SUSSEX COUNTY, NJ

NOVEMBER 14

As soon as Luca stepped into the room, the usually listless Sinclair-2 rose from his seat and came toward him. He looked like he'd slept in his clothes; his face flushed as he started shouting.

"It was you, wasn't it! You killed those sims! You monster! Youmonster !"

"Calm down, Ellis," Abel Voss said, putting an arm around the man's shoulders. "You can't go makin wild accusations like that."

"I can!" Sinclair-2 cried. "I know this man's methods. And if he didn't do it himself, he sent one of his hired thugs!"

No, Luca thought. I did it myself. A one-man op. That's what you have to do sometimes if you want to be sure a job gets done right.

It had taken Luca about a week after the Saw Mill River Parkway debacle to put all the pieces in place. Two nights ago he'd made his move.

But the op developed an early hitch: a tail. If he hadn't been looking for one, he never would have spotted it. But he'd been prepared.

He'd driven into midtown Manhattan and valet-parked his car at the New York Hilton, then zipped through the lobby and out a side exit where he hailed a cab that took him to a second car that had been left for him in a lot near the theater district. He'd driven out of town immediately, directly to Westchester where he'd parked a good mile from the Beacon Ridge Country Club. He'd walked the rest of the way, ducking into the shadows whenever a car approached. When he reached the club, he'd huddled in the hedges until the sims were all in their barrack and the last human had left.

Or so he'd thought. That was when he'd almost got caught. He'd been about to step out of the bushes when he spotted two dark figures gliding between the shadows near the barrack. As he'd watched, they separated, one swiftly climbing a tree, the other disappearing into the bushes.

Someone had the sim quarters under guard. Sullivan? Cadman? No matter. That hadn't been Luca's destination. He was headed for the sprawling structure on the crest of the hill, the club's main building.

Soon he'd reached his destination: the kitchen. Once he'd located the cooking pot labeledSIMS he removed a vial of clear odorless liquid from his breast pocket. A brand new compound sent down through Lister from SIRG; so new it didn't have a name yet, only a number: J7683452.

He'd emptied the vial into the big pot and begun swirling the liquid around, coating the sides and bottom. When it dried, it was invisible. The only thing that could have gone wrong was somebody washing out the pot. But it had been hung up clean, so that was unlikely.

Amazing stuff, J7683452. He could have stuck his head into that pot, licked its insides clean, and he'd be fine. Perfectly harmless in that state. But heat it to a hundred-and-sixty degrees or more and...

Bon appetit.

As for here and now, he didn't owe the Sinclair brothers an explanation. And they didn't deserve one.

"Admit it, Portero! You murdered those nineteen sims!"

"Murdered?" he said with a calculatedly derisive snort - few things gave him more pleasure than getting under these twits' skins. "They're animals. They can be killed, they can be slaughtered, they can be sacrificed to the gods, but they can't be murdered."

With a hoarse roar Sinclair-2 launched himself at Luca, only to be hauled back by the heavier, stronger Voss.

"You don't want to be doin that, son," Voss said. "Trust me, you don't."

"Ellis, for God's sake control yourself!" Sinclair-1 said.

"Listen to them," Luca said softly.

He hadn't moved a muscle. He'd take no pleasure in hurting Sinclair-2 - it would be like fighting a woman - but he could not allow another man to lay a hand on him.

Sinclair-2 struggled a moment, then pulled free and returned to his usual spot on the sofa where he dropped his face into his hands.

What gives with that guy? Luca wondered. How can he be such a wimp?

"Did you?" Sinclair-1 said, staring at him. "Were you responsible for poisoning those sims?"

"Does it matter?" Luca said.

No one answered.

Just as I thought. They don'twant to know.

"Just tell me one thing," Voss said. "And think very carefully on your answer: Will the perpetrator or perpetrators ever be found?"

"My guess?" Luca shook his head. "Never. But whoever they were, they did us a favor. The Beacon Ridge club has surrendered. They're giving the sims what they want."

"Since when?" Voss said. "I ain't heard nothin about this."

"That's because they haven't made the announcement yet."

"If that's true," the attorney said, his eyes widening, "it takes the matter out of the court's hands."

"No precedent," Sinclair-1 whispered.

Luca watched cautious optimism grow in their eyes. He'd be sharing in that good feeling if not for a call he'd received this morning. Nothing more than a hoax, he hoped - prayed. Or maybe a wild fantasy cooked up by some drugged-out waste of protoplasm. He'd fed it to Lister who'd pass it up the SIRG ladder, but he'd keep it from the Sinclairs for now. He suspected a leak somewhere, and if he was right, the less said here, the better.

But he dearly wished he could lay it on these two. The mere mention now of what the woman on the phone had told him would snuff out the relief warming Sinclair-1 and Voss as if it had never been.

Because if this woman had been telling the truth about a sim named Meerm, it made the threat they'd just overcome seem like a pebble in a mountain gorge.