Continuance (35 page)

“What’s wrong?”
Chaela furrowed her brows, concern plain on her face. She followed his eyes to
look over her shoulder, but Grieves was already gone.

“Nothing,” Jason
mumbled. What had just happened? He glanced around, ready to find other agents
waiting to move in. The crowd was losing interest, starting to disperse, but
those that remained were nothing more than curious bystanders. Whatever the
reason Grieves had decided to back off, Jason wasn’t about to complain. If they
came for him again, he’d be ready.

Pushing Grieves
from his mind, he grasped at something Chaela had said earlier. “So why were
you on the phone with Stuart, anyway?”

A blush filled
her cheeks, and she lowered her eyes. “I needed a ride.”

Jason laughed,
sweeping an extravagant hand toward the wounded mess of the M3. “Hop in.”

“Stand down.”
Lindsay strode through the crowd toward the stands as he spoke with Costilla
over the comm channel. “Abort.”

Part of him
couldn’t believe he was giving the order. The crash – or what should have been
a crash – was all the proof he needed to nail Jason Day as a retread. Incontrovertible
and rock solid. No normal human could have maneuvered a vehicle like that, so
precisely at such blinding speeds. Others might have chalked it up to
exceptional skill or blind luck, but Lindsay knew better.

“Grieves? What
the hell do you mean, stand down?” Costilla had every reason to sound pissed.
“You saw! The guy couldn’t have been any more obvious if he’d just crawled out
of the tube! Let’s nail him!”

“I said abort!”
Lindsay barked. “In case you didn’t notice, our little inhibitor stunt didn’t
go as planned. We can’t let the Authority get pinned with sabotage. We let him
walk.”

Silence deadened
the link before Costilla finally replied. “Your call, rook. But I’m telling you
– Neal’s not gonna like it.”

“I’ll worry
about that. Gather everybody up. Let’s clear the area.” Lindsay cut the
channel. In reality, the sabotage was all the more reason to take Day in and
silence him right away, but the excuse would hold water long enough.

 Long enough for
me to regret the real reason I just gave a cornered retread a pass.

After the
near-crash, knowing what he’d just seen, he’d bolted out of the viewing box
like a hound flushing a fox, intent on taking Day down himself. When he ran
into the crowd gathered around Day’s car, he cursed the ignorant fools even as
they slowed him down. If they knew the guy they were so impressed with was a
retread, they’d turn on Day in a blink, maybe even blame him for the explosion,
irrational as that would be. Lindsay had to shove his way through, not caring
if his elbows left the occasional bruise on some enraptured idiot.

But when he
broke through, there they were, Day and Oriole, in each other’s arms.

No. Not Oriole.
She has a name. Chaela Laurensen.

As they stood
there, looking at each other like nothing else existed in the whole world, all
he’d been able to think about was Accardi. Her moans as the agents had dragged
her off to the GRaLE. The crimson streaks on white walls. But mostly he’d
thought of her boyfriend, Gallihugh. The devastation on his face when he’d
learned of her fate, and her deception. Her pleas on his behalf.

A real
relationship. A real love. One he’d single-handedly obliterated.

He trailed his
fingers along the bandage at his throat. The ordeal with Accardi had started
it, yes. But he’d had to almost kill Day to finally realize the horror of what the
DIA was doing. What
he
was doing. Singling people out, plucking them
away from those they loved, and ending their lives. Just like death. And what
was death at the hands of someone else, if not murder?

When he saw Day
and Laurensen together, something had left him. Neal was wrong. Lindsay looked
at two of them and knew they were capable of the love he saw there. He had no
reason to fear them. He never had. They were people, just like him, with the
same needs, flaws, and dreams. They were human.

Only now, he
realized he’d been blinded by Darren’s stranglehold on his family. A
stranglehold that wasn’t the calculating control of a retread over those he
knew to be less capable. Just the arrogant presumption of a successful man with
unrealistic expectations for his family.

