Alien Heat (24 page)

Where was she going? he wondered. And why now?

“But all that aside, I feel like something's happened.
To
you. Something that doesn't involve us.”

“Nothing's happened, everything's fine.” He knew he sounded wooden, but didn't know how not to.

“Don't tell me that, when I know better. I can't tell if it's this case you're working on, or if there's something else. And I'm not worried about me or us or the future. Just you, David, because you're so very … crushed. I want to help you, but you're so faraway, I don't think I can.”

The tears came, streaking Rose's makeup, making the mascara run. He put his arms around her and told her not to worry, but he was the one who pulled away first.

FORTY

The restaurant looked the same—worn, red-checked curtains, bar painted in gold letters on the front window, RESTAURANT PIERRE on the front door. Same scarred mahogany bar, cracked plaster ceiling. There were no bloodstains on the floor where David had fallen, and the broken table had been replaced. The shocked patrons were long gone, and there was nothing left to disturb the diners who ate calmly, happily.

Tonight David was well-dressed and clean, accompanied by his wife and daughters. Then he had been unshaven, in dirty blue jeans and a grimy shirt. Something had happened to him that night in Pierre's, when he'd brought down an Elaki he had considered a hero, and found the venal underbelly of fanaticism gone bad. Maybe it was the aggregate of years of mind-numbing work, but in his mind, that night was the point of no return. He had lost more than blood in this restaurant.

Mattie reached for his hand, and he looked down into the small upturned face, smiled, and led her to the back of the restaurant.

Pierre was waiting, dressed in black as always, distracted by secret thoughts and a melancholy that separated him from the world. David met Pierre's eyes, saw the spark of interest, wondered if the two of them were more alike than he knew, wondered if they had both crossed that boundary that set them apart—not sure he liked the concept.

The back section of the restaurant was six steps up from the rest of the dining room. Pierre had closed the area off with battered, floor-to-ceiling mahogany shutters. David found the dark wood oddly comforting.

He studied the menu, listening to Rose's voice rise and fall softly as she quizzed the children on their orders. Most of the Elaki and his youngest daughter, Mattie, opted for the
pannequets aux laitances
—an aromatic dish of mushrooms, chopped fish sperm, and unsweetened crepes, bound by a fish-based béchamel sauce, and sprinkled with grated Parmesan.

David felt adventurous trying
canapés à la moelle
, figuring that if he could eat Jell-O, he could eat beef marrow marinated in olive oil, lemon juice, and parsley. The canapés came coated in tempura and deep fried, and he shared them with the girls, who had ordered fruit cups.

He drew the line at
anticuchos
(barbecued hearts) and
Hjerneboller
(brain dumplings) as a main course, and settled for a sedate and delicious chicken marsala that he combined, to Pierre's displeasure, with a heavy cabernet.

He watched Mattie eat her crepes, saw that she picked out the mushrooms but devoured the rest. The child had a palate, and he saw Pierre watching and felt a swell of pride.

Atta girl.

It was wrong of him to want Teddy there, but he did, and he wondered what she would have ordered from this, the most interesting of menus. He watched Lisa cock her head and imitate String, saw Kendra eating so self-consciously, so painstaking in her efforts to pass for an adult, that he wanted to hug her and tell her she was fine just like she was.

The children were enjoying themselves—the expensive restaurant, the new clothes, the Elaki all around.

Dessert was Elaki coffee and a simple chocolate cake. Pierre served it himself, on white china plates bordered by delicate blue flowers, and he watched David's girls as he passed the cake around. David caught Pierre's nod of satisfaction at his daughters' delight over the moist and beautiful chocolate, and he guessed that the cake had been made with the children in mind.

Teddy would have loved it.

An Elaki, short and squat by alien standards, but much taller than David, glided to the front of the room, shedding scales as he went. He waited till he had their attention, or as much of their attention as he could get, with chocolate cake on the small round tables, and he began a small speech.

