Vigilantes (18 page)

Popova looked at him over one of the steaming containers. This one contained bright green and red vegetables in some kind of white sauce.

“I can’t do that without the Chief’s approval,” Popova said.

“I’m sure she’ll give it,” Nyquist said. “Just check with her.”

“All right,” Popova said. “Then send it to me.”

He did. Then he grabbed the mess of plum-covered pork, sautéed spinach, and rice that had somehow gotten all mixed together. He had hoped for a bit of separation in his food, but he would have to settle for this.

“You want me to deliver—”

“I got it,” Popova said. “The chief is used to me coming in and out of meetings. She thinks I don’t hear anything.”

He smiled. “Why don’t you send Talia back. It’s probably better for her to eat at a table, anyway.”

Popova sighed. “Who knows.”

And he suspected that was less about where Talia should eat than it was about what was best for her.

He managed one bite of food before his links opened.

Detective Nyquist, I need you back at the station
.

The message was from Andrea Gumiela, the chief of detectives. He leaned his head back. He had known this moment was going to come, but he hoped Gumiela would ignore him for a few more days, thinking he was working on something important for the department.

Grabbing lunch,
he sent.
I’ll be there as soon as I finish.

Now, Detective,
she sent.

Wonderful. He wondered what was so important that he had to report immediately.

The way he felt at the moment, anything that important would have caught the attention of DeRicci’s office first.

But he didn’t know that for certain.

Still, he shoveled his meal into his mouth, and was nearly half done by the time Talia wandered in.

“Wow,” she said as she picked up a fork. “You’re an eating machine.”

“I’m a man who has been summoned back to work,” he said around a mouthful of food he hadn’t even been tasting.

“By DeRicci?” Talia asked.

“By my real boss,” he said.

She blinked as she tried to put that together. Then she frowned. “I thought crime was on hold in Armstrong during the crisis.”

“Don’t I wish,” he said, and closed the container. He shoved it into the refrigerator that used to be full of fresh food and was now full of more containers just like this one. Only older.

“Hey, Detective,” Talia asked as she peered inside her container of food. “Is everything just getting worse?”

He knew the question had more behind it than it seemed. He didn’t really have time to reassure her, and he almost said he didn’t know.

Then he remembered the good mood he’d had when he arrived here.

“Honestly,” he said, “I think we’re starting to make some progress.”

Her gaze met his, and he could feel the intensity behind it.

“Really?” she asked.

“Yeah,” he said, feeling the mood return. “Really.”

He left her, hoping he would still feel that way after he talked to Gumiela, and found out what the new crisis was. He was tired of feeling behind. He was tired of being out of control.

He wanted things to return to the way they had been—not necessarily physically, but emotionally. He wanted to be able to predict what was coming next.

And he had a hunch that wouldn’t happen for a long, long time.

TWENTY-TWO

THE CONNECTION SHUT down, and with it, Salehi’s bravado disappeared. He staggered slightly, then sank into the chair behind him. Jiolitti sat across from him.

She had monitored the entire conversation.

“Holy shit,” she said softly.

He couldn’t agree more. Holy shit indeed. And any other expletive. He ran a hand over his face, trying to get a grip on his emotions.

He was the one who had made Zhu head of S
3
On The Moon, he was the one who had made sure that Zhu confirmed those injunctions, he was the one who had sent Zhu into the wilds of an unprotected, angry populace representing murderers and attempted murderers, with no backup and no talk of security.

And of course, Zhu wasn’t smart enough to think of hiring security on his own.

Salehi squeezed his forehead. Not fair, he wasn’t being fair; Zhu had never had an unpopular case like this, or if he had, he had done so somewhere safe like the Impossibles.

Salehi had had half a dozen cases like this over his career, always away from Athena Base, and—after the first one—with lots of protection.

What an idiot he was. He had been thinking about the legal implications, not the social ones. He hadn’t thought about the atmosphere on the Moon because it had been so very long since he’d had a case like this.

Hell, he hadn’t thought about it because this wasn’t yet a case. It was just a bunch of injunctions.

Against law enforcement.

He’d never had trouble with law enforcement before.

But it sounded like Seng had.

He knew nothing about her except that she had looked rather small and overdressed on that holovid. Her light brown skin, slightly upturned eyes, and tiny nose all gave her a youthful appearance, but he had no idea if she was young, or what kind of experience she had.

Zhu had mentioned he was having trouble finding lawyers on the Moon and that he had interviewed a bunch from Earth. Given Seng’s harsh accent, she had spent quite a bit of time on Earth.

And she clearly didn’t scare easily.

Salehi couldn’t collapse now. He could blame himself later, when he had time. And he needed to blame
himself
, not Zhu, because Zhu had had no idea what he was walking into.

Salehi had simply forgotten because it had been so long.

And because he really hadn’t expected lawlessness from those sworn to uphold the law.

Shishani had called him naïve more than once. And he was. He still was.

He took a deep breath, and sat up.

“Were you close to him, sir?” Jiolitti asked.

It took Salehi a moment to focus. Close to Zhu? Maybe in spirit. Zhu had given up sooner than Salehi, though. Zhu had had a lot of idealism as well, and then it had been destroyed a few months ago.

Zhu had represented a clone of PierLuigi Frémont—not one of the clones who had attacked the Moon, an older clone—and had actually gotten him released, hoping the clone could provide background on the Anniversary Day assassins. Before the clone made it a full day, the ship he’d been on, the ship transporting him out of the Alliance, had been destroyed by Alliance battleships.

