Perfection

by Larissa Emerald

  Fingers curling around the key, Kindra ripped her attention from her daughter. “Call me if she gets upset again.”

  “I will. Don’t forget that my updated replacement arrives tomorrow.”

  “Yes. I have it in my system,” she said absently, grabbing her satchel from the foyer table. As she closed the door behind her, Kindra couldn’t shake the mother’s intuition that told her something bigger was wrong with Brianna.

  She gave her head a shake. Perhaps it was simply growing pains. Brianna had a birthday soon.

  * * *

  He jogged up to Gina just as she was unlocking the apartment door. She jumped. He took hold of her hands, pulling her abruptly toward him. A little winded and a lot exited, a moment passed before he could speak. “It’s done.”

  “What are you talking about?” She looked at him blankly, leaning backward so that her cornflower hair draped down her back. Her fine, sculptured brows knit with confusion.

  He wanted to grab a fistful of that hair and tug her into submission, but resisted. He was a man of willpower, after all. Didn’t his planning and careful execution of that idea, prove that?

  “Remember I mentioned I’d discovered a way to make them pay for all their slights over the years. To show them once and for all I was just as smart and capable as their top scientists.” God, he longed to share his accomplishment. She’d be so proud of him.

  “What did you do?” she asked hesitantly.

  He smoothed his fingers over her cheek, changing his mind about telling her. He didn’t want anything to dampen his mood, his elation. “Nothing. Never mind. We’ll talk about it tomorrow.” He interlocked his fingers with hers and led her into the apartment and his bedroom.

  Chapter Two

  York parked alongside B-Gastion’s Air-Porsche on the second floor of the landing garage, as he had for past visits. He admired the Porsche as he and Vi strolled between the vehicles. B-Gastion had chosen a fancy family flyer while York had gone for sleek power.

  “You’re going to get in trouble parking here,” Vi complained.

  “Maybe. But I don’t think the captain’s speech about not ruffling the locals’ feathers referred to active investigations.”

  They didn’t speak as they navigated the stairs to a private access. A wall of shrubbery kept them hidden until they were almost to the front door. A crowd had gathered halfway up the walkway framed by low, manicured hedges as vehicles filled the street. “Damn. Every reporter in town must have intercepted the police stream.”

  “Better here than at your mom’s arrest. Benefited her situation, don’t you think?”

  “Nah, too much time lapsed. Just a lucky break.” But this morning had been too easy. Coincidence? The media types trolled for headlines, and they had the money to support their efforts. Of course, GEIs were far too interested in what was happening in their own circles to invest much effort in the imperfect world of Coders. But…

  Screw it. He had other worries right now.

  His spot computer thrummed against his hand. He checked it while he walked. The data readout darkened, adjusting to the sunlight that pierced the clouds in the east. InSIGHT had updated the status of Isabelle’s investigation with photos and preliminary stats of body temperature and decomposition. York looked at the images of little Isabelle lying on the floor of a child’s bedroom, a doll clutched to her chest. A knot lodged in his throat. He shivered, and his stomach clenched. He wouldn’t wish this tragedy on the genetic misfits hiding out in the tunnels, let alone on a valued friend.

  As regional director he’d built strong partnerships with other nations committed to accelerate progress toward global development goals of health surveillance and reducing health inequalities. In the eighty years or so since the GEIs had stepped into most of the power jobs in society, the position was always held by a GEI, and his policy usually favored the wealthy. Even so, when York’s boy was ill, B-Gastion was the only GEI to attempt to help him.

  He inhaled a breath, held it, then moved on with the exhale. He could feel Vi watching him, probably wondering how he was holding up. Solid, he wanted to tell her but didn’t.

  Beneath the stately columned portico, Fredrick B-Gastion greeted them with the formality one would expect from a dignitary. His spine held him erect, but the forward dip of his shoulders and grief in his eyes gave him away. “Thank you for coming so promptly, Lieutenant.”

  “Of course.” York clasped his friend’s extended hand. “I’m not sure you’ve met my partner, Detective Vivian Lester.”

