ARC: Peacemaker (15 page)

Her expression suggested she wanted to strangle another kind of answer out of me but instead, she told her officer to step outside the van. Then she followed him.

Through the open door, I heard her organizing a search of the alley and a warrant for Chef’s place.

A throbbing, mind-melting headache descended over my eyes. I need to lie down badly and sleep. My mouth began to water and without any other warning I threw up on myself. The vomit pooled on my lap and then ran down my legs, dripping from the hem of my skirt.

I groaned with embarrassment more than anything else.

“Is she under arrest? Then I insist that you bring her out here where I can see her!” boomed a voice from outside.

A short silence followed. Chance leaned into the unit and pressed a function on the panel by the door. The restraint snapped open and back into its holder.

She curled her lip at the sight of me and beckoned.

I got up and kinda fell out of the door into the waiting arms of Chef Dab. Despite the vomit, he held me fast.

“Chef, I got sick, let go.”

“Are you alright?”

“I’m fine.”

The flush spreading up his neck told me he was not. “You come into my place without a warrant, abduct a guest and traumatize her. That is kidnapping, Detective.”

“We were responding to a complaint about a violent incident and therefore needed no warrant. Your guest agreed to speak with us. Besides, how can it be kidnapping when the person in question is standing right next to you. No need to be melodramatic, sir.”

“
Melodramatic
?” Chef’s voice rose to a pitch that threatened the sound barrier.

The crowd on the pavement fell still and silent around us. People watched. Cameras out and recording.

“Chef, let it go,” I said softly. “It’s OK.”

The hot puff of his breath glanced off my cheek and he set me on my feet.

“However, Chef Dabrowski, in a matter of moments I’ll have a warrant to search your premises. In the meantime, I request that you step back inside and provide full cooperation,” said Chance.

“I will do nothing of the sort,” said Chef. “You will present your warrant to my solicitor and they will accompany you on your search. In the meantime,
you
shall wait outside my premises.”

He clamped his arm around me and ushered me back inside.

Most of the party was out on the pavement and Chef unceremoniously waved them off by locking the diner’s doors.

“Greta! Help Virgin clean up and then bring her to the office.”

Greta emerged from behind the bar and offered me an arm. I glanced back outside as I took it. No Sixkiller, or Corah or Heart in evidence among the bystanders. Caro, I hoped, was already home and examining the strip of pills I’d given her.

“You had a tough night, honey. Here let me sponge you down,” said Greta.

My grateful smile was about as watery as my mouth. Together we washed the worst of the mess off my dress and she gave me fresh kitchen coat to cover it.

“Now let’s go see Papa Bear,” she said.

Chef was drinking neat vodka in his desk swivel when I shuffled into the office. He’d changed his shirt.

“Sit, Virgin. Talk.”

I shut the door and eased down opposite him. The quiet in the room was divine.

“It might take a while,” I said.

He poured another measure into his glass. “I’m a good listener. Vodka?”

I shuddered. “No.”

We were done an hour later. I told him about the murder, the Marshall, my trip to Divine Province and how I’d just crawled across into Jusco’s from his attic looking for a clue to who’d sent Leo Teng after me.

“Why didn’t you just ask me to help?”

I shrugged. “Didn’t want to involve you. But I guess that didn’t work out so well, huh.”

He sighed. “Did you find anything?”

“Yes, and I gave it to my friend Caro. She left the party as they dragged me out. The only thing they’ll find is one of your paddles, down in the alley. It fell as I climbed back.”

“You went across from my play room?”

“Yeah sorry. It was the most direct route.”

He grunted. “I’ll say I threw it out there yesterday.”

“It will have my DNA on it.”

“Then you’ll just have
to
admit to having a penchant for older men.”

I nodded. “You’ll cover for me?”

“Of course.”

I nodded at that. “Thank you Chef. I have no right to–”

“You have
every
right to. I told your father I would watch out for you. And that is what I will do. Is there anything else I should know?”

“Your bouncer, the one who the Marshall knocked out… he knows I went upstairs.”

“He is on his way to Saint Gilliard’s Clinic with a broken jaw. He will not be speaking to anyone for a while, and when he is, I will make sure it’s not mentioned.”

My gratitude evinced itself as stinging tears behind my eyes.

“This detective, she wants you bad?” he asked.

“I think she just needs an arrest. I don’t know. Maybe there’s more to it. Either way, I need to find out the truth myself.”

“I will send my lawyer to visit you. He is good.”

“Superintendent Hunt wants me to use Park lawyers.”

