“Ms. Tyi, you are in a great deal of trouble, you know. I’ve been informed the man in these sceneshots is mainline Service. An Exterior Ministry Security officer.”
Could be the PM. Keeping tabs on her prodigal van Reuter, trolling for tidbits. Or any of the other ministers, for that matter—they wouldn’t even have to be anti-Evan, necessarily. Hell, anyone who could adapt a holoremote to get past sensescan could have taken those shots. Newssheets. Gossip rags. Lucien, the gadget expert, for the hell of it.
Bâtard, indeed.
Ridgeway cocked his head. “Are you listening to me, Ms. Tyi?”
Jani sat back. Her chair was designed to make the occupant feel off-balance—spindly, hard of seat, and tilted forward slightly. It didn’t work. For visitor intimidation, Ridgeway should have tried idomeni furniture. Jani had, on countless occasions, sat through hours-long Academy exams in chairs that had treated her back in much the same way Lucien had.
“I doubt you did this,” she said to Ridgeway, indicating the panels. “If you had, I don’t believe you’d have bothered to show them to me first. You would have gone directly to His Excellency.” She gripped her armrests as a helium bubble expanded in the depths of her skull. “And here you probably felt like Christmas made a second pass.” She took a deep breath in an effort to dispel her lightheadedness. “Sorry to disappoint.”
Ridgeway leaned so far forward he was in danger of pitching out of his chair. “You are a traitor—”
“Speaking of traitors,” Jani interrupted, “I’ve come upon something interesting.” The calmness of her voice fascinated her. She’d never been adept at extemporaneous self-defense—the results reflected in her Service record. Augie never bothered to kick in at those lower stress levels. So why was he being so helpful now? “His Excellency’s father apparently made hash of the Bilateral Accord some years ago. He colluded with the Laumrau during the idomeni civil war and managed to have some of their augmentation technology smuggled back to Earth. Martin, it seems, paid the bulk of the fine for that particular violation.”
“Careful how you speculate,” Ridgeway said. His eyes still shone, but his voice had weakened.
“The technology came from a research hospital, a place called Knevçet Shèràa.” Jani bit out the c as Ulanova had, gave “Shèràa” the two-syllable treatment instead of entoning the double-a upturn at the end, and sat on her hands to avoid gesturing. God, she hated sounding like an Earthbound hick. “Rumor has it that in order to eliminate possible witnesses, he ordered the deaths of the Service troops stationed there. Just imagine, multiple counts of premeditated murder. Oh, and let’s not forget the treason.” She smiled. “Nice to have something in common with a man of Acton van Reuter’s standing, I suppose.”
Ridgeway licked his lips. “Acton’s dead,” he said. From his tone, he didn’t seem altogether sure.
“Yes, but the sins of the father, Durian. They matter to idomeni, and they make humans sit up as well. The shrapnel from this bombshell just might take out our boss.” She looked into Ridgeway’s eyes. Don’t tell me you didn’t know. Oh, he knew—knowing went a long way toward explaining his lack of cooperation in providing her Evan’s documents.
Ridgeway fingered his chin. “Risa—”
Oh, it’s “Risa” again, is it?
“—I don’t know what to say.” He appeared genuinely thoughtful. “Lieutenant Pascal told you this?”
So, no one traced me to the Parkway—sloppy. That implied a stationary cam, perhaps in the Private House. Well, it saved a lot of explaining, although it did make Jani wonder how secure her office really was. “The information was there for the taking.” No reason to disclose who offered it.
Ridgeway’s manner became very clipped. Perhaps he associated that with professionalism. “Did Pascal attempt to interfere with you in any way while he served as your steward on the Arapaho?”
Now it was Jani’s turn to sound surprised. “So you knew about that?” Ridgeway’s stare offered no reply. “Nothing I couldn’t handle.” She thought back to her lunches with Lucien. They had spent most of the time laughing over whatever human weakness he had exploited that particular ship-day. “I think he’d grown used to manipulating through his looks and charm. I saw no reason to disabuse him of his notion.”
Ridgeway nodded sagely. “Brave of you.”
