“No, nothing like that. Just some off-the-record phone calls and e-mails.”

“Well, somebody knew he was involved.”

“How?”

“Don't know. Could be something as simple as a tap on your phone or a bug in your office. Or in his.”

They were quiet for a moment. Ben yawned and said, “I need some sleep. We'll figure out more in the morning.”

Alex felt awkward. He didn't want Ben to have to pay for a room. He'd already paid for a plane ticket. “Did you take a room here? Or-”

“I'll just crash on the couch, okay?”

One of Ben's little games. Acting like he was putting himself out, careful not to accept anything that could get in the way of the routine.

“Suit yourself,” Alex said. “You flew a long way, right? All the way from wherever.”

Alex woke up the next morning and noticed the sound of the shower running. He sat up and glanced at the bedside clock. Six-thirty. Looked like they were going to get an early start. He was surprised he hadn't heard Ben get up. Ordinarily, Alex was a light sleeper.

He walked over to the bathroom in his underwear and tried the door. It was locked. Damn, he had to take a leak. He knocked and said, “Ben, hurry up,” and was immediately struck by how strange it was. They'd always shared, and often fought over, a bathroom when they were kids, and here they were doing it again.

He opened the blinds and looked out. The sun was just coming up and the sky was scudded with long pink clouds. He stood and watched for a moment, rubbing his bare shoulders. He felt disoriented. He should be in his house, getting ready to go to work. The need to get to the office, to be back in his life, was strong.

The shower stopped. Alex turned and walked past the couch. Ben's bag was open on it. Alex saw clothes, a paperback book…

Was that a gun?

He looked closer. It was a gun, small and black. Jesus Christ, Ben had a gun? With him?

The bathroom door opened and Ben walked out, a towel around his waist, a bundle of clothes in his arm. “All yours,” he said.

“You have a gun?”

Ben walked right past, barely looking at him. “Of course.”

“With you?”

“Where else would I want it?”

Jesus, it was like the guy who answered Why do you rob banks? by saying, That's where the money is.

“What I mean,” Alex began, then thought better of it. But wait. “If you're supposed to have it with you, why didn't you take it into the bathroom?”

Ben dropped the clothes he had in his arm onto the couch and like a magic trick was left holding another gun, larger than the one Alex had seen a moment earlier. “The other is backup,” he said. “I wear it on the small of my back. I don't usually bring two into the bathroom.”

“You can travel with them? On airplanes?”

“Sometimes. When I can't, I can have them waiting for me.”

Alex wanted to ask more-Waiting for you how? By whom?-but decided not to. He couldn't get over the idea of his brother carrying a gun. Make that two guns. Of course, intellectually it made sense. Ben was some kind of undercover soldier. But still.

He used the toilet, brushed his teeth, showered, and dressed. Ben paused just before opening the door and said, “Here's what I want to do first. Give the valet this ticket and have him bring around my rental car. I'm going to stroll by your car and have a look around the places I would wait if I were hoping to ambush you. If someone's waiting and he or they don't look right, maybe I persuade one of them to take a ride with us.”

“Persuade them?”

“Do I need to paint you a picture, Alex? Just drive the rental around. If I'm alone, pick me up. If I'm not, pop the trunk. Ask the right person the right questions in the right way and we can find out where your problems are coming from, and why. Isn't that what you want?”

“Yeah, but-”

“But what?”

“Look, I don't want to get mixed up in-”

“You're already mixed up in it. What you want to do is get out.”

“What are you saying? You want me to help you… kidnap someone? In the parking lot of the Four Seasons Hotel in Palo Alto?”

“No, what are you saying? You expect me to do the dirty work for you? Is that it?”

“I don't…” He stopped, unsure what to say next. This was happening too fast. Ben wasn't really proposing to kidnap someone, was he?

Ben laughed. “You're just like the politicians, Alex. You want something done but you won't let people do it right. You think you can pick up a turd from the clean end? It doesn't work that way.”

“That's not what I'm-”

“Yes, it is. I'm sick of liberals who've never even seen a gun, let alone handled one under adrenal stress, trying to crucify cops for not shooting the knife out of the bad guy's hand. Trying to prosecute soldiers who put an extra bullet into Achmed after he goes down, never even thinking to ask whether it was that extra bullet that stopped the fucker from detonating an explosive vest. You can live in that fantasy world if you want, but how about just a little bit of gratitude for the people who make it possible for you? Who do all that dirty work so you can go on pretending you're clean?”

“What do you want, a shiny gold star?” Alex said, louder than he'd been intending. “You volunteered for what you do, right? You get a salary, don't you? Sure, I'm glad people join the army so I don't have to, but I could say the same for people who mine coal. Why do you deserve special dispensation?”

Ben shook his head. “But you don't tell miners how to mine, do you? You don't tell them to try doing it without getting coal dust under their nails. So where do you get your amazing expertise about my business? I have to put up with that shit on CNN all the time and I'm not going to put up with it from you.”

They stood looking at each other for a moment. Alex thought of a few rejoinders. But they all felt childish, and what was the point, anyway?

Ben glanced at his watch as though longing for some other place to be. “I'm going to walk past your car now,” he said, “just to see if anyone is waiting there to kill you. I'll check the lobby, too. Give me a one-minute head start so we don't get seen together.” He handed the valet ticket to Alex, checked through the peephole, and left.

Alex waited a moment, fighting the urge to pick something up and throw it, then went out. He took the elevator down to the lobby, looking around cautiously as he emerged. It was empty. Christ, was this what it was going to be like from now on? Constantly wondering whether some guy reading a newspaper in a lobby was there to kill him? He didn't think he could live that way.

He gave the valet the ticket. The guy left and was back in two minutes with a gray Taurus. Anonymous looking, Alex thought. This is how Ben lives.

He got in and drove around the corner. Ben was standing near the M3, alone. Alex pulled over and Ben got in. He said, “Drive me to your office. Go south on Page Mill, not the direction you would take from the house.”

Alex almost asked how Ben knew where the office was, but then remembered: he'd checked the Web site. And of course he knew the terrain. He'd grown up here, too.

They drove in silence. When they got to the Sullivan, Greenwald parking lot, Ben said, “Drive past wherever you usually park but don't stop. Let's see what we see.”

Alex did as he asked. It was just after seven, and there weren't many cars in the lot.

“See that one there?” Ben asked. “The Jaguar. See how the hood and the windows are covered with dew? That's been there all night. No one could see out of it. For us that means it's safe.”

“That makes sense.”

“What we're looking for is a car that was driven this morning. Most obviously, one that has the engine running to keep the occupant warm and the windows from fogging up. But I don't see anything that applies.”