Destroyed, taking Rafik Fujita with it. Rafik Fujita, one of Salehi’s closest friends, whom he’d recommended as transport captain for that mission because he knew Fujita could be trusted.

Fujita, murdered by the Alliance.

Now Zhu, murdered by the Alliance.

That couldn’t be a coincidence.

Could it?

“Sir?” Jiolitti asked.

“Sorry,” he said, not remembering what she had said before, if she had said anything at all. “I need you to get a team and vet some security firms.
Not
any on the Moon right now, and not any with ties to the Moon. Maybe some from Earth or maybe one of the human-based firms on Mars or something. I want the best.”

“Sir?” Jiolitti said, adding that tone people used when they wanted one word to ask a whole host of questions.

“Clearly, we need protection when we get to the Moon, and we’re not going to get it nearby. I want a team around that building within the hour, but I doubt that’s possible. So I want them on board as fast as you can get them, and someone protecting us when we get to the Moon.”

“Human-based?” Jiolitti said. “Because the best firms are—”

“Think it through, Lauren,” he snapped. “The Moon is human-oriented and more than a little pissed at aliens right now. Let’s minimize trouble, shall we?”

She leaned back slightly, clearly put off by his tone. He didn’t blame her. It wasn’t her fault that Zhu was dead, that the entire team would walk into a clusterfuck tomorrow.

“I want another team reviewing all the footage that Seng sent. In fact, get back with her, make sure she keeps sending us updates. We need everything she has, and we’ll continue to need anything she gets. We’re going in there prepared.”

“Prepared for what, sir?” Jiolitti asked.

“They murdered one of our own, Lauren, because we chose to represent a group of defendants that they don’t approve of. We might not approve of those Peyti clones either, but that doesn’t matter. They’re entitled to a defense.”

He hadn’t said that before. He’d been thinking of all clones, of the injustices presented against the Peyti themselves, not about the actual offenders. He was thinking about the offenders now.

“Sir, don’t you think that this is too dangerous? We don’t know anything about the Moon’s government or how this will be handled. We have no allies, and we’re going in blind.”

He raised his head. He had had hopes for this woman. He wanted to make her partner one day.

“It sounds like this whole thing frightens you,” he said so calmly that he almost didn’t recognize his own voice.

“Yes, sir,” she said. “Doesn’t it frighten you?”

He stopped, thought, examined his own emotions. Fear wasn’t one of them. Anger, guilt, regret, and loss were all there, but not fear.

“No,” he said, and stood. “If you want off this case, let me know. We’ll send you back to Athena Base once we arrive on the Moon.”

Her mouth opened, then closed slightly. “That’s not what I’m saying, sir.”

“Then what are you saying?”

“I’m just wondering if this will be worthwhile. I mean, we’re going in—”

He held up a hand, silencing her. He didn’t want to hear any more. Worthwhile? Schnable thought so: The government of Peyla would pay for this entire defense for years if necessary. That was the money angle.

Shishani thought so: she liked the thought of the money, but she also liked chasing cases that went all the way to the Multicultural Tribunal.

Salehi had thought so: He wanted to change clone law. Or he had.

Now he wanted revenge.

He was going to deal with the clones, the clone law, and with the bastards who murdered Torkild Zhu.

“You do what I tell you or you go home,” Salehi said. “It’s that simple. You don’t get to talk about your feelings. You don’t get to talk about whether or not this is worthwhile. You give this work 150 percent or more, or I will find someone who will.”

Her mouth was open. He wondered if anyone had ever spoken to her like this.

It took a full minute before she gathered herself.

“Yes, sir,” she said. “Security team. Reviewing the footage. I’ll have that underway immediately.”

“I also want background on this Melcia Seng and all the attorneys that Zhu hired yesterday. I want to know if we can identify the cops who killed Zhu. And I want someone to start investigating local Armstrong law as well as laws for the United Domes. I doubt they have any teeth, but if they do, I’ll use them. Or I’ll go directly into Alliance law.”

Jiolitti nodded, then swallowed hard. “Are we telling the Peyti about this, sir?”

For a moment, he thought she meant the Peyti clones on the Moon. Then he realized she meant all the Peyti lawyers traveling with them.

“Of course we are,” he said. “We’re a team. And they need to know what we’re all facing. It’s not just about barring some group’s entry to the Moon any longer. It’s about sanctioned murder.”

And a dozen other things.

“Okay,” she said, and headed for the door.

“Lauren,” he said, just a little softer. “I’ll tell them. I’ll tell everyone. You get the security teams in place, and you take care of the footage, and all the other orders I gave you. We need to move fast on this.”

“Yes, sir,” she said, and left.

He stood for a moment, feeling as if he had been punched in the stomach.

Goddammit, Zhu
, he thought.
When did you get to be so very hapless?
It was as if everything Zhu had touched this last year became something worse.

And then Salehi caught himself. He wasn’t going to blame Zhu. Zhu was doing exactly what Salehi had asked.

Zhu had been doing his job.

Just like Fujita had been.

Just like Salehi had demanded Jiolitti do.

They’d lost two colleagues so far, and this fight was only beginning.

Before it was over, Salehi suspected, they would lose a hell of a lot more.

TWENTY-THREE

NOELLE DERICCI STARED at the two Earth Alliance investigators she had invited into her office, and for a brief moment, she forgot why she had asked them to come.