Wired - Douglas E. Richards [70]
As usual, she made the most fantastic claims seem eminently plausible. “So why the false identities and Swiss bank accounts?”
“I started to get paranoid, so I began taking precautions.”
“Is paranoia another side effect of the enhanced intelligence?”
“No,” she replied solemnly. “It’s a side effect of getting robbed.”
Desh’s eyes narrowed. “Is this where the arch nemesis you wrote about in your E-mail comes in? Your Moriarty?”
“I like that,” said Kira, smiling. “Gives me hope that you aren’t still convinced that I’m Moriarty. If you had said, ‘Your arch nemesis, Sherlock Holmes,’ I’d really be depressed right now.”
Desh couldn’t help but return her smile.
“One of the things that popped out when I was studying you was how wonderfully well read you are,” said Kira earnestly.
“Moriarty isn’t exactly an obscure reference. The majority of ten-year-olds know who he is.”
She smiled and her eyes sparkled playfully. “That doesn’t make what I said any less true. Besides, I wouldn’t be too sure about that. I’m not convinced the majority of adults even know the name of our Speaker of the House.”
A slight smile played across Desh’s face. “So tell me about the robbery?”
Desh tensed as a fit man in this thirties with a serious look on his face approached the hostess station and began scanning the restaurant carefully, his eyes moving in an arc that would soon include their booth. “Duck!” whispered Desh as he slipped the gun out from under his sweatshirt and braced himself for action. Kira slid down in the booth as if she had dropped a coin on the floor.
Seconds later the man’s eyes stopped shifting as his gaze settled on a booth two over from where they were seated. An attractive woman who was seated with two preschool children waved at him happily. He raised his hand in acknowledgment, his face becoming relaxed, and he hurriedly joined his family.
Desh let out the breath he had been holding. “False alarm,” he whispered. “Sorry.”
Kira returned to a fully upright position. “Don’t be,” she said, shaking her head. “Better to err on the side of caution. Besides, I’m sure my pulse will return to normal in an hour or so,” she added with a grin.
“You were going to tell me about the robbery,” prompted Desh.
“Right,” said Kira. “I came home from work one night and my place had been broken into. I had a bottle with twenty-three gellcaps and my lab notebook stored in the false bottom of a dresser drawer. Both were missing.”
“You had a dresser with a false-bottomed drawer?”
“I thought putting valuables in a safe would be too obvious. I measured the drawer and had someone at a hardware store cut a platform to my exact specifications. I wallpapered it to match the bottoms of the other drawers and stacked some sweaters on top.”
Desh raised his eyebrows, impressed. “Did they take anything else?” he asked, chewing absently on the breadstick he had taken and continuing to watch the entrance.
“Nothing. They knew exactly what they were after.”
“Any ideas who it was?”
“Not when it happened, no. I was stunned. I had been careful not to leave a trail. I routinely disposed of the rodents I was using and I never let my lab notebook out of my sight. Until then, I wouldn’t have believed it possible that anyone could have known what I was doing. On a hunch, the next day I hired someone at an executive protection agency, like yours, to look for listening devices.” She frowned deeply. “He found several in both my office and home. That’s the day I truly began to get paranoid.”
“That would do it,” muttered Desh.
“It was a disaster. Whoever he was, having twenty-three doses of my therapy instantly made him the most formidable man on the planet. I began to take elaborate precautions, learned