right off the top of my head where the entire thing could go off the rails. But it's doable. It really is. And it's so damned Byzantine and filled with double-think and possible failure points that it would never have occurred to a professional like Usher-or me, for that matter. I think I can pull it all together for you, but putting all the pieces in place is going to take even longer than I'd thought. I don't like having that long for something to go wrong in.'
'Not a problem,' Giancola disagreed, waving one hand in a dismissive gesture. 'As soon as you've dealt with the lawyer's instructions, Yves can go ahead and suffer that accident. It will have to be a very accidental accident, you understand?'
'That I can handle,' Nesbitt said confidently.
'Then as soon as that's out of the way, you can move on to putting all of the other bits and pieces together. Once everything's been neatly tied to Yves, we can 'discover' the evidence anytime we want to. For that matter, we might even decide the thing to do is to steer Usher and his FIA to the evidence. Let Kevin turn it up. In fact, if I weren't afraid we'd be getting too fancy, I'd almost prefer for him to find Yves' evidence falsely implicating me and accept it initially, until State's own security types detected the fact that it was a forgery. Having him suspect me, or even formally accuse me, when I turn out to be totally innocent, would help me tilt the balance in the Cabinet against LePic.'
He gazed thoughtfully at the ceiling for several heartbeats, then shook his head regretfully.
'No. We've got enough balls in the air without adding that one to it.'
'You have no idea how glad I, as the wizard charged with conjuring all these minor miracles for you, am to hear you say that,' Nesbitt said dryly.
'I'm always pleased when I'm able to make my associates happy,' Giancola assured him. Then the Secretary of State's eyes narrowed once more. 'But now that you're a happy wizard, do you really believe you can pull all of this off?'
'Yes. I'm not absolutely positive of it-not with it all coming at me cold, this way. But as I said, I think it's doable. I'm going to have to sit down and look at it very carefully, probably for several days, at least, before I can tell you more than that. At an absolute minimum, though, I'm certain I can disappear Grosclaude's evidence if it turns out we have to do that, instead. And I feel reasonably confident I can arrange the database hack you want and make it crystal-clear he was behind it. As for the rest, I'm going to have to see how it all comes together before I can tell you positively one way or the other.'
'Take your time-within reason, of course.' Giancola grimaced. 'One thing I think we can count on is that this war isn't going to end tomorrow, or even next week. We've got time to do it right... and we'd damned well better not do it wrong.'
Chapter Six
'That was delicious, Jackson,' Honor sighed appreciatively as Jackson McGwire, White Haven's butler, oversaw the removal of the dessert dishes. Or, more precisely, of the dessert dish, singular, since the only one on the table was the one in front of Honor. 'Please tell Tabitha that she outdid herself on the chocolate mousse.'
'I'll be happy to, Your Grace,' McGwire said, with a small half-bow and a twinkle. Honor's genetically modified metabolism's need for calories was phenomenal, and Tabitha Dupuy, White Haven's cook, and her staff had taken it as a personal challenge. So far, they had yet to repeat themselves with a single dessert offering, despite the recent frequency of her visits to the Alexander family's seat, and Honor and her hosts had a small betting pool going on how long they could keep it up.
Honor started to say something else, then paused as Nimitz sat up straighter in his treecat-sized highchair. He and Samantha, his mate, sat between their adopted humans, and now the male 'cat raised both true-hands to the top of his head, palms turned inward, raised first and second fingers on both hands signing the letter 'U' and wiggling backward. From there, the right true-hand slid down, the palm facing his body, fingers extended and facing left, and moved from left to right. Then his true-hands crooked in the sign for the letter 'C', with the tip of its thumb resting on the upturned first finger of his other true-hand before both true-hands came together in front of him, index fingers extended and held together, and moved across his body, fingers separating and coming back together again as they traveled. And, finally, the second finger of his right true-hand touched his lips before the hand moved down and out a bit, while his thumb rubbed over the same finger.
