Everyone in the lab had gone to the windows.

Peter saw his brother on the street below, beaming like a kid, waving up at them. Eric was standing alongside a bright yellow Ferrari convertible, his arm around a beautiful blond woman. Behind them was a second Ferrari, gleaming black. Someone said, “Two Ferraris! That’s half a million dollars down there.” The rumble of the engines echoed off the scientific laboratories that lined Divinity Avenue.

A man stepped out of the black Ferrari. He had a trim build and expensive taste in clothes, though his look was decidedly casual.

“That’s Vin Drake,” Karen King said, staring out the window.

“How do you know?” Rick Hutter said to her, standing beside her.

“How do you not know?” Karen replied. “Vincent Drake is probably the most successful venture capitalist in Boston.”

“You ask me, it’s a disgrace,” Rick said. “Those cars should have been outlawed years ago.”

But nobody was listening to him. They were all heading for the stairs, hurrying down to the street. Rick said, “What is the big deal?”

“You didn’t hear?” Amar said, hurrying past Rick. “They’ve come here to recruit.”

“Recruit? Recruit who?”

“Anybody doing good work in the fields that we’re interested in,” Vin Drake said to the students clustered around him. “Microbiology, entomology, chemical ecology, ethnobotany, phytopathology-in other words, all research into the natural world at the micro- or nano-level. That’s what we’re after, and we’re hiring now. You don’t need a PhD. We don’t care about that; if you’re talented you can do your thesis for us. But you will have to move to Hawaii, because that’s where the labs are.”

Standing to one side, Peter embraced his brother, Eric, then said, “Is that true? You’re already hiring?”