Jani shrugged. “Solo older woman coming in from a long-term colony assignment. He probably figured me for an easy target.” She looked away from Ridgeway’s developing smirk. I’ll be sorry I said that. Big mouth returns. Looked like augie had finally folded his tent.
Ridgeway swung his feet onto his desk. He’d changed clothes since their morning altercation. His pale green socks peeked through the gap between his black half boots and coal grey trousers. They matched his loosened neckpiece, which in turn contrasted nicely with his medium grey shirt. Occupant as office accessory—very nice. The look he bestowed on Jani wouldn’t have qualified as friendly. More like superior, but without the gloat. “Will you continue to see this man?” He wasn’t quite able to control the lively curiosity in his voice. The idea of operating as a pimp for the House seemed to appeal to him.
“I’ll play it for as long as it runs,” Jani replied blandly.
“It bothers me that Ulanova has zeroed in on Acton again.” Ridgeway pursed his lips. “She’d gone after him once before, of course, but that was before his death. Oh, dear Anais had her claws out for him—make no mistake. Back in the Dark Ages, he alternated between undercutting Scriabin business concerns and aiming Anais’s younger sister at David Scriabin. Unfortunately, David was engaged to Anais at the time. The scandal when David and Milla eloped was horrendous. Poor Anais never really recovered from the humiliation.” He glanced at Jani and smiled coolly. “I appreciate your help, Risa, really I do. I understand what it must have taken out of you. Do you suppose any of this may tie in with Lyssa’s death?”
Jani stifled a yawn. Her head felt heavy—a nap sounded tempting. But she wanted to visit the Library. Then she needed to get ready for dinner with Evan. “It was implied to me that several Families were involved in the importation of the augmentation technology. If you believe Lyssa had discovered what had been done to her son and was trying to figure out who was responsible at the time of her death…” She let the sentence peter out, punctuating the silence with a raised eyebrow.
“Good God!” Ridgeway became positively buoyant, no doubt envisioning how many of Evan’s rivals he could scuttle by linking them to a murder plot. “I’m going to have to meet with Colonel Doyle as soon as possible.” He sat up straight and tightened his neckpiece. “Well, you’ve blown my evening all to hell, Risa, but I think the results may well prove worth the inconvenience.” He hesitated noticeably. “You’re welcome to sit in, of course.”
“You—” Jani stopped her personal commentary in time. “You are too kind, Durian, but I’ll be dining with His Excellency this evening.” She ignored his arch look. “By the way, those files we discussed this morning. Could I have them, please?”
“Of course.” Ridgeway grinned. Grin, hell, he bubbled. In a week, he’d be telling people hiring Risa Tyi was his idea. “In fact,” he said, “let’s get some drudgery out of the way now.”
A few intercommed orders to the frazzled Greer later, Jani found herself in possession of a Class A Interior expense voucher (no manager approval necessary unless she tried to buy something substantial, like Chicago), parts bin and repair chits, and other pieces of paper and plastic designed to make the favored Interior employee’s life easier. The promised files, however, were held up in document limbo. Jani would have to wait for those until tomorrow. Ridgeway apologized profusely as he walked her all the way to the outer-office door, adding they would have to have dinner “very soon.”
Can’t wait. Jani trudged down the hall, wondering what exactly she had opened herself up to. True, she’d gotten Ridgeway off her back, but it crossed her mind he might attempt to reap some of the benefits he thought he
r to be bestowing on Lucien and Evan. She wandered down the wrong hallway, backtracked, then found herself standing before the doorway leading to the alternate breakroom. What would I do? Probably whatever he wanted. Ridgeway, Jani sensed, was the sort of man who thought staking a claim in a woman’s vagina locked up the rest of her as well. A risky assumption, but fortunately, not a rare one. On more than one occasion, her continued good health had depended upon her working that assumption to its limits.
Sometimes, it’s whatever gets you from here to there. She was glad to find the breakroom empty. She spent a few minutes straightening the snack table, then cleaned and reloaded the brewer. Soon the aroma of fresh coffee filled the room and her stomach, having recovered from its bout with Ascertane, responded by growling each time she inhaled. She rummaged around for a cup, then settled into a battered corner seat.