Chef made a rude noise. “Bureaucrats. My man knows how to win a fight.”

I hesitated. It would annoy Bull and I needed my boss on side but Chef had a point. Park lawyers were all about conveyancing, property and environmental law. Their kind of crime came in shades of white. They could be underdone handling a murder.

“Just meet with him, Virgin. Humour me.”

I smiled and nodded.

“Good girl. Now we get you home before Detective Heavy Boots comes kicking through my door.”

I hugged him. “If you hadn’t come and caused a scene, I’d still be in that van.”

“For that you must thank your young man. He came to me, said what I should do in front of the cameras.”

“Young man?”

“Virgin,” he said with a sigh. “I see you with your girlfriend, I think that maybe she is your partner. Then the boy, the dancer, he comes and tells me who he is, and what I should do.”

“You mean
Heart?
”

“Yes, Heart Williams. His name I’m not so sure about… but the rest I liked.”

Chef’s revelation took me by surprise. “Do you know where he went?”

He shrugged. “Perhaps he is outside still?”

I pulled out my phone and called him but it went to message. “Call me, please.”

Greta poked her head in the office. “They’re at the door.”

“Take her out the back and put her in a taxi,” said Chef.

Greta and I headed down the stairs and out through the kitchens.

“You’ll have to walk a block or so to catch a taxi,” said Greta.

“No need,” I said pulling out my phone again.

I called the taxi who’d brought me to the club. “You free now?”

“Just a block over from the diner,” he said.

“Come to the street behind. I’m out back.”

“Be there soon,” said the driver.

Greta waited with me, not saying much. There was something soothing about her.

“None of my business, Greta, but are you and Chef…”

She lifted her shoulders a little. “We have an understanding. You know how it is.”

I thought about Heart. There’d been an understanding between us too, but that seemed to be changing and the ground had become shaky.

“Here’s your ride,” said Greta as the taxi pulled into the alley. It surged over the speed bumps and stopped right in front of us.

I gave her a quick hug and jumped into the back seat.

“Destination,” asked the driver.

“From the pick-up address earlier. The Cloisters, Parkway South.” I settled back, overwhelmed by relief to be going home.

“Rough night?” he asked.

“Rough week,” I said. “Going to shut my eyes for a bit. Can you wake me when we get there?”

“Sure thing.”

And with that, I slept.

Chapter Twenty

A noise woke me. An eagle’s cry. Distressed and urgent.

I lifted my head from the sticky vinyl seat and wiped saliva from the corner of my mouth. The headache had returned but as more of a dull ache at the base of my skull. I rotated my head to either side, stretching the tendons in my neck, and looked to see where we were.

“Hey,” I said sitting bolt upright. “What’s going on?”

“Traffic jam on the ring road, I’m taking the southern bypass.”

“Oh sure, of course.” I settled back for a moment, waiting for my senses to sharpen. My phone clock said I’d been in the taxi almost twenty minutes. If we’d gone the way he said, we should be almost back at the Bypass/Ring Road convergence by now. Instead, it looked like we were driving south towards either Divine Province or the Coast City.

I stared at the back of the taxi driver’s head, a prickle of fear across my skin. As carefully and surreptitiously as I could, I tapped his driver number, illuminated on his visor, into my Safe Travel app. It came up with an alert that the number was fake.

As he slowed for the next intersection, I grabbed the door handle and tried to shove it open. Nothing happened. It was locked.

“Settle down, Ranger,” said the man in the front seat. He leaned an arm back over the seat and aimed a SIG 9mm at me.

I probably should have done exactly what he said, but my adrenalin-whizzed survival instinct had other ideas. I chopped down as hard as I could on his forearm with both hands, forcing his elbow to bend at an unnatural angle. The pistol discharged into the floor. Could have been me, but it wasn’t. Dumb luck.

I chopped again and brought my boot up to heel-jam his hand against the seat. Then I wrenched the pistol from his fingers and shoved the nozzle against his throat.

“Pull over!” I twisted the barrel into the soft part under his jaw where it met his ear, to make my point.

He swerved to the curb, and the cars behind blared their horns in fury at us.

“Unlock my door. One hand, slow so I can see,” I said.

He reached for the release button and pressed it. With my free hand I pressed the handle and kicked the door open. “Who are you working for?”

He kept silent and stiff.

“Tell me,” I shouted at him.

He tilted his head away, bracing against me pulling the trigger, but refused to answer.

That left me with a decision.

I wasn’t going to shoot him and the longer I prolonged this moment, the more chance I had of something going wrong.

