Lester’s computer repair shop was legit. Besides being a cyber whiz, he also indulged in reverse-engineering simple electronics, role playing games and microbrewery—he made his own ale.
Becca had liked him instantly, for he’d not looked at her exterior, but into her. They had become instant friends while working together last year on the Irish gem-smuggling case. It was odd to her, but she found it much easier to relate to people not in her social class. Lester didn’t judge and there were no subtle meanings to every word he spoke. He couldn’t care less about how many zeroes appeared in her checkbook.
“Lester.” Becca backed away when he moved to hug her. He wasn’t offended; he was keen on her quirks. “It’s been a year,” she said as they awkwardly shook hands. “You’re still looking tough.”
“And you are still as gorgeous as a newly minted Pentium chip.” He gestured for her to sit on a wooden stool before a stainless steel counter.
Almost six feet tall but with the hunched shoulders and rounded spine of someone who spent too much time leaning over a computer keyboard, Lester wore his red hair long, tucked beneath a wool cap with the tabs flapping over his ears. Long wool strings dangled from each tab, a pale blue pompom hanging at each of his shoulders.
Starting to take off her coat, Becca paused when she got the first shoulder off. “Yikes, it’s freezing in here.” She buttoned it up again with her free hand and considered putting her gloves on. “I know you like to keep the shop cool for all the electronics, but this is taking it a bit far.”
“Is a bit nippy, isn’t it?” He smiled and then whispered, “Haven’t paid the utilities for a few months.”
“Really? Yet you have power.”
“Heat I can do without. Electricity? Not on your nadgers. So, what brings you to the drippy nose of the world? I thought you did Paris during the winter. Isn’t fashion week coming up?”
“I did Paris for Christmas.”
Shoving aside a scattering of motherboards and a soldering gun dripping solidified silver, Becca set the valise on the counter.
Still cuffed, she wished Agent Dane had set her free before taking off.
“You’re kidding me,” he said, lifting the handle to examine the cuffs. “This is the least secure setup I’ve ever seen.”
“I know. It’s not my doing.”
“Oh?”
“No questions.”
“Right, I know the drill.”
Entering the four-digit code snapped open the valise lock. Becca then laid the plastic bag on the counter. “What brings me to London? This pretty girl.”
“Brill.” Lester tapped out the diamond onto his palm, then held it before him. His pale green eyes crossed comically. “How many carats?”
“Ten. But I can’t determine if there are inclusions.”
“My guess is you need a high-powered microscope?”
“Pretty please? There’s something inside the stone. It fluoresces pink.”
“I thought diamonds only fluoresced blue.”
“They can fluoresce any color, but blue is most common. Pink, I have never seen.” She dug out the light disk from the valise. “Here. It’s a UV light on this side.”
“Nice. Where’d you score this?”
“I have my sources.”
“Sources I’d love to infiltrate.”
Which was exactly why her lips were sealed.
“I flashed it across the crown and thought I saw…writing…or a code?” The notion hadn’t occurred to her until now. Had someone implanted a code within the diamond? Why? And how would the gem have ended up in a New York dealer’s store?
“You’re surprised?”
“Just thinking on my feet.”
And why not a code? It might explain why people were willing to kill—and die—for the stone.
Lester swept the white light over the diamond. Rainbow blocks danced on the walls, which were stashed floor to ceiling with computer parts, old televisions, all sorts of electronic equipment and his mascot stuffed pig which sported a tuft of red fur on its noggin.
“Where’d you get this?”
“Can’t tell you. Sealed lips, remember?” She glanced out the window, stretching her neck to insure her babysitter was nowhere in sight. “Agent Dane would never forgive me.”
“You working with Dane?” Lester chuckled, but his attention remained on the diamond. “Guy’s a proper character.”
“No kidding.”
“But keen, Becca. He’s one of the smartest at Scotland Yard.”
“I thought he was MI-6?”
“Oh, right. He was promoted last summer, though I hadn’t known it was to Six. A right proper bloke, even if the Yard was trying to bust his arse. You’ll appreciate working with him.”
“You know why they were trying to bust his arse—er, ass?”
Lester shrugged. “Dane never goes by the book. He’s all intuition and spur-of-the-moment kind of thinking. If he’s after something, he’ll let nothing stand in his way. I don’t think he fit in with the tighty-whitey code of Scotland Yard—probably why they rushed through his app to MI-6. Course, could have had something to do with his father’s death.”
Interesting. Becca filed that information away for further perusal.
She leaned in to study the diamond, nudging shoulders with Lester. “Flash it across the crown. I could swear I saw words embedded within. Maybe in a matrixlike design.”
“Ion beam?”
“Good, you know your stuff.”
“I’ve read about the process online but have never seen the actual markings before. Access to sparkly bits of this size doesn’t come easily. Ion beam branding is high-tech stuff, Becca. We’re talking nanotechnology.”
“Yes, but it’s a much better process than lasers for marking a diamond,” she said. “Doesn’t damage the integrity of the stone. Nor does it decrease the value. Of course, it should be impossible to view with the naked eye.”
“Not if you have an electron microscope.” The prismatic light beamed through the stone and onto the pocked plaster wall. “Sticky sweet, that’s gorgeous!”
Becca smiled at Lester’s wonder, but tilted his wrist to beam it on the steel counter. “The laser or microscope should reflect the dark matrix in the center.” She moved his hand up to spread the width of the light across a white calendar pad.
“I’m not seeing anything,” he said.
“But something was there. I know it. Have you anything more powerful than this little disk?”
“Somewhere in this disaster.” He got up and shuffled to the shelves behind his desk. Metal parts crashed and the pig landed on its snout with a squeak.
While he traversed the hardware forest, Becca studied the diamond with her naked eye, using the pale winter light beaming through the window. Lester’s store sat on a corner; one wall was entirely window. Couldn’t waste all the natural light. Or obviously, the natural chill.
“You hungry?”
She looked up from her study to see the package of cherry licorice nubs Lester offered, and shook her head. He tossed it over his shoulder to the floor.
“Here we go.” A moment later he emerged from the darkness at the far wall, pushing a wobbly utility cart through a cavalcade of empty boxes that spewed white packing peanuts in his wake.
Becca moved aside to allow him to set up the microscope and plug it into a strip of outlets longer than her arm. Talk about taking your life into your own hands merely by plugging in one more electronic device. It was a miracle he even had electricity.
Seconds later he leaned over the scope’s lens, searching, but seeing absolutely nothing inside the facets of the asscher stone.
Had she thought she’d seen something that wasn’t there?
“Do you see anything, Lester?”
“Well… It’s so fine. It’s not a code. More like…dust.”
“Dust?” She leaned over his shoulder, but could not see what he saw.
“Nanodust.”
“Very small, incredibly minute dust. Like…residue of something that was once there. Wait. A. Minute.”
“You see something?”
“Oh yeah. This is—well, nothing is impossible. The technology to do something like this…”
“Talk to me, Lester.”
He sat up straight and flipped one pompom over his shoulder. Furrowing one red brow, he tilted his head. “Do you hear that?”
Beyond the hum produced by dozens of computers?
“What is it, Lester?”
The man’s eyes widened.
Becca spun around as the grille of a Mercedes soared toward Lester’s window.