CASTLE
Chapter 1
Jennifer peeked into the children’s chamber in the capsule where her grandson and granddaughter were being safely guarded. If she believed the information she had received, this was the best technology available in the cosmos to protect children outside the mother’s body.
The children’s room was sealed. All she could see were monitors displaying vital signs indicating the little ones were healthy. Heartbeats. Pulses. Biological and body formation processes.
Signs of precious life.
There wasn’t a window in the room, so she opened the door of the chamber to look outside.
The Daimon Gate was an independent universe. Because of its special position in multiple dimensions, this universe was the gateway between member universes. Eudaiz and Earth were the two member universes she knew well and had a close affiliation with. She had been born and raised on Earth, and the rest of her family still lived there. Her sons, Ciaran and Tadgh, now held important positions in Eudaiz.
There were thousands and thousands of member universes that the Daimon Gate managed and protected. She didn’t know them all. Members connected their gateways exclusively to the Daimon Gate. That meant citizens of these universes could only travel in and out of their universes and to and from other universes with the proper passes via the Daimon Gate.
The advantage of being a member was that trespassers and enemies could be prevented from entering a member universe because there was no other way to enter and exit unless one passed the Daimon Gate’s strict scanning system—a wicked and unforgiving computer called the EYE. The more members the Daimon Gate had, the safer it was for them because members would protect the only gateway connecting the multiverse.
Safety for everyone.
Jennifer’s husband, Conan LeBlanc, was the Host of the Daimon Gate—the highest position and equivalent to a kingship elsewhere. And that made Jennifer the Hostess. She didn’t dwell much on the position and the perks that came with it. She loved her husband, and she wanted to be with him regardless.
A wave of compressed air blew past the field in front of her, loosening dirt and unearthing young trees. A stone at the gate flipped over and rolled down the hill.
It wasn’t just wind. She knew it was more than that. But she didn’t have the psychic ability to see minds like her daughter-in-law, Madeline. All she had was her gut instinct, and it was telling her that multiple entities were trespassing the gate right now. She couldn’t see them. She didn’t know what they wanted. She just knew they were present, and they wanted something she cared about.
The children.
Before she closed the chamber door, she saw Moira walking amid the gusts toward the capsule. Moira was her five-hundred-year-old ancestor, a formidable and powerful woman who had mastered several dimensions of the multiverse, earning herself a very long life. She had been speaking with Conan in the residence. Why was she now running back out into the wind?
Jennifer waited. Moira rushed in so fast she almost fell onto the floor. Jennifer slammed the door closed after her.
“They’re coming for the children,” Moira said.
“Yes. I guessed that. But what are we going to do? The children are in two gigantic boxes in a sealed room. I can’t exactly scoop them up and run into the house with them.”
Something smashed into the side of the chamber, which was no more than a mobile cabin without combat capability. Jennifer figured one more hit like that, and they would be rolling down the hill. “What the hell is that?” she asked.
“Haven’t you been attacked before?” Moira asked.
“No. Not inside the Daimon Gate. For God’s sake, if we’re attacked here, there’s nowhere in the multiverse that will be safe!” Jennifer exclaimed.
“That’s a myth,” Moira scoffed.
“A myth? Daimon Gate existed even before the concept of time. How can you say it’s a myth?”
Another blow on the side of the chamber. It tilted. Moira darted toward the control panel and entered a series of commands. Jennifer heard humming noises from beneath them, and something snapped into place.
“We’re now grounded,” Moira explained, and she turned toward Jennifer. “I affixed permanent legs to the capsule. It will resist the wind and the attack outside. But I’m not sure how long it will last.”
Something smashed against the chamber again. They heard the sound of claws scratching from right outside the door and walls.
“What’s taking Conan so long?” Moira asked.
“What? You’re not serious. He isn’t leaving the residence, is he?” Jennifer asked but saw the answer on Moira’s face. She rushed toward the door, but Moira snatched her away from it and swung her to the middle of the room. “If you open that door, you’ll kill the children.”
“If Conan makes it here, I’ll have to open the door to let him in,” Jennifer growled in response.
“Well, He’d better come with guards and an arsenal. At the moment, we have nothing to defend this birth chamber with,” Moira snarled back.
“Why does everyone in the cosmos want the children? Yes, they’re two of the best beings in existence, but so what?” Jennifer exclaimed.