  “I have, but I can’t remember where at the moment.”

  Vi angled her head. “I wish this meeting were under different circumstances, sir.”

  Didn’t they all?

  No matter the appearances, B-Gastion was broken and hurting. The evidence rang clear in the regional director’s half-hearted handshake and emotion-reddened eyes.

  “Let’s go inside.” York urged him toward the half-open door.

  Vi trailed them. Their feet rapped an uneven rhythm on the glossy marble tiles as they moved deeper into the house. He and B-Gastion stopped when they reached the living area and stared at each other, professional to professional, man to man, father to father.

  “Who made the discovery?” York asked. The look of anguish on B-Gastion’s face said he may have reached his threshold for holding it together. York placed an arm around his friend’s shoulder and directed him toward the sofa.

  “Her mother.” B-Gastion’s voice broke on the last word, and he cleared his throat. “How…how could this happen? It’s not supposed to happen.”

  York smothered a curse. “We’ll damn well find out. I’m so sorry.”

  “This is… It’s such a shock.” Fredrick pressed his lips together, then turned his head to the side, looking away.

  “The sooner we start the investigation, the quicker we’ll have answers,” Vi said gently. “Where’s Isabelle’s room?”

  Fredrick glanced up the staircase, and his face began to crumple, mouth quivering.

  York stood tall, wishing he could give his friend strength. “We can find our way. Why don’t you have a seat?”

  Drawing a breath, B-Gastion appeared to suck back his emotion as best he could. “No. No, I should go with you.”

  “It’s all right. The ME and the forensic team will arrive soon. You can usher them in.” York sought words of comfort but knew it was impossible. Condolences wouldn’t grant B-Gastion what he wanted most. So York slipped a recorder ring from his finger and held it out, a stall technique to give the other man time to compose himself. “Dictate every detail you can think of. The daily routine. If anyone new has been in the house. Anything and everything.”

  B-Gastion took the ring and eased it over his thumb with shaky fingers.

  A few minutes later, York and Vi stood in the center of the dead two-year-old’s room. Inconceivable. Sprawled on the floor, she looked so alone dressed in her pale pink pajama’s decorated with white and black kittens. He tightened his hold on his crime scene kit and struggled for perspective. If he could shut out the sound of weeping that came from the room next door—surely, B-Gastion’s wife—it would make his task a hell of a lot easier.

  He knelt beside the small body of Isabelle D-Gastion. Long blond hair framed a delicate face. The child could have been in a deep sleep, hugging a look-alike Global Doll.

  He exhaled a shuddering breath and fought the sting in his eyes. It had been six years since he’d been faced with the death of someone this young, and his son’s passing had not been so peaceful. His hand shook as he opened the crime scene bag. Images of his boy flashed in his mind—a toothless grin, a small hand tossing a red ball, thin arms wrapped tightly around his neck.

  He squeezed his eyes shut, opened them.

  The quiet sound of Vi’s voice brought his head up. Standing on the opposite side of Isabelle, she dictated information into her spot computer.

  She met his gaze. “Hey, I didn’t consider it earlier, but why did the capt
ain assign us to this one? It’s not our RO.”

  “Rotation doesn’t come into play here. B-Gastion requested me.”

  She angled her head. “Oh, right.”

  He sensed her watching him, perhaps looking for some reaction. He just passed his med-scanner over the girl, watching the monitor for any sign of physical trauma and finding none.

  “This doesn’t make sense, Vi. No trauma. And GEIs don’t die, even in an accident situation. Primps can put them back together with cloning and such.”

  “Unless the injury is to the head. The brain is the one organ that can’t be cloned.”

  The health packages for GEIs far exceeded the basic medical unit of immunity to disease and illness granted to Coders like him. The genetic code of Coders remained largely unaltered. When they did get alterations, they were the kind that attached to stem cells and altered the genes from the outside in, as opposed to the ground-up method from inception used with GEIs. In the early years of genetic engineering, participating in the new science had required money. Perfection had cost a hefty sum.

