"I've got it," the dwarf responded. "Everybody hang tough, 'cause I'm blowing it-now!"
Halfway up the thirty-meter incline, with men and women in gray sec uniforms closing in on them from all directions inside the garage, a series of explosions rattled the massive door and ripped it from its moorings. Elvis's demolition work had been on the money. The clouds of dust and the noise were horrendous, amplified by being trapped in the garage.
Cut free and blown in a designed fall, the door toppled outward into the street only a heartbeat before Wheeler steered the vehicle over it. The ride was bumpy and rough, but over almost as soon as it began.
Out on Mercer Street, Wheeler cut illegally through the intersection of Mercer and Westlake Avenue North, shouldering a delivery wagon aside and zipping between the drivers waiting to proceed with the green light. A flurry of angry honking followed them, but the motorists didn't waste any time.
Skater watched the intersection fill up as they roared through, knowing whatever pursuit might have made it out of the garage would be effectively cut off for a few seconds more. He let out a tense breath. "Okay, let's lose this rolling bull's-eye and shift to some other transportation."
33
Skater looked up from Archangel's display as Duran led Ariadne Silverstaff into the living room of the suite serving as their safe house. Before returning here, Archangel had checked her over and found two tracking devices. One that the woman must have activated at the time of the attack, and the other set for an eight-hour delay if she didn't use a frequency modulator attached to her portacom. Both had been removed.
Standing, Skater waved to a chair in the circle that had formed around Archangel's work area. "Please. Have a seat."
Ariadne kept herself distant. Her arms were folded tightly over her breasts. She appeared hesitant, not wanting to give in so easily. More than two hours had passed since they'd gotten her, and the trideo stations were full of the news. "My husband," she said in a strong voice that carried a sense of brittleness with it, "I'm sure he will be glad to pay any reasonable ransom."
"You're not being held for ransom," Skater said. "Actually, we may be able to help you. It seems you and your husband have been blackmailed enough lately."
Color drained from her face slightly, but she didn't turn away. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"I'm talking about that baby in the other room." Skater returned her gaze full measure.
"My daughter? I don't understand."
"She's not your daughter," Skater said firmly. "That's the whole point." He let that sink in, watching as the woman drew into herself. Anger coiled restlessly inside him when he wondered how much Ariadne Silverstaff knew about Larisa's death.
He'd held the baby briefly while Archangel had been getting her squared away, purchasing diapers, milk, and other things. Surprisingly, it was Elvis, so huge next to Emma that she could almost lie in one big hand, who seemed to calm and soothe her most.
"I know the whole story about McKenzie setting it all up… everything," Skater said. "But I wonder how much you know, like where the baby came from?"
"McKenzie told us he'd found a suitable surrogate mother. It was a business arrangement. No blackmail was involved." Ariadne's words came faster now, and with relief evident in them. "This whole thing, there was so much pressure on us, it was so hard to know what to do, who to trust, where to begin even."
"There was no surrogate mother," Skater said. "McKenzie coerced a young woman into having that baby for you and your husband. Once the baby was born, the mother became a liability so he had her killed, presumably to keep her from telling anyone about it."
She looked at him with knowing eyes. "You knew her."
Skater nodded.
"What are you going to do?"
"I don't know," he said honestly. "I was hoping talking to you might give me some ideas."
"My husband didn't know about the mother getting killed either," Ariadne said. "He could never have kept something like that from me."
Skater leaned forward, putting his elbows on his knees, making everything more conspiratorial now. Ariadne Silverstaff was going to be looking for a way out, and if his plan was going to work, she had to buy into the one he was going to offer. "I believe you, but I want Conrad McKenzie to pay for what he's done," he stated.
"He's a very powerful man," she said, "that's why Tavis went to him in the first place. We needed help getting NuGene into Seattle, and it looked like nothing could be done in this city without some kind of help from people like McKenzie. We knew that for a price McKenzie's influence could help protect NuGene's interests once we were established here. My husband linked up with him about a year ago.”
Skater gave a short, bitter laugh. "The corps and the criminals may keep their books differently, but seems like they often have the same interests. And always with an eye on the same bottom line."
A look of desperation entered Ariadne's eyes. "NuGene has been in serious trouble ever since Seattle replaced Portland as the main port for goods going in and out of the Tir. Tavis's father had worked so hard to build NuGene into something, but then the Council of Princes took it all away from him. He'd sunk a lot of money into a new product, and suddenly got the market pulled out from under him. And he wasn't the only one. Hundreds went bankrupt. Portland was a boom town in those days, but that changed almost overnight. NuGene was among those who got hit hardest. It's taken years, but it looked like we'd finally found a way out." Skater listened to the emotion behind the words, sensing that he was getting the truth.
"By the time Torin died, some very promising research had already begun on a promising new organic replacement tissue. The research continued after his death, though the financial strain was tremendous. Last year we were finally ready to go into production, but access to the market was virtually blocked. Tavis's only chance to save NuGene and his family was to get as many Portland backers as he could, promising to set up a branch of NuGene in Seattle. Tavis himself underwent a transplant treatment on his injured knee, using our new tissue. It worked wonderfully, but he was waiting until his position in Seattle was established before announcing it. Things seemed to be going fine until the raid on the Sapphire Seahawk. Tavis had no choice but to go public with the stock in hopes of making enough profit that he could buy it all back at a later date, or at least maintain a controlling interest. We had to go into production immediately before someone else beat us to it. But the cost overruns on moving so fast have been incredible."
“The company is vulnerable," Archangel said.
With the amount of stock that had surfaced in the various exchanges. Skater figured it would be two or three years before NuGene made it back into the black. Assuming the company survived.
"Yes," Ariadne admitted. "When the media picked up the rumor that someone had stolen the secret of NuGene's important new discovery, the stocks plummeted. We had to stop releasing it because we couldn't afford to cover the paper once people started to panic and sell. We'd never be able to buy it all back."
"Your husband told you copies of the files were stolen?" Duran asked.
"Yes. He tells me everything. That's why I'm so sure he didn't know anything about the baby's mother being murdered."
Skater stood up, pacing, working it through. Synclair Tone was in another room, kept drugged and cuffed. Now that they also had Ariadne, there were two people who could tie Larisa's murder to McKenzie.
"McKenzie knows you're a human passing as an elf?" Skater asked.