Touch of the White Tiger (7 page)

“This is a compubot,” I rasped, unable to hide my impatience. “And one designed to look exactly like the old movie star, Jimmy Stewart. He played the role of ‘Jeff’ in an Alfred Hitchcock thriller about a magazine photographer who breaks a leg. He’s stuck in his apartment and spends so much time snooping
on his neighbors through his high-powered camera lens that he discovers one of his neighbors has murdered his wife.”

Mike digested this, then exhaled a rare, judgmental sigh. “Angel, did you order him?”

“No!” I snapped, then caught myself. It was a question Mike had every right to ask. I had employed a Humphrey Bogart compubot for years as a lover, I’m embarrassed to admit. I was lucky enough to get a Compubot Classic because I’d done a retribution job for an AutoMates executive. He knew about my obsession with classic movies and was grateful enough to supply me with a top-of-the-line companion gratis. Last month, after falling for Marco, I’d deprogrammed my relationship with Bogie. I guess some wise guy in the supply department of the robotics firm thought I might be getting desperate about now. “Okay, that’s it! Jimmy, I’m sorry, but you’re outta here. Speaker phone, dial AutoMates, Incorporated.”

Sometimes I preferred the house omnisystem over my lapel phone. Especially when I was in the mood to raise my voice. But instead of blasting a customer service representative, I found myself pacing the room, arms crossed, as I battled my way through the company phone directory.

“We’re sorry, but all our representatives are busy,” a sickeningly sweet female voice intoned. The women in these inclusive corporation answering systems always sounded like reformed vampires who sucked on sugar instead of blood, and the men sounded like defrocked television preachers.

Unfortunately, these days the “If you speak English…” option with international companies was usually nine or ten. If you got impatient and called out “zero” for the operator, which didn’t exist, you’d be punished by going back to the beginning of the greeting and then find out the option menu had grown to twenty.

Actually, it was possible to reach a live human being at Au
toMates. I’d accidentally done it before. I think it happened when I won a Hollywood trivia contest while I was on hold.

“If you speak Spanish,” the orgasmically contented voice intoned, “press 1.”

I began to pace. From the corner my eye, I caught Jimmy trying to wheel himself closer to the window.

“Don’t even think about it!” I admonished him. “Some reporter will get you on camera and the next thing I know the newscasts will be announcing that I’m sex-starved and emotionally incapable of a real relationship.”

I paused a moment when I realized that wasn’t far from the truth.

“If you speak Cantonese, press 3,” the sugary voice dripped from the omnipresent speaker phone. “If you speak Mandarin, press 4.”

“Come on, come on,” I muttered. I thought English was 8, but if I was wrong, I’d have to go back to the beginning of the menu.

“If you speak German—”

“Eight!” I shouted, unable to wait any longer.

“Yo!” a hip voice replied, “Watchu want?”

I pounded my forehead with a palm. I’d chosen American slang. Close enough. “Give me customer service,” I said, swallowing my frustration.

I spent the next ten minutes being bounced from option to option, then realized the double-murder case I’d been embroiled in would turn cold before I got through to the right person.

“Hang up,” I commanded the phone system and sank into the couch. “Jimmy, it looks like you’re stuck here for a while. And if you’re going to stay, you’re going to have to make yourself useful. What can you do?”

“Well, I excel at two things. One is spying. The other is—”

“I don’t think I need to hear about the second thing,” I interjected. “I don’t exactly look like Grace Kelly, do I?”

“Well, sweetie,” he said, eyeing me speculatively, “you look pretty darned good to me.”

“Save it for Gigi over there.” I tipped my chin in the direction of my Personal Listening Device, a head-and-shoulders model stashed in the corner.

PLDs looked like manikins, but had pliable synthetic skin and contained interpersonal reactive programming that made them good listeners. They weren’t nearly as sophisticated as AutoMates, but they were an affordable alternative for lonely people on a budget.

Increasingly, PLDs were taking the place of compubot dating services and psychotherapists. People loved having a pseudo human who would listen to them kvetch without interrupting, except for the occasional preprogrammed, “Oh, my!” and “I’m sorry to hear that.”

I thought PLDs were a pathetic new addition to our increasingly isolated electronic society. But I’d received this one as a freebie at a CRS convention. With blond hair and pink lipstick, it looked vaguely like my wicked foster sister, Gigi, so I’d kept it to amuse myself. I’d turned it on maybe once.

A PLD was one thing. A resident compubot was another. I glanced at Jimmy, wondering how I could take advantage of his unexpected arrival. I noticed two connected cylinders in his lap. “What’s that?”

