Micro - Michael Crichton [33]
Drake concluded his presentation on the screens, and the lights went up in the meeting room. “Some of you have brought things to show us,” Drake said, “and we are very eager to see them. Now if—yes, what is it?”
Alyson Bender had come back into the room. She leaned close to Drake, whispered in his ear. Drake stared at Peter as he listened, then looked away. He nodded twice, but said nothing. Finally he turned back to Peter.
“Peter, you have a recording?”
“A CD, yes.”
“What is on that recording, Peter?” Drake didn’t seem upset at all.
“Something that will interest you.” Peter’s heart was pounding.
“Related to your brother?”
“Yes.”
Drake seemed unruffled. “I know this is a difficult matter for you,” he said, placing his hand on Peter’s shoulder. Gently, he added, “Wouldn’t it be easier to talk privately?”
Drake wanted to get him off alone, where nobody could hear what was said. Peter balked. “We can talk here,” he answered. In the conference room with everybody else.
Drake looked concerned. “If I might have a private word with you Peter—Eric was a friend of mine, too. I’ve suffered a loss myself. Let’s step into the next room.”
Peter shrugged and got up, and walked with Vin Drake and Alyson Bender into a smaller adjacent room—it was a prep booth for the conference room. Drake closed the door behind them and with a smooth gesture flipped the door’s lock. Then he spun around, and in the blink of an eye his face had been transformed: it was contorted with rage. He viciously clamped his hand around Peter’s throat and slammed him against the wall. With his other hand, he took Peter’s arm and bent it, holding it in a lock. “I don’t know what your game is, you little bastard—”
“No game—”
“The police aren’t looking for a phone on the boat—”
“No?”
“No, you little bastard. Because they haven’t been to the boat yard all day.”
Peter’s mind was racing. “The police didn’t need to go to the boat yard,” he said, “because they can find the phone just by looking at the GPS tracking signal—”
“No they can’t!” Drake let go of his arm and punched him in the stomach, hard. Peter gasped and doubled over, and Drake grabbed his arm and bent it behind him, and got Peter in a neck lock, immobilizing him. “Don’t lie to me. They can’t, because I disabled the GPS before I ever put that phone on the boat.”
Alyson said nervously, “Vin…”
“Shut up.”
“So,” Peter said, “you disabled the GPS and rigged up the phone to clog my brother’s gas line?”
“No. To kill the fuel pump, you little asshole…I killed the radio, too…”
Alyson: “Vin, listen…”
“Alyson, keep out of this—”
“Why’d you do it?” Peter said, coughing, pulling at Drake’s fingers. Drake’s grip was strong on his throat. “Why?”
“Your brother was a fool. You know what he wanted? He wanted to sell this technology. Turns out there’s some legal issue about ownership, who really owned it. So Eric thought we should sell. Can you imagine: sell this technology. Eric betrayed Nanigen. He betrayed me personally.”
“Vin, for God’s sake—”
“Shut up—”
“Your mike!” Alyson pointed to the lavalier microphone on Drake’s lapel. “It’s on.”
“Ah, shit,” Vin Drake hissed. He punched Peter brutally hard in the solar plexus, and let him crumple to the floor on his knees, gasping. Very deliberately, Drake pulled back his jacket, revealing the transmitter clipped to his belt. He tapped a switch: the light was off. “I’m not stupid.”
Peter knelt on the floor and retched and coughed, unable to get a breath. He realized that the small clip microphone had come out of his pocket, and dangled on its cord. Drake might see it. Groping around, he tried to stuff it back in his pocket, and his hand hit the transmitter. He heard a loud popping noise coming over the loudspeakers in the conference room.
Drake looked toward the conference room. He had heard