Another risk of exposure. And who’s gonna take the heat? Not Command. Not North. Talbott scowled up and down the console. God, he wanted a drink right now.
“What do you think about picking them off in the city?” Paroti asked.
Talbott glared up at him. Why is this idiot in charge? He drew a breath. “We can’t take chances like that, Colonel. Going after them out in the wilderness was risky enough. This is supposed to be an undercover operation, remember?” And now we screwed it up royally.
“Don’t be a wise ass. Give me some options. What about that other rigger, or whatever the hell she is. Legroeder’s woman. Can we do something with her? She probably knows some things that would be useful.”
Talbott rocked back in his chair, surprised by his commander. “There’s a thought now. That rigger might not be so eager to spill his guts if we’ve got his girl. We’d probably have to have Command pass on it first. And I suppose we’ll need to see what Hizhonor North has to say. But grabbing her just might be a way to pull our nuts out of the fire on this one.”
“Then get on it…”
“You know,” Legroeder said, between glances at the instruments and the autopilot, “we’re flying what could easily be construed as a stolen craft. Plus, we’ve got a box full of documents that were probably known to have been in his archives. We might want to do some thinking about how that’s going to look.”
“I have been thinking,” she said softly. “And I don’t like what I’m hearing.”
“You think they’re going to come after us?”
“I think the police will probably want to have some words with us.”
“Which raises the next question. Are they in on this frame-up business?”
Harriet bit her lip. “Maybe not. Whatever’s going on at the RiggerGuild—and whoever they’re colluding with—I haven’t seen a reason yet to suspect the police.”
“But do we trust them enough to go back to Elmira? Will we be safe there?” They were flying on a southerly heading at the moment; Elmira was to the southeast.
Harriet scowled in concentration. Clearly matters had gone beyond anything in her experience. “Seems to me, if anything, we’re probably safer in the city. At least there we have some control, and we can use the legal system. Peter has good security, and whoever these people are, they don’t seem eager to reveal themselves.”
“They might not have to, if they can frame us for McGinnis’s house burning.”
“Yes, but we were shot at before we landed there.”
“Which will be hard to prove, until someone gets through the forcefield and looks at the rental flyer.”
“Well, nothing’s easy,” Harriet said. “You know, McGinnis knew more than he told us. I think he was expecting us.”
“Why do you say that?”
“For one thing, he knew who we were. Remember his remark about whoever shot at us not liking lawyers? Only I didn’t tell him I was a lawyer?”
Legroeder grunted. “I was wondering about his reconstructive surgery. I didn’t see any datachip markers on him, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t have implants.”
“Meaning—? What are you thinking?”
“I don’t know.” Legroeder rubbed his jaw. His guess was, anyone with implants was suspect on this world; but that didn’t mean he was guilty of anything. “I’m just thinking Jakus had them, and gave every sign of being under their influence. And we know where he got his implants.”
Harriet was watching him over her glasses. “Golen Space?”
Legroeder nodded. Implants made him uneasy enough in and of themselves; but in the pirate culture, they were designed without safeguards, and were used for control as much as for enhancement. He shuddered, remembering how close he had come to having them in his own head.
With a deep breath, he set a new course for Elmira.
They landed at the edge of the city shortly after sunset, in a driving rainstorm. They sat in the grounded flyer, listening to the rain pound on the roof, while Harriet called for Peter to send a car to meet them, and made arrangements for the flyer to be garaged outside the city. Then they piled into Peter’s associate’s car with the box of documents. It was a gloomy ride to Harriet’s office, in the rain and the darkness. They were greeted outside by another of the PI’s men, already on watch.
When they walked into the office, shaking off the raindrops, Legroeder was surprised to see a woman sitting at Harriet’s desk, poring over Harriet’s com-console. The woman’s face looked familiar. “Hi, Mom,” she said. “I was starting to worry.”
“We had a few problems, dear,” Harriet answered, showing Legroeder where to put the box. “Like someone trying to shoot us out of the sky, and then a house burning down. Legroeder, this is my daughter Morgan. Morgan, Rigger Legroeder.”
They shook hands. Morgan appeared to be in her mid thirties, a good-looking woman with a narrower and more angular face than Harriet’s, but with her mother’s greenish eyes and intensity of expression. She looked alarmed as her mother bustled around the office, turning down lights and closing shades. Then Harriet told her about the visit with McGinnis.
“Christ, Mother! You need to get some security. Do you think they’ll attack you here in the city?”
Harriet sank into an overstuffed chair with a heartfelt sigh. “I don’t think so. But Peter’s on his way over now. We’ll do whatever he says.”
“But what about Mr. McGinnis? Do you have any idea what’s happened to him?”
Harriet looked grim. “I have a pretty good idea, yes, though I hope I’m wrong. I’ll ask Peter to send someone up there as soon as possible. But in the meantime, McGinnis gave us some extremely sensitive materials to safeguard. This stuff could be major armament for Legroeder in his case with the Guild and the Spacing Authority. What else it will do, I don’t know.” Harriet got up with a groan and pried the lid off the box. “Somebody is awfully afraid of what’s in there. So let’s get busy making backup copies. We’ll want one in a bank vault, one in free-float storage on the net, and maybe a couple in other places. Let’s copy the cube first, then scan in all the hardcopy.”
“Let me clear a space here,” Morgan said. A smile flickered on her lips. “Jeez, mother, I haven’t seen you look this alive in years. Maybe you should have people shoot at you more often.” The smile disappeared when it became apparent that neither Harriet nor Legroeder could make light of the situation. “Sorry. Let me see if I can get this going for you.”
“Any calls while we were gone?”
“Yes—I almost forgot. There was a call for Legroeder from the hospital. It was sealed, so I saved it for you.” Morgan tapped on the phone pad and turned the viewer toward Legroeder. “Do you want to take it in private?”
Legroeder shook his head. Did Maris wake up? he wondered hopefully. He keyed the call and saw the face of the attending physician.
“Mr. Legroeder,” said the doctor, “I’m calling to let you know that Maris O’Hare is about to be transferred out of our facility. Some of her relatives came by and made the arrangements. I know you were concerned about her, and I hope this reaches you before she’s gone. Please give me a call back. It’s now nineteen hundred hours.”
Oh, sweet Jesus. Legroeder looked up at Harriet in fear. “Somebody got to Maris.” He checked the time. It was 2430, getting late in the evening.