“Binoculars.” He raised them and put them to his eyes by way of show-and-tell.

“Did you get them from a museum? Or are they just pretend?”

“They work,” Jimmy replied defensively.

“Then get over to the window and keep an eye out for trouble. But be discreet.”

I could just imagine the headlines if a reporter caught sight
of an AutoMate at my window: Sex-Starved Murder Suspect Hires Disabled Gigolo.

Jimmy wheeled himself to the edge of the couch and raised his binoculars, scanning the crowd still mingling on the street below. “So exactly what kind of trouble should I be looking for?”

I sauntered to his side and surveyed the scene from over his shoulder. At the same time Marco pulled up to the curb in his aerocruiser. He stepped out of the car and fended off a swarm of reporters as he headed toward my door.

I pointed at Marco and said, “That kind of trouble.”

The doorbell rang. Jimmy lowered his binoculars and looked at me with such sober concern I began to think of him as an ally.

“Don’t answer it,” he warned me.

The bell rang again. “I have to. Detective Marco and I have some unfinished business.”

Lovers and Other Strangers

I
ordered the omnisystem to open the foyer door for Marco, then waited for him to climb the stairs. Trying to be cool, I sat in a round easy chair by the fireplace, crossing my legs and assuming a look of ennui. I was so concerned about the impression I’d make on Marco that I didn’t notice what Jimmy was doing.

“Angel?” Marco said as his steps sounded outside the upper landing door.

“Come in,” I called out.

He took one step inside, but that’s as far as he got. Jimmy wheeled his ancient chair forward, held up an old-fashioned square camera with a silver dish light and set it off as close to Marco’s face as he could.
Poof!
The lightbulb popped and flashed. Marco shielded his eyes with his arm in confusion.

“Jimmy, stop,” I said.

“Go on, Angel,” he replied. “Run out the back! I’ll hold him off.”

I realized he was acting out the scene in
Rear Window
when he fends off the murderous Aaron Burr with the only weapon he had—blinding light in a darkened room. But this was ridiculous.

“That’s enough, Jimmy!”

Ignoring me, he backed up his wheelchair and frantically put another bulb in his silver light dish. When Marco tried to walk past him, he set off the flash again.

Marco shielded his eyes, then grabbed the camera, yanking it out of Jimmy’s hands with little effort. “Give me that,” he muttered.

“Hey, wait a minute!” Jimmy drawled indignantly.

Marco marched to the window, clearly intending to lob the camera to the sidewalk below. But one glimpse at the reporters made him think better of his plan, so he slam-dunked the camera in the waste can by the front door.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Jimmy shouted, pounding a fist on his wheelchair’s armrest.

“It’s already done.” Marco thrust both hands into his front jeans pockets and tilted his head as he studied my gallant visitor. “Who the hell….Jimmy Stewart?”

“From
Rear Window
,” I said.

Marco turned a scathing look my way. “When you couldn’t get me in bed, you turned to—”

“Don’t go there,” I growled.

“Why not?” he said with a sneer, making his way across the room.

Jimmy wheeled into his path. “You heard the lady,” he said, jamming his extended leg support into Marco’s shin. “Now why don’t you get out of here?”

“It’s okay, Jimmy,” I said. “Go back to the window.”

He shook his head. “Naw, naw, now, look here, Angel, I have a bad feeling about this one. I have instincts about these things.”

“You’re a damned compubot,” Marco said dismissively. “You can’t have instincts.”

“At least he has manners,” I said.

Marco pursed his lips and raised a brow in acknowledgment of the zing. We’d had this argument before. Marco came to my chair, towering in all his splendid and quiet masculinity.

“Let’s go out to the porch.” He held out a hand for me to take, which I did.

When I uncurled the leg I’d been sitting on and rose, he pulled too fast. I lost my balance. He caught me with a strong arm, then steadied me with a firm grip to my shoulders.

My skin sizzled under his touch, and when he pulled me closer—I swear he did—my breasts and hips seemed to fuse to his lean chest and hard legs. He gazed down at me with a smoldering look that promised a kiss, and I tilted my chin up.

He squeezed my shoulders so hard I nearly winced. “Angel, I—”

“Hey, hey, hey!” Jimmy said, wheeling his way toward us. “Just what do you think you’re doing?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Marco muttered sensually, as if I had asked the question.

“Yes, painfully,” Jimmy shot back in blustering irritation.

“Yes, pleasantly,” I murmured. I would have given a mortgage payment to taste Marco’s lips and feel his tongue on mine again. But Jimmy was doing a remarkably good job of staring us down. I notched my head toward the back porch. “Let’s go.”