  So did saving a life, he thought bitterly. Even a young one.

  Vi averted her gaze from the girl’s body. “Yeah, strange.”

  He shoved the test equipment into his bag and zipped it. “There isn’t a mark on her. Nothing.”

  “Then what killed her?” Vi’s voice snagged.

  York stood. “You okay?”

  She nodded but avoided eye contact. He knew better than to believe her. It was a code of denial they shared.

  “Any guesses?”

  He crossed his arms to control the tightness in his chest and shrugged. “Some sort of asphyxiation, maybe? Poison? I don’t know.”

  His QuL beeped in his ear and he responded with a brusque, “York.”

  “When are you going to get rid of that QuickLink? It’s a dinosaur,” Vi whispered. Then she held up a hand, talking more to herself than to him. “I know, I know. Less likely to be traced by criminals.”

  He rolled his eyes and focused on Captain Avery’s voice. As usual, the captain sounded worried and was probably getting hit from all sides. Damn politics. Avery asked for a crisis update. York obliged with a list of stats. “We’re treating this like a suspicious death until we learn differently. We’ll check out any contacts. Wait to see if there are demands. Maybe it’s extorsion gone bad.”

  He listened to his superior’s instructions, grimaced, and said, “Right. One of us will go over there.”

  He disconnected.

  “Now what?” Vi asked.

  “Avery wants one of us to fetch a geneticist since we don’t have an expert on staff. Then take ’em to the morgue to evaluate the…situation.”

  She pursed her lips and shifted her attention to wrapping up her notes.

  “Vi? Talk to me.” At her obvious reluctance, he added their customary, “Flip you for it.” He withdrew his lucky coin from his pocket. It was a 1976 quarter from the days when they actually used coins.

  She slowly shook her head.

  Finally, she curled her spot computer into her chest. Good thing it was made of flexible material. She looked as if she was going to crush it in her hand. Her almond-shaped eyes blazed. “You know how I hate those scientists.”

  “Like I don’t?”

  “Will you do it? Please?”

  He glanced around the room, taking in the perfect environment of a model GEI child. Just two weeks ago he’d bounced this sweet, laughing girl on his knee. Something horribly strange was going on, and dammit, for little Isabelle D-Gastion, he would set aside his personal feelings and unearth the truth. He’d work with those high-and-mighty scientists even if it killed him.

  “Don’t worry. This one’s mine.” No way he’d be satisfied with anyone else handling the case anyway. A door clacked shut downstairs, and then voices echoed through the house—probably the forensic team. “But you owe me a pizza,” he added.

  “Deal,” she said without hesitation. She tucked her hair behind her ear and forced out a heavy sigh. “Guess we should let go of this hatred sometime.”

  “Never.”

  “Did the captain ask for any geneticist in particular?”

  He lifted the test bag. “Wouldn’t you know, he wants that hardnose B-Zaika.” He didn’t know her personally, but the lead scientist of the Seville Genetics Center was always on the news. He could envision her beautiful smile as she spoke with a slight English accent while hawking her latest creation to the public.

  With an exaggerated consoling pat on the back, she said, “Sorry.”

  “Sure.” He thought he heard a good-humored snicker behind him as they stepped out of the bedroom and into the hall. God knew they needed something to ease the sting of leaving that poor little girl behind.

  A pair of sweepers arrived first. They would check all the electronics in the room. Next came the ME and a couple of uniforms. York acknowledged Shishido, the officer in charge of the forensics team, and then addressed the group. “Test for foreign substances, poison. Check the toys, gel books, clothes, everything. Whatever killed her may be on everything she touched. Take their Nanny Sally back to our lab, too. I want an e-specialist to go over all security and electronics. And we’re going to want to talk with anyone who has access to the house.”

  The others nodded. He passed the command to Vi with a look and went downstairs as she took the team into the bedroom. B-Gastion sat where York had left him. There were people moving around him now, technicians going over every inch of the place and more uniforms documenting everything, all searching for evidence that would tell them what had killed a GEI child.

