DeathWeb (Fox Meridian Book 3) (20 page)

Bart Wade was, as she had expected, sitting out on the veranda. At home, he sat on the steps leading up to his door, but there were none of those here. The veranda had a little loveseat which worked better, in Fox’s opinion, and he did not object when she sat down beside him.

‘Too much of a mediocre thing?’ he asked.

‘Bruce Cauter’s job might be interesting, but he can’t seem to look at my face and his throat clogs up when I get near him.’

‘There’s a reason that young man still lives with his parents.’

‘I’d worked that out. Can you tell me why my mother appears and hovers like a mother hen whenever I get anywhere near Cory Druss?’

Bart gave a grunt. ‘You asked your father?’

‘He said I was imagining it.’

‘Huh. Andrea’s involved more with the politics than Jonathan is. Druss is big on the Watch and “independent, local policing.”’

‘I’m aware, and I think it’s reasonably known that I don’t really agree. But you said that like it was a euphemism.’

‘Big word. Is that like a lie?’

‘The words have… certain similarities. Obscuring the truth with pleasant niceties might be better than lie.’

‘Druss’s idea of independent isn’t mine. He’d like a force that’s under his thumb. Not saying he’s a crook, just a politician.’ That Bart considered the two virtually identical was obvious. ‘He didn’t start the Watch, but he’s been shaping it, and Andrea’s fallen for his line. Druss is working away trying to pull votes out from under Ross and Sheila Runyard, or so I hear, and he’s not too worried about what he has to do to get them.’

‘Oh.’

‘Pretty regular visitor here.’ It was the way he said it, light, easy, just a little hint of something like annoyance.

‘Oh?’

‘Usually while Jonathan’s out in his fields or away from the house. He likes younger women, but your mother’s a striking one and she’s got a fair old sack of votes under her thumb.’

Fox sat in silence for a few seconds. ‘Probably just discussing politics.’

‘Oh, yes. Every Tuesday and Thursday.’

‘Yeah. Does Dad know?’

‘That I’m not sure on. Us men can be damn unobservant, especially when we don’t want to see something.’

‘To be clear, you don’t
know
, you’re just putting two and two together?’

‘That would be a fair assessment. Not like I spy on them or anything.’

‘No, you can leave that to me. Shit. Tell me a story, Bart. Take my mind off it until morning.’

‘Huh. How about indulging an old man and telling me one. Like how did you lose that arm?’

Fox barked out a laugh. ‘Okay. Why not?’

New York Metro, 29
^th
June.

Marie lay in bed, very, very still, trying to remember what her body was supposed to feel like, and the other thing, which she was trying not to think about. Her head was throbbing with a vehemence she could not remember in a long time. Her mouth tasted as though a family of chipmunks had settled in it and made a nest. She thought they might be raising a litter in there, but she was not sure.

She heard a sound and blanked it immediately, focusing on keeping her eyes closed and her breathing even, and hoping that the other thing would go away. Any time would do, but then… How was it going to go away if she was still lying naked in Sam’s bed?

‘You should really get up,’ Sam said. There was a hint of humour in his voice. How could he think this was funny? ‘There’s Painaway and water beside you. You should drink water. You were fairly wasted last night.’ She kept still. ‘I’ll let you get dressed. I ordered something which should sit okay in your stomach.’

Hearing him leave, Marie opened her eyes and immediately wished she had not, but she struggled onward anyway. Fumbling a pair of pills from the blister pack, she tossed them into her mouth and then chased them down with the entire glass of water, and then she sat still for another few minutes praying to any deity who might be listening that the pain would go away. At least the water had washed out the chipmunks.

Her clothes, the shorts and strappy top she had been wearing the night before, were placed carefully on a chair which sat beside the large, firm, very comfortable bed. She knew that it was a dynamic mattress, with settings for sleep and sex, because the subject had come up the night before. She remembered that. Things got a bit hazy not long after, but… But she had woken up naked in Sam’s bed.

Dressing quickly, she got to her feet, swayed a little, straightened her back, lifted her chin, and headed for the lounge. That meant going out into the hallway and the urge to head straight down to her apartment where she could freak out in private was strong, but she kept going.

‘You face it, girl,’ she muttered to herself. ‘You screwed up and fucked Sam, and Fox will be… Don’t know, but it’s not good. Oh, shit.’ She had screwed things up really badly and she did not even remember it!

