Full Circle by Davis Bunn

know. And the largest group follow market trends. I don’t have the resources to build a hunter-seeker team. And I can’t stand graphs.”
    â€œSo you fashioned for yourself a different course.” Peter Austin nodded once. “I thought that about you the first time we chatted.”
    â€œI call it the macro process. I study historical fracture lines. Economic crises, war, raw material surges, major market cycles, political trends that affect markets.”
    â€œAny number of people search the past.”
    â€œRight. But there are two differences here. First I identify what I think is a trend in today’s world. Then I go back and build historical data around past trends that follow as closely as possible what is happening today . I study companies that reaped the whirlwind. Who survived and prospered, and why. And the same for those that failed spectacularly. Then I look for parallels in today’s market.”
    â€œHistory repeating itself,” Peter Austin said.
    Adam replied, “All the time.”
    â€œI like your response, young man,” Peter Austin said. “I like it immensely.”
    Kayla said softly, “Can we go now?”

    Kayla soon had them off the main road. She said the Cotswolds should only be visited on lanes less than ten feet wide. Adam drove because she asked. He felt happy for the first time since leaving America. No, it was longer than that. He scanned back, searching for a time when smiles had come easy.
    â€œWhat’s going on in that mind of yours?”
    â€œAm I that easy to read?”
    â€œAnswer my question.” But her tone was light.
    â€œI was thinking about the day I put my mom on the plane to Africa. It was the first time I can remember actually giving her a lifetime dream.” He shrugged. “Most of my life was spent being a major disappointment.”
    â€œYou don’t know that.”
    He did not answer, because to do so would mean giving in to the clouds, blocking out the sun that streamed straight through him.
    â€œWhat was it like, acting in a television show?”
    â€œDo you realize every time we’ve met, we talk about me and I hear almost nothing about you?”
    â€œI don’t like talking about myself.”
    â€œThat makes two of us.”
    Kayla was quiet long enough for them to pass through a hamlet of stone and timber and wintry smoke. “So ask.”
    But he didn’t. Not just then. Instead, he let the silence ease them through yet another tiny village. Kayla rode with a Cotswold Country map unfolded in her lap. There was no hint of civilization and modern times. The only road signs were wooden fingers planted alongside lanes that emerged from the stone walls and hedgerows. The narrow roads were burnished by a sunlight strong as heat. The landscapes were brown and earthy. Adam drove a grand old beast of a car, so broad he had to reverse away from incoming traffic, for the lanes were too narrow to permit anyone to pass them except where he could ease into a farm lane or lay-by. He kept his speed to thirty miles an hour. He did not care how long it took to get wherever they were going. Or if, in fact, they ever arrived at all.
    Finally Kayla did as he had hoped. She sighed, and for once the sound was not full of the tension that etched her features and carved shadows in her cheeks. Instead, it was a sound of release. Kayla eased down to where her head rested on the seat-back. Her hair spilled over the leather, russet upon brown.
    Adam wanted to hear her voice without the stress, with-out the worry. But all he could think to say was, “This is one amazing car.”
    Then he was glad, because Kayla smiled. It was a rare gem of an expression, for it softened her. He slowed further, so he could look over and drink in the sight of this very different lady.
    Kayla said, “It was my mother’s. Daddy kept it mostly for the memories. He hates to drive.”
    He waited to see if