Free Hot Shot by Susan Elizabeth Phillips Page B

breath as he pressed the latches. What secrets did this biker medicine-show man carry with him? Her imagination conjured up a panoply of ridiculously romantic images—yellowed treasure maps, precious jewels bearing ancient curses, sacred scrolls from the caves by the Dead Sea.
    With a dramatic flourish, he flipped open the lid.
    For a moment he was silent. When he finally spoke, his voice held the whispered awe of someone in church. "Did you ever see anything so beautiful in your life?"
    She stared down into the contents of the case and was overwhelmed with disappointment.
    "The design is so elegant, so damned efficient, it makes you want to cry. This is it, Suzie.
    You're looking at the vanguard of a whole new way of life."
    All she saw was an uninteresting collection of electronic parts mounted on a circuit board.
    "It's a computer, Suzie. A computer small enough and cheap enough to change the world."
    Her feeling of letdown was almost palpable. This was what she got for sneaking around like a cat burglar. It must be the pressure of the wedding that had made her act so irresponsibly. She twisted her engagement ring so the diamond was straight and slipped back into her polite, cool shell. "I really don't know why you're showing me this." She began to rise, only to have a hard hand settle on her shoulder and push her firmly back down. It startled her so much she made a small exclamation.
    "I know what you're thinking. You're thinking this is too small to be a computer."
    She wasn't thinking any such thing, but perhaps it was better to pretend she was than to let him suspect how jumbled her real thoughts were. "FBT has been a pioneer in computers since the 1950s," she said evenly. "I've been around them most of my life, and they're much larger than this."
    "Exactly. Even the so-called 'mini' computers are nearly as big as a refrigerator. But this is still a computer, Suzie. The heart and guts of one. A micro computer. And Yank's improving it every day."
    "Yank?"
    "He's an electronic genius—a born hacker. We met when we were kids, and we've been friends ever since. He can design the sweetest pieces of integrated circuitry you've ever seen. It's a point of pride with him to come up with a design that uses one less chip than anybody else's. With an established company behind this computer, it could be on the market before the end of the year."
    By "an established company," he meant FBT, she thought. How could she have lost sight of the fact that he wanted to use her to get to her father?
    He had made her feel foolish, so she was deliberately unkind. It wasn't like her, but then, neither was slipping away from home to meet a street-smart biker. She gestured dismissively toward the unimpressive batch of electronic parts that obviously meant so much to him. "I can't imagine anybody wanting to buy something like this."
    "You're kidding, aren't you?"
    "I never kid."
    She saw his impatience and once again found herself staring at him, almost mesmerized as she watched him try unsuccessfully to contain his emotions. Unlike her, he didn't seem to conceal anything. What would it feel like to be so free?
    "You don't get it, do you?" he said.
    "Get what?"
    "Think about it, Suzie. Most of the computers in this country are million-dollar machines locked up in concrete rooms where only guys in three-piece suits can get to them—guys with ID cards and plastic badges with photos on them. Companies like FBT and IBM
    make these computers for big business, for government, for universities, for the military.
    They're made by fat cats to serve fat cats. Computers are knowledge, Suzie. They're power. And right now the government and big business have all that power locked up for themselves."
    She tilted her head toward the collection of electronic circuits. "This is going to change that?"
    "Not right away. But eventually, yes, especially with a company like FBT marketing it.
    The board needs expanding. Everything has to be self-contained. We need a