  Fredrick started to rise, but York motioned for him to stay put. Better to remain out of the techs’ way. “You done with that?” he asked, indicating the recorder ring.

  Slowly, the dazed man nodded and handed it over.

  York slipped it back onto his finger. “I’ll need to talk to Isabelle’s mother, of course, and your staff. I’ll need a list of your enemies. People not happy with your policy, whoever you can think of who might want to cause trouble or hurt you.” His voice softened. “And if you think of anything else, or if there’s anything I can do, call me.”

  B-Gastion rubbed the back of his neck and looked up. “Thank you.”

  York gave a curt nod. “I’ll be back later.”

  Vi was waiting for him at the gigantic double panel doors. As he walked closer, all the anger and frustration, pain and memories twisted into a colossal knot in his chest. He’d forgotten rule number one: don’t allow people to get too close because it hurts like hell.

  He thought he’d learned that lesson. He’d thought he was numb.

  God, he’d thought wrong. His dismay about investigating the death of a child weighed on him. With a white-knuckled grip on the brass handle, he glanced at his partner and threw open the door. “Get set for the piranhas.”

  They’d gotten in behind the cover of the landscaping, exiting would not be so easy.

  Vi stepped quickly out, almost breaking into a run. York matched her pace. This was standard in such situations, but that didn’t mean he had to like it. They had not gotten far before they were bombarded by reporters. York halted within inches of bursting through the wall of news people lining the pristine lawn. “Get the hell out of my way.”

  No one budged. Fine. He’d enjoy mowing them down. It was that kinda day.

  A cluster of tiny drone cameras, Tracers, hovered overhead. At times like this, York detested procedure. In his experience, rules weren’t necessarily the quickest route to satisfactory solutions.

  “Move,” he bit out more loudly. Dealing with these dipshit reporters wasted time he didn’t have. A child was dead, for God’s sake. They needed answers ASAP.

  Unexpected images from the time surrounding his son’s death attacked his mind with strobe-light speed. A final wheeze of breath. An unnatural stillness. The scent of incense at the funeral. He fisted his hands, fingernails digging into his palms.

 
Danny.

  He thrust his hands into his pockets and slammed his son’s memory back into its box. That had been another life. Another ambition. Another person. Since Danny’s death, York had taken strong measures to avoid cases like this, even going so far as requesting that Avery keep him off child death investigations. Yet here he was, right in the thick of one. Assigned to work with a GEI geneticist to uncover the truth.

  A tall reporter, his expression aggressive, tried to block York. “I heard it was the child. Was she in an accident?”

  “Take it somewhere else.” York gave the man a chance to comply before he tore the Tracer controller, branded with the Chicago Times logo, from the guy’s hands and flung it away from them. Above, a single drone spiraled out of the pack, plummeted, and crashed into the sleek marble courtyard fountain.

  “Hey!” The reporter lunged forward with a searing glare. “Lieutenant”—the guy dipped his gaze to read York’s ID—“Richmond.” He stepped back. “Whose side are you on?”

  “The child’s.” Why did people always reduce genetic issues to our side versus their side? The shadow of a beard and slightly darker expression told York that, like himself, the reporter was a Coder. The reporter was sturdy and muscular. York forced calm as his instincts prickled. He glanced about.

  “Wait. Richmond. Isn’t your mother one of the leaders of the anti-GEI movement?” one reporter asked.

  The other reporters closed ranks on him, like ants after a legs-up beetle. They spit out question after question.

  “Is it true a GEI child died?”

  “Isn’t that unheard of for Artificial Womb Engineered babies?”

  “Can you give us a name? A quote?”

  “From which generation? C? D?”

  “What does Fredrick B-Gastion have to do with this?”

  York felt his spine tighten one vertebra at a time. He lowered a shoulder and shoved the tall reporter out of the way, ready to linebacker his way to the air-car if necessary. Central in his mind were the words why and how.