“You yourself gave birth to a child of the Red Stage of the Daimon Gate. Look at how Ciaran has turned out. Look at the power he has. And now—there are twins. Of course, everyone wants them.”
“Ciaran is my son. He will always be my child. I don’t see any exceptional power or good it has brought him.”
Moira laughed. “Don’t be so sentimental . . .”
“Sentimental! You’re not a mother. You’ll never understand—”
An explosion cut Jennifer off. Its impact shook the chamber so severely she was afraid all the walls would cave in.
Then it went suddenly quiet.
An eerie quietness she didn’t care for at all.
It was like the air and the life had been vacuumed from her surroundings. She scrambled to the door and pushed it open. The garden in front of her was a war zone. The bodies of guards littered the ground.
“Conan!” Jennifer whispered.
She charged out into the field of bodies, blood, and gore.
Chapter 2
Madeline gazed at the control panel and its jumble of buttons and symbols. She figured some of the buttons functioned in a way similar to the ‘enter’ key on her computer keyboard back on Earth. And she recognized a delete button—in her terms, the ‘oops’ button.
She was pretty sure the control panel operated by voice recognition. She should be able to just tell it what she wanted.
She glanced at the bed. Her husband still slept. It’s not that he was a lazy sleepyhead—he was in something like a clinical state of mini-hibernation. The battles they had engaged in before arriving in Eudaiz had drained all of his natural energy, so his body now operated on a temporary artificial energy that recharged itself every night during sleep. In this universe, energy was more vital than blood.
Madeline wanted to call her mother-in-law, Jennifer, in the Daimon Gate to check on her children. But it might not be a good idea. Although Daimon Gate should be the safest place in the cosmos to hide her children, the fewer people who knew where they were, the better it was.
Calling, or holocasting—similar to a call in Eudaiz—was a sure way to publicly announce their children’s whereabouts. One of their executives was a mole, and there were invisible enemies out there who wanted Ciaran dead before his coronation. It was a given that their enemies would be hunting for every single opportunity to kill him, even if it included kidnapping his children.
She sighed and gave up the idea.
Ciaran stirred and opened his eyes.
She whooshed to the bed and pressed a kiss on his face. “Good morning, warrior! How are you feeling?” She smiled.
He rubbed his thumb across her dimple and pulled her down into his arms. “Why do you have to ask me that every morning? I’m not sick, Madeline.”
“Let’s just accept it as my ritual morning greeting until after your coronation when you won’t have to wake up every morning not knowing how much energy you’ve got for the day!” She grinned. “And you know what? I’m your First Councillor now, a fully operating Sciphil One. And I am a lot stronger than you.”
He laughed. “A Scientist Philosopher, you are! I see you’ve grown to love the term!”
She loved his laughter. “Hmm, not really. Let’s stick with Sciphil. I’ll pretend I don’t know what the word means.” She played with his long, raven-black hair and noted it had grown quite a bit in the last few weeks. It nearly touched his shoulders now, making him look even more like a warrior. Her warrior. “Gaia dropped by earlier to check on you,” Madeline said.
“Check on me? She’s only a child. She shouldn’t be out and about by herself in the Sciphil zone.”
Madeline shrugged. “She’s one smart kid, let me tell you. She went from knowing a few basic English words to speaking just like you—overnight.”
Ciaran pinched Madeline’s chin lightly. “What do you mean by that?”
Madeline laughed and donned her best British accent, “Well, she speaks like this. It’s a cheesecake. Dark, rich Belgium chocolate with a hint of chili and strawberries.” She hoped he’d laugh again. His killer grins and the way his intense eyes twinkled and focused on her when he smiled never ceased to melt her. But instead, the smile faded from Ciaran’s face.
Madeline was puzzled. “I did my best with the accent. Guess I need more practice. What’s wrong, Ciaran?”
“That was the dessert we had after our first dinner together in London. That was my description. You remember it.”
She didn’t tell him she remembered the very first moment they had collided in Hyde Park. She remembered everything—what he wore, the way he looked and spoke, and even the smell of his perspiration.
“You remember that fine detail of our first date,” Ciaran repeated.
Madeline arched an eyebrow. “Yes, I have a good memory. Why is that a big deal?”
Ciaran shook his head and sat up. “Sometimes it’s better to just forget,” he mumbled and headed toward the bathroom.
