That left cameras still in both offices. Damn. Well, he would just have to work around them.
Then he realized he could also use them.
Irah hauled the ladder away. Cole followed her. After returning the ladder to the custodian’s closet, she settled in her office and as he hoped, switched on her spy monitor.
The Lamper channel showed him talking to Mrs. Gao.
Irah switched to the Flaxx channel. He scowled across his desk at Maldonado. “My wife’s already told me that. I had a rough night. Make my coffee strong today.”
Now would be a perfect time for a materialization that made use of Irah’s spying. He needed an energy charge first, though, and before he could zip to his intersection of choice, Irah was already switching channels to watch Lamper. How often did she switch back and forth?
A short wait told him that she focused most on Lamper, which was to be expected, though she periodically checked Flaxx. He could work with that, he decided, and zipped to the Embarcadero.
From the Embarcadero he came back to Irah’s office, where he waited until she switched channels to Flaxx. Flaxx sat with his chin propped on one hand as he looked down at a brochure spread open on his desk. A bobble suggested the hand was supporting his head.
Quickly, Cole ran through Irah’s office wall and the washroom and over to the door of Flaxx’s office. He materialized as Irah. “Donald.”
Flaxx looked up, scowling. “Try knocking before you come in.”
Last night had really dented the urbane facade. “Are you this grumpy just over that camera?” Cole sat down across the desk from him, hoping Irah was still watching. “I told you I put it in to help you.”
“Without bothering to ask first.” Flaxx’s mouth tightened. “But then, you’re not bothering to ask about much of anything lately, are you? I think that gives me the right to be grumpy, as you put it. You may be my sister but…” He sat forward and stabbed a finger down on his desk. “…I own this company and you’re an employee. If you can’t remember that, I’ll fire your ass out of here just as fast as I would anyone else! Now what do you want.”
Please let Irah be catching this. “To ask if you know Earl plays chess.”
Flaxx grunted. “Of course I know Earl plays chess. Every time he won a trophy he’d come around waving the thing like a dog showing off a new toy. So what?”
Cole tented his fingers. “So…chess uses strategy and mind games.” He paused, hoping to provoke a response that would let Irah follow the conversation.
“What of it?”
Not a helpful response. “Chess strategy doesn’t necessarily focus on the next move. It may be more concerned with the next five or six moves. So the current move may not make sense. It may even involved a sacrifice. But it sets you up for a checkmate. I’m thinking it’s occurred to good old Earl that between you thinking he’s indispensable and what he’s learned about events in the past week, he’s in a position to better his position here…maybe demand to be made a partner.”
Flaxx stared at him in exasperation for several moments, then reached for his phone. “Earl, will you please come to my office right away for a meeting with Irah and me?”
Shit. Cole’s mind raced. He did not want Irah seeing both men talking to someone invisible to her. He needed out of this. He widened his eyes and stared past Flaxx out the window.
As he hoped, Flaxx swivelled his chair to see what was outside the window.
Cole let go of everything except Irah’s voice. “I need to run to my office.” And he still had energy to spare.
Flaxx turned. “Irah, don’t- ” His blink of disbelief turned to a sigh of exasperation. He started to stand but sat back down when the door opened and Lamper came in. “Earl.” He produced a mechanical smile. “Have a seat.”
Lamper sat on the edge of the chair, peering anxiously at him. “What’s up?”
From the doorway, Irah said, “That’s what I’d like to know.”
Good, she came. Cole relaxed, and felt even better seeing the calculation in her eyes as she looked Flaxx over. After she sat down, he stood to the side where he could watch all three faces, keeping motionless to hang on to the spare energy.
Flaxx leaned against the desk in front of them. He sighed…a sound carrying weariness and sadness. A sigh intended to portray him as a burdened man? “Earl, Irah…we have a problem. Ever since the washroom incident yesterday each of you have been coming to me with suspicions and accusations of the other. But…” He paused as though searching for words. “…that’s counter-productive. We have nothing to gain and everything to lose by turning on each other. So let’s bring everything in the open and clear the air so we can get back to business.”
Ah. Cole’s lip curled. This was a pep rally.
Lamper seemed to agree with the idea. He nodded at every sentence. Irah crossed her legs, folded her hands together in her lap, and eyed the others appraisingly.
Flaxx started to cross his arms over his chest, then must have decided that made his body language wrong. Instead, he slid his hands into his jacket pockets, thumbs hooked outside. “And the first problem we need to resolve is your belief, Irah, that Earl was outside the washroom.”
“I swear I wasn’t,” Lamper said.
Flaxx nodded. “I believe you. If for no other reason than whoever it was had knowledge of…certain events that you don’t.”
“How do you know he doesn’t?” Irah said. “And who else could it have been?”
“Well…” Now Flaxx folded his arms. “There’s you.”
Cole smiled. So last night’s visit had planted at least one seed.
Irah arched her brows. “Really.”
Lamper straightened, looking thoughtful. Remembering that coming up in
“You’re familiar with the event mentioned and you’re a great mimic,” Flaxx said.
“But with no reason to pull such a stunt.” She remained unruffled.
Still, Flaxx smirked as though he had scored points on her. “Earl doesn’t have one either. So…I don’t want any more men’s room confrontations or accusing phone calls to him at home.”
The beginnings of a grateful gleam in Lamper’s eyes turned to bafflement. “Phone calls? She hasn’t called me at home.”
The smirk vanished. Flaxx frowned. “What the hell? When you showed up on my doorstep last night you said- ”
Lamper gaped at him. “What are you talking about?”
Now it was Flaxx’s turn to stare, his expression equal parts astonishment, disbelief, and anger. “You mean you deny coming to my house last night?”
If Lamper had been a dog, Cole reflected, he would have been cringing, ears and head down, tail tucked tight between his legs. “Donald…I–I was home all evening. I never left.”
Irah peered at him, then at Flaxx. Cole wished he could read minds, because while her face went deadpan, a gleam in her eyes said her brain had gone into overdrive.
“Ask Irah if I wasn’t sitting at the computer when she sneaked into my house.”
While Irah’s brain cooked on all cylinders, Cole gleefully watched Flaxx’s trip and fall flat. Gears screamed almost audibly as he floundered through shifting. The Mister Rogers theme parodied itself in Cole’s head.
Flaxx almost sputtered. “Irah, you- ”
“I wasn’t going to say anything,” Lamper said, “but you said get everything in the open… and I want back the rook she stole off my trophy.”
Irah arched her brows. “What makes you think I was there?”
Lamper’s mouth thinned. “Besides the fact that you came back later and admitted you had the rook? I recognized your voice through my computer room door. ‘Don’t have a cow, Earl,’ you said. ‘I’m just making a social call.’” He looked up at Flaxx. “But when I opened the door, she’d gone. Just like you and your washroom, Donald.”
Flaxx frowned thoughtfully at Irah.
She was eyeing Lamper and her baby blues had turned to ice. She opened her mouth to say
