Chapter 28

His remaining guards surrounded McGowan as he departed the helicopter. An SUV pulled alongside the chopper. Stone and Danders watched as Straight and Cueball got out and joined the group heading towards them. Straight, Cueball, and McGowan kept moving ahead; the others went to the truck.

“We meet again, Mr. Stone, Mr. Danders,” McGowan said flatly. “Going through a change of life? Seems as though your brains have gotten smaller and your balls bigger.”

Straight was glaring at the two of them, but under control. Cueball seemed spaced out on painkillers.

“I’m not going to have you checked for weapons but I will point out that all of my men have them. So let’s keep our conversation friendly,” McGowan urged.

Seeing that Straight doubted his ability to manhandle him after the altercation in the hospital, Stone checked Cueball, who doubted his ability to keep food down because the drugs he was on were upsetting his system.

McGowan doubted his team. He paid three million dollars in security personnel salaries each year and all of them, even his top men, Straight and Cueball, were incompetent. Yet, he wasn’t concerned. Clearly Stone and Danders were not going to overpower his team, but that was unimportant. It was going to take the person with the sharpest mind, combined with the most tenacity over the next few hours, to gain control of the thought-reading invention. He believed that there was no one stronger mentally, and no one more determined than him. He was not going to let some punk inventors play him.

Punk, huh? We’ll see.

Stone was beginning to have fewer doubts about his plan and getting out of there alive.

Irv, Jerry, and Jonas were hauled out of the back of the truck by the rest of the guards, who mocked them for being overpowered. The three of them didn’t mind. They knew Evan McGowan to be a fair man. He was going to pay them handsomely for capturing Stone and Danders. They kept quiet as they followed everyone else to the front door.

McGowan had alerted his chefs to prepare a sumptuous meal. He was going to give Stone and Danders another taste of the obscenely good life of the wealthiest. He was about to bring everyone into the house when to the surprise of everyone, Lewis strode up the sidewalk of the estate. He told Chapin that he saw no fighting nor any sign of Murphy’s group. She told him to be careful. He told her to pray for justice.

A frowning McGowan told his men to forego frisking Lewis as well. When he got close enough he told Lewis that nothing had changed-he was going to let him use the invention, “in spite of the fact that your listening device was removed from the table you tried to hide it on, you punk.”

Lewis responded with a hearty laugh.

“And here I thought the bug was defective,” he said.

McGowan found no humor in Lewis’ reaction, but he told him that he could join the meeting as long as he did not interrupt the proceedings.

Stone saw by looking at McGowan that Lewis, whoever he was, was in danger by staying; he told Danders.

When he reached the portal, for door was an insufficient word to describe the grandeur of the area surrounding, and including, the entrance to the structure, McGowan turned around to look at the faces of those behind him. His employees looked distracted; Lewis looked amused and optimistic; Stone and Danders were focused and relaxed. To Stone and Danders, McGowan looked like he was in over his head; but Stone saw that McGowan was confident that his practiced demeanor would fool them.

McGowan decided to dismiss his guards as a show of good faith. He told Stone, Danders, and Lewis to grab a drink and something to eat and he’d join them soon.

Lewis introduced himself to Stone and Danders and told them his story, including having met with McGowan before, how he tracked the two of them down, and how Chapin was waiting across the street.

Stone told him he was impressed by his resourcefulness and was glad he was not an enemy. He also mentioned that, in his opinion, the police offered the best way to catch his girlfriend’s killer; but when Lewis stressed that the guy might be a flight risk, Stone and Danders stepped away and spoke quietly in private. They agreed on a plan, which Stone explained to Lewis.

“Mr. Lewis, we will let you use the invention under one condition. You must leave here now, because you are in danger. I’m not making this up to get rid of you. You must believe me. McGowan will never let you use it. Do not be fooled by anything he’s said. Here’s my card with my private phone number. If you haven’t heard from me by this time tomorrow, call me. If I don’t call you back then within an hour, call the police and have them come here. Leave now before McGowan returns. We’ll tell him you said that you went back to get something from your car.”

