Caught in Us (Lost 3)

James gives me a loaded look. I hold his gaze. He and I both know what will happen if locking up Gabe fails. I will have to disappear from Dani's life for good. It won't solve the issue, but it'll hopefully make Gabe leave Dani alone. My presence here is a provocation for Gabe.

"Have you told Dani about Gabe?" James asks.

"No, I wanted to talk to you first."

"That’s a change." His tone holds appreciation.

"I want to make things right this time."

"I'll put some detectives on it immediately. It's best if you talk to them first and tell them everything you know about Gabe's current activities. They'll be here within an hour."

"How do you know?" I ask. "You haven't even talked to them."

He gives me a pointed look. "They will be."

"You know detectives who can be here in an hour?" Serena asks half-amused, half-incredulous. "Who am I marrying?"

James makes the call, and then he and Serena look over some papers again. I catch the words ‘chocolate factory’ and ‘father’.

"I heard your father suffered a heart attack," I say.

"He did," James replies, without looking up from the papers, "and the doctor ordered him to stop working. He actually listened and now Serena and I are looking for someone to take over the reins of the factory."

"Why don’t one of you do it?"

"I don't have time, and Serena already has a job."

"What do you do?" I ask her.

"Investment banking," she replies, just as someone knocks at the door.

"Later," James bellows.

The door opens, and James looks up exasperated. I have a hunch the word ‘later’ doesn't mean much around here. Two twenty-something guys who look like they haven't slept for a while stand in the doorway. One of them carries a laptop.

"We know you're busy, but this is urgent,” one of them says. “If we break through this, we could advance by a month. We need your input on the code."

"Okay, come in." James gives Serena an apologetic look, but she waves him away good-naturedly, continuing to look over the papers by herself.

"You still code yourself?" I ask, impressed. James is something of a legend in Silicon Valley—an exceptionally skilled coder who started his company when he was a few years older than me. I figured he's doing only business stuff by now, leaving the coding to minions.

"Sometimes," he answers.

The guy carrying the laptop places it in front of James while the other one grabs a marker and starts scribbling some lines of code on the whiteboard. James scans the laptop intensively for a few minutes, and then the three of them huddle in front of the whiteboard, each writing snippets in an attempt to find the piece of code they need to move forward. James is very good, but looking at the lines of code, I realize they’re missing s

omething.

I grab a blank sheet of paper and a pen. Blocking out their voices, I focus hard and start writing down possible solutions.

"How about this code sequence?" I hold up the paper.

The three men stop mid-talk, turning to me. James copies the sequence on the board as the other two still look at me in surprise.

"Nah. The repetition happens one sequence too early. It won't—” James stops mid-sentence, drawing a double-headed arrow between two of the lines of code. "But if we inverse this sequences, then it will work. Great job, Damon. Chris, John, what do you say?"

Chris and John stare at the whiteboard suspiciously. Then the guy called Chris says, "I have to run it in the program, but I'm ninety-nine percent sure it will work."

"Is he another prodigy, James?" the guy named John says. "Where do you find them?"