"Put them off," Kendric snapped. He caught himself, and rested a companionable hand on the blond man's shoulder. "Six months, Clancy. If I haven't come through by then, I'll step down from the family board anyway. OK?"

Greg considered the faces on the screen. The two financiers' obvious concern. Kendric's driving anger. And intuition was totally spurious. A cornered animal had no choice in the way; it reacted. "Have you got a record of all the visitors?" he asked.

Suzi tapped the sensor array with possessive pride. "No sweat. Day or night, anyone on or off gets tagged. We've got infrared and low level, for night work. Not that we need them, that baby is lit up like a football pitch after dark. And we've got an antenna rigged to intercept Mirriam's local calls. But there's nothing we can do about her satellite uplinks. Trouble is, the local calls have all been the big zero so far, social gabbing and ordering booze, that kind of crap."

Greg grunted and wiped some of the sweat off his forehead.

"Good. If I know who he's been seeing, I might be able to get a clearer idea of exactly what he's planning."

"You figuring on doing an extra-parliamentary number against him?"

"Insufficient data."

She bent back and dragged a koolcan of orange from the heap at her feet. "I'd like in if it happens." She twisted the tab ninety degrees.

Greg watched frost forming over the can with something akin to lust. "No promises. As I said, this is big league. Black-hat spooks with viral wasps and funny midnight accidents."

Suzi pulled the tab and gulped down the icy stream of bubbling orange, burping loudly. "Figures."

"So what happens in the afternoon?"

"She—Hermione, right? — goes shopping, maybe does lunch with a load of airhead cows just like her. Evening, they party; sometimes on one of the other yachts, mostly on theirs, 'bout twenty-five came to it last night. Then after midnight they take off for the Blue Ball. That's a casino in New Eastfield. Hottest spot in town, people say. We tailed them for you, but no fucking way could we get past the bouncers. They pack up around three or four and come straight back. Spoke to a couple of the casino's waitresses, though. They reckoned Kendric and Hermione usually pick up a girl at the Blue Ball, bring her back to Mirriam to provide themselves with some fun. These waitresses, a friend of theirs let herself get talked into going along with them once. Bad scene, Greg, no sadism, but she was really put through her paces. Kendric and Hermione screwed her brains out. Then she got kicked off the next morning. Apparently, they all do. One-nighters; fuck and forget."

"What about the crew?"