An image flashed in her mind. Her psychic ability switched on, and she saw Ciaran’s mind. It was rare for her to see it out of the blue. And especially when nothing significant was happening. Or was there something significant happening?
“We’ve come up with the name Caedmon for our son. But we don’t have a girl’s name yet, Ciaran. How about Lyla?”
That was the word she had just seen in his mind. He turned around slowly. The look on his face made her want to recoil. But she didn’t. She manufactured a smile. “What do you think?”
“Anything but Lyla.”
His voice was so low, it came out more like a hiss.
“But I like that name. If you don’t, can you tell me why?”
He shook his head and strode out of the room.
“Don’t walk away from me, Ciaran.” She raised her voice. “There can’t be secrets between us. Not back on Earth. And especially not here . . . not . . .” It might have been her tone, what she said, or the fact the she started to breathe heavily as if she was in shock that stopped Ciaran in his tracks.
The precognition hit her liked a tidal wave. In front of her was a flash of images.
Blood.
Zombies.
Snakes.
Space creatures.
And Conan—Ciaran’s father—covered in blood. In her vision, she pushed the monsters away to save Conan. But there were so many of them. Without a weapon, she couldn’t do much.
She pushed and shoved, but it had no effect on the monsters.
She cried.
And then she was floating. Ciaran was shaking her. She opened her eyes and found herself in his arms, and she saw the terror on his face. The thin material of his sleeping shirt had been torn. She saw trails of blood on his chest where she had scratched him.
He wiped the tears from her face. “I’m sorry. Don’t cry. Let me take you to bed.”
He carried her to bed and wrapped her up in a blanket. Her teeth chattered uncontrollably, and she couldn’t even speak. He climbed onto the bed and held her tightly. She could feel his muscles quivering as much as her own. She could feel the vibration of his anxiety. She knew he suffered from her vision as much as she did even though he didn’t have any psychic abilities and hadn’t seen what she’d seen.
After a while, her temperature evened out. Ciaran looked at her and asked, “I guess this was one of your psychic episodes?”
She nodded.
“If it’s this bad, then we have to do something about it,” he said.
“I saw—”
He locked her lips with a deep kiss to cut her off. When he finished, he said, “Whatever terrible thing you saw, we’ll fix it. Okay? I want you to know that.”
She nodded again. Before she could say anything further, a robotic announcement broadcast from the speaker.
“You have a holocast from Jennifer LeBlanc.”
“Accept,” Ciaran said.
“Affirmative,” the robot said.
Then Jennifer’s voice came across, “Ciaran, your father’s in trouble. Come at once.”
Chapter 3
Everyone called him Master. He liked it. Creatures in space, humans on Earth, and paranormal creatures feared him, at least those he was in contact with. He had never told them his name, so he was happy their fear translated into the name Master.
He was the master of many things. But sorcery was his forte.
It had been hundreds of years that he had walked the cosmos, living in multiple dimensions and multiple universes. He had no place he could call home, but there was one place he wanted—Eudaiz.
Among the many things he couldn’t have, Eudaiz had always been his most desirable goal and the most painful failure he had ever experienced in his very long and unnatural life.
Unlike the many pathetic creatures he hired, he would never give up. One day, he would take his rightful place in Eudaiz, and he was willing to do whatever it took to get there. He had sacrificed enough. There had always been one hurdle between him and Eudaiz—the LeBlancs. But he’d learned his lesson. This time, he would be successful.
He would be where he deserved to be.
He wiped the gore of Kyle’s body, a remnant of the explosion, from his hands. “You’re useless,” he muttered. The tasks he had given Kyle were simple—capture the children and replace Sciphil Seven.
Kyle had failed both jobs.
Now he would have to get his hands dirty and handle some trivial matters.
He shook his head.
There had been too many errors, and the coronation date had crept up faster than he wanted. There were too many things to do and not enough reliable creatures in the multiverse to hire.
He turned on his communication channel, blocked the visual, and called his spy in Eudaiz. “Give me some good news,” he said.
* * *
As soon as the capsule landed and he verified his palm print on the control panel, Ciaran strode straight to the gate of his parents’ residence in the Daimon Gate. Madeline was right beside him. She always was. And he would need all of her support very soon.
The grand reception room reeked of the stench of blood. The bodies of guards were everywhere. Blood smears painted the room. On the shiny white floor. On the polished marble benches. On the white walls decorated with classical paintings. And on the glass of the windows.
