"In your back yard."
"The neighbors'll freak."
"Tell 'em you got it with a subscription to Gun Fancy."
I led Eddie around back to the van. Zoe opened the side door and nearly fell out. As I caught her, she said, "You're not as big a jerk as I thought."
"Everyone says that. Eddie LeFevre, Zoe Domingo."
She said, "G'night, Eddie," and closed her eyes. I picked her up. About the weight of two wild cats, I thought as I carried her toward the house. For some reason, that made me smile.
Eddie said, "You're doing this for a critter? I mean, she's cute, Captain, but—"
"She's a client."
"Whatever you say, Cap."
He held the door open for me. If Eddie had been a chimera, he would've been a packrat: His place was very well insulated with boxes that had undoubtedly "fallen off a truck". Or maybe he was operating a mail-order business. Or, knowing Eddie, both. I didn't ask, and I didn't study any of the boxes. For your friends, sometimes it's good to preserve deniability.
Making my way through the maze of his living room warehouse, I said, "Can you get a glass of water for her?"
"Sure. Bottled, none of that shit from the tap."
"You only got the best, Eddie."
As he headed for the kitchen, I carried Zoe into his office and guest room, which continued the warehouse decor with what looked like cartons of software. I'd seen Eddie's French Whorehouse of a bedroom once, and figured Zoe and Eddie would both be happier if I put her here. When I set her on her feet, she fell back onto the airbed and said, "I'm gonna lie down."
I pulled her into a sitting position. "Nope."
"What'd I ever do to you?"
"Don't get me started. Now, stay awake, stay alive."
Eddie came in with a tall glass of water. I took it and handed it to Zoe. She drank it down obediently.
Eddie said, "I called some guys about the van. They'll pay a hundred K. I figured it was better to go for speed than top dollar. Sure you don't want half?"
"It's all yours, Eddie. Think you can keep her awake while I clean up?"
"Sure, Captain." He looked at Zoe as her head nodded slowly forward. "Hey, cat! Don't do that."
She peered at him through heavily lidded eyes. "That's Ms. Cat to you."
"Uh...how 'bout those Dodgers, huh?"
She lifted her head to give him an "I can't believe you said that" scowl.
I said, "Don't like baseball?"
Her head bobbed like a dashboard doll. "Sure. Very restful sport. Wake me at the end of the ninth."
Eddie gave me a hopeless look. I said, "Keep trying. I'm sure you've got something in common." That was a bit of a joke; I figured Eddie and Zoe had as much in common as she and I did.
"Oh, man—" He turned back to Zoe. "Okay, cards? Checkers? What do you like to play?"
"Dead."
He caught her as she leaned back. "C'mon, Ms. Cat! You fall asleep, the Captain'll skin me."
Confidant that Eddie would annoy her enough to keep her awake, I went to the bathroom. I emptied my pockets, then stepped into the shower fully dressed. The blood and food washed out, but crawling under the van had been the suit's kiss of death. More sadly, I'd done in the Hawaiian shirt, too. When a button went, it tore a V in the cloth.
I switched from shower to dryer and stood under the warm air jets wondering what kind of fool I was. This twenty-four-hour job had been extended indefinitely when I became an accomplice by helping Zoe out of the cafeteria. Or had it? If I'd left her, the mob would've killed her. I had the same right to protect a chimera that I had to protect a dog or a horse from being killed by anyone who didn't own it.
The right thing to do was to finish my day's work. If I couldn't get Zoe out of trouble by exposing the people reprogramming copbots, I would wish her good luck and send her on her way. More than that, no one could ask. Not even me.
The dryer might've improved the look of my clothes—the stains weren't as obvious with the cloth rumpled—but I doubted it. I took what consolation I could in knowing I would looked worse in anything borrowed from Eddie.
Coming up the hall, I heard him say, "Hey, hey—don't sleep."
She said, "I'm thinking."
"Think out loud."
"You're a good guy, too."
As I entered the room, I saw Eddie blush. He shrugged and told Zoe, "Shoot."
Wondering who else was supposed to be a good guy, I said, "What kind of lies has Eddie been telling?"
He looked guilty. "Just yakking about the old days, Captain. I'll make some coffee."
