Dan was coming in late to The Jewel, and to hell with the looks his people were going to give him. Allison had been magnificent that morning. It had been worth every second. He and Allison had dropped a tiny hit of eros, and buoyed on the drug, the sex had been fantastic. Maybe the best. Or at least the best until next time.
Just the thought of it, the memory of her sweat-glowing skin, the way she’d hammered herself against him, conjured a tingle at the root of his penis.
“Now that,” he told himself as he strolled down the main avenue, “is as good as life gets.”
He chuckled, glancing up at the morning sky. Partly cloudy. Patches visible of that curious turquoise blue that had so charmed him from the first day he’d set foot on Donovan. Already, he could read the signs: Rain tonight.
He passed the spot where Talina Perez had shot Deb Spiro. Stopped, stared at the hard-packed gravel. Still hard to believe.
Dan had been standing in his doorway, not ten paces away. He hadn’t seen Spiro’s hand move, so fast did she draw her pistol. One instant the weapon was in her holster. The next it was pointed at Talina Perez’s face.
A sure thing. Just shoot.
But Spiro had to talk.
How the fuck had that slit Perez crouched and shot so fast? Again, though he’d been watching, Dan hadn’t seen it happen. Hell, the way she dropped, he thought Perez was shot through the head. The first thought was that somehow, with a bullet in her brain, Perez had shot through reflex.
Only to find out it was a graze.
And then Talbot takes out Chavez.
“So much for insurance.”
Damn it.
“Alas, poor Spiro. So today you rot up in the cemetery just downhill from good old Donovan, and I who could have so used your services am left high and dry. With nothing but my own wits. Of course, you’re dead, and I’m still aglow with the greatest sex a man can stand.
“God, what a waste on your part. If you’d shot the bitch like we planned, just the threat of turning you lose on Mosadek or Dushane would have handed me the whole fucking town. And not a word of resistance uttered along the way.”
So saying, he scuffed the gravel where Spiro had fallen. The blood, of course, had long ago washed away in the rains.
“Alas and alack.”
He strode for The Jewel’s door, opened it, and stepped inside. “How are we doing, Art?” he called as his heels rapped on the chabacho-wood floors as he passed the tables on his way back to the cage.
“Took hours, but we’re cleaned up and ready for business again, boss.” Maniken was seated in the back, a cup of mint tea steeping on the table before him. “Got to tell you, I’m so glad Aguila let her people come back. Pulled in a couple thousand SDRs last night.”
“Yeah, well the good Supervisor is no one’s fool. She can understand the simplest of messages.”
Dan stepped to the back of the bar, poured a cup of hot water from the pot on the hot plate. He crushed some mint between thumb and forefinger. God, he wished for coffee. Rued the day the last cup had been drunk. Word was the seedlings were still alive in the greenhouses, but it would be years before they bore.
“Um, boss? Found a backpack on the floor when we were cleaning up last night. Had Desch Ituri’s name on it. I didn’t know if you’d want me rummaging through it, so I set it on the counter in the cage.”
“Ituri, huh? When was he in?”
“Beats me. I don’t remember seeing him last night.”
Dan used a spoon to stir his tea and stepped over to the cage door.
It sat on the counter as Maniken had said. A regular old backpack. Black. With Ituri’s name stenciled in white.
“No telling what wonders might lie within. Plans? Construction info? Some secret to the good Supervisor’s empire down at Corporate Mine?”
He did, after all, have the slit scared half to death. Tompzen reported that she’d found the pebble, drank the water. And the fact that she’d immediately reinstated crew rotations to The Jewel was proof enough that she understood exactly what her position was.
Dan unsnapped the restraints and lifted the flap, finding an envelope marked To Allison.
“Indeed.” Wirth opened it. On the sheet of paper, it simply said, Desch won’t be coming to see you again.
Well, not every goose continued to lay golden eggs.
Reaching into the pack, Dan removed a curious device that filled most of the interior. A plastic-wrapped square of what looked like clay was topped by a small power pack. On the front, a black duraplast screen flickered to life, the numbers 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, flashing in countdown. Then the letters BANG! flashed on the screen.
“What the hell?”
A piece of paper had been taped to the side. This Dan pulled loose, reading: I, TOO, HAVE AGENTS. SHOULD ANYTHING EVER HAPPEN TO ME, YOU AND THE JEWEL WILL BE A SMOKING CRATER.
A curious tingling of fear raced around his guts. His hair was standing on end, and it was with difficulty that he forced a swallow down his throat.
He glanced at the fake bomb. Then considered the note again. Crumpled it up. Carefully he replaced the fake bomb and letter to Allison. Taking the backpack and his tea, he walked out.
“Art?” He set the backpack on his enforcer’s table. “I want this delivered back to the Supervisor next time she’s in town. You do it. In person.”
“And what do I tell her, boss?”
“Tell her . . . Touché.”
“I don’t get it. Touché?”
“Trust me. She’ll know what it means.”
And with that, he raised his cup in salute. It was, after all, a good morning. First Allison had gotten him off in a way that had left him wondering if his skull was going to explode, and now he discovered he had a most worthy adversary.
“Okay, so it’s a stalemate. Makes the future a lot less boring place.”