“No,” Lucas said. He got to his feet and joined Victor at the window. “I don’t have your computer brain but I’ve got damned good intuition. Given what happened in Fogg Lake a couple of weeks ago, and now this situation with the Chastains, I agree with you. We’ve got good reason to worry.”

“We’ve always believed that if the weapons development project was successful it was in the Vortex lab, not in Fogg Lake or elsewhere. But say Chastain and Rancourt were able to produce some lethal machines that operated on paranormal principles. That would have provided Crocker Rancourt with a motive for murder.”

“He killed Griffin Chastain in order to control the weapons?” Lucas nodded. “I’ll buy that. But if Rancourt made it out of Fogg Lake with paranormal weapons, where have they been all these years? You can’t just keep artifacts like that a secret, not for decades.”

“You could if they were well hidden.”

Lucas shook his head. “If the Rancourts had possessed serious paranormal weapons they would have used them to maintain control of the Foundation. Hell, they would have used them against us when we went after them.”

“You’re right. But what if Chastain was the one who hid them?”

“And took his secret to the grave?” Lucas considered that for a long moment. “Okay, that is an interesting theory. Either way, it looks like someone has found the artifacts.”

“We’ve got to get on top of this situation, Lucas. We’re running out of time. Right now we need to focus on Delbridge Loring and the Riverview Psychiatric Hospital.”

Lucas reached for Victor’s hand. Their gold wedding rings glinted in the early morning light. They stood quietly for a time, drawing strength from each other as they always did in a time of crisis.

“Give me ten minutes,” Lucas said.

He squeezed Victor’s hand and then he crossed the room to a desk and fired up a computer.

CHAPTER 17

North’s phone rang while Sierra was slicing avocados. She glanced at the device. It was lying on the end of the dining counter. She was pretty sure she knew what was coming next, so she took the precaution of slicing a lime in half and squeezing the juice over the avocados so that they wouldn’t turn brown.

North’s phone stopped ringing. A couple of beats later the bells that she used for a ring tone chimed. She wiped her hands on a towel, picked up the phone, glanced at the area code and took the call.

“North can’t come to the phone right now,” she said. “He’s in the shower.”

“What the hell? This is Victor Arganbright.”

“Believe it or not, it didn’t require any psychic powers to figure out you would try my phone after you got dumped into voice mail on North’s. I’ll tell him you called.”

“I want to speak to him immediately. This is critical.”

He sounded sincere. Worried.

“All right,” she said. “Hang on.”

She traipsed down the hall and cracked open the door of the bathroom. Steam poured out.