She was going to ignore them for the moment.
She was going to ignore a lot of things as she prioritized. Time to take control of this investigation, do it her way, and make sure that every order she gave got fulfilled.
Time to start now.
“Rudra,” she said. “I need you.”
Popova looked up, clearly startled. She hadn’t heard DeRicci come in, which was unusual enough for Popova. She was usually on top of everything.
She had deep bags under her eyes, and her clothes looked a little rumpled. DeRicci wondered if she had slept here. In fact, DeRicci wondered when Popova had last left the office.
It was time to pay attention to such things: time to make changes.
Popova stood and grabbed a pad. She rounded her desk and headed for DeRicci’s office, pushing open the door.
The place was huge. It was the biggest office in the building, with floor-to-ceiling windows all around, something that Flint had commented on, something that he hated.
DeRicci couldn’t work in a place without windows. She had done it as a young police officer, and she refused to do it again, even if it placed her in a bit of jeopardy.
She just needed to see her city. And by extension, her Moon.
Her Moon.
As she walked toward her desk, which looked terrifyingly clean, she said, “Have we heard anything from the Earth Alliance’s investigation of the PierLuigi Frémont clones?”
“No, sir,” Popova said. “I would have let you know.”
DeRicci let out a small breath. She had wondered about that ever since she had spoken to Jin Rastigan on the train. DeRicci didn’t like the fact that the Earth Alliance hadn’t gotten back to her.
Or maybe they had, in the form of those investigators. She wouldn’t be able to ignore them after all. She would talk to them when she was done here.
She made it to her desk, touched its clean surface, and wondered how she had let it get so sterile. Another thing to think about later.
She looked up at Popova, who had stopped in front of the desk.
“I had a disturbing contact from Peyla,” DeRicci said.
“Peyla?” Popova asked.
“Yes,” DeRicci said. “There’s been an incident on Peyla that we wouldn’t have known about if some Earth Alliance researcher hadn’t been onsite. Even then, the Earth Alliance contact on Peyla couldn’t get anyone in the investigative office to listen to her.”
Popova frowned, then glanced over her shoulder. “Is something going on with the Alliance?”
“I think so,” DeRicci said, “but what, I’m not sure. What I am sure of is this: We need to run facial recognition on three different files. They’re all of the same face, but it’s a Peyti face. These files are different ages and at least one of them has a standard Peyti mask. I want to know if we can find any hits here on the Moon.”
“Faces of different ages?” Popova asked. “Of the same person?’
“Yes,” DeRicci said. “I should have received the information from Peyla about ten minutes ago.”
“Are we dealing with another clone problem?” Popova asked.
DeRicci sincerely hoped not. She wasn’t willing to admit what she worried about, at least not yet. She didn’t want Popova to know that DeRicci feared another Anniversary Day-type attack, only this time on Peyla.
“Something’s happening,” DeRicci said. “I’ll explain it to you in a minute. And let’s not discuss this yet with anyone else, all right?”
Popova’s frown got deeper. “You mean the Earth Alliance investigators?”
“I mean anyone,” DeRicci said. “I’m not sure if this facial-recognition thing is me helping a colleague, or something more.”
“You’re being very mysterious,” Popova said.
“I suppose I am, but it can’t be helped.” DeRicci tapped her desktop screen. The files had arrived in a secure package, sent directly to her, avoiding all links. “The files are here. Let’s start this process. And let me tell you what I learned from a woman named Jin Rastigan when she woke me up this morning.”
Forty-two
They met in Celestine Gonzalez’s office again. This time, Flint arrived first. Gonzalez let him in herself. No secretary, no assistants, no one at all sat in the outer office.
“You know I can’t keep doing this.” She wore a powder blue suit that should have been too girlish for her, but somehow managed to accent her dark hair and eyes. The clothes made her look even older and tougher. “I don’t rent office space.”
“I know, Celestine,” Flint said. “I appreciate this.”
“You should.” She held the door to her office open. “Fortunately for you both, I have court this morning. I’m trusting you to lock up. Close the door and double-tap the window when you leave.”
“I will,” he said.
“And I, to keep up appearances, will wait for our friend, Mr. Deshin.”
“No need.” Luc Deshin had entered the corridor. Flint hadn’t heard him arrive. “I’ll pay you for your time, Celestine.”
“Of course you will, Luc.” She smiled at him. “You get to pay for my office rental, too, even though I’ll bill it as something else. You might want to share the cost with Mr. Flint. I know for a fact he can afford to chip in.”
Flint grinned at her. “What ever happened to client confidentiality?”
“I never ran your financials, Miles,” she said. “So I’m not giving away a client’s secrets. But I do know where you’re living now.”
Flint let out a small grunt. People paid attention to the strangest things.
Gonzalez led them into her office. “My assistant arrives in an hour. No one else needs to be on this floor for another two hours. But I’d suggest you keep the meeting short if you don’t want any questions.”
She grabbed a pad and a briefcase. Then she locked down her desk. As she walked out of the room, she waggled her fingers at them. “Play nice, boys.”
And then she was gone.
