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“I started it,” Eoghan continued. “I was awarded the MacArthur Fellowship when I graduated high school.”
I knew what the MacArthur Fellowship was. Often referred to as the MacArthur Genius Grant, the organization gave a person a ton of money for being insanely smart. With no strings attached.
“And you chose to do this with it? No MIT for you?”
“I hate school.” Eoghan wrinkled his nose in distaste. “Too structured.”
I raised an eyebrow, holding some sort of square equipment in hand. “And the mob isn’t?”
Eoghan took the object out of my hand, placing it where I’d found it. “It’s more interesting.”
“Is your receptionist an AI?” I asked, half joking. She was too perfect to be human.
“No, Zara is private security.”
Had I heard him correctly? The blonde woman on the other side of the door was akin to a supermodel. She wasn’t a beefy guard like the ones below.
“Zara is a sharpshooter,” Eoghan explained, noting my incredulity. “And she never misses.”
“I’ll take your word for it.” There were millions of dollars’ worth of equipment in here. If Eoghan thought Zara was capable of protecting his assets, so be it.
A glitter nearby caught my attention. “What are these?”
There were about fifty small metal chips lining the lip of a table, each the size of my pinky nail. They were the most inconspicuous item in the room by far, even smaller than a SIM card.
“Subcutaneous trackers,” Eoghan answered, circling the other side of the table. “Still in development.”
Careful not to drop it, I picked one up, holding it between my thumb and forefinger. “Don’t these already exist?”
“Not these bad boys.” His grin was magnetic. He was enjoying this, I could tell. “They’ll monitor location, heart rate, oxygen levels, blood pressure, toxicity. They go beneath the epidermis. Undetectable in a pat-down or body scan.”
“Do they need to be under the skin if you’re just trying to track location?”
He furrowed his brow. “Well, no, but they’re not ready yet. They don’t transmit underground. And the tracking doesn’t work until it’s broken for some reason.”
I narrowed my eyes, brain whirring. “Explain.”
“They only send a location ping when snapped.” He retrieved a small tablet out of his back pocket and loaded a program. “Look.”
I set the chip down and rounded the table, peering over his shoulder.
“These are the trackers.” On screen, there was a list of about fifty trackers, all numbered. “No location yet. Now break one.”
“Really?”
The eager gleam in his eye sent a wave of excitement through my veins. “Really.”
I grabbed a chip, held it between two fingers then bent. Hard. It snapped clean in two, and I cupped the tiny pieces in the palm of my hand.
“Now, watch,” Eoghan ordered, calling my attention back to his tablet.
On screen, one of the tracker’s tags went red. Next to it, a set of coordinates popped up. Eoghan tapped on the coordinates and was directed to an aerial view of the city. A red dot appeared in Soho, right where we were standing.
“That’s awesome,” I breathed, impressed.
Eoghan shook his head. “They aren’t done yet. I need them constantly sending a signal. And with the subway system in this city, they’ve got to work underground.”
“They don’t work underground?” I clarified.
