“When you arrived in the States, they gave you an electronic chip. They scan everyone at customs, and if you don’t have one, they insert one into your upper arm. It’s how the government tracks everyone.”

“But I didn’t go through customs.”

“You what?”

“Something about diplomatic…Lauren said I didn’t need to go through customs.”

I returned to the table. “They didn’t give you a chip?”

“No.”

That changed everything. “So no one knows you’re here, except possibly Sabin.”

She nodded.

“Abby, how much do you trust him?”

“Quite a bit…I think. He’s been great to me. Why?”

“Because if he tells Lauren or the federal agents you might be with me…How loyal do you think he is to her?”

She shrugged. “They don’t seem very happy together. Lauren seems warmer toward Hutch Hardin—that’s her political consultant.”

“Where did you see them together?”

“At his father’s funeral. Anyway, Lauren and Sabin’s relationship is certainly not like my parents’ marriage.”

I smiled. Probably no marriage on the planet had been like her parents’ marriage. At least in her eyes. “So how did Sabin feel about your staying in the States?”

“He wasn’t too thrilled about it.”

That wasn’t a good sign.

“But I think he was just worried about me. I don’t imagine he’ll tell anyone where I am, unless he has to.”

“That’s a risk we’ll have to take. We can’t both go traipsing across the country, fleeing people that we don’t even know are after us.”

Nor would it be wise to add to the appearance I was harboring a fugitive. My conversation with Sabin had one upside: I could claim that someone knew where Abby was—that I wasn’t, in fact, hiding her.

I went back to the kitchen and fixed us some coffee. We moved to the living room couch.

“Abby, do you know how your grandfather died?”

She nodded slowly. “From an aneurysm, I was told.”

I sipped my coffee. “Let’s verify that, shall we? Alistair, please pull up the National Death Registry.”

Alistair accessed the Grid site of every death recorded in the country. I looked at Abby. “What was his full name?”

“Raymond Blaine Caldwell.”

“Do you have a birth date?”

She shook her head.

“Alistair, try that name.”

“A Raymond Blaine Caldwell died April 16, 2088.”

“In what location?”

“Silver Springs, Maryland.”

“Of what cause?”

“A brain aneurysm.”

I thought for a moment.

“What?” Abby asked, touching my hand lightly.

“I’m just surprised that one of the world’s leading neuroscientists died of a brain aneurysm.”

“What about your father? Did he ever say anything that made you think he might commit suicide?”

“No. But we didn’t talk that often. And when we did…it was primarily surface level. We were never close. He did leave a suicide message, though.”