city blues 02 - angel city blues (18 page)

I was walking in my front door when Vivien called back. The unexpected jangle of the ringtone made me flinch. My nerves were a bit skittish after my encounter with Thug 1 and Thug 2.

The audio bug was still in my ear, so I accepted the call, sound only. “Any luck?”

“Absolutely,” Vivien said. “I’m forwarding the vid to you now.”

An alert popped up on the screen of my phone, prompting me to accept or reject the incoming file. I accepted it, and waited a few seconds for the download to complete.

“Hang on,” I said. “It may take me a little while to find what I’m looking for.”

I hit the ‘
play
’ tab, and fast-forwarded through the security footage until I spotted two people entering the lobby of Leanda’s apartment building. I zoomed in on their faces. Not my thugs. I fast-forwarded again.

Nine-fingers showed up on the screen at a little after three a.m. He was with another man of similarly Asian appearance. The second man—probably Arm-twister—was about ten centimeters shorter, and at least twenty kilos heavier. From the way he carried himself, the extra weight was all muscle.

I fast-forwarded again, and caught sight of my two Asian buddies walking out of the elevator and leaving the lobby at a few minutes until four.

“Thanks,” I said to Vivien. “This is exactly what I was looking for.”

“Glad I could help,” she said. “Are you going to tell me what this is about?”

I checked the exact time index for the entry of the two men into the building. “Call up the video, and freeze-frame on three-oh-two a.m. and eighteen seconds. You should see two men crossing the lobby.”

After a brief pause, Vivien said, “Got it.”

“Zoom in on their faces. Does either man look familiar?”

A longer pause, as she searched her memory. “No,” she said finally. “I don’t remember ever seeing either one of them. Is there some reason I should know them?”

“Not really,” I said. “Just hoping for an easy answer.”

“Who are they?”

“Hired muscle,” I said. “At least one of them—the taller one—is a killer. They came to visit me when I was going through your daughter’s apartment. I’m fairly sure that they let themselves in with a key chip.”

“That’s impossible,” Vivien said. “How would they get a key to Leanda’s door?”

“The same way I did,” I said. “Somebody made them a copy.”

There was a short silence as we both thought about the potential implications of that thought.

Vivien spoke first. “What did they want?”

“They roughed me up a bit, to get my attention. Then, they offered me a bribe to walk away from this case.”

“How much?”

“A half a million marks.”

Vivien didn’t hesitate. “I’ll double it.”

I laughed. “Relax. This is not a shakedown. You know what my rates are, and you’re paying them. I’m not open to a counter offer from Muscle Boys Incorporated.”

“Are you sure?” she said. “A million marks is a lot of money. And I wouldn’t mind paying, if it’ll help you keep your head in the game.”

“My head’s
already
in the game,” I said. “But if it will make you feel better, I’ll let you buy me a steak sometime. About five centimeters thick, with all the trimmings.”

“So, you’ll definitely be turning down the bribe?”

“I don’t know about
that
,” I said. “They say they’re going to kill me if I turn it down. They’ll also kill me if I take their cash and then double-cross them. Either way, I’m dead, so I might as well enjoy the money while I can.”

Stunned silence from the other end of the phone. Then, “You’re kidding, right?”

“About keeping the money? Yeah, that was a joke.”

“No,” she said. “The other part… The part about killing you…”

“Oh. No, that part wasn’t a joke. They threatened to kill me if I don’t leave the case, and I’m pretty sure they weren’t bluffing.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Tell them to stick their money up their asses. Then, I guess I’ll spend a while looking over my shoulder.”

“I’m serious,” Vivien said.

“So am I. There’s not a whole lot I
can
do. I’ll keep an eye out, and I’ll keep digging until I figure out what this is all about.”

“Why do they want to kill you?”

“Good question,” I said. “Here’s a better one… Why
don’t
they want to kill Bruhn, or any of the other cops on your daughter’s case?”

“What do you mean?”

“Think about it. You’ve seen the LAPD files. Those guys have not been sandbagging. They’ve been working
hard
on this investigation for the better part of two months. I’ve been nosing around for a few days. So why are Thug One and Thug Two focusing on
me
, and not the cops? Or to put it another way, what have
I
been doing that the police have
not
been doing. Whatever it is, it seems to be setting off alarms with some very nasty people.”

“You’re getting close to something.”

“Maybe,” I said. “Or, maybe I’m just moving in the right direction. Either way, I think things are about to get ugly.”

“I can help with that,” Vivien said. “I can provide guards, security services, and as much surveillance equipment as you need to protect yourself.”

“I appreciate the offer,” I said. “And I might want to take you up on it at some point. But I’m not sure I can work that way.”

“I understand. The offer stays open, if you change your mind.”

I yawned. “Thanks.”

The yawn must have been contagious. She echoed it softly. “Good night, David.”

“You mean good morning.”