Lewis deliberated. Danders, not waiting, took Lewis by the elbow, led him to the door, and told him to stay safe. With Chapin’s additional urging in his earpiece, Lewis offered no resistance, and handed his wire to Danders, who whispered “no thanks” in Lewis’ ear, giving it back to him.

McGowan reappeared, wearing casual clothes that cost as much as it takes to feed a family of six for a month. Stone and Danders were seated in chairs in a sunny room overlooking an Olympic sized swimming pool, drinking bottled Bing water, discussing how impressive the rooms of the house were that they had seen, pretending to be jealous of what McGowan had. They were not going to discuss any plans that McGowan could listen to, and he was not surprised that they didn’t. Even his house’s surveillance system couldn’t capture what wasn’t said; with the invention, he would have.

McGowan joined them by the pool. As soon as he sat, he was interrupted by an announcement from his butler that three more people had arrived.

“Who are they?” he asked civilly, although he was pissed at the interruption.

“Ms. Murphy, Mr. Summa, and Mr. Long, sir.”

“What the hell are they doing here?” McGowan wondered aloud.

“Didn’t say, sir, other than asking to join the party. Shall I show them in?”

McGowan deliberated a moment before saying to Stone and Danders,

“I’m sure they can add value to the discussion.”

Stone saw that McGowan was not interested in what they might add, but rather he wanted to have additional people he could test the invention on. He’d get rid of them, literally, as well as Stone and Danders, once he understood how the invention worked.

Regardless of their value at this meeting, Stone had no choice; he didn’t want harm to come to them. He told McGowan that none of the three would contribute anything that he couldn’t provide and would likely delay his training.

And keep your friends from sharing in the sale? Who knows what I might learn if they’re here.

“The more the merrier, I always say, Mr. Stone. Show them in, Bernard.”

Stone shot Danders a look. Danders nodded, knowing that it would be exponentially harder to get five people, not two, out of the house safely.

“Where’s Mr. Lewis?” McGowan asked as they waited for the Murphy trio.

“Said he needed to get something from his car,” Danders answered.

McGowan checked his camera displays. Lewis was not in sight. “That’s all he said?”

“Yeah.”

McGowan was worried that Lewis might blab to the wrong people. He excused himself and spoke with the town’s police chief, his brother Bert, telling him he needed Lewis found.

“Gonna be tough with no idea of what he looks like or what kind of car he’s riding in.”

McGowan sent him a picture of Lewis from his surveillance camera, told him the guy’s first name was Stanley and he lived near the Massachusetts border in northern Connecticut.

“I need him found. Work with the state cops if you have to.”

Bert told his brother that he was getting tired of being a cop, and as payment for this chore, he wanted to become a U.S. Senator. McGowan, who detested the slugs posing as Connecticut Senators, agreed to the demand.

Stone saw the conversation and whispered to Danders that Lewis was in trouble. They both knew that there was nothing they could do to help him. Unless…

“Lewis told me that once you own the invention that you were going to let him use it to catch a killer. That’s magnanimous of you, Mr. McGowan, and will show the public that you will be a good patron of the most important human creation. That knowledge removes any doubt about our decision to be here with you. Are you ready to see what we’ve brought?” Stone asked.

McGowan thanked him for his kind, encouraging words, but Stone saw that he was not going to change his mind about Lewis, and that he didn’t give a damn what he and Danders thought of him.

A broad smile, a hearty “Yes!” and an arm gesture pointing them to another room got Stone and Danders on their feet.

“You can set up here,” McGowan said, pointing to an enormous table in an ornately furnished room that was large enough to make the table look tiny. “But we’ll wait for Ms. Murphy’s group before beginning.”

Stone took the prototype eyeglasses out of his bag and set them on the table for McGowan to see. McGowan noticed how clunky looking they were, nothing like the ones described by Murphy. He reached for them. Stone stopped him.

“You need to be trained first.”

McGowan felt like he was a child being chided. Stone saw the anger in his eyes and the loathing in his mind.

“Consider the cost,” he told McGowan. “Do you want to pick them up and admire them without knowing how they operate?”

“Yeah, I do. You can make me a thousand pairs for what you’re being paid. Let me take a look.”