“You follow me and I‘ll shoot your face off,” I said.

With that I was ripping my heels off and out on the street running.

It didn’t take long to lose my kidnapper… and myself. After a few alley zigzags, I found my way onto a wide road lined with endless used car lots, low brick utilities buildings and gas stations. The Million Mile they called it.

The East Coast had nominated lots of areas where only public transport, delivery and emergency vehicles could go. But the freeways still linked commuters to their work and they got there by a combo of drive, park and ride. Which meant you could still buy cars.

The Million Mile sold mainly electrics, but some still specialized in the old style guzzler V8’s and Diesel Devils, more as collectors’ items than anything else. Like wearing animal products around Liberationists, driving gassed cars in certain parts of the city could get you dead real quick by the hand of anti-vehicular fanatics. Car lots along here all boasted electrified fencing and Black Box Image Recognition SecWare. You came in through the security checkpoint and left the same way. Everything was monitored.

I checked the safety on the pistol and tucked it in the inside pocket of the Chef’s whites with still-trembling hands. Whoever the hell the taxi driver was, he would still be out looking for me. I had to get off the main road.

Flashing signs ahead wooed me with names like Burger Beast, Chicken Chow and a Round the Dick’s. I slipped my heels back on and headed for them.

A quick reconnoitre told me that Chicken Chow offered teriyaki and rice and a darkish corner to hide, so I headed in, keen to be off the brightly lit sidewalk. I ordered a regular meal with an upsized drink and took it to the corner table. The food tasted better than I expected after two vodka vomits and an evening full of stress but I made myself eat slowly, giving my stomach time to relax and accept the peace offering.

My phone vibrated in my pocket and I pulled it out.“Caro. I was just about to call you.”

“Where the hell are you? I’ve had Delicious Williams and the Marshall demanding I tell them where you are. Like I can pull you out of my pocket! Why haven’t you answered your phone?”

I glanced about. The few late night diners didn’t seem interested in me or my conversation. “I’m in Chicken Chow on the Million Mile. I think I need a ride home. Public transport might not be safe.”

“The Million Mile! What the–”

“Chef sent me home in a taxi while Chance was off getting a search warrant. The taxi driver took me south. I got out, but he’s still looking for me. Caro…”

I didn’t need to finish my thought. She caught my tone. “OK. Right. I know a guy who has a car. Sit tight, I’ll get back to you. Meanwhile…
ring those men.”

Caro always knew a guy. Always.

I leaned back on the booth seat and sipped on my Sprite, thinking. This thing that I’d got caught up in was not going away.

I considered what I knew. Leo Teng and the guy who tried to grab me in Mystere both wore the Korax gang tattoo. The alley guy was carrying a warning talisman.The dead guy in the park was some kind of government spy. If they all tied in, I still didn’t see what the connection with me was, nor did it explain Aquila or the Mythos.

The Mythos attack in the Park, my injury and blood loss, and Sixkiller’s obvious ability to see everything I saw… well that still defied my logic.

Keep moving forward, I told myself. Something will click.

Papa Brise and Corah and Caro had mentioned the name Kadee Matari. I guess that meant I had to go back to Divine Province and make this woman’s acquaintance. She could know something more that could help me.

And the more I thought about it, the more I realized so must the Marshall.

I prodded at my shoulder. It ached worse than hell now after slamming the taxi driver’s arm. My phone buzzed against the plastic table top.

I picked it up. “Yes?”

“My guy’ll be there in an hour wearing scrubs under an overcoat. He has your picture. I’d come but it will be quicker if he doesn’t have to wait for me.”

“Thanks Caro.”

“You be safe until then? You got protection.”

I felt the pistol pressing into my ribs. “Yeah.”

“Use it,” she said.

“Why? Do you know something?”

“You’re stranded in the Million Mile, Ginny. People take guard dogs to go shopping there. Just get back here in one piece, alright.”

“That’s the plan,” I said.

I went back up to the counter, bought an apple turnover and a coffee and retreated to my corner again.

Two sips later, a posse of guys, talking loud and waving their hand about, came in and ordered up big. They’d been test-driving a car from one of the lots, or so I learned from their conversation
–
an old V12 Chevrolet and it didn’t seem to bother them that the whole place knew about it.

I kept my head down but they weren’t having any of it. Female alone equals good hunting.

They took the two tables across from me.

I hunkered down, wishing to be invisible but some fries landed in my lap. I flicked them away and didn’t look up.

The next few bounced off my chin and landed in my drink.

