Odd Girl Out

'They don't have parking permits here,' McMicking said. 'But the cars do all have locators. Let me pull up a map for you.'

I pulled out my reader and keyed for a download. 'Ready when you are.'

'Here it comes,' he said. 'You haven't explained yet why the Modhri wants Veldrick to pass around pieces of his coral. Assuming the Modhri has a reason.'

'Absolutely,' I said, looking at the city map he'd just sent. One glance at the current positions of the Fillies' cars was all I needed. 'Take a look at the placement of the Fillies' cars. Remind you of anything?'

'You mean like your basic more-or-less circle?'

'Exactly,' I said. 'Now think back to the search and surveillance classes you took back in your Marine days.'

There was another pause. 'I'll be damned,' he breathed. 'A detector array?'

'Sure looks like one to me,' I said. 'And, you'll note, currently centered squarely on Karim's tavern.'

'Meaning what?'

'Meaning—I think—that our young friend Rebekah is a telepath,' I said. 'And that she's broadcasting on a frequency the Modhri can pick up.'

'Wonderful,' he growled. 'And the Fillies? Just along to add cultural weight to the whole thing?'

'Or else it only works with a coral-plus-Filly combination,' I said. 'Probably Fillies genetically engineered nine ways from Sunday, come to think of it. There certainly would be no reason to drag in aliens from the other end of the galaxy if Halkan or Jurian walkers would work as well. Regardless, bottom line is that we need to eliminate or move either the coral or the Fillies before we can move Rebekah.'

McMicking grunted. 'The whole thing's crazy,' he declared. 'But that seems to be about par for this course. What's the plan?'

'Like I said, we have to take out the coral or the Fillies or both,' I said. 'And we might as well start with Veldrick's stash. Get yourself over to his house and figure out the best way in. I'll meet you there as soon as I can. Don't start the party without me.'

'What about the bodies?'

I looked into the car. Ideally, I would have preferred to move the whole mess a few kilometers away from Rebekah's hiding place. But I didn't have the time or equipment to pull that off without leaving bits of my DNA everywhere. Not to mention the instant trouble I'd be in if someone caught me driving a car with two dead cops in it. 'We leave them here,' I told McMicking. 'There's no time for anything else.'

'All right,' he said. 'I'll see you soon. Watch yourself.'

'You too.'

I broke the connection and put my comm away. I started to close the door, then had a sudden thought. Reaching past Aksam, I forced my hand gingerly behind Officer Lasari's back.

The Glock they'd taken from me earlier was gone.

Gently closing the car door, I headed back down the alley. It was, I reflected, just as well that Bayta and I had had a good dinner. It looked like it was going to be a very long night.

NINE :

Bayta wasn't at all happy with the plan. Neither was Karim. But they weren't in charge here. I gave them their orders, borrowed the keys to Karim's car, and headed out.

The garage behind the building where the car was parked was double-locked. Inside, the car itself was literally chained to the concrete floor. Apparently, auto theft was a major problem in Zumurrud District. Even with all the keys it took me a good ten minutes to get the car ready to go.

Maneuvering my way through streets filled with drunks and loiterers was the next challenge, and it cost me another ten minutes. But there was nothing I could do except ease my way forward through the wandering pedestrians and keep an eye out for drunk drivers. Finally, I was out of Zumurrud and back into the relative calm of Makarr. I picked up speed and headed for Veldrick's upscale neighborhood.

All seemed quiet as I pulled into Veldrick's street. I parked a block from his house and went the rest of the way on foot. 'Things here were even quieter than they had been in Makarr pistrict. Imani City's rich and powerful were apparently finding their evening's entertainment in the comfort of their own homes.

Veldrick's house was well lit, with lights showing through the curtains in both the great room and one of the back rooms. I eyed the shrubbery and nearby buildings as I approached, but McMicking was nowhere in sight. Strolling past the house like an innocent pedestrian, I keyed my comm.

'Yes?' McMicking answered.

'I'm here,' I said. 'Where are you?'

'Inside,' he said. 'Hang on—I'll unlock the front door for you.'

He keyed off. Muttering a curse, I reversed direction and went back to the house.

The front door opened as I approached. 'About time,' McMicking commented in greeting. The middle-aged jogger Bayta and I had had dinner with had been replaced by an elderly Oriental man with a small goatee and hair gathered high on the back of his head. 'What did you do, walk the whole way?'

'I had to run the Zumurrud obstacle course,' I growled as I brushed past him. 'I thought I told you to wait for me.'

'I'm on Mr. Hardin's clock here, not yours,' he pointed out reasonably as he locked the door behind me. 'Come on in and give me a hand.'

I walked into the meditation room to find a half-dozen small Quadrail-style cargo crates lined up near Veldrick's artificial stream. On top of one of them were a pair of thick, elbow-length leather gloves. 'Where did you get the crates?' I asked.

'Veldrick's storage room,' McMicking told me, crossing to the boxes and pulling on the gloves. 'I figured that however he moved the stuff in he would probably have kept the transport boxes. Turns out I was right.'

'It'll certainly make it easier to move it back out again,' I agreed, frowning. Something was nagging urgently at the back of my mind. 'You have a story ready in case Veldrick walks in on us?

'Veldrick won't be walking in on anyone for a while,' McMicking said. 'He's sleeping off a snoozer in the master bedroom.'

'You have any trouble getting in past the alarms?'

'Not a bit,' he said. 'I shot him as he opened the door for me.

I stared at him. 'You knocked on the door?'

'Actually, I rang the bell.' He gave me an innocent look. 'You worried he's going to describe his assailant to the police when he wakes up?'

'That would be amusing,' I growled, eyeing his Seven Samurai look. 'How long have you been here?'

'Here in the house? About twenty minutes.'

I frowned. 'You made it all the way from downtown that fast?'

'Who says I started from downtown?' he asked, reaching into the flowing stream and working at a piece of coral. 'It's as easy to tap into a computer system from one neighborhood as another.'

'So you came here directly from the restaurant?' I asked. The urgent nagging in the back of my mind was getting stronger.

'More or less,' he said, lifting out the coral and holding it gingerly at arm's length. 'I did have to stop once along the way to change faces. You want to open that first crate for me?'

I moved toward the crate, staring at the coral. He'd been here twenty minutes …

And suddenly, the nagging in my mind blew into full-fledged certainty. 'You know, these crates are going to be a bear to get out of here,' I remarked, keeping my voice casual. 'I've got some smaller ones in my car that we won't need a forklift to move.'