Silken Prey

does databases.”
    “He’s really good?”
    “Lucas, the guy’s a legend,” ICE said. “He not only does databases, he does everything. There’s a story—it might not be true—that Steve Jobs was afraid that Microsoft’s new operating system would crush the life out of Apple. This was back in the late nineties, or maybe 2000. So Jobs asked Kidd to help out, and Kidd supposedly said he’d see what he could do. The next Microsoft release . . . well, you’ve heard of Windows ME?”
    “Sort of.”
    “It did more damage to Windows’ reputation among consumers than anything before or since,” ICE said. “It sucked. It worse than sucked. Supposedly, Kidd had a finger deep in its suckedness.” She hesitated, then said, “Of course, that might all be a fairy tale.”
    Lucas said, “Well, I guess I’ll give him a call.”
    “Say hello for me,” ICE said. “Tell him if he ever ditches his wife, I’m around.”
    “That way, huh?”
    “He is
so
hot . . . don’t even get me started.”
    •   •   •
    H OT? K IDD?
    Lucas had never thought of Kidd as hot, or even particularly good-looking. He certainly didn’t know anything about fashion—Lucas had never seen him in anything but jeans and tennis shoes and T-shirts or sweatshirts, sometimes with the sleeves cut off. Weather gave money to the Minneapolis Institute of Art, quite a lot of money, and they’d once gone to a function that specified business casual dress, and Kidd was there . . . in jeans, running shoes, and a sweatshirt, but with the sleeves intact. He said it was casual, for his business.
    Still, in regard to his hotness . . . Weather seemed to enjoy Kidd’s company. A lot. Sort of like she enjoyed the company of Virgil Flowers, another predator, in Lucas’s opinion. And Kidd had a wife who was herself so hot, in Lucas’s view, that she was either far too good for the likes of Kidd, or . . .
    Kidd had something that Lucas didn’t recognize. Not that there was anything wrong with that, Lucas thought.
    •   •   •
    L UCAS DUG K IDD’S PHONE number out of his desk and called him. Kidd picked up: “Hey, Davenport,” he said. “Wasn’t there, didn’t do it.”
    “How’s Lauren?” Lucas asked.
    “Who wants to know? And why?”
    “Just making small talk,” Lucas said. “I need to talk to you . . . about computers. A friend told me that you understand databases.”
    “What friend?”
    “Ingrid Caroline Eccols.” There followed a silence so long that Lucas finally asked, “You still there?”
    “Thinking about ICE,” Kidd said. “So, what’s the situation?”
    “I’d rather explain it in person,” Lucas said. “But time is short. Would you be around tomorrow, early afternoon?”
    “Yeah, but ICE isn’t invited.”
    “She’s a problem?”
    “I couldn’t even begin to explain the many ways in which she could be a problem,” Kidd said.
    “Okay. She’s not invited,” Lucas said.
    “Can Lauren sit in?”
    Lucas hesitated, then said, “It’s a very confidential matter.”
    “She’s a very confidential woman,” Kidd said. “And if it’s that confidential, I’d rather she hear about it. You know, in case I need a witness at some later date.”
    “Then fine, she’s invited, if she wants to be there.”
    “Oh, she’ll be there,” Kidd said. “She thinks you’re totally hot.”
    •   •   •
    T OTALLY HOT.
    Everybody was hot, everybody was rich. Better than chasing chicken thieves in Black Duck, Lucas thought, as he settled at his desk with the file from Whidden.
    The file looked pretty good, until he opened it. Once opened, half of it turned out to be printouts of 911 conversations, repetitive reports on the seizing of the computer from the campaign offices, and reports of conversations and interviews with office personnel, most of whom knew nothing whatever, and an interview with Brittany Hunt, the volunteer who found the pictures.
    Hunt was twenty and had been working as a volunteer since June, and would return to college—Sarah Lawrence—the following winter, having spent half a year working on the campaign.
    She knew only slightly more than the completely ignorant office employees. She’d had a report on the ten-year cost of proposed bridge repairs, for which Smalls had gotten appropriations from the feds. She’d walked into his office a little after ten o’clock in the morning, and since Smalls himself had ordered the report, she’d placed it where