Jennifer stormed in from the hallway. Ciaran rushed over to hold his mother. He knew she would never allow any sign of weakness to show. But at the moment, fear had taken over his mother. She was incoherent. So he did what a son should do. He comforted her.
Ciaran signaled Madeline. She came to stand next to Jennifer. Ciaran turned on the control panel to check the computer system. The computer didn’t detect the carnage. It thought everything was operating normally, and that Conan was most likely relaxing in the room, drinking his tea.
“Do you sense any Black Rock creatures here, Madeline?” Ciaran asked.
“No,” she answered.
“The computer detects nothing,” he muttered.
“It was a tremendous explosion. The gusts from it almost blew your children’s chamber away. How can the computer see nothing?” Jennifer exclaimed.
“The attackers were invisible to the system. The EYE is the most sophisticated computer system in the cosmos. If it can’t detect the creatures, your gate security has no hope.”
Jennifer flopped down heavily in a chair. “It was my fault,” she cried. “I was always thinking of Eudaiz. If things went wrong, it had something to do with Eudaiz. If someone attacked us, it was because of Eudaiz. There are nine thousand gates within the Daimon Gate, and each one is connected to thousands of universes. But I’ve never thought much about them. I left the residence defenseless and locked myself in the children’s birth chamber because I thought that was what they had come for.”
Ciaran crouched next to his mother and held her hands. “You’re not thinking straight, Mother. Eudaiz is the most prosperous universe. Of course it’s the most likely target for attack. Go easy on yourself.”
“If they targeted Eudaiz, they must be the Black Rock, right? Can you go there and bring your father back? You’ve been there before to rescue Tadgh.”
“Madeline didn’t sense any Black Rock creatures in here.”
“But if it wasn’t them, then who else?” Then Jennifer looked behind Ciaran. “Where’s your brother? Why isn’t Tadgh with you?”
“Mother, Tadgh has just taken his Sciphil Seven position. He’s still in training. I didn’t tell him anything yet.”
“Your father is missing, and you didn’t think to tell your brother? I know Conan isn’t your real father, but he brought you up, and he’s the only father you know.”
He knew his mother wasn’t thinking straight. But he didn’t expect what she was saying would hurt him so much. “Mother, you’re being unreasonable.”
Madeline pushed her way in and held his mother’s shoulders so she looked straight into Madeline’s eyes. She said, “You know I have psychic ability. I told you it wasn’t Black Rock creatures. If you insist that Ciaran go to Black Rock, it will be a waste of time and effort.”
Ciaran turned away from his mother. He looked out to the garden where he had parked the birth chamber of their children, and his blood ran cold. His mother had left Moira, his wicked ancestor with a vested interest in the children, alone in the birth chamber.
Saying nothing, Ciaran darted out of the house toward the chamber.
* * *
Moira turned around and smiled at Ciaran when he stormed into the room. In the confined space, he could feel the vibration of her energy. Her formidability and authority would have overwhelmed any creature in the cosmos.
“You were afraid I’d take your children, Ciaran?”
“I trust no one when it comes them.”
“Well, you don’t have much of a choice, do you? You can’t take soldiers into the Daimon Gate. Now that your father’s been taken, will you go and rescue him, or stay here and guard your children . . . against me? We have an agreement, Ciaran. If you hold up your end, I will mine. Your mother isn’t thinking straight right now. But you are the king-to-be of Eudaiz. You cannot let your judgment be clouded by such trivial matters.”
“My father is missing. That’s not trivial. Not to me personally, and not to the Daimon Gate and the safety of the cosmos. If he is held for ransom, it will be catastrophic.”
“Not really,” Moira said matter-of-factly. “If Conan is held against the interest of the cosmos, he will kill himself. That’s just a necessary responsibility of a man in his position.”
Ciaran punched the wall so hard it shook loose a wooden panel.
Moira continued, “Human emotion is your weakness, Ciaran. You have to get it under control, or you’ll be in serious trouble.”
“I know what I’m capable of. I don’t need your advice,” Ciaran snarled as Madeline and Jennifer stormed in.
“How is quarreling going to help the situation?” Jennifer raised her voice.
“He’s upset because you weren’t thinking straight. Don’t blame that on me, Jennifer,” Moira said.
Jennifer sighed. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean what I said about . . . Conan.”
