A place for everyone. Help for everyone. Open spaces, inviting spaces.
A place to grow.
Maybe. Or maybe just a rusting hulk with my grave out back, Serenity thought.
Somebody bumped her from behind.
“Hey,” said Doom. “Nobody should have a smile as big as yours this early.”
“That’s the first-floor smile. Wait until you see my seven-story smile.”
Doom nodded. “I look forward to it. Six more days.”
“If we can hold the fort that long.”
“Fort-holding is our new job?”
“Hold the fort while we build the shining city behind it. That’s why we’re divvying things up.”
“You want Joy to be in charge of holding the old library together and me to set up things for the new library so we’re ready to transition, while you fight the war?”
“Yeah.”
“Okay. I’m packing new programs into as many places as I can in the old MAD to get them up and running, ready to move into the new MAD, but we’re running out of room. What do you think about renting a couple of trailers for overflow?”
“Don’t rent, buy. When we’re done, we’ll put them around town as little pocket libraries and help centers.”
“Good idea. We can put a couple of them in the poor areas.”
“Rich areas, too. I want garden clubs and bank presidents to rely on the MAD, too. They need to stop feeling like libraries are something they have to pay for to help others. Keep me posted. I’ll be spending most of my time here getting the MAD built. And trying to protect the money.”
“Keep Bentley’s hands off this.”
“Bentley and anyone else. But I need to find out where the money is coming from. You and Joy keep the library running. Keep Faulkner fed, but don’t give him too much rum. And, I’ve got one more guerrilla operation for you.”
She opened her notebook and took out a slip of paper. “That account made the last deposit to the Residuals fund.”
“How’d you find that? I looked for the deposit history last night, and it looks like it gets wiped after each deposit. The little Residuals account should have pennies, but instead it has millions. No record of how it gets there, it just does.”
“Well, they missed a spot somewhere. Do you think your library hacker club can find out who owns that account?”
“Aye, aye, captain.”
Burroughs came up. “Told you, you need a hard hat.”
“Sorry. I got distracted. I’ll get one now.”
He pulled a pink hard hat out from behind his back. “Figured you’d be spending a lot of time underfoot here. The boys painted you a special hat.” He handed it to her. “Asked me whether to put “Hammer” or “Serenity” on it. Figured this was the right title.”
Serenity looked at the label of “Boss” and tried it on.
thirty-eight
mountains and mohammed
SERENITY WAS ON THE SECOND FLOOR when she heard a familiar voice behind her. “If the mountain won’t come to Mohammed.” She turned, and saw Joe’s head was at her knee level, climbing up the ladder to the second story. He rose until his head was even with hers, then kept rising above her. Finally, he stepped off the platform.
“Then Mohammed must go to the mountain.” He smiled. A little forced, a little weak-hopeful, and a little tough-defensive all at once.
He looked like the big little-boy she had fallen in love with, and she hugged him.
“Honey, I’m sorry,” she said. “This is hard.”
“Everything’s hard when I don’t have my Sweetblossom on my side. I’ve been going crazy imagining all the things you can’t tell me.”
“Don’t. It’s… complicated.”
“Always is.” He studied her face before she turned away.
There was nothing for her to say.
“Okay,” he said. “How’s this? I’ll be at Stem and Stein tonight at five o’clock, if you want to talk. You don’t show, I’ll go stay at Rick’s until we work things out. Be at Stem and Stein every night waiting for you.”
“Oh, Joe, don’t make such a big deal out of this.”
He pulled back. “When you’re married to a woman twice as good and twice as smart and twice as hot as you are, you worry every day. When she kicks you out of her bed, you worry a lot.”
“Joe, you’re being silly… wait, you see me that way?”
“I’m not blind.” He waved his hands. “All of this costs a lot. Only one man in Maddington County has this kind of money, and it’s from drugs. And he’s also a lady’s man who hates me.”
“Joe, no—”
He stepped away and put his hand on the ladder. “Five o’clock. Every night until I know what’s going on.”
Then he was gone. But the line of men waiting to see Serenity was not.
“Boss,” the IT guy said, “we haven’t talked, but I’m assuming you want the same kind of internet service you had at the library before? Shared DSL?”
Serenity focused and said, “Crappy service barely good enough for a couple of people to check email at once? Hell, no.”
“Bandwidth costs money.”
“Spend it. And when it comes to equipment, don’t rent, buy. Today. What would we need if we were a high-tech corporation?”
“T1 line. At least.”
“Suppose we had twenty high-tech startups working at once? And a digital film studio?”
“Multiple scalable T1s.”
“And suppose we offered free Wi-Fi satellite hotspots around town?”
He swallowed. “Then I would have to get smarter.”
“Get smarter, today. Tomorrow morning, I want to see this starting. Not options, not plans. I want to see wires going in. Clear?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Seth Burroughs elbowed his way to the front of the line.
“Boss, we’ve got a problem.”
“Then let’s fix it.”
Burroughs snorted. “This may be beyond your superpowers, Boss. Rain coming in Friday. We’re going to lose most of that day. Nothing in your bag of tricks for that.”
“We’ve got money. Lot you can do with that.”
“Can’t stop the rain.”
“No.” She paused. “But—what do people do when they want to cover the outside in a hurry? They put up a tent.”
Burroughs said, “You think we run over to Cabela’s and pick up a couple of pup tents? Maybe get umbrellas for the men?”
“No. Bigger. Like circus tents. Big circus tents. Got to be someplace that makes them. We don’t need quality—we only need them for a week—just big. And fast. Your engineers can figure how to put a tent up on top and keep moving it up with each floor.”
“Take time to make it and get it here.”
“Not if the tent company wants more money than they’ve ever seen. Remember, Seth, you’ve got money. You don’t have time.”
“Maybe,” he pulled on his chin. “By Friday.”
“Definitely,” she said, “by tomorrow.”
There was a tug at her sleeve. “Ma’am,” the man said, “there’s someone yelling for you down below.”
Serenity nodded and walked to the open edge and looked down. Doom was standing on the ground looking up.
“Ms. Hammer,” she yelled, “I’ve got news.”
thirty-nine
goddamned army desk
DOOM GAVE SERENITY THE WORD before she was off the ladder.
“Ms. Hammer, we’re not going to be able to find out who tried to make that withdrawal last night.”
Joy walked up and joined them. “Bahama banks are the new version of Swiss banks. Even the government, with warrants and double-naught spies, can’t find out who owns what there.”