Chapter Eighteen
Tommy Sunday knew something was wrong the minute George walked into the office he used whenever he worked on base. It was only “his” office in the nominal sense. Two strips of very small cubicles, and their associated chairs, occupied the office. A shielded hard line from the wall cabled up through the backbone of each strip of desks, ready for plugging into the back of clean AIDs or buckley PDAs for greater data security. This, of course, as he participated in breaking the encryptions on other people’s data, which data would then be fed back into the Bane Sidhe’s higher AIs for pattern searches and preliminary analysis. Tommy’s office chair was his own. With his size, it had to be — a fact that had not endeared him to organizational bean counters. The chair simply migrated with him to whatever cube happened to be available when he was.
George Schmidt didn’t often track him down at his desk, and didn’t often wear a facial expression that seemed to be mixed in equal parts of bewilderment and anger.
“What’s biting your butt?” the larger man asked.
“Cally. She — or rather, we — may have fucked up our surveillance covers. At least, I’m going to have to float a good story to cover the damage. Thing is, I don’t know what the hell happened. I do not understand women,” the assassin said, pulling up a chair from the wall and wincing at its rickety wobble.
“Tell me,” Sunday said.
“First, she caught me popping the booze pill at dinner. We were having good champagne, I know my limits, why not? Then it turned out she didn’t even know about it and had basically never had alcohol before. So she practically insists and I give her one, expecting her to be sensible or at least not stupid. She proceeds to get trashed out of her gourd, which I guess is partly my fault—” he interrupted himself as Tommy gave him a skeptical look. “Okay, it’s my fault. I should have insisted her first drinks not be in the field. I knew alcohol, and she didn’t. Fine. Then she proceeds to make bedroom eyes over the table and climb all over me on the drive back to the apartment, where she’s supposed to stay over.”
“Wasn’t she supposed to be your cover’s girlfriend?” Tommy was finding it hard to be sympathetic. Yeah, Cally was hot as hell, but George was supposed to be a professional with sense, too. Unless his lack of sense meant he was getting involved. Ordinarily, Tommy would have cheered — to his certain knowledge Cally hadn’t seriously dated anybody since James Stewart’s shuttle blew up seven years ago. If he was getting the hots for Cally, George’s timing was horrible. It could complicate the mission. And it was awful hard to feel sympathy for a guy just for having a hot woman climb all over him.
“Well, yeah, but usually there are limits to how far you act it out,” the discomfited man said. “I doubt our tails had cameras looking down into the seats of the car and doing a hand check. And don’t look at me like that. She’s drunk and she’s damned lethal — as if I’m going to piss her off and risk an incident.”
“Wah,” Tommy commiserated. “I can guess what’s next and you get no sympathy from me for your poor lost innocence. Or for having to face Papa.”
“We didn’t screw; she ran out on me. Knocked me on my ass for no reason and ran out on me, that is.” The bewilderment had taken over George’s face.
“Ah, now we see what you’re really upset with.” Then, quirking an eyebrow at the other man, “There’s got to be more than that. What did you do, what had just happened — there’s something you’re not telling me.” Tommy leaned back, threatening to tip over the chair if he hadn’t had excellent balance honed by regular hiking and boating.
“Just something stupid. She said she hated my carpet. It makes no damn sense.”
“Well, what’s the damn carpet look like? Is it nasty, or what?” the cyber asked impatiently.
“It’s gray and dingy, but not grimy or anything. No bugs or nasty smells. Besides, white shows dirt. It’s pretty ugly, but not—”
“White?” Sunday interrupted him. “What kind of white carpet?”
“What’s it matter? Matted down shag. It still makes no damned sense. Why throw a fit and jeopardize a cover over a stupid rug? Is she crazy?”
The big man sat up, burying his face in his hands for a few long moments before looking up at the other guy. “You are so lucky to still be breathing it isn’t even funny. White shag carpeting. Holy fuck. She had a bad experience,” he explained, shaking his head. “George, I’ll make it real simple for you. Do not get Cally O’Neal drunk. That woman has more land mines in her past than you ever want to risk stepping on. Didn’t you ever think there might be a reason nobody had volunteered himself as the one to introduce her to real liquor? And get a decorator in there. Today.”
“Why the hell would a guy about to move redecorate? Hello? Cover?”
“If it were me, I’d do it and think up an excuse.” The code cracker looked at his skeptical colleague and sighed. “Fine, ignore me. It’s your funeral.”
“This is an odd place to meet.” Michelle was wearing a get-up that looked almost like a parka and mukluks to the ice rink Cally had given her as a rendezvous location. She looked dubiously at the white figure skates she was expected to don in place of the tan, furry boots. “These look cold,” she said.
“They’re not,” Cally replied as she finished lacing her own, wrapping the long laces twice around the top for ankle support before tying them.
Michelle copied her, even though the standard size white boots were lumpy inside and a bad fit for her feet. Self-discipline or no, there were limits. She fixed them. They were still all Earthtech materials and so forth. Nobody would ever notice. Besides, she only changed them a small amount.
Her sister handed her a bag of red and white candies from her purse before shoving her gear into a rental locker. The bag had “Star-Bright” blazoned across the front in italics.
“Oooh. Peppermint gears!” the mentat exclaimed, delighted. “Thank you!” At a loss for what else to do with them, she tucked a couple of them in the top of one boot before shoving the rest of the bag into her own locker.
On the ice, after an initial stumble, Michelle glided like a dream, if only like a dream that had discreet puppet strings assisting her balance. She regarded her sister’s rusty fumblings with tolerant amusement. The great assassin. How cute.
It took 3.2 minutes, more or less, for Cally to get her ice-legs back. She had obviously done this before, and done it a great deal.
“This is a favorite leisure activity for you. Am I correct?”
“Yeah, but it’s my first time back on the ice this winter. Hey, that looks fun.” The operative looked no more than sixteen as she swung a hand towards two girls who were spinning like a two-kid top, toes turned out, holding hands, leaning back. They were laughing with an innocence only a little kid could have. The blonde one’s braids swung straight out behind her.
Cally’s face lit up. “Let’s!”
It was only the engineer’s abilities and instantaneous comprehension of the mechanics involved that kept Michelle upright as her sister spun around in front of her, grabbing both her hands and whirling her into a matching spin.
When she recovered from her surprise, the mentat noticed that there was a data cube squashed between their joined palms. The mechanics of intrigue involved pleasant toys, but she wondered when, or if, her sister would grow out of them.
Later, as the two sipped hot cocoa in a corner too isolated for the tastes of the child patrons, Michelle sighed, “It was truly unwise of Pardal to try to murder one of us.”