Ciaran turned around and looked at his mother. “He’s the father I’ve known my whole life. And he will always be my father. But he didn’t give me my life—”
“I know, and I said I’m sorry, Ciaran,” Jennifer cut in.
Ciaran nodded. Moira was right. He was too emotional about this. He was glad his mother had cut in. Otherwise, he could easily have ranted on and on about the fact that he’d had to kill Bran, his real father, for Conan. He didn’t regret it. He had done what he had to do. But he would never forgive himself for doing it.
Madeline walked toward the two boxes that contained her twins. She traced her hands across the glass panel. Ciaran approached from behind. He removed her hands and held them in his. “Our children will be fine, Madeline.”
“I’ll look after them when you leave to rescue Conan,” Moira said. “How many guards do you have left, Jennifer?”
Jennifer shook her head. “We don’t have any residential guards left alive. But we have hundreds of thousands of guards at the gate at our disposal. All I have to do is to call the committee.”
“Don’t,” Ciaran said. “If you call the Daimon Gate committee and tell them their leader is missing, you’ll spread confusion and fear. That’s a recipe for chaos and will lead to disastrous consequences. It might be exactly what Father’s kidnapper wants.”
“Welcome back, Ciaran,” Moira smiled. “Precisely. The Daimon Gate is the only secure gateway to the multiverse for thousands of universes. If an outside universe wants to invade those member universes of the Daimon Gate, they will need the Daimon Gate to be vulnerable. Chaos is the best strategy to weaken it. And capturing Conan is a good way to create chaos—if we give in to what they want.”
“I’ve been to the Black Rock. I’ve seen their creatures. They don’t have the capacity to pull this off,” Ciaran said.
Moira shook her head. “It’s not the Black Rock. It’s far worse.”
Chapter 4
Sizx hunched over the control panel in her workstation. There had been some issues with the data migration all morning. She could fix it, but data manipulation wasn’t her strength. She was best in spy devices.
The problem wasn’t severe, but she had been distracted. She couldn’t get the memory of the night’s encounter with Ciaran out of her mind. She was the head of intelligence of Eudaiz, a position that was so important she couldn’t afford to have any weaknesses.
Emotion was a weakness.
Humans suffered it most.
She wasn’t human. She was a Eudaizian. And she should be able to control her desire and urges for a man. She sighed, it was Ciaran she was thinking about. Not just any man.
Maybe she should court a male counterpart in the Eudaizian community. There were billions of them out there. And she wasn’t exactly lacking in looks. She should have no problem finding a man.
Ayana whirled into the room so fast it startled Sizx. They always communicated using holocasts. Ayana had never set foot in her station before. She was Sciphil Two, the second in charge after Ciaran. What brought her here must be a universe-shattering matter.
Without a greeting, Ayana shot right to the point. “I didn’t want the holocast recorded. That’s why I’m here. Can you locate Ciaran’s capsule for me?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Sizx muttered and concentrated on the task. Ciaran’s capsule wasn’t on the radar. It was as if it had vanished.
“Can you message his wrist unit via private channel? The central computer wouldn’t have access to that?” Sizx asked.
Ayana shook her head. “I tried. He didn’t respond.” She whirled around the room, walking back and forth. “He’s got to understand how important this is,” she said.
“Is there anything else I can help you with?”
Her question jolted Ayana back to reality. She was at Sizx’s station, not in her own office. Ayana paused for a moment then shook her head. “No. There’s nothing you can help with unless you have another way to locate Ciaran’s whereabouts.”
“No, ma’am.”
Ayana nodded. “Okay then.” And she turned on her heel.
“How important is it?”
Ayana stopped in her tracks. “How important is what?”
“The matter that you have at hand? The reason you have to locate Ciaran’s whereabouts?”
“Eudaiz’s safety is at stake. It’s very important. Ciaran is new to all this. He wouldn’t understand the scope of the problem. I need to talk to him.”
Sizx nodded. She drew in a breath and said, “I might have a way to track him.”
Ayana arched an eyebrow. “Oh really?”
* * *
“Are you sure? That place doesn’t look like it even exists!” Jennifer exclaimed, staring at the search results Ciaran had just pulled up on the computer screen.
Standing in a corner of the computer room, Moira waited patiently.
Ciaran turned around to look at Moira. “Xiilok doesn’t exist anywhere. That’s why creatures from there cannot be detected. But how do you know about it?”
