Heather fumed for a minute, occasionally moving her hands as if she were going to say something.
“If that’s all, Paladin GioAvanti…”
“Yes,” said Heather, and she rose, still trying to look defiant as she departed.
She returned to the reception desk.
“I’m not sure if I should be impressed that your interview with the Senator ended before security arrived, or saddened that security is so slow.”
Derius and her receptionist have been working together too long, Heather told herself. They sound too much alike.
“I did what I came here to do,” Heather said in rather plaintive tones.
“You did? In so short a time?”
“Yes. I just needed contact information for an individual.”
The receptionist snorted. “You mean to tell me you invaded the Senator’s office for an address? I could have given that to you.”
“Not the one I’m looking for. I’m sure you understand that the Senator has some contact information that you don’t have.”
“Impossible. The Senator trusts me with everything.”
Heather called up a screen on her noteputer.
“Henrik Morten,” she said.
The receptionist’s hands flew, and he called up information that he read to Heather.
She slumped her head, looking defeated. “That’s the same information she gave me.”
“And that’s what you had to break into her office for.” The receptionist shook his head. “With all due respect, Paladin GioAvanti, I’m not sure you’re applying your brute force in the right places.”
Heather shot a glare at the receptionist, as if pondering a retort, but she said nothing. She let her shoulders fall, then walked away—the very picture of defeat. Or so she hoped.
Once she was out of view of the receptionist, her shoulders lifted and her pace quickened. That wasn’t her preferred method of getting information but, when dealing with people who thrived on humiliation, sometimes it was necessary to give them a little of what they wanted to get what you sought. So much the better if they ended the encounter thinking they had stymied her; hopefully, thinking her defeated, they would ignore her as she finished her work.
43
Les Rues-Basses, Geneva
Terra, Prefecture X
17 December 3134
Burton Horn had a pretty good list of places not to go. Morten’s Geneva home, his three favorite restaurants, a nightclub where he was often spotted, homes of his closest political supporters. There was no chance he’d be showing his face at any of those spots right now. Horn could go and strong-arm some of Morten’s friends, but, as enjoyable as that might be, it wouldn’t get him anything. If Morten was as clever as he was supposed to be, he wouldn’t have let anyone close to him know where he was staying.
But even if Morten was going to different places, he was still the same person. Heather GioAvanti had passed contact information from Senator Derius along to Jonah, and Jonah gave it to Horn. Some of it told him nothing—the telephone number was a disposable one, now disconnected, and though the electronic contacts traced back to Geneva, they were easily accessible from anywhere in the world. The physical address was only a post-office box, but that at least was a strong indication that Morten was, in fact, in Geneva. It also helped Horn figure out where in the city he might be.
Horn knew that, if Morten was in the city, he was still going to clubs, still looking to end most nights with a pretty girl on his arm, and still trying to live comfortably, though anonymously. He might give up some places, but Horn couldn’t believe Morten would give up his lifestyle.
Only a few neighborhoods in the city would give Morten the kind of life Horn knew he craved. High-rent districts contained too many eyes that might recognize him, sleepy middle-class areas would not give him enough ways to spend the considerable sums he’d earned recently, and Horn was sure Morten wouldn’t be caught dead living in a slum (neighborhoods that, according to the proponents of The Republic’s Golden Age, didn’t exist).
That pointed Horn to the recovering neighborhoods in the city, places starting to stand up again after years of being trodden under the city’s collective feet. In a decade or so, these areas would become high-rent districts, full of designer boutiques and restaurants so exclusive their name doesn’t appear on their exterior. At the moment, though, they were a mix of artists, recent college graduates, and long-time residents perplexed by the sudden popularity of their neighborhoods. They exploded with new restaurants and trendy nightclubs, and the residential turnover was so rapid that most people in these places didn’t recognize each other. This kind of community would be a perfect place for Morten to hide.
One of these areas, Les Rues-Basses, happened to be within walking distance of the post office Morten was using. Les Rues-Basses seemed to cycle from high-rent to poverty every quarter century or so, always traveling the path to one type of community or the other, never stabilizing at either end of the spectrum.
The docksides, at least in the current incarnation of Les Rues-Basses, were the most deserted part of the neighborhood. But that was soon to change. Abandoned warehouses lined the wharfs, but most of them bore “Coming Soon!” signs that advertised soon-to-be-constructed residences that cost as much as Horn would make in a decade.
Sandwiched between these warehouses was a grimy brick building, a holdout from the old community, with a “Furnished Room for Rent” sign in the front window. Thanks to his ability to pay in cash (working with a Paladin’s expense account had definite benefits), Horn had been allowed to take immediate occupancy of the room the previous day.
His new apartment needed to be both a base of operations and, hopefully, an interrogation chamber. To that end, it needed some work. The layout was simple—long, narrow main room with a small kitchen branching off its end and a bathroom tucked in a corner. Brown stains had already started to peek through a recently applied single coat of off-white paint, and the stiff carpet crunched lightly as Horn walked on it. The supplied furnishings were a threadbare couch, a table that rocked on its legs, and four plastic chairs. A bed folded down from one of the walls.
The first task was changing the lock. Horn knew at least three different ways to mess with a keycard lock, and he was supposed to be on the legitimate side of the law. Sometimes old technology was the best; Horn installed a metal cruciform lock that required a key to operate from either side of the door. Locks like that were very hard to find, but part of Horn’s job was knowing where he could pick up such items.
The windows were next, one off the main room and one off the kitchen. Each window frame received six nails to make sure it would stay shut. Horn then installed a metal grate across each window just in case Morten felt like trying to jump through.
He disabled every electrical outlet except one in the main room. That meant the refrigerator no longer worked, but Horn wasn’t planning on cooking.
The final necessary adjustment to the apartment was insulation. He set a white noise generator in the center of the main room, then toyed with the settings until the field covered the whole room. Anyone trying to eavesdrop by listening through the walls or doors wouldn’t hear more than a murmur of white noise. It wasn’t foolproof—the right microphone could pierce the field like a needle through fabric—but precious few people in Geneva, let alone Les Rues-Basses, had such equipment. And Horn intended to make sure he didn’t get the attention of those who had such resources.