A test of wills. Stone let him win this one. He handed McGowan the glasses and he slipped them on.

“These freaking things are heavy. I won’t be able to wear them for more than a couple of minutes at a time.”

“Once you start using them you forget you’re wearing them. They never stop being a novelty.”

“How do they work?”

“I thought we were waiting for Murphy.”

We don’t need her, but I did say we’d wait. He removed the glasses and handed them back to Stone.

Murphy, Summa, and Long made a purposefully boisterous entrance to the meeting. They wanted to make everyone think that they were players making a much-anticipated arrival. They fooled no one.

“How’s the face, Mr. Summa?” McGowan asked with a snicker, as the trio was shown into the room.

Summa noticed that none of the guards were present, and while that tempted him to smack the snicker off McGowan’s face, he merely smiled.

Murphy jumped in. “So nice to see you again, Mr. McGowan. And it’s so nice to be with my good friends Jon and Gary again, too. What’s new with you two?”

Her sarcasm was not lost on either of them. When Stone responded with a stare and a smile saying, “I’m trying to stay alive,” it wasn’t lost on her that he likely knew about the discussion she had with her accomplice in the office.

But how?

Long, for reasons known only to himself, was optimistic that this meeting was going to end well for him, and only him. He, too, smiled at McGowan without saying anything; unlike Summa, he gave Danders and Stone robust handshakes, as if to tell them that he had the strength to fight for his view on what should happen to the invention. It was Stone’s turn to wonder.

What is my estranged partner up to now?

Everyone sat. McGowan offered drinks. Only he wanted liquor. Stone took the eyeglasses out of his pocket. Murphy’s eyes widened considerably. She knew they were the original pair. Murphy’s turn again. What is the Stone up to? By the looks on their faces, she knew Summa and Long were aware of it as well. McGowan was obviously again losing patience, but he didn’t care.

“Hurry up,” he demanded of Stone.

“Almost ready,” he answered, as he dragged the process out.

McGowan paced. A guard appeared in the doorway.

“What’s he doing here?” Summa asked, recognizing him as the one who smashed the gun in his face.

“Keeping an eye on things.”

“Send him away. No one’s here to harm you.”

Whatever pretense of civility McGowan had shown initially was gone.

Stone saw that McGowan was thinking of bringing all his guards into the room. He stood.

“Here you are, Evan,” he said, handing him the eyeglasses. “Put them on and look at me.”

McGowan temporarily forgot about the guards. He snatched the glasses out of Stone’s hand and placed them on his nose.

Looking at Stone, he saw ‘the words you see will have an average accuracy rate of fifty%’ displayed on the lenses. He relayed that to Stone, who smiled and said, “It will be a higher percentage soon. We’re working hard to improve the success rate. How does it feel to be the second person in history, that we know of, who has scientifically read someone’s thoughts?”

McGowan saw and heard roughly the same thing. He was impressed. He turned his head towards Murphy. Stone followed suit. She did her best to think of something innocuous. She failed.

Jon is looking really nice. Why haven’t we…

She stopped, smiled, and thought of money.

McGowan realized that she might be messing with his mind. Nothing in his detectives’ reports mentioned a Murphy infatuation with Stone. She may have deliberately made herself think of Stone in that way. If so, then how was he to know that what he was seeing on the eyeglasses display was what the person was truly thinking?

It wouldn’t be a deal-breaker. McGowan would have his scientists further develop and enhance the software.

At least McGowan believed that that would happen.

“It is an odd feeling. I’ve imagined doing it, but the experience is different. I feel like a pioneer and a voyeur at the same time. This is what I hoped for. But of course, it must never be used in a way that harms anyone or violates their privacy of thought,” McGowan replied.

No one in the room needed to be wearing Stone’s contact lens to know that McGowan had uttered an outrageous lie. His intent was to violate the privacy of thought of anyone he chose, and for any reason, starting with Stone.

