Solomon's Throne Read Online Free Page B

styled. Now, however, his tie was loose and flipped over his shoulder. His jacket was tossed onto a coffee table, apparently over a cold cup of coffee. His hair was spiked up on one side from running his hand through it.
    “Sir?” Gideon stood just inside the door.
    With a wild gesture, Xavier waved Gideon to the leather sofa. “Sit. Sit. Meu Deus!” He started pacing again while Gideon sat down.
    “I understand the Lisbon office has had a burglary?” Gideon felt off balance at Xavier’s obvious distress. He had never seen this man, normally a powerful, confident presence in any room, come unglued. He wasn’t sure what to make of it, and what, short of the murder of a loved one, could have caused it. “Was anyone injured?”
    Xavier sat in the leather armchair as if his legs had been cut out from under him, energy sapped. “No. No one was there. The system failed, but felizmente no one was at the office. It was quite early this morning…” He rolled his head back and forth against the chair, the disbelief and anger all too visible.
    “I have not yet spoken to the police detective. They called, of course, to report the break in, and they have one of the thieves in custody. Emil de Castro has been at the office, and has talked to the detective in charge. Only one vault was broken into…” He stopped, words temporarily failing him. “The system was supposed to work! Droga! The vault that was hit has a 28 number code. The code is random, and is changed every week. I know it, and the security firm’s computer that generates it knows it, and no one else is supposed to be able to discover it.” He sighed. “In addition, my fingerprint is required. In order to thwart someone trying to remove my finger, the scanner requires that the finger exert a calibrated amount of pressure, as well as my exact body temperature. There is, of course, a randomized laser nest throughout the vault room, as well as a live camera feed over each individual vault, with a fish eye lens that can capture 18” around each unit. Each vault has its own keypad and code. To even enter the basement, which was originally a root cellar and is made of thick stone, there is a keypad with a 14 digit code. The rest of the house has a standard but high end system of glass break sensors, motion detectors, and door and window sensors. All of that was breached. All of it. Inconvievable.”
    Gideon just stared. It was obviously an inside job. If the only person in Xavier International who knew the codes was Luis Xavier, then de Castro had a breach. But that alone couldn’t be what had caused this earthquake in his boss’s demeanor.
    “What was stolen, sir?”
    “Something that has been in my family many generations. It is…secret. I do not know how anyone could have known what it was, or that it was there. But they must have. They must have.”
    “Yes sir, I would say that is the only conclusion, since that was the only thing taken. Someone knew something—at least that there was one vault with especially valuable contents. With the additional security on that vault… Well, it would be a logical conclusion.”
    Xavier closed his eyes. “I am praying that it was an educated guess by someone connected to the security firm. The only people, besides myself, who know what that vault contained are my own family… My wife. My son.” He rubbed his forehead. “That is all. That is all…”

    “So he wouldn’t tell you what was stolen?” Rei Quinn asked her husband, looking at him over her cup of coffee. They were sitting at a table at the Serpentine Bar and Kitchen in Hyde Park, taking their lunch hour together.
    “Not yet. He wants me to talk to Emil de Castro, and to the police detective. He’s trying to find out if the thieves knew what they was taking, or if they were just running a gamble that it was something big. He knows he’ll have to tell someone eventually, if he has any hope of getting it back…” He forked some beef pie into his