“I can arrange that. But I’ll need a new supply of the drug.”
“I’ll take care of it. This had better work, Twitchell. One more fuckup and I’ll be looking for a new fixer.” Dunstan’s jaw was as hard as the quartz the Aliens had used to build their Underworld. “Find out March’s price. If it’s just money, pay him off. But there will be no negotiation over the ownership of those shares. Understood? My brother thought he could destroy Kelbrook Industries and me by leaving a controlling interest in the company to that woman. That is not going to happen, not on my watch.”
“I understand, sir,” Leonard said.
“For now, we need Radstone alive and back in a locked ward. Do whatever you have to do to grab her. Tell your people to be sure to get the sedative into her before she can rez her talent. She’s dangerous. And for fuck’s sake, find a different place to stash her. We can’t send her back to Serenity Gardens. Those incompetents lost her after three months.”
“Yes, sir,” Leonard said. “Will that be all? If so, I’ll be on my way to Illusion Town.”
“Go. Do your job.”
Leonard headed for the door, eager to escape.
“One more thing,” Kelbrook said.
Leonard stopped and turned around. He knew what was coming. When it came to some things, Kelbrook was very easy to read.
“Yes, sir?”
“When you have the situation under control,” Kelbrook said, “make sure that March never gets to spend the ransom money. I want the bastard dead.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Beforehe has a chance to do any more damage.”
“Understood, sir.”
Kelbrook’s watch pinged. He glanced down and then went to a cabinet, opened the door, and took out a small leather case. Leonard knew there was a syringe inside.
“Go on, get moving,” Kelbrook snapped.
“Yes, sir.”
Leonard let himself out of the office and closed the door very quietly. The two personal assistants looked up from their computers, anxiety in their eyes.
Both women were sleek and beautiful, elegant and refined. Kelbrook liked to surround himself with attractive people. As far as Leonard could tell, Dunstan did not sleep with his staff, wisely preferring to avoid the dreary conflicts and emotional fallout that inevitably followed in the wake of such affairs.
But Kelbrook had been a womanizer all his life. In his younger, more reckless days, he had been drawn to dangerous sex clubs. These days he took his business to the discreet and expensive professionals who worked by referral only and catered to exotic tastes.
Advancing age had begun to slow down his extracurricular activities. That annoyed and frustrated him. Kelbrook now felt threatened by something that scared the ghost shit out of him. He would never admit it, but his talent had begun to fail. He had gone so far as to hire a personal doctor who claimed to be able to retune and stabilize fading talents and, in the process, extend the lifespan. Leonard was convinced the man was a quack, but desperate people—even a desperate con man—will pay anything for the promise of a cure.
Kelbrook was now on a regimen of supplements and off-label injections designed to stimulate and enhance his senses. Leonard doubted any of the crap would work, but you did not argue with Dunstan Kelbrook.
He rezzed up a reassuring smile for the personal assistants. The pairvisibly relaxed. Everyone in the household knew Dunstan Kelbrook was not in a good mood. That made those around him nervous.
Leonard kept going and let himself out into the hallway that would take him to the front door. He had a long drive ahead. The trip to Illusion Town would give him time to do what he did best: come up with a strategy for making Kelbrook’s latest problem go away.
He crossed the amber-and-gold foyer. The butler opened the door for him. The man had worked for the Kelbrooks almost as long as Leonard had, and he was almost as good at reading the boss’s mood. A reassuring smile would not work on him.
“It will be all right, Barns,” Leonard said quietly. “The situation is under control.”
“I hope you’re right,” Barns muttered.
Leonard went out onto the colonnaded portico and down the front steps. He was halfway to his car, a gleaming new Resonator fully equipped with the latest tech, when he saw Charlotte Kelbrook.
Dunstan’s second wife had been a spectacular beauty when she had married into the family twenty-five years ago. She was still a striking woman and always would be. She had given Kelbrook two handsome, smart, talented sons, both recently out of college. The eldest was being groomed to take control of the family empire. The younger one was focused on a career in politics.
The option of trying to force one of his heirs to marry a woman with Alice Radstone’s unnerving abilities had been briefly considered a year ago after Hampton’s will had been opened. Dunstan had immediately dismissed the idea on the grounds that under no circumstances would he allow Alice’s psychic talent into the family gene pool. She had to be neutralized so that the shares were once again in his hands, but she could not be allowed to reproduce. Both sons, however, had to marry wellandreproduce. They were expected to enhance and enlarge the Kelbrook dynasty.