If Stone had more time, he might have been able to design a mechanism that used some of the contact lens’ power source to make electromagnetic fields capable of interfering with the wearer’s neuronal thought activity while still permitting the wearer to read other people’s thoughts. Then, he’d be able to stymie McGowan’s attempts to read his mind. For now, he had to concentrate on keeping his thoughts devoid of both his plan and McGowan’s thoughts. No point in letting the guy who thinks he’s reading your thoughts know that you’re reading his as well.

Stone’s Buddhist meditation served him well as he saw McGowan’s thoughts but did not think them, allowing McGowan to see them. Instead, he processed, stored, and hid them inside the temporal lobe of his brain. McGowan, having no knowledge of Stone’s contact lens, was at a disadvantage for which Stone was grateful.

Danders, who introduced Stone to Buddhist meditations, easily hid his thoughts from McGowan, further perplexing him.

Murphy might be playing with my head, and now Stone and Danders are hiding their thoughts altogether?

McGowan took the glasses off and set them on the table. Stone saw that he was seething inwardly, upset that he was having this much trouble reading thoughts, and wondering if this invention was the weapon he craved.

He excused himself, saying that he had to make an important phone call, and telling his guests to help themselves to the food and drinks being brought into the room by his attractive waitresses.

“Is there a problem, Evan?” Stone asked. “The demonstration is nearly over; don’t you want to finish before we eat? Besides, some of us may be distracted by all this food and drink, some by the beautiful women serving them, or both. We’ll never get back to the invention,” he deadpanned.

Shut up, goddamn you, Stone. I don’t need your bullshit. I gotta talk to my science people right away.

“I like your sense of humor, Jon. The most important invention ever, and we’ll have a hard time getting back to it. Hahaha, you’re a truly funny guy,” McGowan said, excusing himself. God, how can such a smart guy be so stupid, Stone saw him think.

Stone gave Murphy, Long, and Summa a quick look. Murphy was deciding whether to drink hard liquor or wine; Long was asking a waitress if any of the dishes were low salt and bland; Summa was thinking that he had died and gone to heaven. He was trying to figure out if it was two, or three buttons, which were holding the skimpy waitress uniforms on to the six lovelies hovering about the table.

Summa quickly downed three beers and needed to go to the bathroom. Getting up from the table, he managed to catch his foot on the leg of the chair and stumbled into a tall, blonde waitress, knocking her and a tray of dirty dishes onto the floor. Summa was not the least bit embarrassed by what he had done. He initially yelled at the waitress for being so clumsy, but seeing her on her back with food scraps and half-finished drinks splashed all over her, he ineptly attempted to help her up. He thought he was about to make a new friend. He was wrong. The waitress was already trying to stand up when Summa put his arm around her. Her skimpy uniform was finding it difficult to keep her covered as she slipped on the now wet floor, dragging Summa down and on top of her.

Summa liked where he landed, on top of her ample breasts, forcing them out of her clothes. He was about to get familiar when a sudden smack to the back of his head forced him to roll off the young lady and slowly get to his feet. He was face to face with the guard who had hit him in the face with his own gun on Summa’s last visit to McGowan’s. The guard wore his familiar smirk. Summa wore traces of a sesame oil chicken wings appetizer on his clothes. He also briefly wore a smile of relieved recognition, similar to the guard’s smirk, before he punched the guard in the face, sending him reeling into the waitress, who was busy pushing body parts back into her uniform. The other waitresses, coming to the aid of their friend, were having none of this. They gathered around her, providing a screen to let her fix her clothing, then got between Summa and the guard to try to prevent them from going after each other.

Long, the sideshow, the laughing and urging the waitresses to kick some ass amused everyone except Stone, who was concentrating on what the guard was thinking, hoping he could exploit the incident and have him and Summa removed from the grounds. He didn’t need to.

McGowan stormed back into the room, unable to contain his anger and frustration.

“Goddamn it, I leave you assholes alone for 5 minutes and you start fighting? This is the most important meeting the world has ever known and you can’t act civilly? Never mind, it was a stupid question.”

Speaking into his wireless ear communication system, he told someone to come and escort both men outside. McGowan told the offending guard that his final paycheck would be mailed and not to use McGowan as a reference.