The gun against my ribs began to burn into my skin.

Leave me alone, assholes
.

I could get up and go to the counter, call the manager, but that meant walking past them to get there. Grabbing hands would be waiting.

Were they harmless? Too hard to tell. In here, they wouldn’t try assaulting me but it could be a long, aggravating hour.

The only refuge was the restroom which also meant walking past them.

A condom packet skittered along the floor and landed at my feet.

I got up, deliberately crushing it under my heel, and walked the few feet to the entry of the restroom. As I pushed open the door, one of the guys ran over and bumped into me.

Smaller than me, but thickset with pill-pumped muscles, his jawline showed the puffiness of ’roids use. Behind it all though he was just a kid. The tight jeans and tee he wore looked like his mum might have pressed them.

“Seeing as we’re going to the same place, darlin’. You wanna share?”

“I’ll wait.” I stood back.

He giggled. “Nah, you go. Just fooling.”

I hesitated then went on through. Soon as the door shut, he burst in after me and threw his jacket up over sec-cam. With one hand he grabbed at my breast, the other at my crotch.

Predictable.

I pulled the gun from my inside pocket and pressed it against his balls.

“Out,” I said. “And leave me the fuck alone.”

“Whoa!” He put his hands up and backed away. “Nothin’ meant. Nothin’ meant.”

“Course,” I said. “But learn some manners. And remember how I didn’t blow your nuts off.”

He nodded vigorously. Whether out of panic or agreement, I’d never know. Fumbling backwards for the door handle, he vanished through it.

I sagged against the hand basin. Tonight had been too long in so many ways. Now I just had to survive until my ride came.

I sat in a cubicle, lay the pistol on my knees and set my alarm for fifty minutes. Caro’s ride would be here soon after that. Then I leaned back and closed my eyes. It wasn’t sleep, but it was rest of a kind, and the alarm beeped at me what felt like almost immediately.

I scrubbed my face and checked the display. Time was up.

The boys had gone, leaving their tables piled with wrappers and burger entrails. A black trickle of spilled cola dribbled onto the chair and puddled onto the floor.

The lone counter person glanced up at me from behind his sec-screen.

“You alright ma’am?”he asked over the intercom.

I gave him the thumbs up and took the same seat. My apple turnover had gone but the drink sat there, flat and ominous. I pushed it away not willing to risk what the boys might have dropped in it.

Finally, the door opened and in came a guy matching the description Caro had given wearing a hospital uniform covered by a hooded greatcoat. He scanned the few remaining patrons and nodded recognition at me. He was younger than I expected – thirty plus, but with a lean body and already-grey hair.

I got up and walked to the door to meet him. Closer up, I saw his grey eyes, tanned skin and an unreadable expression. He held his head back at an unnatural angle and I realized he was keeping it out of the sec-cam’s view.

“This way, Ranger,” he said. That was all.

We exited Chicken Chow into the parking lot and I followed him towards a dark sedan.

He beeped the remote locking and climbed into the driver’s side.

“Pistol girl!” shouted a voice. “Safe travels.”

I glanced over my shoulder. The boys were on the far side of the lot, drinking on the bonnet of their new Chevy.

What startled me was that Aquila was with them, perched as if waiting for me. I hadn’t seen her since the park, and in the artificial light it was hard to tell if she still looked injured.

Suddenly, she took off towards me at full tilt.

I flinched.
What…?

The question remained only half formed in my mind as someone shoulder-charged me from the behind. I went down with a howl of pain but came up swinging.

The taxi-driver was all over me though, taking me down again, hands at my throat. “Where’s my gun, bitch?”

I writhed in his grip and looked for my ride.

“No!” I shouted as the sedan reversed out of the parking lot.

Aquila screeched louder. She was above me somewhere, wings beating hard.

The boys on the Chevy started shouting too, hollering encouragement as the taxi guy and I rolled each other. But he was bigger than me and I was exhausted. I couldn’t free my hands to grab the gun in my coat.

Instead, I brought my knee up and jacked him between the legs. Breath evacuated his lungs into my face as I connected with his soft bits. I followed up by head butting him hard. The two moves loosed his grip enough for me to break free.

I stumbled to my feet and ran towards the boys.

“Shoot him,” shouted my friend from the rest room. Enjoying the sport of it all.

I fumbled for the pistol but my fingers caught in the pocket seam.

A knife clinked next to my foot, and the boys scattered to hide behind the wide girth of their V12.

“Stop!” shouted the taxi driver. “The next one won’t miss.”