When Lindsay got
back to the box in the stands, he found Neal there with Costilla. Neal wore a suit
so blue it was almost black, and for once he wore a tie – a gray and blue
diamond pattern several years out of style. He’d found time to loosen it along
the way from Everton, and it hung draped around his neck like a noose.

Whatever they’d
been talking about died when Lindsay entered the room, but he didn’t have to
hear the details to know it hadn’t been good. The same height as Lindsay,
Costilla had a good six inches on Neal, but he used the distraction of Lindsay’s
entrance to put a few feet of space between himself and the other man.

“The man of the
hour!” Neal spread his arms in welcome. He held one of his hands cupped closed,
and he finished the gesture by popping a pair of Macadamias into his mouth, one
after the other.

Lindsay
understood why Costilla wasted no time gathering up his datapad and heading for
the door. Someone who didn’t know Neal might have interpreted his greeting as
friendly. Lindsay knew better, the menacing undercurrent plain to his ears.
Costilla heard it too. The look he exchanged with Lindsay on the way out was
almost sympathetic.

“The inhibitor
didn’t work as planned,” Lindsay said. “There was an explosion.”

“So I heard. I
also heard the malfunction wasn’t your fault. Costilla screwed up.” Neal
reached inside his jacket, drawing the graphene blade. He sliced open another Macadamia,
tossing the shells to the floor. “You improvised a solution to keep the op
alive.”

Lindsay nodded
agreement, feeling surprised. Maybe this would go smoothly after all.

Without warning,
Neal’s hand lashed out, and pain exploded across the bruises on Lindsay’s
throat. Neal shoved his head against the glass behind, iron fingers gripping
his neck like a vice. Lindsay glanced down. And froze. The double points of the
graphene blade hovered centimeters from the hollow of his chin.

“So why did you throw
away all that effort by letting a retread run?” Neal’s voice was a door
scraping closed inside a tomb. “I gave you specific orders NOT to call the
operation without clearing it through me. You were close enough to that retread
to smell rubber!” At this distance Lindsay could only smell Neal’s breath, the
acrid scent of half-chewed macadamias.

“After that
white room, I thought you understood.” Neal said. “It takes a little empathy
with a retread to realize just how dangerous they are. Costilla and Wright
don’t get that. They haven’t seen what you and I have. That’s why I put you in
charge tonight.” He cocked his head to one side, a man examining a worm beneath
his shoe. “But maybe you’re just your granddaddy’s rubber loving little boy after
all.”

Anger seethed through
Lindsay’s veins. He knocked the blade away, tearing Neal’s hand from his throat
as he forced the other man back a step. He stood so close he could see the
veins in Neal’s eyes like a satellite photo, tiny red rivers tracing out a landscape
of eggshell white.

“Our evidence is
no good!” Lindsay shouted. “If we draw attention, we’ll be implicated! As it
is, there’ll be an investigation into the explosion. Covering this up will be
impossible if we try to use it for prosecution.”

It was true. All
of it. Lindsay no longer cared if it had nothing to do with why he’d let Day
go. Looking at Neal – at the wild, predatory look in his eyes – Lindsay
realized he was seeing a twisted reflection of his future self. Eaten up by
prejudice and hate. Blinded to what it really meant to be human.

The ghost of a
smile turned up the corners of Neal’s mouth.
So the worm had a backbone
,
the expression said. “You’re talented Grieves. Gifted, even. One day you could go
far in the Authority. Further than me.” He turned away, pacing over to the
datapad Grieves had used to adjust the inhibitor. “But right now, you still don’t
know shit. While you were down there cancelling this operation, Wright was up
here doing his job. He walked the stands, SLIDe scanning the crowd. Turns out,
Day had more company out here tonight than Oriole.”

Neal gestured at
the datapad with the blade in his hand. A long range still showed the grainy
image of a man and a woman through the window of one of the VIP boxes.

Lindsay felt his
face flush as he straightened his shirt, steadying himself. “That’s Darren.”

“I guess he
didn’t invite you to hang out.” Neal said.

The other face
didn’t surprise Lindsay. But what did was the disappointment he felt knowing
she’d be charged along with Darren. “And Dr. Fairchild.”

