didn’t matter. Where exactly did she get this?” She picked up a black velvet bag and undid the drawstring. Inside rested a silver jar the size of a bowling pin, a symbol of Horus carved on the lid.
Heinrich Carson shot to his feet. “You said it was safe in the vault. Not to be removed. Do you have any idea what danger this represents? What the Re-Animus will do to get it back?” He seized it, the iron set of his jaw daring her to take it back.
She waved her hand. “Security, restrain Mr. Carson.”
The door burst open, but Heinrich Carson was waiting, expecting the guards. The first one flew past the camera, crashing into the wall beside the director. Another screamed and fell, never entering my field of view. The last slammed into the window so hard the camera flashed with static.
“Stay here, son. I’ll be back once this is secured.” Heinrich Carson strode out of the room, the jar under his arm.
After a moment, Maggie Bismuth stood and set her chair back up. She scooted toward Brynner, reaching out to cup his chin so he’d look at her. “Young man, what happened to your mother?”
He whispered, the subtitle reading “She didn’t see them coming for her.” He dissolved into tears. His hands over his ears.
Maggie Bismuth stood and looked toward the camera. “We’re done. Find Carson and recover the jar if you can without being killed. Someone get in here and clean up this mess.”
I paused the video, my gaze locked on the boy. There weren’t words for the pain I felt for him. I wanted, more than anything, to call him, hug him. Wished that someone had done that for him. I’d never look at the director the same way again.
I wiped tears from my eyes, then reversed the video frame by frame, reading the glyphs off the jar. One by one, I pieced them together until it made a name I recognized and a phrase that brought more questions than answers: Ra-Ame, daughter of the pharaoh. Her heart, for eternal death.
The hospital phone rang, startling me so badly I threw the laptop off my bed. It landed in a crash of sparks, the screen broken. I picked up the phone, my hands shaking. “Hello?”
“Grace.” Brynner’s voice slurred like he’d just woken from a deep slumber. “I’m sorry to wake you, but I screwed up. Do you have your laptop?”
A bolt of fear lit me up from head to toe. It lay just out of reach beside my bed. “I—I had it on my bed. It was right here.”
He cursed. “Someone probably stole it while you were sleeping. It’s my fault for leaving myself logged in.”
“Let’s not jump to conclusions. What makes you think it’s stolen?” I struggled to keep my tone normal as I asked.
“BSI network security reported an intrusion a half hour ago. Someone tripped a file marker on a high-clearance server.”
“I don’t understand.”
“All the secure files have a few in them that trip alarms when opened. Anyone with access knows better than to load them. I left your laptop connected as me. I’m so sorry. They’re going to do a remote shutdown and just catalogue everything that got pulled. We’ll get you a new one, but any pictures or documents you had on it are toast.”
My hands shook now even harder. My voice caught in my throat. “I didn’t have anything personal there.”
“Go back to sleep. I’ll report the theft. God knows they expect this kind of crap from me. Night, Grace.” He hung up, leaving me asking myself why I’d lied a third time to him in one day.
I got out of bed and picked up the remains of my computer, which, despite the crack in the screen, still somewhat worked. I held down the power until it clicked off, then dumped it in the waste container outside the door.
As I lay back in my bed, the adrenaline drained from me, making it near impossible to keep my eyes open. Then my phone chirped. A new e-mail message, high priority.
I unlocked the phone and read the mail. I read it again, to be sure. It came from Director Bismuth, sent just seconds ago. The body contained a list of files, dates and times, along with my laptop name.
The last line sent chills through me.
“We need to talk.”
Twenty
BRYNNER
I slept in until one and ate a dozen-egg omelet when I got up, compliments of the best chef in the world, my aunt. She granted me