S. M. Stirling - Draka 04 by S. M. Stirling

Author:S. M. Stirling
Language: eng
Format: epub

***

"Be careful," Henry said. "You—"

The line went click, and then it was replaced by the steady hum of a dial tone.

"Shit!"

Carmaggio's thick finger stabbed for the pad, and then he realized that he hadn't the remotest idea of the number in the Bahamas. He glanced at the clock: 12:30. He swore, hauled himself into the bathroom—time, tide, and the bladder waited for no man—and then sank down at the kitchen table with the phone there and a pad and paper. Pushing aside a stack of pizza boxes and some fried rice still in the carton, he began.

"Hello, operator? I was in the middle of a long-distance call, from Andros Island in the Bahamas. I was cut off; can you—no, I don't know the number. Yeah, thank you very much for fucking nothing, too."

He laid the phone down and ran a hand through his hair, flogging at his mind and feeling the sand in the pipes. A nice juicy one had come up last night, a spousal just-can't-take-it-anymore ballpeen-hammer divorce, and kept him up; this was two days' sleep he was missing, and it got harder past forty. Hell, it got harder past thirty, if he remembered right.

Okay, Jenny used my call-in line. One of the few perks of this job at his level was that it made it easier to get two phone lines. That'll catch it if she calls back.

So . . . area code for Bahamas, no big deal.

"Hello, directory assistance?"

An accent this time. "I'd like the number of IngolfTech Incorporated. No, not the Nassau branch, the headquarters on Andros Island. Thank you."

He jotted it down. Maybe a bit impolite to call this time of night, but fuck that. Five rings.

" Hello. You have reached IngolfTech Incorporated. Our business hours are —"

"Shit!"

He slammed the handset down into the receiver. "I can't leave a goddamn message. No fucking way I can let them connect to me. I shouldn't be calling as it is.

"Directory assistance? I'd like the home number for Ms. Gwendolyn Ingolfsson, Andros Island . . .

. It's unlisted. Thank you very much.

"Bitch," he added.

Except that he had to do something; the knowledge was there in his mind, as definite as his own

self. He stabbed more keys.

"Jesus? Yeah, I know what time it is. Listen, you still got that plastic piece?"

There was a silence on the other end of the line, and a sleepy woman's voice muttering in Spanish somewhere behind his partner. The gun was a curiosity, a little plastic-and-synthetics one-off they'd picked up a while ago. Technically Department property, but nobody was hurt by it going missing. The former owner had lost an argument; the way you did when your head tried to argue with a rifled shotgun slug at close range; and it hadn't figured in the evidence trail.

The interesting thing about it was that there was no metal except the ammo and the firing pin. It wouldn't activate an airport security scanner, not unless the scanner was set so it'd go off from the bridgework in your teeth.

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