“I don’t know how you do it, Marco,” I said, leaning against the porch rail in the shade of the elm tree that towered over my house and garden.

“How I do what?” He leaned against the rail a foot away from me.

I crossed my arms in a desperate bid to keep my feelings out of this. “I was ready to hang you from the nearest tree, and you almost got a kiss out of me.”

He leaned a forearm on the railing, moving closer. I stiffened against the buzzing excitement his closeness always created. “Let’s just face it, Angel. You and I are hot for each other, no matter what the circumstances.”

I gave him a cold smile. “That didn’t seem to matter when I visited your flat and asked you to make love to me.”

“It didn’t seem to matter when you decided to go to the Cloisters just hours before our deal was done.”

“A colleague was in distress. I couldn’t refuse his call for help. You would have done the same thing if you were in my position.” I moved to a lawn chair and propped my heels on the railing. Slouching, I massaged my temples. “At least I think you would. Maybe I’m giving you too much credit.”

He straightened and regarded me with all the confidence and certainty of an enlightened soul—or an accomplished sinner. A chill wriggled up my spine and down my arms when it struck me that I didn’t really understand Marco at all. And the more I knew about him, the less I understood. Hell, even ruthless assassins could be loving when you got them in bed. Whose side was he on?

When I’d thought Marco was merely a surprisingly intelligent Chicago tough who’d grown up to make something honest of himself, I’d felt safe. But he’d been in the R.M.O., and he’d been scary-hurt, and he wouldn’t make love to me,
and he’d betrayed me. The checks in the “con” column of the “Pros & Cons” list were mounting.

“Why didn’t you tell Lieutenant Townsend that we were lovers?”

He heaved a sigh and crossed his arms. “Because it probably wouldn’t have helped, and it most certainly would have hurt.”

“How?”

“If he’d known you and I were involved, he would have taken me off the case. As it is, I have access to all the details.”

“Which you cannot ethically or legally share with me or my counsel.”

“Ah!” He mugged a wry grin. “So you’ve actually deigned to hire a lawyer.”

I frowned and blushed. “Yes.”

“I don’t plan to help your defense case, Angel. I plan to find the son of a bitch who framed you.”

“My gun…” I ran out of air. I couldn’t look him in the eye. I didn’t want to falsely accuse him, but neither did I want to be right. “Marco, you had it at the crime scene….”

“I found it when we investigated the scene.” He paused. “What? You didn’t expect me to pretend it wasn’t there.”

“How did it get there, Marco? Did you plant it just to get me out of your hair?”

“What? Are you nuts?”

“Sorry,” I said, realizing I’d gone too far, “so who else would have taken it?”

“That’s what I’d like to know.”

“And the phone records—”

“Would imply that someone with powerful connections is involved. Someone who can have the phone system altered.”

“So at least we agree I’ve been framed. I suspect Corleone Capone. Or Vladimir Gorky.”

“Why would Gorky want to get you in trouble? You helped him find his Maltese falcon.”

“At least, that’s what we think.”

Gorky had agreed to free the kidnapped orphans if I could use my psychic abilities to find clues to help him locate a missing treasure. It was a replica of the black falcon statue featured in the 1940s film noir
The Maltese Falcon
, starring Humphrey Bogart. Ironically, Gorky was a Bogie fan, as well. He’d stashed some sort of priceless object inside the falcon replica for safety, but it had been stolen.

In a vision, I located the falcon at a farmhouse in Chechnya. Pleased with this information, Gorky had released the girls into my care. But he’d warned me that if my vision proved false, he’d make me pay.

“Gorky might be trying to punish me if he couldn’t find the falcon using my psychic clues. But why kill the mayor’s son just to punish me?”

Marco shrugged. “He wouldn’t hesitate to piss off the president of the United States if it suited him.”

“I still think Capone is our man. He’s much more of a fringe player with less to lose. The only thing is he’s more known for slitting throats in darkened alleys than elaborate political schemes.”

“I think you’ve just been inducted into a complicated chess game. It’s too early to see who the pawns are protecting. Personally, I want to know why the mayor exposed your contract to avenge his niece’s rape.”

“That makes two of us. Marco, did you tell Townsend about it before the mayor admitted it on TV?”

He shook his head and knelt in front of me. He took both my hands and caressed my knuckles with his thumbs. “Angel, I have many faults, but breaking confidences isn’t one of them. You have to trust me.”

How could I trust a man who was this handsome and willing to kneel at my feet? I slowly pulled my fingers from the warmth of his and folded them in a fist. “I don’t have to do anything. That’s the sad thing about it, Marco.”

