DeathWeb (Fox Meridian Book 3) (12 page)

Fox feigned a hint of fear as she tugged on the cuffs. The things felt real and it had been a while since she had been in restraints. ‘W-what kind of latitude?’

Marie stalked around her captive, reached out, and pulled the belt of Fox’s robe free. It took nothing more than a light push to have the silky material sliding down Fox’s arms to hang over the cuffs at her wrists. Marie licked her lips and wrapped her hand around the handle of the baton at her hip. ‘Are you going to talk?’

‘N-never, napper.’

Marie pulled her ‘baton’ free and Fox found herself looking at a long, thick, black dildo with a handle attached to it. ‘Spread ’em, sister,’ Marie hissed. ‘I’m going to do things to you that’ll make you scream your confession.’

Looking into the redhead’s eyes, Fox got the impression that she was not kidding around.

23
^rd
June.

Fox’s eyes opened as Kit pinged an alarm through her head. She blinked. ‘Kit, it’s barely seven and I didn’t get to sleep until two.’

‘I know, Fox,’ Kit replied. ‘I rather enjoyed the display. It was very educational and I would like to discuss it later. However, you are needed at the conference centre.’

‘At seven in the morning?’

‘Yes. They have found a body.’

‘Shit.’

Marie stirred as Fox rolled out of bed. ‘Is it time to get up already?’ The voice was slurred with sleep and Fox grinned down at her, lying there sprawled across the bed with her blue skirt still bunched up around her waist.

‘I have to go in, you stay in bed.’

‘’Kay.’

‘You look… incredible.’

There was no reply; Marie had drifted back to sleep.

~~~

Sending orders ahead had Pythia’s forensic swarms crawling all over the body by the time Fox got to it. Fox stood at a distance, watching through the eyes of a six-legged cyberframe which was also part of Pythia’s retinue. Through the false colour of multispectral sensors, the bruising, burns, and wounds were more obvious. The basic analysis the swarm and the scans had already produced showed tissue damage almost everywhere.

‘And then you get dumped outside an emergency exit like trash.’ Even this early in the morning, the sun was beating down and the air temperature was over twenty Celsius. The scent of blood and decay was hitting Fox’s stomach even at this distance. Getting the body out of the baking heat was going to be a priority.

‘That looks bad.’ Fox looked around to see Jarvis standing beside her.

‘It is. When did they find the body?’

‘Seven-oh-two. Routine sweep around the building every hour by cambots.’

‘So he dumped her between six and seven. Knows the patrol cycle. Yeah, that sounds like the guy.’

Jarvis frowned. ‘You know who it is?’

‘I’ve been studying his work. Kit’s been working a profile on him and when Lauren Mary Coolidge there went missing on Saturday, Kit flagged her as a possible victim. She fitted his rather broad range of victim profiles. But his last kill was in Berlin.’

‘He gets around.’

‘Oh yeah, six more in New York, two in Cape Town, three in Berlin. This makes an even dozen. But now he’s dumped his cast-off right on my doorstep.’

‘Right outside a conference on the future of policing. I may not be the investigator you are, but that sounds like a challenge.’

‘I think you’re a better detective than you think you are, Ryan.’

‘If that was the case, I’d have your job too. And just to be quite clear, if I have to spend my time looking at things like that to do your job, you can keep it.’

‘Thanks. Kit, call NAPA, have them put you through to Cant. Tell him to get down here to look at this. Tell him his serial is back.’

Kit appeared beside them, her eyes on the body. She was looking disquieted, but she said, ‘Yes, Fox,’ and Fox decided to question her AI’s mental state later.

‘You’re calling in NAPA on this?’ Jarvis asked.

‘According to the law, I have to and we might as well get it over with. I’ll have the forensics on the body anyway and Cant will end up with the paperwork.’

‘That’s kind of mean.’

‘What can I say, I hate paperwork.’

~~~

Fox spotted Cant walking across the exhibition floor from quite a distance. He was a big man and made an impression. She had heard a number of rumours to the effect that he used all that mass to very good effect when ‘questioning’ suspects outside HQ, but no one had ever come forward to complain. He was not a good cop, but there was a look on his face as he approached the stand, the kind of look a good cop got when he really
wanted
to nail a criminal. She nodded toward the back of the stand and then went that way herself to where there was a small, closed-off space they used for breaks.