Moira smiled. “As I said, I’m not going to tell you how I know. But Xiilok is the only place that could produce this sort of soldier. You can choose not to believe me—”
“I do. I believe you. Please tell us about Xiilok,” Jennifer cut in.
Moira nodded. “Xiilok is the opposite of the Daimon Gate. While Daimon Gate is the connection between participating universes, and it validates legitimate passengers, Xiilok is the place for multiversal outlaws. Xiilok fighters don’t have forms that carry energy. They retain the physical form they had before being turned into a Xiilok. When they die, they disintegrate into black puddles filled with swimming worms. Because they don’t have live energy, computers cannot detect them. They can slither straight into the Daimon Gate completely unseen.”
Jennifer teared up. “You’re saying they’re invincible? What do they want from Conan?”
Moira shook her head. “Xiilok is neutral. It doesn’t have a leader, a government, or a policy against any universe. Xiilok fighters are freelancers who fight and kill for a living.”
Ciaran’s blood ran cold. “It’s not the Xiilok that want Father. It’s someone else. Someone who knows the multiverse well and knows how to use illegal forces that are undetectable. And capturing Father would create chaos inside the Daimon Gate. I can only think of one plausible motive for this—invasion of a member universe.”
Moira nodded. “Yes, the Daimon Gate is the only gateway through which they can bring a massive amount of soldiers into the member universes.”
Jennifer said nothing more. Tears rolled down her face. Ciaran approached and held his mother’s shoulders. He looked into her eyes. “I will go to Xiilok and bring him back. I want you to trust me and wait for me. Don’t do anything drastic. Don’t call your committee yet. Can you do that?”
Jennifer nodded. “Be safe.”
“I’ll go with you, Ciaran. That’s the word of your First Councillor, not your wife,” Madeline said.
“Shouldn’t we send troops with you two to Xiilok? You can’t go to a strange universe on your own,” Jennifer said.
“You can’t take ordinary troops into Xiilok. It’s a universe of illusion. You’ll send your troops to their death. But Ciaran and Madeline can survive as individuals if they fight their way through it. In Xiilok, nobody cares about anyone else’s business. They work for money. It’s the land of multiversal outlaws. They have been rejected by the entire multiverse, and the only thing they care about is currency. You pay them, they’ll work for you. It is as simple as that,” Moira said.
Ciaran smiled. “Fortunately, wheeling and dealing is one of my specialties. There is no need for super troops.”
“But I’m sure some super soldiers would help,” Madeline said.
“Unfortunately, we are not at a stage where we can create super soldiers yet. Not for a long while,” Ciaran replied.
“I have some psychic ability, and I can guess direction. But if Xiilok is that mysterious, I’m not sure my psychic ability will work. Do you know how to get there, given that they’re not on the map anywhere?” Madeline asked Moira.
“I have never accessed them via the Daimon Gate. But there is a system where you can find information about anything in the cosmos, including the entrance to Xiilok.” Moira donned a wicked smile.
“If the EYE is what you’re thinking about, I don’t have access,” Jennifer said.
The EYE was the most advanced computer surveillance system in the cosmos. It recorded everything in the cosmos and was managed by the Host of the Daimon Gate. An attempt to breach the EYE databank would bring a death penalty to any unauthorized individuals.
Moira laughed. “I can see Conan embraces the ethics of his position. Even his wife doesn’t have access to the databank.”
“You know very well the EYE is not just a databank,” Ciaran said. “It stores the history of everything in the multiverse. Anyone with access to that much data will have the power of God.” Then he turned toward his mother. “Still, I need to access the EYE, Mother.”
“You’re not hacking it. I won’t risk your life for this. Your father won’t, either,” Jennifer exclaimed.
Ciaran smiled. This ordeal had seriously knocked the wits out of his mother. “I didn’t say I’ll hack the EYE. But every computer system needs maintenance. Where is it done, and who handles it?”
Jennifer’s eyes lit up. “Oh, for sure. Computer maintenance, that is. I know just the person for that. You father recruited a geek from London to upgrade the security for the system. Before upgrading, he needed to do an audit first. I’d imagine that guy would have the access you need. And this was a side project. Your father didn’t report it to the committee.”
Ciaran arched an eyebrow and smiled. He said nothing. Jennifer tossed him an electronic pad. “Here’s the map. The address is installed in there. His name is Lorcan Brody.”