Zoe watched him leave. "He's nice."
I said, "Don't lend him money."
She smiled, slumped back against the headboard, and closed her eyes.
I lunged for her. "No, you don't." I hauled her to her feet, draped her arm over my shoulder, and walked her around the room. "C'mon. Just like strolling in the park."
She glanced at the room. "Needs landscaping."
"Yeah? Like what? Some pines in the corner, a pond by the bed?"
"Don't want to talk about landscaping."
"Then tell me a story."
"Don't know any stories."
"Tell me about you."
She pulled herself up. "Boring!" Then she slumped again.
"C'mon. What's your favorite color?"
She bared her teeth at me. "Rare steak red."
"Don't torture the vegetarian."
She smiled in sleepy contentment.
I tried again. "Who's your best friend?"
"Um. Tim."
"Tim who?"
"Timurlane."
"Tim's a chimera?"
Her head nodded in an exaggerated and exasperated nod. "Cat critter."
"How'd you meet him?"
"We ran away from the Petting Zoo. It's this place where—"
"I know the kind of place." I had read about them. They seemed to be especially popular in "N" states—Nevada, New Jersey, North Dakota—where you could do anything you wanted to chimeras, provided you could pay to replace them if they didn't live. "Then what?"
"Mostly running and hiding. We were too good to get caught."
"I'll bet."
"We were happy. We did everything together." She smiled.
"Where's Tim now?"
The smile disappeared. "Werewolfed. Cops killed him."
Zoe let go of my shoulder and started to fall. I caught her, jolting her back awake. "What about Dr. Gold? How'd you meet her?"
"Doc? People said Minnesota was a good place for critters. She was at the U."
"The University of Minnesota?"
"Yeah. Paying critters to take tests. Comparing human and critter reactions, stuff like that. We got along." She smiled again. "Said she always wanted a daughter."
"She took care of you."
"I took care of her, too. Only not good enough."
"You did what you could."
She shook her head vigorously. "Cops killed Doc. And Tauber."
"Bots killed them. Maybe cops are involved, maybe not. All we know is someone programmed the bots."
"You slept with that Blake. Ick!"
"Thanks. I've been trying not to think of that."
She smiled. "You said to talk."
"I'm tough. Keep talking."
"Why do you gamble?"
"I like it."
"No, you don't."
"I do it because I don't like it?"
"Uh-huh. Cigarettes, too. Punishment."
I frowned at her, but she missed it. Punishment? I wondered where she had gotten a notion like that.
Eddie said, "Coffee," and I looked up at the likely source. He came in with two mugs and put them on the desk. If he had overheard anything, he played innocent perfectly. But then, Eddie had a lot of practice at playing innocent. I wrapped Zoe's hands around a mug and walked her to a straight-backed chair.
"Let's watch some HV." I clicked on the set and gave her the remote. As she flicked through channels, I drew Eddie aside and said quietly, "You told her about Long Island."
"You said keep her awake. She was interested—"
"When this is over, remind me to kill you."
Zoe said, "Uh-oh. It's the Max and Zoe show."
The HV showed the USCLA cafeteria with cops and copbots swarming through it like ants in a picnic basket. An ambulance team rolled Tauber's sheeted body out on a crash cart. Good old Adam Tromploy said very earnestly, "In Los Angeles today, chimera rights activist Amos Tauber was killed in a werewolfing."
Blurry blown-up security camera stills of Zoe and me in a USCLA hallway appeared. Tromploy said, "The police warn the public to be on the alert for the werewolfing suspect and her human companion."
I glanced at Zoe, expecting to see her looking worried. Her eyes had closed again. I grabbed her cup before it fell, then shook her. "Zoe? Stay with me, damn it!"
She blinked at me. "You're back."
"Yeah," I agreed. "I'm back. What do you want to talk about?"
"Nothing."
"You can do better than that."
"Okay. You."
"Forget it."
"Okay." She closed her eyes.
"Blackmailer."
She nodded. "Like you won't cheat to get what you want."
"I don't cheat. I take advantage of the moment."
"Yeah. That's what I meant."
"So what do you want to hear?"
"Everything."
I glared at Eddie. He said, "You guys holler if you need anything," and left.