Standing eyeball-to-eyeball Summa he said,

“My men will shoot you if you come back here.”

Summa, more angry than embarrassed at his predicament, shot a glance at Murphy as he walked out. She looked the other way. Summa got ready for what was going to happen when he and the guard got outside. Murphy got ready to listen to what she believed was going to be a lively discussion between McGowan and Stone, especially since she wasn’t going to see Summa get his ass kicked.

“I gotta piss,” Summa said.

His escort didn’t acknowledge him.

“Be easier on you if I use the bathroom rather than piss on the floor.”

This was the second time in an hour that the guard heard some guy threatening to deposit excretions on the grounds. It put him in an acrid disposition.

“No bathroom. You piss on the floor I will roll your body in it until your clothes are soaked and then I’ll throw you into the street. Tie it in a knot and shut up.”

The guard who had hit Summa with his gun laughed heartily, as did everyone else within earshot.

Stone knew that his onetime friend was in trouble. The two guards were going to gang up on Summa as soon as the three of them got outside, and probably more guards would join in.

“The most important meeting in the history of the world cannot be remembered also as the one where someone was killed,” he said, loud enough for all to hear.

McGowan exploded. “Give me those goddamn glasses, Stone. I want to try them, now! No more bullshit. Let Summa leave by himself,” he instructed the guard.

After being shown the door, Summa left the estate without further incident, having come to the same conclusion as Stone about more guards being likely to show up if he dallied. Before going to his car and driving off, forcing Murphy and Long to find their own way home, he took a long, beer-fueled piss on the flowers near the entrance. Then he flipped the finger to the cameras. There was no doubt now that if he was going to share in the riches of the invention, it would only be because of Stone’s beneficence.

McGowan was given the glasses. It took five minutes to show him how to properly handle and store them, and the demonstration was over. Stone saw that McGowan confirmed being pleased having proof of their capabilities but frustrated that the ratio of correct reads was only 50%, and that people were able, apparently, to hide their thoughts.

“As I mentioned, a significant improvement to the ratio of correct reads is forthcoming. In addition, the improved ratio will lessen the ability of the subject to hide thoughts simply because having the ability to hide them is your mistaken explanation of what you are experiencing. If half of what you see is incorrect, then your conclusion is the subject is fooling you. When you can read with a 98% accuracy rate, there’s no way the subject can confuse you,” Stone explained.

Stone’s duplicitous comments should have sidetracked no one, especially someone as intelligent as McGowan. But they did. McGowan’s thoughts were on how quickly his programmers could make the changes he wanted to the software, knowing that none of them had experience with any aspect of the invention. He questioned his idea of keeping Stone and Danders around; his intention had been to do to them what they did to Straight: kidnap and isolate them until the sale was complete and McGowan could finish his takeover of the country. Then he’d release them. Their value would be gone and their story would not be believed.

But now, he needed to keep them by his side and do what McGowan’s programmers could not provide right away: give him the invention his way.

So how am I going to make them willing participants in their own kidnapping?

Stone saw McGowan’s thoughts and breathed a sigh of relief; he was going to get all of his friends safely out of McGowan’s house. Getting himself and Danders out safely was another matter.

“Listen, I’ve seen enough to conclude the purchase of the invention,” McGowan informed his guests. “I’m sure that Mr. Stone and Mr. Danders can handle this by themselves; Ms. Murphy and Mr. Long, please finish your meals and go home. Thank you for coming. It’s unlikely that we shall meet again; I wish you all the best.”

Murphy laughed in response; Long smiled and shook his head ‘no’. Murphy said that she couldn’t trust Stone to tell her the sale price. Long agreed.

“We’re talking trillions of dollars. Does it matter?” asked Stone, whose focus was on getting them both safely out of McGowan’s.

Long, Stone saw, was not concerned about the sales price. He resented being subjected to McGowan’s ridicule on his previous visit, and was more interested in payback. Long didn’t think now of how he would exact his revenge, having determined that previously. Stone moved ahead.

When no one responded, Stone jumped in and said,

“They must be ready to leave.”

“Not me,” answered Long. “I think Mr. McGowan will use the invention for evil purposes. He has to convince me otherwise.”

