Notes: Part 2 of 3.

"You checked the plate on the car?"

"It was rented. The driver paid cash and used a badly forged ID."

Lara paced back and forth, tapping an elegant finger against her chin. Hillary sat in a chair and alternately seethed and worried.

"Where were you?"

"Oh, a friend's wedding. I stayed over last night. Sorry, I forgot to tell you."

"Thank you, madam."

"Oh, stop that. The weather had me on edge. I was ready to bite your heads off, both of you. I thought I'd take a few days away."

Hillary sighed and turned back to the matter at hand. "Bryce seemed to know the man."

"But you don't?"

"No. If it's a disguise, it's a very good one. If it's someone I used to know who's changed over the years, he's changed a lot."

"We can't just sit here." Lara was obviously almost as agitated as Hillary. And obviously had just as little an idea where to start. Someone known to neither of them, with no apparent connection to either of them, and with nothing desired of either of them, had come along and taken Bryce as if he were a lucky coin found in the street. Lara walked outside and paced again around the spot where the car had parked, stooped to the ground. No matter how carefully she looked, not a chunk of dirt or drop of oil had fallen off of the car, let alone a more substantial clue. She walked back inside. Hillary was pacing in the hallway and trying, unsuccessfully, to think.

"Let's go," she said, curtly.

He stopped pacing. "Where?"

"Police station. There's a bobby who owes me a favor. Let's look through the list of wanted men - see if you recognize anybody."

"Lara," Hillary ground, "I don't think these are exactly the types to lift stereos from cars and grow marijuana in their bathtubs..."

Lara spun to face him and yelled, "Do you have any better ideas churning through your stupid thick head? Or do you want to pace for a few days and see if that brings him back?" She stormed out of the room like a small and elegant volcano. Hillary, tight-lipped, followed.

xxxxxx

He sat in a stiff wooden chair an hour later, looking through yet another page of photographs with eyes that were rapidly tiring of keeping focus. He had noted a few Possibles for the driver, but no definites, and nobody who looked anything like the elderly passenger. It irritated him to no end; some part of him just knew that this was not the right way to find Bryce. But the more he tried to think of another means of going about this, the more he had to admit that Lara was right - they had no other way. He glanced through the frosted glass door to where she stood outside with the officer who was letting him look through this book. She was being as charming as hell. It must be grating on her. He turned back to the book.

xxxxxx

In a dim white room that could have been next door and could have been hundreds of miles away, Bryce sat in front of a monitor and sweated. He tilted his chair back, sipping a glass of water and looking at the screen of code in front of him. He checked it for errors. He checked it again. He compiled part of it and checked it again. He wondered what he was going to do.

There is only so long one can stall, after all. He had to show measurable progress, or he and the two people closest to him were dead. He had not been told as such, but the implication was clear. And, he was sure, if he finished the project, they would kill him anyway. There was no way for him to help them and not know the clichéd Too Much. He nibbled on the only nail that was not already down to the quick. He was going to have to conserve this one, he thought clinically.

"How goes it?" asked a smooth voice behind him. The white-haired man stood up from the easy chair, walked across the small living area, past the two shuttered windows, and mounted the stairs to the alcove where Bryce sat in front of a lone flatpanel attached to three very expensive computers.

"Ducky, Uncle Tony," Bryce said. He could not keep the note of sullenness out of his voice.

Tony laughed humorlessly. "Come, now, Bryce," he said, "Keep your pecker up. You like a good challenge, I know - especially when it's in such a good cause." He walked back down to the living area, refilling his drink at the bar, and sat back down. He picked up a newspaper, but Bryce knew that the man's attention was on him. He turned his own attention back to the code. Doing something this original and complicated on a tight schedule was like trying to pee while someone was watching. It was hard.

He still had one card up his sleeve, though. He knew that his uncle wouldn't expect his sister's techie, gay, pacifistic son to have any kind of weapon, so he had not been searched. The gun Hillary had given him still sat in the pocket of his leather jacket. And so he continued to wear the heavy black thing, despite the discomfort of an autumn jacket in summery temperatures. Just as long, he thought as he wiped clammy sweat from his forehead, as I actually get a decent chance to use it where it will do some good. This was not Bryce's forte - running around like Lara, kicking people, shooting people, thinking on his feet. He wished desperately that she were there to pull him out of this - or that Hillary were there to give him sound advice. But neither were, and he had put himself into this to keep them safe.

The more he thought about it, the sillier that decision looked in retrospect. He could have done something; pulled out his weapon to tip the balance of the stalemate; pulled out some teargas from the munitions cabinet; stalled until Hillary thought of something better... even going down in flames would have been preferable to walking meekly into this like a sheep into a slaughterhouse.

But that man hand pointed a gun at Hillary, and he had folded like a cheap polyester suit.

Hell.