Zoe said, "Well?"
"Everything?"
"You got my story. Fair's fair."
So I talked. Sometimes she interrupted, and sometimes I nudged her so she would interrupt. I didn't want to tell her as much as I did—hell, I didn't want to tell her any of it—but Eddie had given her enough about Long Island to let her dig for the full version. As for the rest, well, she was a good listener, and there wasn't much else to do while the afternoon died and we waited for Eddie's friends to fetch the van.
I grew up rich. Not super-rich like a software sultan or a petroleum prince, but rich. Like most rich people, I didn't think I was especially well off. I knew plenty of people who were richer. My parents used the same euphemism that all our neighbors in Darien did: we were "comfortable." I never stopped to consider that this must've meant our servants were uncomfortable. It was the way life was, and it was good.
The family money came from the earliest days of personal computers, when Grandpa invested heavily in Silicon Valley. Dad used his inheritance to buy up post offices after the first big flurry of privatization. He met Mom when she came on as a vice-president of nonhuman resources. Maxwell Mail Services expanded quickly, and so did the Maxwell family, with me, then Jeff, who drowned at fourteen in a sailing accident, then Selene, who knew all her life that she was going to be a prima ballerina who would have many famous lovers and two perfect children.
As a kid, I never paid attention to the family business. I remember touring an MMS facility once and seeing our chimeras at work, but the only thing I felt was boredom; I desperately wanted to be hanging out with my friends. Everyone assumed that after I graduated, I would become a vice-president and work my way to the top, and someday, I would leave my heirs and Selene's the world's biggest mail delivery service. I had no complaints with the plan. When I went to Yale, everything seemed to be proceeding on schedule. MMS had just acquired two of its competitors and driven a third out of business. I expected to spend four years in New Haven studying astronomy, intoxicants, and women, not in that order.
Then Dad put a bullet through his brain. His debts were enormous. He had overextended the company, then gambled on a few business propositions that failed. Maybe we should've run off to Europe and claimed to be economic refugees, but Mom had been a Libertarian her entire life. Saying she was too old to become a hypocrite, she sold everything that would've been seized by the courts. And then she sold the only asset she had left: herself.
She negotiated a ten year indenture to Canoga Corp as a middle-management exec, with clauses stipulating that she wouldn't work more than sixty-five hours a week and would have her contract shortened if they promoted her into a position with more responsibility. For a forty-five year old woman in debt, it was a very good deal. She said she welcomed the challenge.
But it didn't cover all our expenses. To buy my sister enough time to finish prep school, I dropped out of Yale before second term finals and joined the UN Peace Force.
Getting far away from home seemed like a good idea. With my travel allowance, I could alternate visits to Selene in Connecticut and Mom in Senegal, where she'd been sent to help open a new plant. My theory held for exactly one good visit with each of them.
On Selene's sixteenth birthday, when I was stationed in Mississippi helping to contain the Jackson Rebellion, Selene sold herself for three years to a brothel in Chicago. As a virgin, she got top dollar, more than enough to buy out Mom's contract and let me go back to Yale. I learned this on a vid that she emailed me, because she knew I wouldn't have let her do it if she'd spoken to me live.
I never got a chance to speak to her live. A month into her contract, she was offered a year and a half off her indenture if she would sign a rider to take on rougher clients. Three weeks after she signed it, a man named Vernon Bolanders beat her to death. A house bodyguard broke into the room and shot Bolanders dead. There wasn't anything for Mom and me to do after that but mourn.
Maybe I should've gone back to school and gotten a business degree. Instead, I gave my share of Selene's money to Mom, who moved into a domed community and began drinking one and a half bottles of wine a day. I doubled my efforts in the Peace Force. Someone noticed and promoted me to lieutenant, then transferred me to U. N. Security. I liked that. I was going to make the world safe for the people who wanted to make it better. Because I'd been lucky in Mississippi, I was assigned to Counter-Terrorism. When I made captain, they issued me my very own Infinite Pocket.
I met Rita Hlavy in Geneva and married her four months later. We figured I would do my twenty years in UNSEC, then our two kids would be in college and we could spend the rest of our lives together in comfort. We were working on the first of the kids when the Long Island assignment came along.