‘You think it’s him?’ Cant said as soon as the door was closed behind him.

‘It fits the pattern.’ Fox handed him a mug of coffee, possibly the only nice thing she had ever done for the man that she could remember.

‘Yeah, it does. You’ve had all your fancy forensics stuff run on her?’

‘Pythia’s still processing the swarm results. You’ll have it inside of the hour. You’ll need to clear it with Canard–’

‘It’s cleared. I’m on the case.’

Fox nodded. ‘I’d like to continue working it, but if I find him, you get the collar.’

Cant’s brow creased and he sank half the contents of his mug. ‘I’d like to say I don’t care who gets him, but I can’t quite say it and mean it. It’d be a good mark on my record. And aside from that, I want this freak. What he does to people, men and women, it’s sick. It’s… not human.’

She smiled. ‘Self-knowledge is always valuable, plus I never knew you had that kind of dedication. But he made this personal. Or he made it a challenge anyway, dropping the body right outside the conference building.’

This time he sipped, thinking. ‘You think he’s challenging us, you, to catch him?’

This time it was Fox who frowned. ‘It reads like that, but I’m not sure. He’s cocky, sure of himself, meticulous, and clever. He knew the schedule on the security sweeps here and dumped the body to be found quickly. I think he wanted us to know he’s back. He must know someone’s tied his kills together. I think he wants people watching, knowing he’s out there, and worrying who’ll be next.’

‘I don’t suppose you have any ideas on that?’

‘Huh. He picks his targets out by looking for people who go running. I think he tracks them using that LifeFit app and there are thousands in New York alone who do it. You could narrow it down by age and he seems to like them fit–’

‘He likes people he can torture for a long time. Fitter they are, the longer they’ll last while he breaks them.’ Fox just nodded in response. ‘And we can’t tell everyone to quit using LifeFit. LifeWeb would scream at us for starters. They’ve got political clout.’

‘Yeah. See why I don’t like politics?’

‘For someone who doesn’t, you’ve got a lot of NAPA people delegating law and order votes to you.’

‘Canard notice that?’ Kit had told her about a sharp rise in delegations after the presentation. Fox’s answer to the last question had had an effect.

‘Yeah, he did. He won’t like you working this case.’ Cant took in a long breath and let it out. ‘I’ll square it. Play up you handing us the collar. I’ll be using you and your resources to get a result. I can play politics too.’ He gave her a lopsided grin. ‘Doesn’t make us friends.’

‘I promise to look pissed off when you put this bastard in a box.’

‘Sounds good. I figure the Lensmen will want in. You’ll handle that side?’

‘Yeah, I can handle that. Deveraux seems to like me and there are some things, politically difficult things, the UNTPP could handle more easily.’

There was another lopsided grin. ‘What’s not to like? You brush up kind of nice. Never thought I’d see you in a suit.’

Fox shrugged and drained her coffee. ‘I think it makes me look kind of frumpy. Wait ’til you see me in a dress.’

~~~

‘Fox?’ Kit’s voice was quiet, subdued, and she was using audio only. They were still on the stand, but there were panels open elsewhere and the ground traffic was thin.

‘Yes, Kit.’ Fox kept the conversation in her head, because Kit seemed to want it private.

‘This killer, what he does to his victims…’ The AI’s voice trailed off and Fox gave it a second before prompting.

‘Yes?’

‘Reading the reports on the previous ones was bad, but it seemed… one step removed. Seeing this one… How can one human do something like that to another? I don’t understand. I can’t believe anyone… I mean, I can see it. Pythia has provided the full list of injuries and my copy at home is filing everything in the murder room, but I can’t seem to quite believe it.’

Fox was silent for a second, considering. ‘Kit, you weren’t originally designed to do this kind of work. You’re good at it and I’ve been happy with your work, but not every human can handle it. It’s like Ryan said earlier, he wouldn’t want my job. If you wanted to step back–’

‘No! No, I want to do it. I feel we make a good team, you, me, and Pythia. I think we are the best hope of stopping this man and I
want
to stop him. I see why you become so determined and I see why even Inspector Cant wants to see this one behind bars. Please don’t make me stop. I just wish to understand
why
.’

‘Okay. I think we make a good team too, but I think you should talk this through with Terri. I don’t want you damaging yourself doing this.’

‘I will. I promise.’

‘Okay. Well, some people kill on impulse, for defence or out of anger or passion. That’s not what we have here. Some kill for money, either being paid to kill or for material gain. Again, not what we have here. Some people just like it. The term is anti-social personality disorder. They don’t have the same sort of empathy for others that we consider normal. This guy clearly doesn’t empathise with his victims. He
likes
handing out pain and humiliation. Modern education practice and genetic screening has done a lot to eliminate this kind of behaviour, but there are plenty of people around who were born before the tests came in, or they live in the Sprawl and never got them. Maybe in a century there won’t be any left, but for now we have to deal with them.’

‘I know something about anti-social personality disorder,’ Kit said after a second. ‘I will do more research and consider how it affects this case. Thank you, Fox. I will not allow my… disquiet over this man’s methods to affect my work.’

‘It will affect you, Kit. If it doesn’t, then there’s something wrong with you too. Just remember you can always talk to me or Terri about it.’

‘Okay. And, if it helps, you can talk to me about it too.’

Fox smiled, despite the fact that it might make her look strange to anyone watching. ‘Thank you, Kit. I’ll remember that.’

