At sunset, the titanium cube that housed BioGen Research shimmered with a blinding red glare, and bathed the adjacent parking lot in a dark orange color. As president Rick Diehl stepped out of the building, he paused to put on his sunglasses, then walked toward his brand-new silver Porsche Carrera SC. He loved this car, which he had bought the week before in celebration of his impending divorce-

“Fuck!”

He couldn’t believe his eyes.

“Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! ”

His parking spot was empty. The car was gone.

That bitch!

He didn’t know how she had done it, but he was sure she had taken his car. Probably got her boyfriend to arrange it. After all, the new boyfriendwas a car dealer. Moving up from a tennis pro. Bitch!

He stomped back inside. Bradley Gordon, his chief of security, stood in the lobby’s waiting area, leaning over the counter, talking to Lisa, the receptionist. Lisa was cute. That was why Rick had hired her.

“Goddamn it, Brad,” Rick Diehl said. “We need to review security tapes of the parking lot.”

Brad turned. “Why? What is it?”

“Somebody stole my Porsche.”

“No shit,” Brad said. “When did that happen?”

And Rick thought, Wrong guy for this job. It wasn’t the first time he had thought it.

“Let’s check the security tapes, Brad.”

“Yeah, sure, of course,” Brad said. He winked at Lisa, and then headed back through the keycard-swipe door, into a secure area. Rick followed, fuming.

At one of the two desks in the little glass-walled security office, a kid was minutely examining the palm of his left hand. He ignored the bank of monitors before him.

“Jason,” Brad said, in a warning tone, “Mr. Diehl is here.”

“Oh shit.” The kid snapped upright in the chair. “Sorry. Got a rash. I didn’t know if-”

“Mr. Diehl wants to review the security cameras. Which cameras are they exactly, Mr. Diehl?”

Oh Jesus. Rick said, “The parking lot cameras.”

“The parking lot, right. Jason, let’s start forty-eight hours back, and-”

“I drove the car to work this morning,” Diehl said.

“Right, what time was that?”

“I got here at seven.”

“Right. Jason, let’s go back to seven this morning.”

The kid shifted in his chair. “Uh, Mr. Gordon, the parking lot cameras are out.”

“Oh, that’s right.” Brad turned to Rick. “The parking lot cameras are out.”

“Why?”

“Not sure. We think there’s a cable problem.”

“How long have they been out?”

“Well-”

“Two months,” the kid said.

“Two months!”

Brad said, “We had to order parts.”

“What parts?”

“From Germany.”

“What parts?”

“I’d have to look it up.”

The kid said, “We can still use the roof cameras.”

“Well, then show me the roof cameras,” Diehl said.

“Right. Jason, bring up the roof cameras.”

It took them fifteen minutes to rewind the digital storage and begin to run it forward. Rick watched his Porsche pull in. He watched himself get out and enter the building. What happened next surprised him. Within two minutes, another car pulled up, two men jumped out, broke into his car quickly, and drove it away.

“They were waiting for you,” Brad said. “Or following you.”

“Looks like it,” Rick said. “Call the police, report it, and tell Lisa I want her to drive me home.”

Brad blinked at that.

The problem, Rick reflected, as Lisa drove him home, was that Brad Gordon was an idiot, but Rick couldn’t fire him. Brad Gordon, surf bum, ski bum, travel bum, recovering alky and college dropout, was the nephew of Jack Watson, a principal investor in BioGen. Jack Watson had always looked after Brad, had always seen that he had a job. And Brad invariably got into trouble. It was even rumored that Brad had been fucking the wife of the vice president of GeneSystems up in Palo Alto-for which he was duly fired-but not without a big stink from his uncle, who saw no reason why Brad should be let go. “It’s the vice president’s own fault,” Watson famously said.

But now: No security cameras in the parking lot. For two months. It made Rick wonder what else was wrong with security at BioGen.

He glanced over at Lisa, who drove serenely. Rick had hired her to be the receptionist soon after he discovered his wife’s affair. Lisa had a beautiful profile; she could have been a model. Whoever had refined her nose and chin was a genius. And she had a lovely body, with a narrow waist and perfectly enhanced breasts. She was twenty, on her summer break from Crestview State, and she radiated healthy, all-American sexiness. Everyone in the company had the hots for her.

So it was surprising that whenever they made love, Lisa just lay there. After a few minutes she seemed to notice his frustration and would begin to move mechanically, and make little panting sounds, as if she had been told that was what people did in bed. Sometimes, when Rick was worried and preoccupied, she would talk to him, “Oh baby, yes, baby, do it, baby,” as if that was supposed to move things along. But it was only too obvious that she was unmoved.

Rick had done a little research and discovered a syndrome called anhedonia, the inability to feel pleasure. Anhedonics exhibited a flat affect, which certainly described Lisa in bed. Interestingly, anhedonia appeared to have a genetic component. It seemed to involve the limbic system of the brain. So there might be a gene for the condition. Rick intended to do a full panel on Lisa one of these days. Just to check.

Meanwhile, the nights he spent with her might have made him insecure, if it were not for Greta, the Austrian postdoc in the microbiology lab. Greta was chunky and had glasses and short, mannish hair, but she fucked like a mink, leaving them both gasping for breath and covered in sweat. Greta was a screamer and a writher and a howler. He felt great afterward.

The car pulled up at his new condo. Rick checked for his keys in his pocket. Lisa said matter-of-factly, “You want me to come up?”

She had beautiful blue eyes, with long lashes. Beautiful lush lips.

He thought, what the hell. “Sure,” he said. “Come on up.”

He called his lawyer, Barry Sindler, to report that his wife had stolen his car.

“You think so?” Sindler said. He sounded doubtful.

“Yeah, I do. She hired some guys. I have it on security tape.”

“You have her on tape?”

“No, the guys. But she’s behind it.”

“I’m not so sure,” Sindler said. “Usually women trash a husband’s car, not steal it.”

“I’m telling you-”

“Okay, I’ll check into it. But right now, there are a few things I want to go over with you. About the litigation.”

Across the room, Lisa was stepping out of her clothes. She folded each item of clothing and placed it on the back of the chair. She was wearing a pink bra and pink briefs that skimmed her pubic bone. No lace, just stretchy fabric that molded smoothly to her smooth body. She reached behind her back to release the bra.

“I’ll have to call you back,” Rick said.

Endangered Species To “Die Out in 200 Years”

According to the BBC, “a study by experts in Germany suggests people with blonde hair are an endangered species and will become extinct by 2202.” Researchers predicted that the last truly natural blonde would be born in Finland, a country that boasts the highest proportion of blondes. But the scientists say too few people now carry the gene for blondes to last much longer. The researchers hinted that so-called bottle blondes “may be to blame for the demise of their natural rivals.”

Not every scientist agrees with the prediction of impending extinction. But a study by the World Health Organization does indicate that natural blondes are likely to become extinct within the next two centuries.

More recently, the probability of extinction was reviewed byThe Times of London, in light of new data about the evolution of theMC1R gene for blondeness.