Tau Ceti (an Ell Donsaii story #6) (19 page)

Ell grinned back, “They sound awesome!” She winked, “They must be really great musicians.”

He grinned back, “They are, no doubt.”

She raised an eyebrow, “You don’t think it has anything to do with t
he incredible acoustics of th
is
venue?”

He frowned
and rubbed his chin
as if considering, “Might have a little bit to do with it.” Then he grinned proudly. “So, you like it?” He waved his arm
again
to encompass the bar/venue that was his pride and joy.

“Yeah
! I think it’s amazing.
You sure do have
an
ear for these things.
“
I’m thinking
my friend
Belle’s
crazy aunt isn’t
going to regret her investment?
”

Vic shrugged. “Opening nights can be good and everything can
still
go to crap, but
I
sure
hope not
… Are you gonna dance?
”

Ell laughed, “I think I’ve done
enough
dancing at Gordon’s concerts.”

“No you haven’t! I
know
Gordon’s hoping you’ll dance at this one.
So am I.
He left some space open at the right side of the stage again.”

Ell said, “How ‘bout just you and I dance, then you can tell Gordon I danced at his concert for him.”

“
I
can’t do any of that crazy stuff you do on the dance floor!”

“Let’s just dance like everyone else. I’ve made a spectacle of myself
plenty of
other times.”

Vic shrugged
and moved out through the crowd toward the dance area. Ell followed
,
wondering if she could keep the hoodie up and
try to
remain unrecognized.
Vic
stepped out into the midst of the other dancers, almost all freestyling, and turned to face Ell. They both began moving to the music.

Vic mused that Donsaii didn’t seem to be doing anything complex, just swaying to the music like he was, shuffling her feet a little and
moving
her arms to the beat. But, she did it
so
…
elegantly
. Not different, just better.
So
much better. Her clothing wasn’t sexy, she wasn’t performing any of her unbelievable athletic feats, yet he
just
couldn’t
take his eyes off of her. He looked at her clothing, an ordinary hoodie with
short
t-shirt under and loose pants, not so different from many others in the bar. In fact
,
other than her graceful flat tummy peeking out from under her shirt,
it seemed
something more likely to be worn by a guy than a girl. Yet there was no doubt that she was
a girl. Though you couldn’t see
her very well with the hoodie up
,
you just had a feeling that she was
pretty
. Could it just be because he knew who she was? Vic glanced around and saw that
most of
the people nearby were watching her
, both men and women. He didn’t think they’d recognized her, just that they were fascinated with her graceful
,
though simple dancing
.

Then one of them pointed. Like a ripple around her
,
people began focusing on her
, turning toward her
and obviously recogniz
ing
her. He would have sworn that Donsaii was blushing even though her face was shadowed.
The people around her opened up an area of the dance floor and several waved toward it, obviously hoping that she would dance
one of her
remarkable
dances
again. Instead she
shook her head and
backed up to the edge of the open area as if waiting for someone else to dance in it.
When the song ended Vic took her back to a dark corner of the back bar and
got
her another Coke. Talking to her
he found her to be
very down to earth
, he could see why Gordon thought he was crazy about her
even though Gordon had only spoken a few words to her
.

When Velos took
their next
break, Vic took her back to the band’s dressing room. “Gordon, someone here to see you.”

Gordon turned
, “Ms. Donsaii!”

“Ell
,
please.” Ell said quietly, almost shyly. She turned, “Hi Emma, Joe,” she said, nodding to each of them.

“How do you like the show?
”

“You guys sound great!” She turned and winked at Vic. “I’m thinking that something about the acoustics here is helping?

“Oh yeah,
” Gordon enthused
, coming over to Ell
, “Vic’s helped us tremendously with our sound
out on the road
but this place he’s built is
just amazing
. Everything sounds so clean in here.
We’re hoping to turn out a ‘Live’ album from what we’re recording tonight.”

Ell turned to Vic, “You aren’t manning the mixing board for that?”

He grinned, “Naw, I’ve got the world’s greatest recording engineer doing that tonight.”

Gordon waggled his eyebrows, “His Dad is on the board. He knows more about recording than any
two
ordinary engineers.”

Vic said, “I
was
out there trying to learn from him when the ticket office told me that a certain VIP had picked up her ticket and I went out to look for her. In fact, I’d better get back before he decides I don’t care.”