~~~

Fox and Marie stood near the door into Sam’s lounge, watching him fret over the furniture arrangements as Belle projected virtual models of the furniture he was worrying about into the space.

‘I never knew there was so much planning needed,’ Marie whispered.

‘It’s not exactly feng shui,’ Sam said, having heard her anyway, ‘but there’s a certain aesthetic style I’m trying to achieve to allow me to have my own space which also functions for entertaining clients.’

‘Oh.’

‘Yes. It’s part of the training, though something many professionals pay only lip service to. It’s one of the reasons I’m using v-tags a lot for the decoration. Reds are appropriate for client visits.’

‘Red tends to bring out passion,’ Fox supplied.

‘Your bedroom is painted red,’ Marie commented.

‘Yes, and it seems to be working.’

Sam flashed them both a grin. ‘When I’m not working, I prefer something different. Cool colours in summer, warm in winter. The furniture has to work with all of that, plus I need appropriate areas in the room for its various functions.’

‘It’s a lounge,’ Marie said. ‘You lounge in it.’

‘You may. Fox works in hers, even if that’s while lounging. We all entertain. Many of my clients prefer not to restrict sex to the bedroom. I need chairs which…’ He stopped and frowned at Marie. ‘Do you really want the details?’

‘Um, maybe not.’

Sam nodded. ‘I need suitable furniture and, thanks to Felix and the discount I got on the renovations from Palladium, I have money to spend on getting suitable furniture. The bedroom will be easier and the exercise room is just a matter of fitting in the equipment.’

‘I have a space-optimised arrangement calculated, Sam,’ Belle put in. ‘If it meets your requirements, you will simply need to select a colour scheme.’

‘Thank you, Belle. We’ll v-tag the room decoration and go over colour palettes later. I’ll give your design a once-over, but it should be fine.’ His eyes narrowed as he scanned once more around the room. There was an L-shaped sofa and a wide chair which formed an area around a low table. Near the door, this was the first part of the room you came to and was clearly designed for entertainment. Two large chairs were set apart from that, facing a wall, each with a small table beside it, and that looked more like an area for watching vids, though the chairs were angled inward which made sitting and talking an option. There were also a couple of extras, a small desk and a cupboard of some sort beside it, both set out of the way behind the sofa. ‘And I think that should do it. Please save that design and we can get the builds started.’

‘When are you planning on moving in?’ Fox asked.

‘I’m moving things over at the weekend. I should be here full-time on Monday night. It would be Sunday, but I have an engagement.’ His lips curled. ‘Alice Vaughn. I’ll be accompanying her to this banquet tomorrow and she’s staying over the weekend.’

Fox smirked. ‘You left with her after the rehearsal too. She’s paying?’

‘Oh yes. Her suggestion. Last time, she said, “was very flattering, but talent deserves to be rewarded properly.”’

‘Ha!’

‘Working with her is one of my more pleasant tasks. I am not displeased to be doing so. She actually said she would come over here on the Saturday to see how we were settling in and help with the move.’