“Tell me about this other club of theirs.”
“Like I said, I’ve never seen it. What I know is only rumor.”
“What is the rumor?”
He hesitated. “I believe they were setting up the kind of club they wanted to run. The kind of club I didn’t want to run. I don’t know where.”
“Where did you hear this rumor? We’ll speak to them.”
Chaney paused, shook his head. “It was small talk in the club, I don’t remember who said it.”
“Of course you do.”
“There was a group,” he shrugged. “I really can’t remember which one said it.”
“Tell me all their names and we’ll figure it out.”
“No.”
“No?”
“I told you, I will not betray my clients’ trust.”
“And I told you what charges you could be facing. This person that you’re so afraid of is out there killing people and making them disappear. They need to be stopped.”
“You won’t stop them.”
“We’ll be the judge of that.”
Chaney leaned forward. “And if they have dirt on the judge?”
Salvi stared at him.
“They can’t be stopped,” he said, sitting back again. “I told you, they own half the people in this city. You need to forget this, or they will take you out.”
“Is that a threat?”
“No. It’s a warning,” he said. “I’m not a heartless asshole, detective. If you take this investigation any further, you will wind up like your colleague did. I’m trying to help you here.”
“You act like you’re protecting me, but I think you’re just protecting them.”
“I’m protecting everyone. From them.”
“No one will be protected if they’re allowed to continue doing what they’re doing. If we leave the beast unchecked, it will rise up and consume us all.”
He sighed and folded his arms. “I’m sorry, but I can’t give you anything more.”
Salvi stared at him a moment, then stood.
“Then I’m sorry but we will have to press charges and shut your club down.”
12: FAR AND WIDE
Salvi sat at her desk in the hub, watching as Riverton did its thing, processing the security footage from Floor to Ceiling. It had taken some calls from Ford, but eventually she found a judge willing to sign off on the warrant. It was only for the club’s external footage and the floors 1-3 only, as apparently the Ceiling and Diabolique had no cameras installed, but it would do. Now they could scour the footage to see if they could find a trace of Caine or the Chief’s daughter, while Ford began the background processes to shut the club down.
Ford had suggested Salvi go home to rest, but she couldn’t. Although Chaney was being charged for the illegal neural-tech and supply of drugs in his unlicensed underground club, they couldn’t hold him, and he’d been released. Ford had strongly recommended that Chaney remain in their custody, but Chaney had refused the offer, saying that would just make him look guilty. Ford sent him on his way and Sorensen placed a couple of the narcotic detectives, Farrugia and Burke, on his tail to keep an eye on him. Regardless, with Chaney released, that meant time was short before word hit the streets that he’d been talking to the police. They had to move fast.
The curiosity was burning inside her. She wanted to see what Riverton found on the footage and so had ordered the AI to display its activity on her screens. And she wasn’t the only curious one. Although Ford had convinced Bronte and Hernandez to rest, Mitch and Beggs had stayed back to watch with Salvi. Mitch sat beside her now, eyes darting over Salvi’s console screen which had been divided into several sections displaying the AI’s different processes; some showing the fast moving security footage, another bearing a list of names the AI had facially recognized, and another showing statements of interest the AI had lip-read on the screens. Beggs remained at his desk, undertaking his own searches on the names listed by the AI, as well as those provided by Attis Solme.
“Huh,” Salvi said, eyeing the latest name that had appeared on the list of guests entering the club. “I guess she’s not the pure pop princess she makes out to be.”
“This ghost worries me,” Mitch said, motioning to the screen. “Chaney has a lot of powerful friends, but even he doesn’t seem to think they’re enough to protect him from this ex-silent partner of his.”
“That’s why we have to take them down, Mitch. Because everyone else is too scared to.”
“But how do you catch a ghost?” he said, sitting back in his chair and looking up at the ceiling.
Salvi looked past him to the mugshows along the wall. She stood and walked over to them, wanting to stretch her legs more than anything, as she paced and rubbed her neck.
“What bothers me most,” Mitch said, finishing his takeout coffee, “is that he said cops were some of his patrons.”
Salvi nodded and looked back to the screens. “If they were at the club, Riverton will find them for us.”
“Sadie!” Mitch called, and the department’s robo-cleaner came out of its cupboard and swooped toward him.
“Detective Brentt,” it said as it passed, turning its white ball-shaped head to Mitch. “Detective Grenville.”
“Sadie,” he acknowledged it, tossing the cup into Sadie’s receptacle.
Salvi watched as Sadie turned and went back to its cupboard. For some reason it made her think back to her visit to the ‘Mission and all the robotic stores there. Then, of course, she thought of Randy’s Retrotech again. She turned back to her console. “Riverton?”
“Yes, detective.”
“Confirming you have a search programmed for Dancer, a.k.a. Dancell Marks, especially with the lip-reading?”
“Yes, detective. I’ve already included that name, along with Randy’s Retrotech, as I am linking every line of questioning in the Trident investigation we have done so far.”
“Good.”
“Son of a bitch!” Beggs blurted.
Salvi and Mitch looked at him, then back to her console screen.
“What
