of engineering. You see how troublesome facial recognition can be. For example, woman sitting with you is not Ms. Joann Myers, but is,” he examined the paper delivered a few minutes before, “Ms. Colleen Frost of Southwestern State University in Arizona. We would like to be free of such intrusive surveillance as soon as possible, too.”
Ice misted over Tristan’s skin. Being threatened himself was inconvenient, but an innocent bystander in danger was untenable. “She’s nobody. She’s an easy lay I picked up in Phoenix.”
Sergey laughed. “Is she? Ms. Colleen Frost has much coding experience for just another woman in your stable, Mr. King. She has won national hackathon and coding competition. She even come in fourth place in Regeneron Science Talent Search in high school and is National Merit Scholar. I think it more likely you have employed her to do something we might be interested in.”
Well, shit. “You’re mistaken. I was just trying to get some ass.”
“If she is just another notch on belt, then you had better start employing her because we wouldn’t want her to be loose end that we would have to tie up.”
Jesus.
With that, Sergey popped a wide smile and slapped the desk to push himself up. “And now we have concluded business. Lawyers will finish paperwork, and we will all have good afternoon. We will go out tonight to celebrate our signing of contract, won’t we? Successful completion of business deal is always something to celebrate. I have good restaurant for us to go to. You like sushi, don’t you?”
Tristan maintained his enthusiastic grin. “I love sushi. I’m sorry my associate will not be able to join us. Unfortunately, she is deathly allergic to soy sauce. She swells up, has to inject herself with an epi-pen if she even gets near a bottle. And those epi-pen things don’t always work, you know. It would be better if she didn’t go.”
Sergey grinned wider. “Then we will go to Russian restaurant, and we will make sure that she gets no soy sauce, unless we think is necessary that she eats the soy sauce. But she must join us. I insist.”
Dammit-dammit-dammit.
“Sounds great,” Tristan said.
“Excellent! I will have Mikail drive you to Nobu Ryokan Malibu Hotel to get rest this afternoon before supper, since your assistant Jian Laio took car there while we were in meeting. We will also send car to pick you up to go to Russian restaurant tonight. But do not try to go anywhere else.” He wagged a finger at them like a metronome keeping time. “We would not want you to get lost. It seems you are hard man to track, Mr. King, but Ms. Colleen Frost is not. We could easily find her.”
12
Screaming Inside
Colleen
Colleen sat in the rear seat of the Russian’s car with Tristan King as they were driven back to Tristan’s hotel, staring out of the window and not moving an unnecessary muscle.
Because she was screaming inside.
Her head buzzed with panic. Her fingers kept crawling toward the handle of the car door, but the crazy Russian bratva guys had engaged the child locks. She couldn’t even jump out of the back seat and run away at one of the many crowded intersections in Los Angeles.
Even though the Russian chauffeur cruised the car smoothly through the crazy traffic and drove responsibly, the screaming part of her brain was insisting that they were on a roller coaster, the old wooden kind that was battering her like a flopping ragdoll and she needed to step off right now, right now, right now.
Beside her in the back seat, Tristan King sat with his long legs stretched because the car was a limousine, and there was room for him to stretch those ridiculously long legs of his. He looked unconcerned, smiling faintly at her while he observed the traffic and freeways flashing outside the car window and his long fingers drumming a slow waltz on his thigh.
Colleen hadn’t said a word.
Tristan hadn’t, either.
She wanted to shake him.
The car rolled to a smooth stop under the porte cochere of the hotel.
The guy driving the car, Mikail, had nodded to them as they’d entered the car but hadn’t tried to make conversation. He drove for an hour through the Los Angeles traffic, out onto the coastal highways, and then slowed to a stop at the Nobu Ryokan Malibu Hotel.