“Each year, in States every one, we of the Elaki Benevolent Association select a human who has done the advancement of human and Elaki relationships the smooth.”

Lisa grinned at David and he winked.

“For this year in Saigo City, we have found the human who has worked side by side with the Elaki, before the fashion is to follow.”

David noticed that Mattie was swinging her legs. Vigorously.

“… so we are to be the pleasure of awarding this year's Racial Harmony Award to the Detective David Silver, of the Saigo City Police Department.”

David stood up. Nodded at the applause. Saw the camera following his every move as he went to the front of the room. Someone took his picture and he made a little speech, talking off-the-cuff. Afterward, he had no memory of what he'd said, just that it seemed well received, that people laughed once or twice, that his little girls were smiling and looking interested, that Mel gave him the thumbs-up sign. Teddy, of course, was not there. He did not look at Rose.

Afterward, a newspaper photographer wanted a family picture, and David sat with Rose by his side, Mattie in his lap, Lisa and Kendra on his right. Last family portrait? he wondered.

The reporter asked if he was going to take a vacation. He said he had something of a personal nature to work out, with the help of the money and a little time off.

“My father has been missing since I was a child,” he said. “I'm going to find him.”

“Find Granddaddy?” Mattie asked.

David looked at his daughter, felt a pang. But that night on the Elaki Channel, he was featured with the caption
RACIAL HARMONIST
. The film clip was followed by a video on “
Dealing With the Difficult Human
.” And the next morning's paper had his picture with the caption:
HOMICIDE COP USES AWARD MONEY TO FIND MISSING FATHER
.

Everything was going according to plan.

FORTY-ONE

A volcano had erupted, miles away and months ago, on an island David did not remember studying in school. For that reason and that reason only, as far as the current art and science of meteorology could divine, the day was deliciously cool, the sun hard and bright.

By the end of the week, the miserable weather was due to return, but for now, it was perfect.

It seemed that a weight had lifted from the city along with the heat, that everyone had gotten up that morning in an exceptionally fine mood. David wondered if the ills of society were more tied to the weather than anyone suspected.

He parked blocks away from the Mind Institute and sat in his car. Two boys with chains hanging from their belts, divots of hair in the back, and a top stubble on their heads, gave David what they likely thought was a hard look. Then one of them smiled, sweet and friendly.

Weird day.

He had parked at a distance on purpose, feeling the urge to walk through the Psychic Fair, an area he had avoided for years. It was nothing more or less than a few city blocks offering a labyrinth of storefronts, boutiques, and parlors for those seeking advice, guidance, and diversion from psychic phenomena. Signs showing a black palm glowing on white background were common.

David passed a house with a front door painted like a tarot card—the card of love. A sign in the window said
APPOINTMENT ONLY
. Beneath the sign was a hand-lettered note that said
WALK IN—SPECIAL HALF-OFF READING
. The note had yellowed with age.

Candy Andy's place had no such sign. His business was brisk, and all word-of-mouth, and he had the cachet of catering to clients in the know. David stood outside the glass door leading up to Andy's apartment, looking inside at the dusty staircase, sporting those worn brown rubber treads. It was all so familiar. He felt bad for the young police detective he had been, looking over his shoulder as he traipsed up those stairs for another fix of hope.

He had decided years ago that Candy Andy had been nothing but a con, but maybe Teddy was right. A little bit of talent and a lot of panache could go a long way toward manipulating vulnerable people.

David blushed to think of the things Andy had made him do—stand under the shower for fifteen minutes with the water as hot as possible. Cleanse your body, your heart, your mind. The deferential way Andy had accepted his fee, as if financial transactions were embarrassing and beside the point. The limits he had set—you may come no more than every two weeks, but you may call every week.

The man had wanted the money, but he had enjoyed the power.

A curtain twitched in an upstairs window—the kitchen, as David remembered, smelling again the cloying fragrance of the tea laced with whisky that Candy Andy liked to drink.

One of these days, David thought, looking up the dark staircase.

