“You’re in serious trouble, Zelda.”
“No, you are and sit the fuck down, Boar Face.”
Katrina stumbled against the glass wall.
“I didn’t go through with it.” She waited for the entire gasp to leave Katrina’s body. “Oh, I know, you’re so disappointed.” Her breaths were ragged. “You set me up. Watt wasn’t using any surgical procedure, only the mistoprene. Get me loaded first. 100, 99, 98. Now 97. Hands clean. How’d Zelda get a hold of an illegal drug? I said sit the fuck down.”
Boar Face meekly obeyed.
“Who knows? There’s always a way. You were the kind loving boss. Bet you told more than a few people how you’d taken me under your wing, trying to help. Dr. Watt and the AG nurse, well, they never saw me. Is he even a doctor? How much did you pay Watt? Or was it just in kisses? Baby’s gone, Zelda did it herself, murder, Katrina’s horrified. And you trusted me. Mr. Saul trusted me. Look at Zelda’s erratic record, who can be surprised.”
“Now I’m out of the way.” Zelda pressed into Katrina’s snout. “You take all the credit for my work, as if I never existed. Salmon’s a dirty business, ain’t it, girl?”
Katrina kept moistening her lips. “What do you want?”
“I’d love to barbecue you, but I’m a nice person. So you’ll move me…”
“A promotion…”
“No, no, because then I’d be gaining from deceit. Just reassign me to a new unit where I don’t report to you, but to Mr. Saul directly. Sorry, I didn’t hear your answer. I’ll take the nod for a yes. And maybe someday I’ll forget about this. But probably not for a long while, at least until I give birth.” Zelda smiled sweetly, patting her stomach. “Now get out of my office before I report you for violating every business ethics violation ever.”
She waited a few luxurious moments, feet on the desk, believing that if you could hold your nose, the business world wasn’t a complete cesspool.
Skipping out to an early lunch, Zelda stopped at one of those sniveling veggie places she wished would burn to the ground, ordering an AG avocado and tofu sandwich and finishing all of it, only gagging once.
Zelda was still sipping the last of the SC spinach juice, expecting her breasts would turn green eventually, when she walked into Ruby’s. Beth stepped through the beige curtain and stopped, really surprised.
“You got anything for a fat pregnant girl who only looks good in blue? I have a big deal event in a couple days.”
Beth smiled impishly. “You want something tailored in forty-eight hours?”
“Rush it. Money doesn’t matter. I’m betting my old boss will resign soon and I’ll get her job.”
“Over here.” Beth gestured toward a rack. “And I suggest gold. Goes with your eyes.”
• • • •
PABLO SPENT THE morning camped in the Cousin’s waiting room; after one o’clock, Kenuda finally strolled out of his office, grunting at the dentist.
“I told him you were busy, sir.” With an accusing roll of its eyes, the A10 babbled on about everyone thinking their business was the most important to the poor overworked Commissioner, embarrassing Kenuda, who granted Pablo about forty seconds in the elevator.
“What is it now, Diaz?”
“You need to read this, sir.”
“I’m absolutely swamped…”
“It’s critical.”
“Which is what everyone says.”
“Do I look like the sort of person who exaggerates?”
They rode up and down for five minutes as the Third Cousin studied the Olak, Inc. certificate, closing the elevator door on visitors and fellow Cousins. He alternated between frowning and staring suspiciously before agreeing to meet around four, which gave Pablo a couple hours to attend to his patients.
“Susan, where is everyone?” He peered around as if people were hiding amid the HG tooth.
The A27 sadly shook its head.
“They could only wait for so long, Dr. Diaz.”
“I’ve been busy.” He tried remembering the last time he’d been here.
“They know that, but their teeth don’t.”
Pablo arranged some pamphlets on the coffee table, glancing at his watch while calculating downtown traffic and rush hour subway and bus schedules for the best way to arrive on time.
“Can you please get some of the patients on the medemerline to apologize and reschedule?”
“But it’s not an emergency, Doctor.”
“I’m a doctor checking on his patients,” he snapped.
“But they went elsewhere so technically they aren’t your patients anymore. I’m happy to pull up the regulations on the Medical Emergency Line usage, Doctor.”
“I think I know them,” Pablo growled.
The ‘bot’s glittering eyes suggested otherwise.
Pablo spent the next hour sterilizing all his equipment, scrubbing the chair and re-hanging pictures; he tossed his white dental gown on the front desk as he left. “I need this washed, please.”
“You have a patient tomorrow at eight-thirty, sir,” Susan reminded him.
Probably his last one, which was the only thought Pablo gave his moribund dental practice as he suffered through an agonizing extra fifteen minutes on the subway; Kenuda grumpily paced outside Needleman’s.
“Apologies, Third Cousin. The local green line was delayed,” Pablo explained breathlessly.
Elias winced at the boarded-up warehouses on both sides of the street. “Where am I exactly?”
“Morrisania.”
Kenuda didn’t like the way the name sounded. He scowled at the deli. “That’s it?”
“Yes, sir.” Pablo took a step, hoping Kenuda would follow, but the Commissioner held his ground. “We don’t need a reservation, Commissioner.”
“Oh, I’m sure. But once I go inside, I’ve acted, and before I act, there are questions.”
Pablo glanced through the scuffed window at the three men at their table, eating the same food, moving their arms the same way.
“You found the Olak certificate at the Dead Past Warehouse.”
Pablo nodded, suspecting there was going to be a long line of questions.
“Which you went to under the Cousins training umbrella?”
Another nod; this time Kenuda frowned.
“Though you’ve not been formally accepted into the program.”
“I’ve not formally been rejected, either.”
Kenuda darkened. “Are you being smart, son?”
“No, sir.”
“A BT was present during your search of records?”
“For most of the time. He had to return to his
