her father’s drug business.
Yuan Chen caught us up to speed on his investigation so far. “Intruder or intruders, we don’t know which, busted the kitchen window and unlocked the door, then proceeded upstairs and committed the crime, then exited through the kitchen.”
My heart beat at unprecedented speed. “You didn’t hear anything, Natasha?”
“No, nothing. I was sleeping.”
Chen said, “It’s a good thing she didn’t wake up. Who knows what would have happened if she walked in on them.”
Natasha sobbed. “But I could have saved them.”
Chen calmed her. “You can’t let yourself think that. If you had tried anything, they would have killed you, too.” Chen looked at me. “I know you two probably want some alone time, but is it okay if I ask her a few more questions?”
“Natasha,” I said, “can you do that?”
She nodded a watery-eyed yes.
Paul leaned in. “I’m sorry to interrupt, Chen, but did you check the basement yet?”
Chen blinked through his glasses. “No. The door was locked.”
“They say Yashin keeps a stash in the cellar.”
Natasha chimed in. “My father is not a drug dealer.” Playing the clueless daughter bona fide.
Even though he already knew the way, Paul thought to ask Natasha, “Where is the door to the basement?”
She gave directions to the door and the key. Chen and Paul headed through the kitchen to the basement door.
Natasha and I were alone-coast clear. “Let me get you something to drink, Natasha.”
I went into the kitchen, my nerves on edge. My eyes sought out the refrigerator. Damn-two uniforms were in the kitchen. Neither of them paid much attention to me, so I opened the fridge with my shirtsleeve over my hand. I ran it up and down the handle then I pulled open the door, trying to look natural. I saw Natasha’s half-empty soda bottle on the top shelf-bloody fingerprints all over the glass.
I reached for it. SHIT! I heard one of the unis slide his chair. Is he watching me? I panicked and took out a different bottle. I rummaged through the drawers, found a bottle opener, and flipped off the cap.
Paul and Chen entered the kitchen through the basement door, Chen saying, “We have our motive. The basement’s been picked clean. Looks like a robbery/homicide.”
Paul gave me a questioning look. I frowned a negative; the bottle was still in there. They moved back into the living room. I followed with a sparkling clean soda bottle in hand.
Chen went back to questioning Natasha. She did great-had him feeling sorry for her. My heart reached for her. I knew she was putting on that act for me as much as for Chen. She started off wanting me to save her from her father, and now that she had saved herself, she wanted me to save her from the police and the make-pretend monsters that did this to her parents. She needed me to be her rescuer one way or the other.
Chen said to Natasha, “The coroners are here. It would be best if you waited outside while they work. I’ll come out and check on you.” He brought her out through the rain to sit in one of the cars.
I stayed on the sofa. One of my knees bounced up and down with telltale jitters. I crossed my legs to keep it still. Cops were all over the damn place. I tallied up our violations: illegal surveillance, evidence tampering, accessory to murder, and add a robbery to top it off. That soda bottle would land all three of us in the Zoo.
Hommy dick Yuan Chen was directing traffic from the living room. “Dust every fucking inch of that basement…search the alley for our murder weapon…nobody talks to a reporter-anybody talks, they answer to me.”
I made three trips to the kitchen-always somebody there. I needed that bottle. I sat still, mortified through and through. The lab techs were already moving away from the bedroom, working their way downstairs. They’d be all over the kitchen soon.
Paul caught my attention with a subtle wave. He winked and went upstairs.
Paul had a plan! I leaned forward in my seat, primed to leap into action. I eyeballed the kitchen door, anticipating Paul’s upcoming distraction.
He jogged back down and shouted, “You guys gotta see this! Yashin’s got vids up there of himself doing two girls at a time.” Cops started up the stairs, men and women alike. Paul yelled into the kitchen. “You guys gotta come check this out, come upstairs.”
The unis filed out of the kitchen and followed the crowd up to the bedroom. Paul, you’re a fucking genius!
I went for the kitchen-just nab the soda bottle and take it to the sink for a quick rinse. I speed-walked through the door and stopped in my tracks. The refrigerator door was open and Deputy Coroner Abdul Salaam was putting the soda bottle into a bag. “I found something,” he said, blinking through his glasses.
TWENTY
OCTOBER 3, 2762- OCTOBER 7, 2762
I leaned over the rust-eaten rail of Koba’s tallest bridge. My eyes strained to see through the dead of night to the black water below. I pulled one very expensive soda bottle from its evidence bag and held it tight as I looked down into the blackness, my gut heavy with the realization that I was a criminal.
I wondered how far I was willing to go for Paul and his plans. He wanted to change Lagarto, and he was willing to do anything to achieve it, including getting in bed with Ram Bandur. Paul had made his intentions clear to me after we’d bought off the deputy coroner. He was going to take over KOP, and he wanted my help. He was going to need somebody to help with the dirty work.
Were we really that bad off that saving this planet required such desperate measures? I scanned the riverbanks, taking in the city lights. I could see the capitol building with its well-lit marble facade and golden dome. It was there, inside that building that they sold us out, making the decision to sell off the Orbital and the mining rights, dooming this planet to economic isolation. Fuck the rich politicians and their picture-perfect lives.
I could smell the mold that was growing thick on the bridge rails. Try as you might, you couldn’t ever get away from that smell. Fuck this lizard-infested jungle planet.
I looked over at Tenttown. Its tents looked like lanterns when they were lit up at night. I couldn’t believe I used to live in one of those things. My skin reflexively itched as I remembered how the mosquitoes would swarm through holes you could never seem to find. Fuck that fucking place.
I watched the tangle of Floodbank lights shimmering on the river, each one bobbing independently of the others. There was a carnival going in the Old Town Square. A Ferris wheel was spinning slowly in front of the cathedral’s steeples. The city would’ve looked beautiful if I didn’t know better. Fuck the drunks that piss and vomit all over the street. Screw the O-heads hiding in their cardboard boxes. To hell with the unemployed, the lazy fucks. Fuck the wife beaters and the wives who keep going back for more. Fuck the pimps and whores, and the kiddie rapers. Fuck those tech-hoarding offworlders. Double-fuck Nguyen and her bug-zapper skin. Fuck everyone!
If any of them got in our way, they’d deserve what they got.
I held the soda bottle up to the beam of a street lamp, the glass reflecting back sharp points of light. I heaved the fucking thing into the darkness.
When I made it back to the stakeout pad, Paul had holo-mugs of Yashin’s dealers lined up against the wall. We went through them together, methodically evaluating their records. We discarded the holo-heads one by one, tossing them into a pile like stones until there was only one left: drug dealer and stick-up artist Elvin Abramson. His history of armed robbery would go well with the fact that as one of Yashin’s dealers, Abramson would know about the basement stash. The perfect fall guy for our first frame job.
We concocted a plausible line for lead-dick Yuan Chen. We told him about an imaginary snitch who worked for Yashin. We said that we leaned on him hard, made him spill everything he knew. According to our fake snitch, Elvin Abramson dropped by and started acting like he was the new O supplier. When our pseudo-snitch asked him where he came up with an O supply, Elvin responded with a sham story about some cousin who put him in touch with a