Flint looked at Deshin. The man seemed tired, his cheeks gaunt. That couldn’t just be from this investigation. Flint wondered what else Deshin was working on, then decided he didn’t want to ask.
“You said you wanted to be involved in the investigation,” Flint said.
“I do,” Deshin said.
“I need an assurance from you before we go any farther,” Flint said.
“All right.” Deshin pushed on the door, apparently seeing if Gonzalez had shut it tightly. “Did you scan the room to see if anyone is monitoring this?”
“No,” Flint said. “I figure if there’s a monitor, it’s Celestine’s and we shouldn’t mess with it. Besides, what I’m asking you to do is not illegal.”
“Just questionable?” Deshin returned to the center of the room. Both men stood there, as if they were afraid to sit down.
Flint shook his head. “I’m running out of people to trust.”
Deshin’s eyebrows went up. Then he inclined his head, just a little. He was clearly surprised that Flint had used the word “trust.”
Flint wasn’t going to explain that. “Before we go any further, I need a promise from you.”
“What kind of promise?” Deshin asked. He didn’t sound wary. He seemed intrigued.
“I’m going to need some investigation done, and I don’t want it farmed out.”
“You don’t want my assistants doing it,” Deshin said, as if he were clarifying.
“That’s right,” Flint said. “I’m trusting you, Luc, not anyone else.”
He made sure to use Deshin’s first name, even though the man had never given him permission to do so. Flint wanted this to be intimate, to be between them, as if they were friends.
“If I can do it, I will,” Deshin said. “I swear to it.”
That surprised Flint. He had expected more of an argument.
And his surprise must have showed, because Deshin smiled. “I understand the need for secrecy here. I’m not sure who is trustworthy when it comes to A
nniversary Day, either.”
Flint nodded once. Deshin was a smart man, something Flint would do well not to forget.
“All right,” Flint said. “We’re having trouble getting the Earth Alliance to investigate the assassin clones. We believe they’re reluctant because there might be blowback.”
Deshin’s lips curved upward, but he didn’t quite smile. “I wondered the same thing myself.”
“Did you investigate?”
“No,” Deshin said.
He did not explain, almost as if he were in a court of law. Maybe he felt like he was. He hadn’t liked the possibility of being monitored here.
“My sources tell me that when PierLuigi Frémont was caught, all of his loose DNA was destroyed. A fire obliterated his compound, and any known DNA samples were demolished. One of my sources, whom I trust deeply, tells me that the Earth Alliance has a very complete system for getting rid of the most miniscule DNA samples.”
“So,” Deshin said, “the Frémont DNA came from a source the investigators know nothing about.”
“That’s possible,” Flint said. “But I have a different idea. Generally weapons sales are about money, aren’t they?”
“I would assume so,” Deshin said with that curious half-smile.
“So someone could have made a lot of money selling PierLuigi Frémont’s DNA.”
“Including Frémont himself,” Deshin said.
“Even though he was in one of the Alliance’s maximum security prisons.”
“Even though,” Deshin said.
“You see my dilemma,” Flint said. “I am unable to follow this lead from Armstrong, and because of my inability to trust anyone outside of my rather tight circle, I have no one to ask who can investigate this.”
Deshin really did smile now. “Except me. Have the criminal investigate the criminal activity.”
“I never said you were a criminal, Luc,” Flint said.
“No, you haven’t,” Deshin said. “In fact, it could be argued that your business requires more criminal activity than mine.”
Flint wasn’t sure where that was going. Was it Deshin establishing a bit of power? Or simply an attempt on Deshin’s part to make them colleagues?
“The problem with this part of the investigation,” Flint said, “is that if I were to go in or send in another investigator, that investigator would have to be undercover—”
“I know this,” Deshin said. “I already have what you call ‘cover.’ The problem is that no matter who runs this part of the investigation, it will take time. And I thought you wanted to resolve this quickly.”
“That’s why I came to you. Establishing an undercover persona can take years. We don’t have years.”
Deshin shook his head, that smile still on his face. “So you’re operating on the perception of my criminality.”
It didn’t seem to bother him, but Flint had trouble reading Deshin easily. “I would have sent in Ki Bowles, the reporter, if she was still with us. But she’s not.”
It was a non-answer, but it was the safest thing he could think of saying.
“It’s all right, Miles,” Deshin said. “I play on the perception of my criminality all the time.”
Flint smiled.
“So,” Deshin said, “just to be clear. You want me to track Frémont’s DNA. See how they got it, and maybe that will lead us to…what? The people who planned this?”
“It might lead us to the people who made the clones.”
“Surely, if you know it’s blowback, you know who made the clones.”
Flint shook his head. “I might be able to find the company, but that doesn’t mean it worked with whoever attacked the Moon. For all we know, there’s a disgruntled employee who set up a shadow company to sell designer criminal clones.”
“This, then, might be a major investigation,” Deshin said.
“I think you were right initially,” Flint said. “This part of the investigation will take time. I’ll help as much as I can from Armstrong.”