Once Vic had excused himself Gordon turned to Ell, “Sit, sit. I’ve so wanted to have a chance to get to know you
. First
,
I want to second what the President said about you
…
”

As Ell walked out of
Vic’s
she felt placidly happy.
The music had been great and
talking to Gordon had been a lot of fun, though it
had been
hard not saying something that would give away the fact that she
also
knew him as “Belle.” It had also been difficult resisting his entreaties that she dance on the stage next set.
But she
had
agreed to go out to dinner with him before
Velos’
next concert in
Raleigh
…

Her AI told her that her car
would meet
her around the corner because the street in front of Vic’s was busy
enough that
AI driven cars weren’t allowed to stop there to pick people up.
As she turned the corner onto the street where her car was to meet her she heard steps
jogging up
behind her.
Glancing back
she recognized one of the men who’d been dancing near her when she’d
been on the dance floor
with Vic.

“Ms. Donsaii? Hi, I’m Gary Palot. I’ve admired you for
…
forever
and wondered if I could buy you a cup of coffee?”

Ell smiled at him, “Thank you. I appreciate the offer
,
but I’m pretty tired and
,” she shrugged, “I
don’t even drink coffee.”

His smiling face twisted
fleetingly
, then the smile returned. “Dessert?”

Ell’s eyes narrowed, she hadn’t liked the look that had
momentarily
appeared on his face, but she smiled anyway and shrugged, “No thanks.” She stepped off the curb to walk around to the other side of her car.

“Sam said you were a
bitch
,
but
I didn’t believe him.”

Falling into the zone Ell turned to look at “
Gary
” again. The twisted look was back, occasionally flickering toward a smile
,
then back to
his
uglier aspect.
Gary
reached toward his waistband. Ell stepped toward him, wondering why her life seemed to have so much drama in it. When his hand dipped in and
pulled out a pistol she stepped the rest of the way to him and twisted the gun toward him, loosening his fingers and ripping it out of his grasp. “Call 911,” she said to her AI, stepping back and dropping the gun into her purse. Putting her hands up in a fending off posture she said, “Back off
Gary
, that wasn’t nice.”

Grabbing his right hand in his lef
t,
Gary
said, “You little bitch
!”
Letting go of his hand h
e stepped forward
,
reaching out.

Ell just stepped out of his reach
, speaking slowly so he’d understand
, “
Gary
, calm down. You’re in enough trouble. Don’t make it worse.
”

A familiar
sounding
voice said, “Don’t move
,
bitch
…
”

Ell looked to
Gary
’s right and saw
Bridget’s Sam stepping out of the alley,
right elbow
locked around Emma’s neck.
Some kind of splint was still on his right hand.
The way Emma was leaning back there was no doubt
in Ell’s mind
that
his left hand
had the barrel of a gun pushed into her kidney.

A spike of fear shot through Ell as she saw
the
panic
in
Emma’s
wide
eyes.
She raised her hands, empty palms out, “OK, what do you want?”

“We’re all going to get into your car there
,
Donsai
i. Then w
e’ll
go for a little ride out to your house.”
Sam nod
ded at her car. “Then we’re going to
have a little talk with
my
Bridget
.
You’re gonna
undo whatever
brainwashing you two have done on
her
so
’s
she can come
home
.
”

Ell’s eyes widened, it sounded like Sam was completely out of touch with reality. He’d built an imaginary mental world in which Bridget lived with Ell because she’d been
programmed to do so rather than
because of her fear of Sam. Speaking calmly Ell said, “OK
” and turned to get in the car
. As she opened the door she quietly said, “Allan, blitz,”
which was
the prearranged signal to her AI to contact her security team
and the police
and send a constant audio-video stream to them.
She pondered the
common
advice that you
should never
go anywhere with a kidnapper
. You
didn’t want them
to
take you to an isolated area. However, it sounded like Sam planned to take her to her
own
farm
house
which would allow more of her security team to gather in a location they were familiar with.

Gary got in front with Ell
,
while Sam and Emma got in the back. When the doors closed Ell told the car’s AI, “Take us to my house.”
She took a couple of deep breaths and felt herself drop out of
her
zone
.

As the car started rolling
Gary
reached out and
pulled off
Ell’s
AI headband, “Sorry it has to be this way,
”
he said.
He popped the PGR chip out of her headband but to her relief didn’t look for the
second
hidden chip.
When she looked at him wonderingly he shrugged and said, “If you’d
just
gone for coffee…”

Mentally Ell rolled her eyes, but physically she
just
stared at him, trying not to look as disgusted as she felt.

From the back seat Sam said,
“I’ll bet you girls
thought you’d beaten me for good.” He
giggled, almost hysterically
, “You probably thought that with my hand trashed I wouldn’t be able to do anything to get Bridget
back
out of your clutches.”