Erin laughed. “Well-adjusted is debatable. Remarkable is, too, but I’ll take it. But the answer is, I found a way to come to terms with the trauma I’d experienced. Which was obviously responsible for my increasingly reckless behavior. I decided to deal with these memories, with this trauma, head-on. To dedicate my life to studying the force that had destroyed the people I loved. To help society root out these monsters, identify them for what they were, before they could destroy other lives. To make myself strong, mentally and physically, so I would never feel helpless again.”
She stopped, and Hansen waited patiently for her to continue at her own pace.
“And now I find myself living the definition of the word irony. I would never have dreamed that I’d actually be in a position, not just to root out these monsters, but to eradicate their condition from the face of the earth. And if you would have told the sixteen-year-old me that I would grow to actually resist the idea, I’d have said you were crazy.” She sighed. “I guess the future is more unpredictable than any of us can imagine.”
“As someone who’s been working with an alien for many years now,” said Hansen, “you won’t get an argument from me.”
“It isn’t just that you never know what the future will hold,” said Erin. “It’s that people can be so dogmatic in their beliefs. So certain of their views they can’t imagine these could ever change, no matter what the circumstances. And convinced anyone who believes otherwise is either stupid or misinformed. But I’ve talked to any number of people whose most deeply held beliefs of early adulthood have changed over the years, through repeated exposure to new and different experiences, and to new ways of thought. I’m just struck by how absolutely certain we can be about things for which there is no objective certainty. How stubborn. And how often we can fool ourselves.”
Hansen nodded. “I think it’s even worse than that,” he said. “We’re all guilty of being absolutely sure of things we have no business being sure of. But I think most of us also cling to these cherished beliefs with superhuman tenacity. Even in the face of overwhelming evidence that we’re wrong.”
Erin eyed him appreciatively. “Superhuman tenacity. I like that. Very eloquent for a physicist,” she said. “I find you to be a wise, fun, brave, and slightly geeky man, Kyle Hansen. Exactly the type of man I’ve been looking for.” She paused. “Only I didn’t know it until we met.”
She turned away and sighed as the Lexus continued to slice smoothly through the star-filled night. “You’d just better be the man I think you are,” she added under her breath.
35
HANSEN CHECKED THE address again and nodded. “This is the place,” he said.
Erin squinted through the tall wrought-iron gate, but the pavement twisted just beyond it, and a thick barrier of various pine trees and other foliage surrounded and completely obscured the residence within, which was clearly the intent.
A keypad and monitor stood as a sentry before the gate and Hansen pulled up alongside it, lowered the window of Apgar’s Lexus, and pushed a button on the keypad. They had been driving for twelve hours without incident and had seen no sign of pursuit.
After almost a minute’s wait, a male voice came through the monitor, but the video remained off. “What can I do for you?” said the voice suspiciously.
Hansen cleared his throat. “My name is Kyle Hansen. An associate of mine named Drake said you’d be expecting me.”
There was a long pause. “I’m afraid I have no idea what you’re talking about. You must have the wrong place.”
Hansen eyed Erin in confusion. He was sure he had the right address.
Erin determined the source of the problem before he did, pointing to her head and then to his.
Hansen rolled his eyes and turned back to the electronic sentry. “I’m guessing I’m on camera right now,” he said. “And you were probably sent my picture. Do me a favor and mentally subtract all hair from the picture, and add some large neck tattoos. And then look at me again. I had some close calls getting here and I changed my appearance, ah … slightly.”
“Slightly?” said the voice after another few seconds. “I don’t think your own mother would recognized you—or claim you,” he added. “You should have a passenger with you. I need to see her and have her introduce herself.”
Erin leaned across Hansen so her face would register on the camera. “Hi,” she said. “Erin Palmer here.”
There was a loud click and the gate began to swing inward. “Welcome,” said the voice as Hansen drove through. “Can’t say I love either of your new hairstyles,” he added.
Yeah, tell me about it, thought Hansen.
After winding along the private driveway for only thirty yards the residence came into full view. “Wow,” said Hansen appreciatively.
The mansion was the height of opulence. It appeared to Hansen as if three ordinary luxury homes had been linked together into one, although in a jagged pattern rather than a perfectly straight line. Stone, brick, and wood combined to form pillars, turrets, and balconies.
“This is where Drake keeps his genetic engineer?” said Erin in disbelief.
“Apparently so,” said Hansen as he inched toward the circular drive that abutted the front rotunda entrance. “But trust me, he keeps his quantum physicist in a twelve-by-twelve room in a small underground facility in Yuma. I should have studied genetic engineering,” he added with a smile.
“Well, at least he put the money you guys stole to good use,” she said with a playful twinkle in her eye. Erin had teased him the night before about feeling more guilty about stealing fifty bucks’ worth of T-shirts from the U of A bookstore than about skimming millions of dollars from government slush funds. He had explained that he’d been able to make peace with that theft, even though he knew it was a rationalization. He figured, if the government were to know about Drake and his mission, they would have funded him to at least this high of a level.
As they pulled up in front of two stately cherry-wood doors, a good ten or twelve feet tall, two men emerged from the house, weapons drawn. They were dressed casually, but had a hard edge to their features and demeanor. One was thin and wiry while the other, taller man, looked to be a bodybuilder, with his musculature showing even through clothes not designed to put this on display.
“Out,” ordered the bodybuilder, and both Hansen and Erin exited the car, their hands in front of them.
The thinner man looked inside the car, while his partner said, “Open the trunk.”
Hansen studied Apgar’s car remote and pushed a button with a picture of a trunk on it. Both men inspected the trunk, but it was totally empty.
The thinner man now had a phone in his palm. “Any sign they were followed?” he said into it without bringing it any closer to his mouth, indicating it was on speaker.
“No,” said a distant voice. “They look to be clean.”
Both men holstered their weapons. “Sorry about that,” said the thinner man, holding out his hand. “Greg Gibb. I head the security detail.”
After Hansen and Erin had shaken his hand, he gestured to his partner. “And this is Slade Zalinsky,” he added, after which the handshaking ceremony was repeated.
Hansen wasn’t at all surprised that Drake had hired these men to protect this property. He certainly hadn’t skimped on security in Yuma, for all the good it had ended up doing him.
Gibb led them through the towering doors into the house, which was just as spectacular inside as out. “Tough duty,” said Gibb, noticing his guests gawking. “But somebody has to do it.”
As they walked through the residence, Hansen couldn’t help but notice that the spectacular bookshelves they passed were largely empty. No paintings hung on the walls and no knickknacks adorned shelves. Most of the rooms didn’t contain a single piece of furniture. The size and opulence of the mansion was just a cover, ensuring the outer gate and presence of a security detail wouldn’t be out of place. But when Drake had purchased it and the previous owners had moved their belongings out, no one had taken the time to personalize the place in any way.