'Of course, Nimitz,' McGwire said with a smile. 'I'll inform Ms. Dupuy personally.'
'Please do,' Honor reinforced, reaching out to rub the treecat's ears affectionately. 'While I'm not a connoisseur of rabbit and celery stew, Stinker here certainly is. If he says it's delicious, Tabitha could probably get rich operating a treecat restaurant chain!'
'I'll certainly tell her that, too, Your Grace,' McGwire assured her.
'I think that's probably all we'll need, Jackson,' Hamish Alexander, Thirteenth Earl of White Haven, said from his place at the head of the table. 'If we do discover we need anything-or if Her Grace should discover she has a hollow ankle somewhere that still needs filling-we'll buzz.'
'Of course, Milord,' McGwire replied with a smile, and followed the footman with the tray of dishes out of the dining room.
The dining room in question was one of the smaller ones White Haven boasted. The formal dining room was big enough for the massive parties a Manticoran aristocrat-even one with as little time for 'social fripperies' as Hamish Alexander-was expected to host from time to time. Since he, Emily, and Honor were the only humans at the table, that cavernous chamber had not been called upon. Instead, Emily had directed that supper be served in the far tinier dining room off her personal suite. It was an intimate little room, built into the side of one of White Haven's older wings, with floor-to-ceiling windows which looked out over the landscaped east lawn, lovely under the light of Roc, Manticore's single moon. The red ember of Phoenix, otherwise known as Manticore-A II, rested on the horizon, just above the tips of the Old Earth spruces fringing the lawn, and the gleaming gems of at least a dozen orbital platforms moved visibly against the stars. Emily and Hamish often dined there, because of its proximity to her rooms, but it was rare for them to invite anyone else to join them.
The door closed behind McGwire and the footman, and silence fell for a moment. Despite everything, Honor still felt a bit awkward, and she tasted a slight, answering spike of awkwardness from Hamish. The earl took a sip from his wine glass, and his wife smiled slightly. Emily was genuinely and affectionately amused, Honor knew, and that was important to her.
'Well,' Hamish said after a moment, setting his glass down precisely, 'I'd say Samantha was probably as happy to see Nimitz as Emily and I were to see you, Honor.'
It was his turn to reach out and caress the ears of the small, dappled treecat sitting beside him. Nimitz's mate pressed back against his fingertips, and the loud buzz of her purr made the use of any signs totally unnecessary. Emily and Honor chuckled, and Nimitz bleeked a laugh of his own before he jumped lightly from his own highchair to join Samantha in hers. The two 'cats draped their prehensile tails about one another, and Nimitz's happy, bone-deep purr mingled with Samantha's.
'I think that's probably a safe statement, dear,' Emily observed dryly.
'Actually,' Honor said more seriously, 'it's really hard on them to be separated.' She shook her head. 'I've come to suspect that one reason they're the only mated pair that ever both adopted humans is the separation factor. Treecats are literally almost a part of one another, especially mated pairs, and it's almost... physically painful for them to be apart from one another as much as these two have been since Samantha adopted Hamish.'
'I know,' Hamish sighed, looking at Honor, and she tasted the multiple layers of meaning in his tone. 'Sometimes I'm afraid she'll come to regret having done it.'
'Oh, no,' Honor said, returning his gaze. 'It's awkward, and neither one of them likes all the consequences, but 'cats don't look back over decisions of the heart, Hamish. As Emily pointed out to both of us once upon a time, they're remarkably sane in that respect.'
'As well they should be,' Emily pronounced. She looked back and forth between husband and Honor and started to say something, but Honor felt her change direction before she spoke. 'On the other hand, it's not as if Samantha hasn't been able to find things to occupy her while the two of you were away, Honor.'
'No?' Honor looked at Samantha, who returned her gaze and groomed her whiskers with an undeniable air of smugness.
'Oh, no. She and Dr. Arif formally opened the conference day before yesterday,' Emily said.
