At All Costs

"No, thank you, Chief. I've seen enough. Head straight on to the flagship; Captain Cardones is expecting me in time for lunch."

"Aye, aye, Ma'am."

The pi

"Dr. Illescue! Dr. Illescue, would you care to comment on the press accounts of Duches Harrington's pregnancy?"

Franz Illescue walked stolidly across the Briarwood lobby, ignoring the shouted questions.

"Dr. Illescue, are you prepared to confirm that Earl White Haven is the father of Duchess Harrington's child?"

"Dr. Illescue! Isn't it true Prince Michael is the child's father?"

"Are you prepared to categorically deny that the father is Baron Grantville or Benjamin Mayhew?"

"Dr. Illescue-!"

The lift doors cut off the hullabaloo, and Illescue keyed his personal com with an almost savage thumb jab.

"Security, Meyers," a voice responded instantly.

"Tajman, this is Dr. Illescue." The fury seething in Illescue's normally controlled baritone was almost palpable. "Will you please explain to me what the hell that... that three-ring circus in our lobby is about?"

"I'm sorry, Sir," Meyers said. "I wasn't aware you were coming in through the public entrance, or I would have at least warned your driver. They descended on us right after lunch, and so far, they haven't committed any privacy violations. According to SOP, I can't bar them from the public area of the facility until they do."

"Well, as it happens, I wrote the damned SOP," Illescue half-snarled, "and as of now, you can bar those jackals from any part of this facility until Hell's a hockey rink! Is that perfectly clear?!"

"Uh, yes, Sir. I'll get on it right away, Sir."

"Thank you." Illescue's voice was marginally closer to normal as he broke the circuit and inhaled deeply.

He leaned back against the wall of the lift car and rubbed his face wearily.

He and Meyers were no closer to finding the leak than they'd been when they began, and the story was ballooning totally out of control. Not that he'd ever had much hope of controlling it in the first place. The press was working itself up to a feeding frenzy, and the most preposterous speculation imaginable-as the shouted question in the lobby indicated-had become rampant. At least he'd spoken to both Doctors Harrington, unpleasant though it had been, and he felt reasonably confident neither of them thought it had been his doing, but that didn't make him feel much better. Even though he was prepared to dislike Duchess Harrington because of her parentage, she was a patient. She had a legal and moral right to privacy, to trust that doctor-patient confidentiality would not be violated, and it had been. It was almost like a form of rape, even if the assault was non-physical, and he would have been coldly, bitterly furious in any patient's case. In this instance, given the prominence of the patient in question and the way that prominence was goading the newsies speculations, his emotions went far beyond fury.

Franz Illescue was not a man with much use for the custom of dueling, even if it was legal. But in this case, if he could find out who was responsible, he was prepared to make an exception.

"Welcome back," Michelle Henke said with a smile as Andrew LaFollet peeled off at her day cabin's hatch and Honor and Nimitz stepped through it.

"Thanks." Honor crossed the cabin and flopped onto Henke's couch far more inelegantly than she would ever have considered if anyone else had been present.

"I trust Diego did the honors properly?" Henke asked lightly. Captain Diego Mikhailov was Ajax's captain. "I told him you wanted it kept low key."

"He kept is as low key as my faithful minion outside the hatch there would permit," Honor replied. "I like him," she added.

"He's a likeable sort. And good at his job. Not to mention smart enough to realize how harried and hunted you must feel right now. He understands exactly why he's not invited to di

"As a matter of fact, I've seldom been happier to find myself confined aboard ship in my entire life," Honor admitted as she rested her head on one couch arm, closed her eyes, and stretched out with Nimitz on her chest.

"That's because the worst that can happen here is that you get blown up," Henke said dryly. She crossed to the wet bar, opened a small refrigerator, and produced a pair of chilled bottles of Old Tilman.Honor chuckled appreciatively, although her amusement was clearly less than complete, and Henke gri

"I told Clarissa I'd buzz for her if we decided we needed her," she continued, holding out one of the bottles to Honor. "Here." Honor cracked one eye and looked up, and Henke waggled the bottle at her. "You look like you need this."

"What I need is about fifteen minutes-no, ten minutes would do nicely, actually-alone with Mr. Hayes," Honor said balefully. She accepted the bottle and swallowed a mouthful of cold beer. "I'd feel ever so much better afterward."

"At least until they came to put you in jail."

"True. The courts are tacky about things like that, aren't they?"

"Unfortunately." Henke swallowed some of her own beer, leaning back in an armchair facing Honor's couch, and rested one heel on the expensive coffee table on the thick, even more expensive carpet between the two of them.

Honor smiled at her and looked around curously. It was the first time she'd visited Henke aboard Ajax, and although Henke's day cabin was substantially smaller than her own lordly flag quarters aboard Imperator, it was still large and comfortable indeed by the standards of most battlecruisers. Ajax's total complement was under six hundred, including Marines, and her designers, faced with all that space, had obviously felt someone as lordly as a flag officer deserved the very best. The deep pile carpet was a dark crimson, which Honor knew Henke would never have chosen for herself and undoubtedly intended to change at the earliest possible moment, but the paneled bulkheads, indirect lighting, and holoscupltures gave it an air of almost sinfully welcoming comfort.

Best of all, it was totally empty except for Henke, Honor, and Nimitz.

"Feeling better?" Henke asked after a moment.

"Some." Honor closed her eyes again and rolled the chilled beer bottle across her forehead. "Quite a bit, actually," she went on, after a moment. "The mind-glows out here are a lot easier on Nimitz and me."

"There must be times when being an empath is a complete and total pain," Henke said.

"You have no idea," Honor agreed, opening her eyes once more and sitting up a bit. "To be perfectly honest, Mike, that's one reason I was so happy you invited me to di

"Hey, it's what friends are for!" Henke said, more lightly than she felt and trying not to show how touched she was.

"Well, the company's good," Honor said with a crooked smile. "But I suppose if I'm going to be completely honest, the real attraction is Chief Arbuckle's paprikash."

"I'll see to it that Clarissa gives Mac the recipe," Henke said dryly.

"Attention on deck!"

The Eighth Fleet's flag officers, their senior staffers, and their flag captains rose as Honor, Rafael Cardones, Mercedes Brigham, and Andrea Jaruwalski entered the compartment. Simon Mattingly and Spencer Hawke parked themselves against the bulkhead just outside the compartment, flanking the hatch, and Andrew LaFollet followed the naval officers in. He took his customary, inconspicuous place against the bulkhead behind Honor's chair, and level gray eyes swept the entire briefing room with instinct-level, microscopic attention to detail.