‘You look,’ Sam said, ‘as though you’re walking to a firing squad. Cheer up.’

Marie sagged. ‘Cheer up? How can I cheer up after what happened last night?’

His eyes narrowed a little. ‘We got drunk. You got
very
drunk.’

‘And then I woke up and realised what had happened.’

‘The hangover would be something of a clue.’ He was
really
amused about this.

‘What’s Fox going to say? Don’t you care?’

‘She’ll say, “Damn, I wish I’d been there.”’

‘What?! Look, Mister Sex God, you may be used to threesomes in your line of work, but I–’ She stopped as he burst into laughter. ‘What the fuck’s so funny?!’

‘Marie, I have never, in my entire life, had to get a girl so drunk that she passed out so I could have sex with her.’

Marie’s cheeks reached the temperature of a fusion reactor in a little under a second. Her head throbbed harder. ‘Ow… Ow…’ Stumbling forward, she found a chair and sat down. ‘Ow… You mean we didn’t…?’

‘If I’d had sex last night, I feel sure I would remember it, even if you don’t. Which, I assume, you do not?’

‘No. I woke up in your bed, naked. I kind of figured, because you’re gorgeous and all that, that I must’ve seduced you.’

The grin on Sam’s face was becoming irritating. ‘You were in no condition to seduce anyone. You woke up naked because I undressed you and you were not wearing underwear. Not that it should matter. I’m a professional. And you were in my bed because I decided that getting you down that narrow staircase would likely result in bruises. Wait. Belle?’

The prim and pristine avatar appeared beside the table instantly. ‘Sam, how can I be of service?’

‘You’ve got eyes everywhere. Did anyone in this house have sex last night?’

‘No, Sam. Your breakfast is on its way up from the kitchen. I have taken the liberty of preparing a tonic of rehydration salts for Marie. Marie, perhaps you should allow me to tidy the house today. It is no trouble and you may feel unwell for another few hours.’

‘Thanks, Belle,’ Marie managed. She felt utterly mortified and the assurance from the house AI was
not
helping. Belle vanished, one of the house robots walked in with a tray, and Marie dropped her head on the table and groaned.

‘What’s the matter? You didn’t cheat on Fox, you got drunk, but–’

‘You undressed me, put me in bed, slept right beside me all night.’

‘Yes. I admit to a little twinge of guilt since undressing you was not a chore. You’ve a fine body, I’m a man, and I’d had a few myself. I caught myself wishing you hadn’t fallen asleep.’

‘Well thanks, that doesn’t help. I slept with a really hot, naked man, and I don’t remember a damn thing!’

Topeka Agri-Zone.

Crystal Bateson sunbathed naked. Fox could see her on a lounger in the backyard, lying there in the sun with a timer beside her. Fox figured it would be fifteen minutes per side, and naked sun worship did not seem in the timid Crystal’s repertoire, but there she was.

Turning from the window of Sandy’s room, Fox checked the forensic swarms had deployed correctly and then picked her way out into the hall. There she leaned against a wall and pulled up the images being relayed from the single scan-head she was using. ‘Okay, so what do you make of the Batesons?’

‘Mister Bateson is the master of the house,’ Kit replied. ‘His wife is definitely subordinate. She speaks when spoken to and prefers that her husband deals with all matters regarding the case. She has bruising on her face and right wrist, the latter commensurate with being gripped very firmly by a large hand. His hands are large. I believe that Mister Bateson strikes his wife, possibly quite regularly. She exhibits behaviour associated with domestic abuse victims.’

‘We agree so far. How about the sunbathing? Her daughter is missing, there’s a stranger digging around in her house, and she decides on some naked lounging in the yard.’

There was a fractional pause. ‘I would say that Mister Bateson does not like tan lines. He expects a clean, tidy house when he comes home, and the dinner ready for him. Mrs Bateson has a summer routine of topping up her tan before the sun gets too hot and prior to housework. A missing daughter is not sufficient cause to see his requirements are not met and she is too afraid of him to stop.’

‘Batting ten for ten, Kit. Of course, we could be wrong, but she doesn’t seem the callous type.’

‘While he does. I admit to being somewhat worried about what the swarms are going to find in Sandy’s room.’

‘You’re thinking that, maybe, Mister Bateson tucks his daughter in at night in a rather un-fatherly way?’