Neal gave a smug
nod. “A photonics sweep showed some kind of data link to the lap transponders
on the cars. Wright thinks they know about the inhibitor.”

Lindsay felt a
chill. Any implication of the DIA would mean deep trouble with Cavanaugh, if
not outright criminal charges.
I haven’t been on this job long enough to be
ready to lose it. Have I?
“And if they do know something?”

“Then we’ll make
sure no one else does.” The cunning look in Neal’s eyes left no doubt what he
meant. “And there
will
be an investigation. One we’re going to cooperate
with fully.”

“You can’t be
serious.” Lindsay said. “Why?”

“Because as far
as you or anyone else is concerned, we didn’t plant that inhibitor. Katelynn
Perez did. She used it to intentionally falsify evidence – against our specific
orders to the contrary. We regret that she did so, and of course the inhibitor
data will be inadmissible. But Day’s acrobatics during the crash give us all we
need.”

Had Neal gone
truly mad? “She’ll go down with him. You’d throw her to the wolves to take the rap
for the inhibitor? She doesn’t deserve that.”

The hard edge
returned to Neal’s eyes. “It’s the
least
she deserves for spreading her
legs for a retread.” He raised the blade, slowly twisting it in his hand as he
studied the graphene tip, so thin it was nearly transparent. “In the Authority,
staying sharp is the only edge we have over the retreads. Perez lost hers. She’s
useless to us now.”

He sheathed the
blade, locking eyes with Lindsay. “Make sure the same doesn’t happen to you.” Neal
paused at the door. “Call it a night, Grieves. I have a feeling we’ll need you
in that white room again tomorrow.”

The apartment
lights swelled to the ambience preset as Jason and Chaela walked in from the
garage. With Stuart gone, the place was quiet. He hadn’t packed much, just a
few containers stacked in the hallway. He’d sent Jason a message through SocialNet
to let him know he’d be by later to get some more of his stuff.

He hadn’t packed
the RealiSIM either, and as they walked into the living room, its photoscreen
glowed to life. Dozens of gold and silver metallic ribbons appeared along the
walls and ceiling, slowly intertwining in a 3D Celtic knot work pattern.

“Cool animation.”
Chaela spun in a circle to take in the knot work, a guest admiring the home of
her host. Somewhere along the way home, she’d found time to fix her tousled
hair and touch up her makeup.

“Yeah. Something
Stuart downloaded. I think he must change it every two days. You just missed the
one with the Laker Girls.”

“Oh, I’m sure
that was entertaining.”

“In a way. They
had an algorithm where you could have them dance to whatever music played
through the system. It was kind of fun watching them chest pump to Beethoven’s Ninth.”

Chaela rolled
her eyes, but then spoiled it by doing the two things he’d seldom seen before
tonight – looking him in the eyes and smiling. It was something he could get
used to.

The ride home after
the race had gone well – closer to what he’d imagined when he asked her to go
in the first place. He was starving after using his perks so intensely, and by
the time they left, he felt like a singularity had formed in his stomach. They stopped
at a roadside QuickCafe long enough for him to down a pair of hamburgers and
some fries, and he ate so fast she made oinking noises at him, laughing the
whole time.

Back on the
road, he told her about the near miss during the crash. She’d been on the back
side of the track and missed the whole thing. He gave her the gist, toning down
reality and chalking it all up to great luck. She’d reached over and put her
hand on his then, sending exhilarating warmth along his veins. She hadn’t let
go the rest of the ride back.

“Listen,” he
said. “There’s beer in the fridge or wine in the rack if you want it. Make
yourself at home. I’m going to get out of these clothes.”

She raised a
devilish eyebrow, cocking her head to the side. “I trust you’ll be replacing
them with others?”

“Sorry, yeah.
Stuart will be back any minute. He gets a complex when he sees me naked.” She
laughed at the same time his stomach rumbled loud enough he wondered if she
heard it anyway. The burgers had been a start, but he still needed more to eat
after the heavy perk use. “Back in a few”