Maybe McGowan would have reacted differently if Long had responded tactfully. But he didn’t, and he and Murphy were hastily shown the door.

“My offer is two trillion dollars,” McGowan told Stone, “with one catch: you must live here until you and Danders give me the product I want. I need the higher percentage of successful thought readings, and I need a way to get past a person’s defenses that do not allow me to read their thoughts, such as the ones all of you have used since your arrival, with what appears to be varying degrees of success.”

“Live here?” Danders asked with a laugh.

“Block thought-reading capability? That can’t be done,” Stone stated. “Not yet anyway, not by us. Are you working with someone else?”

As the group that was bringing the invention to market, Stone considered the possibility that McGowan, or anyone, was working with someone else to be remote. The thought that it possibly was not caused him grave concern—McGowan might be able to harness the power of it much sooner than anticipated and use it for god knows what.

McGowan feigned being offended by Stone’s question.

“There is no one else to work with, even if I wanted to.”

Stone saw the names of two people flash through McGowan’s mind. He recognized them as experts and competitors. He felt that he was more gifted intellectually than either, but if they worked as a team, they had an advantage over him. His concern was validated.

“Let’s get the financial transfers started,” he said in an effort to conclude the sale and get out.

“No money changes hands until what I need gets done. I know that neither of you have children so there’s no reason to leave. There’s no time to waste; someone else may be ready to release their version of the invention and I cannot allow that to happen.”

Stone looked at Danders who nodded. They knew what each other were thinking.

“Then there is no deal,” Stone answered abruptly. “What we’ve brought to you is the best. It will be improved and it will evolve quickly, but Gary and I won’t be involved in that. Pay us or we’ll take the invention and leave.”

“You know I can’t let you do that. It’s impossible for you to leave. If you don’t cooperate, I will bring your friends back and torture them in front of your eyes until you work with me, or you will watch them die. If you can stomach seeing that and still don’t cooperate, you will also face the same fate.”

“You’re bluffing. You can’t kill five people and get away with it,” Danders said.

Stone saw that McGowan wasn’t bluffing.

A look of disdain showed on McGowan’s face.

“I can have your friends back here within an hour. Once my men pick them up they will never be released. You’re wasting time. What is your decision?”

“For all we know you haven’t let our friends get away from here, and you’re hiding them. I cooperate, they die anyway, and we know nothing of it. Or, you have let them go, only to kill them after we give you what you want. For that matter, you will kill us all once you have what you want, and you won’t get caught. No deal.”

McGowan spoke into his microphone. A moment later an aide entered the room, carrying a meat cleaver. Eyes fixed on Stone’s, McGowan told him,

“First the hand, then the head.”

To drive home the point, McGowan and the aide grabbed Danders right arm and held it tightly against the table. Danders could fight his way out of this now, but not if several guards showed up to help. The cleaver was raised.

“Let him go. We’ll do as you wish.”

Long and Murphy crossed the street. Summa was gone.

“You’re on your own, kid,” Long told her. “Get yourself a ride. Go home”

“What are you going to do?”

“I’m going home and waiting for Stone to contact me. He’ll get the money.”

Murphy called for a ride and began walking toward the pick-up spot.

Long made a call, walked a half-mile in the other direction to get out of the range of McGowan’s cameras, and waited. A few minutes later, Stanley Lewis drove his car up to the curb. Long got in the back seat behind Sharon Chapin.

“We have to get them out of there,” Long said, nodding acknowledgement of Chapin, who had turned around with a smile to greet him.

“Based on what Stone told me, I asked Sharon to get in touch with some law enforcement friends she has, people not owned by McGowan,” Lewis responded.

“I have a friend in the Department of Homeland Security,” Chapin explained. “I filled her in on what’s going on, and because the invention is a threat to the security of our country, she has jurisdiction over other law enforcement agencies, although any kidnapping issues will be handled by the FBI or local officers. She is waiting for us outside McGowan’s.”

“What’s her name?” Long asked.

“Estelle Cardona.”

“Let’s go meet this Estelle Cardona,” Long replied.