Vivien yawned again. “Whatever…”

She hung up the phone.

The messenger showed up about an hour later. I’d been expecting a regular bonded courier, like the one Vivien had sent a few days earlier. This guy was definitely not from one of the commercial delivery services. He was hired muscle, punched out of the same mold as Nine-fingers and Arm-twister. His facial features had that same loosely-Asian fusion of cosmetic handsomeness and calculated brutality.

The fabric of the messenger’s dark clothing was suspiciously thick, with a striated weave pattern that suggested Kevlar, or one of the carbon-polymer armor analogs. Bulletproof, or at least highly bullet-resistant, and it would probably turn the blades of most knives.

His package—presumably a half-million Euro-marks—rode between his shoulder blades in a charcoal gray backpack of the same armored fabric. This left both of his hands free for action.

According to House’s hard object scanner, the man was armed with a semi-automatic hand gun, a shock rod, and three edged weapons—two with blades in the thirty-five centimeter range, and one with a blade length of about fifteen centimeters. House’s sniffers picked up traces of chemical propellant consistent with small arms ammunition, but no other evidence of explosives.

I didn’t bother to figure out where the weapons were concealed. I just took it for granted that the guy could get to them quickly, and use them proficiently.

I’d thought about handling the messenger by video, but I decided to meet with him in-person. I didn’t want Nine-fingers to think that his intimidation tactics had me too scared to show my face. So I instructed House to put his defensive systems at full readiness, and I met the guy at my front door.

The messenger didn’t bother with thumb prints or retina scans. He pulled out a trid and compared it to my features. When he was satisfied, he shoved the 3D photo back into his pocket and said, “Stalin, I’ve got a package for you.”

I yawned and shook my head. “No thanks. I’m not accepting any deliveries today.”

The man didn’t seem particularly surprised. “You sure you know what you’re doing?”

“Probably not,” I said. “But I’ll take my chances.”

He opened his mouth to reply, but I cut him off. “If you’re about to deliver the obligatory threat, you can save your breath. Biggest mistake of my life, and I won’t live to regret it. You’re going to spank me with a rusty cheese grater, and feed my testicles to a rabid mongoose. Yep. I got all that. You can go back and tell your bosses that you’ve delivered the message. I’ve been sufficiently threatened.”

There was a subtle realignment of the man’s posture. His left shoulder came down a fraction of a centimeter and his right hand began to move.

Suddenly, his body was covered in bright red dots. At least ten low-intensity targeting lasers were concentrated on his head, and another twenty were focused on strategic points of his anatomy. House had him covered from every angle. If the man blinked funny, House would cut him to ribbons.

“That’s the worst case of laser measles I’ve ever seen,” I said. “You should really have that looked at before it gets serious.”

The messenger looked down and saw that multiple targeting beams were focused on his heart, his groin, and both of his hands. There were other laser dots on his neck and cranium, but he couldn’t see those.

“This conversation is over,” I said. “Go back and tell your nine-fingered buddy that he’s starting to irritate me.”

The messenger started to respond, but I took a step backward, and let the door slide closed in his face.

CHAPTER 14

I left House on full defensive alert, and went to bed.

When I woke, the sun was going down again, and I had an idea. One of my dreams had been something about the messenger guy, running around LA, showing the trid of my face to everyone he encountered. Not exactly a practical method of tracking my whereabouts, but my subconscious had latched onto the concept, and transmuted it into a potentially more viable alternative.

One shower, one meal, and two cigarettes later, I left home by the side door, which I only use when my house is likely to be under surveillance. The door opens into an abandoned office complex, littered with broken furniture, the debris of fallen ceiling tiles, and collapsed interior walls. The teetering jumble of wreckage looks like an avalanche waiting to happen, and that’s exactly how it’s supposed to look.

Occasionally, a squatter will poke his nose inside, in search of a place to sleep, or any scrap that might be worth salvaging. House keeps an eye on such uninvited guests. If they behave themselves, he lets them stay for a while. If they get too obnoxious, or if they show signs of taking up residence, he uses his defensive weapons—at non-lethal levels—to encourage them to move on.

There were currently no visitors in-residence, so my exit was unimpeded. House kept my path illuminated with low-intensity lighting, to make sure that I didn’t trip over anything.

It took several minutes to follow House’s winding trail through the staggered heaps of junk. By the time I reached the glassless frame of the office complex’s street door, I was on a side street, about 80 meters from either of my public doors.

I had House run a final scan of the street. There was no one within the perimeter of his cameras or sensors.

I stepped out into the night, and took an alternate route to the barricade. After the usual onceover by the cops, I was passed through into Dome 12.

I loitered in the shadows at the end of the block long enough to be sure that no one had followed me out of the Zone. If Nine-fingers and his thugs were really going to come after me, they didn’t seem to be on my trail yet.

I walked to the 52nd Street Depot, and caught a westbound Lev to Dome 15: West Hollywood.