‘Yes. I feel sure he hits her, but my worry is that he does worse.’

‘That’s my worry too. Hold on, what’s that?’ Fox snapped a display up to fill her vision and tightened it in on a section. ‘Terahertz radar is picking up an object hidden under her bed. Does that look like a pocket computer to you?’

‘It is the right size and shape, but that is about as good as this technology will give us.’

Nodding, Fox turned and slipped back into the room. Kneeling beside the bed, she ran her hand along the underside of it. It was a box-style frame with cloth sewn beneath it, but there was no sign of a hole. Then she found it: there was a patch sewn in place over the hessian, lightly tacked in place. Pulling that free revealed a rip which could have been an accident, but was probably not. Fox reached in, used the radar image as a guide, and pulled out the box.

‘Yup, small portable, pocket-sized. Not powerful, but enough to run a few basic functions.’

‘Like a diary?’

‘Like a diary.’ Getting to her feet, Fox slipped the box into her bag. ‘We didn’t find this. If it’s all innocent, then we’re not getting Sandy in trouble for having it.’

‘I have another worry, Fox.’

‘Oh? What’s that?’

‘I worry that Sandy’s diary will not be describable as “innocent.”’

~~~

‘Nice outfit,’ Detective Rogers said as Fox sat down across the desk from him.

Fox had received her delivery of clothes and picked out a spaghetti-strapped top and a pair of lightweight slacks. The effect was not too unprofessional, but she had to admit that it showed off cleavage. Kit had reminded her to put sunblock on her exposed skin. ‘It’s hot out,’ Fox replied, ‘and I don’t have to wear a suit.’

‘Fair point. What can I do for you, Miss Meridian?’ Rogers was a good, solid sort of cop, probably no older than Fox was and still a detective. Short mid-brown hair, not unattractive, but nothing to write home about. Nice eyes: really clear and blue.

‘I said I’d been contracted to run a parallel investigation into Sandy Bateson’s disappearance?’

‘You did. You’re trying out this “kidnapped by a gang” theory of Bateson’s?’

‘It’s not just him, apparently. I ran into a guy called Cory Druss last night and–’

‘I know Druss.’ His tone told Fox all she needed to know.

‘Struck me as a bit of an asshole, but he thinks the same as Malcolm Bateson. I’ve got a forensic swarm going over Sandy’s bedroom. I’d like to get access to medical records and camera footage from the market on the day she went missing. And I’d like to hear why you’re going with the runaway theory.’

‘He let you run a swarm over her room?’

‘He didn’t look
entirely
happy about it, but he agreed. I told him I might find evidence to back his idea.’

‘I wanted to do the same, but he said there was nothing there, no sign of forced entry. I didn’t have enough to force it. He’s right, there was no sign of forced entry, which is one of the main reasons I think she lit out.’ He paused, apparently considering his words. ‘Look, you’ve met them, talked to them. You didn’t come away thinking she might have had reason to run?’

‘I’m reserving final judgement.’

‘My read is that he hits her, both of them, the wife too. She told me she was clumsy, the wife. Said she’d walked into a door. Seriously? That old cliché?’

Fox’s respect for Rogers went up. Male cops in some of the outlying offices were not the kind to worry over a little wife-beating, but Rogers was as outraged as he was likely to get. ‘I know. Fuck all you can do about it unless there’s a witness or she makes a complaint.’

‘You used to be a cop?’

‘NAPA in New York.’

He nodded, then his eyes widened. ‘You’re
that
Tara Meridian?!’

‘One day people will forget. How about those records? Look, I work for Palladium, so I have all the best toys. I’ve got data search and analysis systems available that make the stuff NAPA has look like they’re steam-powered. If you’ve got something you need that I can help with… A little quid pro quo, and a new pair of eyes on the evidence can be useful, right?’

‘Oh, I already decided to cooperate. I think
you
might be able to get some evidence on Bateson, even if you aren’t looking for it. And I don’t know about your toys, but Sandy has a friend, Trudy Shane.’

‘Crystal mentioned her. I was going to try to talk to her this afternoon.’

‘I talked to her, but I’m a guy and a cop.’

‘She clammed up.’

‘More like evaded. Said she didn’t know where Sandy had gone, and maybe she doesn’t, but my gut says she knows something. You’re neither a guy nor a cop.’