Page 22 of Touch in the Night

Filip continued to glower. “Lucky you’re still breathing, if you ask me.”

“I didn’t.”

Filip tensed. “You will need to watch your back, little boy.”

Jesse flashed him a grin. “Why? What do you want to do to my back?”

Filip colored but said nothing.

Jesse took the seat next to Tom as he began loading the firewall protocols.

“I’d like to build something from scratch,” Jesse said as Tom worked. “It’ll be like Fort Knox when I’m done. Better.” He gave Tom a glance. “I got into Fort Knox once.”

Tom blinked. “Really?”

“Well…” He looked away. “Just the gift shop accounts…but still.”

“Sounds good,” Tom said. The light from the screen warmed his gentle smile. “Does this mean you’re taking the job?”

“Kid should be in prison,” Filip muttered, draining his mug and slamming it down. “Not getting a job.”

“Mate,” Jesse said, “if you want some dick, you only have to ask.”

Filip lurched out of his chair. Jesse smiled up at him. He muttered something under his breath then slammed out of the door.

Tom laughed a little nervously. “You sail close to the wind, huh?”

“If that’s what you call it.” Jesse slid him a sideways glance, then looked hurriedly away. “I call it my gob getting away from me. Sorry.”

“Don’t worry about it.” Tom waved his hand. “If anyone needs plain-speaking, it’s Filip. Want that tour? If he’s not put you off the whole thing, that is.”

“No, I, uh.” Jesse fumbled for words, suddenly unable to meet his keen, brown eyes. “Let’s do it.”

* * * *

Tom took him past the now-empty break room and through the deserted but spotless kitchen. “It looks like it’s never been used.”

“It hardly has,” Tom said as he opened another door. “But it needs to be as secure as the rest of it. More, even.”

Jesse eyed the industrial refrigeration unit in the corner with its heavy-duty padlock warily. “Is that…uh…?”

“That’s where his feed is stored, yes,” Tom said as he went through the door. “The donated blood. You can ask about it if you want.”

“I’m good,” Jesse muttered as he followed Tom out into an airy dining room. “Just wondering why he has a kitchen at all, if the human staff have their own?”

“He’s hoping to host more human guests—dinners, business meetings. He did lots of that stuff back in Austria. But here, it’s still early days. There are cameras in all these public spaces,” Tom continued, gesturing at the black orb in the ceiling over the thirty-seater dining table, “but not upstairs, where the staff quarters and private rooms are—or in his study, the library or the pool room.”

Jesse blinked. “The pool room?”

“Oh yeah,” Tom said, grinning. “We’re allowed to use it, too, during the day. But boring stuff first, I think.” He took Jesse through another swipe-card door, and Jesse winced to see that they were in the corridor that led to the basement.

Tom reeled off the specs of the security door, the motion sensors in the sleeping cell and the locks as they approached. Jesse told him about how his Crack Box had bested it and suggested specialist fingerprint and retina-scan technology.

Next, they went through the parlor, a sitting area and a music room with its own stage. Minimalist black-and-white photography adorned the walls. All the floors were marble. Blinds were drawn across every window, giving the place a dim, shadowy feel.

They didn’t come across another living soul, and their footsteps echoed off the high ceilings. It was vast and luxurious, with no expense spared, but Jesse felt like he was walking through a museum. He wondered how anyone, even a haemophile, could truly live in somewhere so new, so…empty.

He suggested upgrading the wiring and installing some back-up wireless transmitters. Tom made notes then headed for the library.

---