Deshin nodded. “I may have to bring in an assistant or two, but I will clear the information before I give it to you.”
“I would prefer that no one else knows,” Flint said.
“As would I,” Deshin said. “But this sounds like a major investigation, and I may not be able to do it all on my own.”
“Give it a shot,” Flint said.
“Oh, I will.” Deshin extended his hand. “Thank you for including me, Miles. I needed to do something, and I suspect this might be quite useful.”
Flint took Deshin’s hand. They were partners now, whether Flint liked it or not.
“I think it will be extremely useful,” Flint said. “In fact, I think it might be the most important part of the investigation.”
And he was trusting a known criminal to get it done. Ironic that he had no one else.
“We’ll resolve this, Miles,” Deshin said. “Whatever it takes.”
Flint did not repeat that last. The whatever it takes worried him. He hoped that whatever it takes would be easy and legal.
He also knew that hopes like that were often in vain.
Forty-three
The yacht bounced through the water. Zagrando felt vaguely queasy. In fact, the queasiness was worse than it had been when he traveled to the island with Elise. And the queasiness wasn’t caused by nerves or by remorse over leaving her behind.
Apparently, he got motion sickness on the water. Severe motion sickness. Because if it hadn’t been severe, the stay-healthy nanobots would have alleviated all of it.
He needed to ride in the prow of the yacht, just so that he had an unimpeded vision of where he was going. But he didn’t want to leave the security of the cockpit.
He monitored everything—the exterior, the water around him, the air above him. He worried that someone would come after him.
He was vaguely disappointed that no one had.
He really wanted to shoot someone. He hadn’t been this angry in a long, long time. Maybe not since he had to stand in that room in the Port on Valhalla Basin, watching his own clone get murdered.
Murdered.
By the people he worked for.
Who had just screwed him again.
He’d been doing this a long time. He knew that Elise could have been working on her own. She could have made a back-door deal with one of the men on that island, and she needed to maintain her own cover.
But if that were the case, why hadn’t she just killed Zagrando and taken over the meet herself?
He had a hunch—a strong hunch—that she was following orders. And orders usually didn’t mean killing another agent. Usually orders superseded other orders, which sometimes led to the torpedoing of a case.
But courtesy between agents meant that she should have told him before they arrived on that damn island. Hell, before they traveled across this choppy water. Before they arrived on this stupid planet.
She hadn’t said a word.
Maybe that was her style. Maybe she didn’t share anything with anyone, just took matters into her own hands.
Or maybe she figured the men on that island—or their guards—would kill Zagrando for her.
There was only one thing she hadn’t planned on: She hadn’t planned on Zagrando walking away from her.
Leaving her behind.
Effectively signing her death warrant—if, indeed, she was still working for Earth Alliance Intelligence, and not working for herself.
He swallowed hard. Maybe this entire mess had made him sick. Maybe his body was just reacting to the betrayals. Over and over again, people in this business, this intelligence business, had screwed with him, lied to him, betrayed him.
He’d had enough.
He would contact Jarvis for the sake of his own conscience. Zagrando needed to find out if Jarvis had betrayed him, too.
If not, Zagrando had to let Jarvis know that Elise was tainted. Which meant that all her past work was tainted as well.
Zagrando glanced at the na
vigation equipment. He wasn’t far from his ship now. Hopefully, no one waited for him there.
He needed to be cautious. He needed to stay on his game.
He needed to get the hell out of this place.
Forty-four
Talia slouched in the back of her History of Earth class. History of Earth. Like anybody cared. Most of the kids going to this school had never even been to Earth. Talia hadn’t. And she certainly didn’t care about its stupid history, which seemed to have gone on forever and ever and ever.
A security guard stood outside the door. Ms. Rutledge had increased the security on all of the rooms and in the hallways, not to prevent anyone from getting in, but to prevent the kids from rioting, which was her word. Rioting. If Ms. Rutledge had sat through a History of Earth class she would know what rioting really was. What had happened in the cafeteria yesterday was just a fight.
Most of the kids involved in the fight looked tired this morning. Their parents had probably yelled at them. Like that was a problem. The Chinar twins hadn’t even come back to school, and Talia heard a rumor that they might not ever return.
The door opened, and Kaleb Lamber tried to sneak in. He hadn’t been at the assembly this morning, and Talia had heard he was hiding out in the Office of the Headmistress with some lawyers. She had no idea who they would’ve been talking to, since Ms. Rutledge had conducted the assembly.
Kaleb looked smaller somehow. His right eye had closed completely and his face was a mass of bruises. Apparently, his parents hadn’t let him get fixed up.
His friends said his dad was a nightmare, a bigger bully than Kaleb himself. No one went over to Kaleb’s house because no one wanted his dad near them.
If Kaleb hadn’t been so mean, Talia would have felt sorry for him. The fact that she felt a bit of sympathy now pissed her off. She didn’t want to feel anything for him.
He glanced her way and caught her looking at him. Her cheeks flushed. She would’ve looked away, but that would’ve sent the wrong signal, like she was interested or something, like her dad had said. Sometimes her dad could be so clueless.
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