Marco thought about his conversation with Angel when he pulled into Vladimir Gorky’s compound on Lake Michigan later that night. As the pink and blue laser gates dissolved so he could drive his new-used land cruiser into the expansive compound, he thought again about chess. Angel’s game with the Chicago syndicates had just begun. Marco’s had been in play for some time. He wasn’t a pawn. More like a rook. Still, he was a long way from checkmate.

He pulled his silver cruiser into the circular drive and left it running for the young Slavic-looking guard who came unsmilingly to park it. He’d get a warmer welcome, he knew from past experience, when Alexia greeted him at the door.

“Ricco,” she said, her cool disposition thawing at the sight of him. “How is your mother?”

“She’s fine,” he said, kissing her cheek. “And you?”

She folded her hands and tilted her head, her eyes wistful with memories of better days they both had known. “I’m okay, Ricco. Better at the sight of you. How long has it been?”

“Two years.”

“Well, it must be important if Mr. Gorky wants to see you after so much time. He’s in the Romanoff dining room. You remember the way?” she asked with an ironic smile.

“Of course.” Marco gave her a wink and headed toward the long corridor that wended in a northwest direction.

He knew every nook and bend in the mansion. The front of the house looked like a columned Southern plantation, but the interior was a faceted hive of eclectic architectural styles and decor.

Though it had been twenty years since he’d been unconditionally welcomed here, he remembered enough to get around and how to make a fast escape if necessary. In the old days a fast escape would mean a raid by Homeland Security. These days, now that Gorky had more control over the Feds, Marco was more worried about Gorky himself. Their truce was uneasy to say the least. And Gorky was a dangerous, unpredictable man.

Marco needed no reminder of that, but he received one nonetheless when he entered the oblong, high-ceilinged dining hall where Gorky was eating his usual late dinner. He sat at the far end of a gilt table big enough for a state dinner, absorbed in conversation with someone hidden behind a huge vase of flowers.

Unnoticed, Marco paused in the doorway and surveyed the place, looking for his favorite pieces among Gorky’s vast and priceless collection of early twentieth-century artifacts mounted on gold flocked wallpaper. Marco’s gaze caught and lingered on the pale pink enamel and pearls of the Lilies of the Field egg. Inside, Marco knew, was a picture of Czar Nicholas II and his two oldest daughters, Olga and Tatiana.

He then glanced at the Czarevich Egg. Done in a Louis XV style, it was a deep lapis lazuli blue, decorated with chased gold. Fabergé created 140 different translucent enamel colors to adorn the imperial bibelots, which included fifty-six of these priceless eggs, most of which Gorky had acquired for his personal collection.

He also had gathered some bizarre artifacts from the Romanov Dynasty. For example, the famous Anastasia fin-gerbone mounted on the wall on a flat piece of slate like a rare dinosaur relic. This was the evidence that finally provided DNA proof that Czar Nicholas’s daughter had indeed been murdered along with her family by the Bolsheviks in the early 1900s. Marco happened to know that Gorky also
kept the head of a Czar Nicholas clone in a jar of formaldehyde, though he was gracious enough to keep it out of the dining room.

“Here he is now. Marik!” Gorky said, waving him closer. “
Zdravstvujte!
Come eat!”

Gorky didn’t like Marco’s Italian heritage and had insisted on using a Slavic version of the name Mark. It used to bother Marco, but he’d learned to choose his battles. It was the only way to win the war.

“Dobryj vecher,”
he greeted Gorky.
“Kak vy pozhivaete?”

“Eh.” Gorky shrugged noncommittally, and they chatted in Russian about the weather as Marco strolled along the dozen red velvet dining chairs lining one side of the table.

But Marco stopped when his line of vision cleared the hotel-foyer sized flower arrangement and he recognized Gorky’s dinner companion and heir apparent sitting on the left side of the table’s end.

“Yevgeny!” Marco blurted out.

“
Privet
, Marik,” the arrogant young Turk replied.

He wore a sleek Nehru-style jacket of millifine steel that shimmered in the chandelier light. He’d slicked his jet-black hair from his high forehead straight back to his nape, showing off smooth, handsome features. Marco could see Gorky in his grandson, and the resemblance added to Marco’s disapproval.

“I didn’t expect you here, Yevgeny.”

“I was just leaving.” The young man stood and dabbed a smug smile from his mouth with a silk napkin, then tossed it beside his plate. “Grandfather was just showing me some pictures from the old days. I have to say, Marik, I’m impressed. I didn’t think you had it in you.”

Suspicious, Marco glanced at Gorky, who raised his bushy gray brows almost apologetically, saying, “So I showed him a few photos. I was feeling sentimental.”