The area picked up as he closed in on the Mind Institute. David passed two hookers heading the other way. One of them shook her head sadly.

“He's a
john
, honey, he's not going to fall in love.”

“But it's in my palm, Vanna, she
said
—”

David kept moving.

The Mind Institute did not blend—not possible, it was complete Elaki design, a milky-white dome of thick glass over a snarl of small, narrow rooms. A billboard blinked with moving images—an Elaki behind a table reading scales. Elaki did not trust people to read.

The front door was not a door at all, just an open space, tall and narrow, Elaki-shaped. David went inside.

A feminine voice echoed. “Pleassse wait. Pleassse wait.”

It was dark in the foyer. Heavy wood latticework had been layered under the dome, blocking the light. David stood under diamond-shaped patterns of muted sunlight, remembering Teddy's advice. Perfectly okay to be nervous, she'd told him, but watch that hostile edge. Some hostility is normal, but your best bet is to keep your mind on your daddy.

Your daddy
. Such a Teddy thing to say.

It was harder to do than he imagined. He had perfected the art of putting his father out of his mind and was rusty now, when it came to calling him up.

David realized that an Elaki was in the room with him.

“Please, do you have the appointment?”

Male, David decided. Old. “My name is Silver. David Silver.”

And yes, indeed, he had the appointment. The Institute had accepted his initial call with a cautious nonchalance, but after they'd had time to check his financial records, they had been eager to accept his business.

“You are to be exsssspected, David Silver. Pleassse follow.”

The Elaki crept ahead, hunched over to one side, the right fin making rhythmic, jerky motions that looked involuntary. Gravel beds lay in strips on either side of a walkway that was uncomfortably narrow by human standards. The light here was blinding, no latticework beneath the glass, and David blinked, eyes aching. He knew his every move and physical reaction was being monitored by Peterson, Clements, Mel, and String, but he wished his partners were there with him. He missed Mel's crude but effective way of diffusing situations by making vulgar remarks. Mel was like Alice in Wonderland—he had to say three outrageous things before breakfast.

The Elaki stopped, and David skidded to keep from running into him.

“Pleassse to go to the right, onward this way.”

David moved through an open doorway and squinted, eyes adjusting to the gloom. The room was covered in some kind of brown fabric—walls, floor, ceiling, like a sensory deprivation chamber.

“You are the David Silver?”

“Yes, I'm Silver.”

“You are made welcome. Please, do come all the way forward. I am Jordiki. Be hospitable here. Will you not have this chair?”

David went, nearly blinded by the change in light. The Elaki was hard to see, but David had the impression of unusual bulk, heavy, almost muscular eye stalks, stark white belly encased in a black outer section. David stepped up onto a platform and sat down. The chair and table were simple bleached oak, and the elevation allowed the Elaki to stand while David sat, eyes and eye prongs at a level.

Which meant the clientele was human, David thought. Prey was the word that came into his head.

David looked down at the desk. A collection of Elaki scales fanned across the top.

“When you have given information for this Institute, David Silver, it was not of the personal nature.”

No, David thought, it was of the financial nature. Which was really more to the point. You didn't afford the Mind Institute on anything like detective's wages—not if you had a family and the usual load of debt.

“These scales are of my person, and I must ask that you do not touch.”

David nodded. The Elaki twitched an eye prong, casting a look over David's shoulder. The old Elaki came in with a mug, steam rising from the top. The smell was familiar. The same brew of tea used by Candy Andy.

The old Elaki set the tea on the table, a good ways from the scales.

What if I spill it? David thought.

“Please to drink. It will relax you, this liquid warmth, and is only tea leaves-in water.” The Elaki waved a fin. “No drugs of caffeine or any other toxin to pollute the body and mind. Please to forgive me that I do not join. I eat, drink, and smoke abstinence before scale reading, so the focus is complete and full circle.”

David picked up the mug and sipped, finding the tea hot and weak. He wondered if there were any extra additives, knew Miriam would be monitoring his blood chemistry.