Page 29 of Escape Velocity

Harry shuffled through them.

When Amber stepped out, Harry gave a long whistle through his teeth. “I see why you wanted to disguise this beauty.”

“Yeah.”

“First and last names,” Harry said.

“Amber . . .”

“Jackbo,” Max supplied

“DOB?”

“What . . .what is that?” Amber asked.

“Date of birth.” He gave one that would fit her apparent age.

“How much are you putting in her credit account?” the hacker asked.

Max named a modest sum and handed over more credits. They wouldn’t get her far, but it would look odd if she had nothing in the bank.

“Stand over there,” he said to her.

She did as he asked, and he raised a device that was hooked up to the service unit on his desk.

When he had taken a picture of her face and a close-up of her eyes, he had her press her fingers and palm to the view screen.

Harry bent over the keyboard, processing the information he had obtained.

“Accessing the Danalon database,” he said.

Max didn’t ask how he got into a restricted government account. He only trusted that Harry wasn’t slatting him. He’d done business with the guy before, and it had always turned out okay.

It took only a few minutes for a picture to appear on the screen. It showed a headshot of Amber. Below it was her handprint and a scan of her retina.

Next, he showed them the Danalon central records, where they could see Amber Jackbo listed between Acana Jackbo and Arturo Jackbo.

“All done.”

Max bent to the screen, seeing there were more credits listed than he’d given Harry.

“Where’d the extra heavy come from?” he asked.

“As long as we’re starting from scratch, I can increase her pot a little. Not enough to make anybody wonder where the money came from.

“Thanks.”

Amber stared at the screen. “I have means of payment?”

“Don’t get excited,” Max said. You could probably live on that for a month.”

“How would I spend it?” she asked.

“Your print will tell how much heavy you have.”

“You didn’t use a print.”

“Because I’m keeping this off the record.”

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