Chapter 17: Eleven Recordings

We drove to the coast house with the flash drive in my bra and the radio turned off.

Nobody had followed us from the gala.

Jasper checked the mirrors anyway, every half mile, until the Carmel gate closed behind us.

Inside, he set a laptop on the kitchen table and a second one beside it.

"Two machines," I said.

"One to open it. One to keep it from phoning home."

He plugged in the drive.

It held eleven audio files, each named with a date and a three-letter code.

"Start with the oldest," I said.

He clicked.

A phone rang twice, and a woman's smooth voice answered. "Corvin Trading."

"It's me," said Preston.

I put my hand on the table to steady it.

His voice was calm and four years younger.

"The Halcyon stones are in the Long Beach warehouse," the woman said. "The shell takes title on Friday."

"Whose name is on the transfer?"

"Yours. As the buyer's agent."

"Move it," Preston said. "I don't want my name near it. Find me someone who signs without reading."

"A designer?"

"Yes. My wife."

The woman laughed.

"You'd put her name on a mine collapse?"

"She won't know what it is," said Preston. "She'll think it's insurance. If it ever surfaces, the paper trail ends with a woman who doesn't exist."

Jasper clicked the file closed with a hand that was not quite steady.

I sat very straight.

"Next," I said.

The second call was a year old.

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