Ridgeway let me off easy. He could have bounced me off three walls and the ceiling besides, and he caved as soon as I brought up Acton.
Nimble little counter-jumper, Anais Ulanova would have said. Knows how to keep his feet under him. One option, if Ridgeway felt Jani had uncovered knowledge he wished to keep buried, would be to shower her with bounty. She reached into her shirt pocket for the expense voucher. Silver, in contrast to Lucien’s red, with a discreet scripted a in the lower left hand corner that she hadn’t recalled seeing on the lieutenant’s card. Anything within reason, and maybe a thing or two without, Ridgeway had said when he handed it to her. Just be discreet.
“But diddle an account once, and I’m all his.” Jani repocketed the thin plastic card. “He thinks.” If she put her mind to it, she could divert half of Interior’s liquid assets into a float-rebound maze before the Comptroller’s office had a chance to reconcile her first transaction. Working with the Haárin had been an education in more ways than one. She wouldn’t think of doing it, of course. But it was nice to know she could.
When I’m good, I’m very, very good. When she was bad, she could make Lucien look like a stiff. Still, the ease with which she had gotten around Ridgeway nagged her. But then, her idea of what constituted “difficult” differed from most peoples’.
My Academy final exams were oral. In High Laumrau. Not one idomeni on the examining board, not even Nema, looked her in the face. Instead, they watched her posture, her hands, the way she moved. Listened to her tones, lilts, phrasings.
Pauses after her replies stretched for ten minutes or more, then suddenly questions would pile on questions, with no chance of a request for clarification being honored, or even acknowledged. The exam lasted for nine humanish hours, with Jani knowing every step of the way that only one other being in the room wanted her to succeed. And also knowing for that very reason, he dare not make a move to help her in any way.
I learned as idomeni. Which had made it damned difficult to slip back into the humanish way of doing things. Back to the world of subtext. Hidden meanings. Things left unsaid, glossed over. The world between the lines, Hansen had called it. He’d been able to move between idomeni and humanish without breaking a sweat, but there had been a very good reason for keeping Jani off to one side. A typical socially backward paper pusher—I gabbled, and I blurted, and I explained too much. To go from a culture where everything you say is understood instantly to one where you could talk for hours and not say a goddamned thing had rattled her. She had fit with the idomeni so well, she thought.
“Until I proved myself most human.” She sipped her coffee, grown cold in the cup. Too easy. The coffee tasted greasy and harsh. Jani flushed it down the sink and set out for the Library.
It proved a happy accident that she ran into Angevin Wyle in the journal reading room. She had been trying to figure out how to contact her without using the Houseline or risking another encounter with Ridgeway.
“Hullo.” Angevin leafed without interest through a documents journal. “What’s up?”
“I have some info for you.” Jani beckoned her toward a pair of chairs in an isolated corner of the room. “About those sailracing lessons we talked about. It’ll give you a chance to get out of here for an hour or so.”
“Sailracing? I never—” Angevin lowered herself to the edge of her seat. A flicker of life animated her pinched features. “What’s going on?”
“I need you to contact someone outside Interior. You have to do it from a public comport in the city. He’ll meet you to arrange the transfer of some things he’s obtaining for me.”
“Why don’t you use the courier service?”
Because I don’t trust the courier service. Jani debated the best handle by which to grip Angevin for this detail. “The Doc Control administers the courier service, and I don’t want Durian to find out I had contact with this guy. He works for Exterior.”
“Durian. Phfft!” Angevin cradled her chin in her hand. “Is this guy good-looking?”
“Oh yes.”
“Even better.” The young woman fluffed her mashed curls. “Any particular place I should contact him from?”
“The only spot I know in the city is the mall with the skating rink.”
Angevin wrinkled her nose. “That tacky place.” She rummaged through her small shoulder bag, liberating a colorstick and a mirror. “I’ll call him from the Galleria,” she said as she applied bright copper to her lips with a few deft strokes. “What’s his name?”
“Lucien Pascal. He’s in Exterior Security.”
“Lucien.” Angevin waggled her eyebrows. “Oo la la.”
“Blond. Brown eyes. Your age. As tall as Minister van Reuter. Make sure to mention the sailracing—then he’ll know you came from me.” Jani hid a smile behind her hand as Angevin applied the colorstick to her cheeks as well. “I appreciate this.”
“Yeah, well, I need a break. Supper meeting coming up. Then I get to confer with Durian again.” Angevin crossed her eyes. “Speaking of Durian,” she said nonchalantly as she continued to apply her makeup, “what are you getting from this Lucien that might upset him?”
Jani leaned back in her seat. Her battered shoulders cramped. “Job-related things,” she replied through clenched teeth. “Just stuff.”
Angevin dabbed at the corners of her mouth. “Things. Just stuff. For the sake of my Registry standing, I don’t want to know the details, do I?” She studied Jani over the top of her mirror. “Durian doesn’t like you. He thinks you’re trouble. He told me, and I quote, ‘His Excellency has taken in a stray who will turn on him,’ unquote. Durian tends to be melodramatic, but he didn’t get where he is by being wrong a lot.” She tossed the mirror and colorstick back in her bag. “Does this involve Lyssa van Reuter’s death?”
“I thought that had been ruled an accident,” Jani said.
“Oh, we’re going to be that way, are we? Maybe I should beg off and let you arrange your own damned transfer.”
Please don’t. If Angevin didn’t agree to help, Jani knew she’d have a difficult time finding another runner. Steve and Betha certainly wouldn’t oblige, which meant she’d have to pick a suitable stranger and bribe him or her with nontraceable cash chits. And you could not get a dummy chit from a Cabinet House bank booth, no matter how many a’s you had on your expense voucher.
Assuming Lucien comes through with something worth paying for. Assuming he had anything to come through with. Courts of Inquiry weren’t exactly known as fountains of useful information. Anything good had a tendency to be kept in the Family. “Why do people wonder about Lyssa’s death?”
Angevin wandered to the window behind Jani’s seat and stared into the winter darkness beyond the glass. “There were rumors.”
“That her death wasn’t an accident?”
Angevin nodded. “That it was murder. The big one for about a month was that His Excellency finally got so fed up with her that he arranged a mishap. When that led nowhere, everyone whispered about how much Anais Ulanova and Lyssa’s mother hated one another over the mess with Lyssa’s father, and that Anais waited until he died to murder Lyssa in revenge.”
“That hypothesis sounds bizarre enough to be popular,” Jani said with a dry laugh. “Doesn’t jibe with the fact Lyssa worked for Auntie, though.”
“How about the rumor Lyssa was really Anais’s daughter by Scriabin.” Angevin’s lip curled. “Durian laughed till he cried when that one started circulating.”
“Sounds like one he’d start himself.”
“Doesn’t it, though?” The young woman’s tense face relaxed in a grin. “Nice to know we have the same opinion of my boss.”
“So why work for him?”
Angevin shrugged. “Means to an end. Building the old Cabinet pedigree.” She grew serious. “Last thing my dad would have done, according to all who knew him. When that’s the case, sign me up.”
Oh Hansen—maybe she doesn’t mean it. Jani looked up at Angevin’s somber face. Oops. Maybe she did, at that.
“What type of man,” Angevin continued, “would leave his wife and child behind in order to school in a place that didn’t want him and meddle in things that didn’t concern him? That’s my mom’s slightly biased viewpoint.”
“What’s yours?”
“Every time someone who knew him sees me, they tell me how much I look like him. Then they stand back with this shit-eating grin on their face and wait for me to do my Hansen Wyle imitation.” Angevin tugged at a flattened curl. “I don’t know what they want me to say. I don’t know what they want me to do. I never knew him. I don’t remember him. To me, he’s a few holos and a name in the first page of the Registry.” She looked down at Jani. “You’re about the age he’d be now. You’ve lived out for years. Did you ever meet him?”
Jani swallowed hard. “No.”
“I wonder if he’d have ever met anyone in secret to arrange an iffy transfer?” Angevin shouldered her bag and moved away from the window. “I have to go to my office and get my coat. Then I’ll be off.”
Code of Conduct Page 18