Clean: A Mindspace Investigations Novel (19 page)

“Branen and Paulsen are going to have to deal with it,” I told her. “They told me I could pull in other resources, I’m doing just that.” The truth was, I just didn’t care. This was suddenly about a lot more than just my job.

“I’ll drive you,” she said reluctantly. “I have to be out here at twelve to talk to the widow again anyway.”

“Thank you.” Suddenly it hit me again like a knife in the flesh—I was going to have to talk to Kara. To
Kara
, about this.

Two o’clock and we were still ten minutes out. Cherabino had taken too long talking to the widow—her sadness somehow greater then, even though I was two rooms away from their conversation.

“Can we stop for food? I didn’t get lunch.” I was hungry, and the thought of irritating Kara by being late was suddenly appealing.

“Neither did I,” Cherabino said distractedly as she weaved her way through the skyscrapers in the air lanes. “And I’m not complaining. Let’s get this done, and we’ll see what we can do.” She had no intention of getting me lunch, just a handful of nuts or a bar or something; she thought she had something in her desk.

I slouched down in my seat, stomach gnawing on my backbone as she circled the National Bell complex one more time than necessary and pulled into the sky-level parking deck entrance. Waiting impatiently for her turn, she drummed her fingers on the steering wheel before handing the security guard some coins.

He made her sign a waiver that he wasn’t responsible for anything in particular, and waved her through.
Great. We were going to do this, weren’t we? I reminded myself of the stakes as she parked and we got out of the car.

Downstairs we walked through the lobby, right in the middle of the hundred-year-old speckled marble floor, underneath the faux glass ceiling. I stopped in the middle of the floor. Cherabino frowned at me, paying too much attention to the people passing on either side.

“What?” she asked.

“Just bracing myself.” Then I walked much too quickly through the huge rotating door and out to the courtyard. Cherabino rushed to keep up, yelling at me about something or other.

I’d known it was coming, but the impact of the magnetic field was still overwhelming, like nails on a chalkboard overlaid with a hundred angry bees. I took a breath and pulled into myself, lessening it as much as I could.

In front of me, Cherabino paused. “Oh, it’s cool out here!” She turned around, looking at the bright green grass, the spring flowers, the people enjoying the outdoors—the sun overhead no longer an adversary but a close friend. To normals, anyway.

“Yeah, they refrigerate the courtyard with a magnetic field cooler,” I said, gritting my teeth. After a few moments I’d stop noticing it, I told myself. I’d chosen this place on purpose for this reason—because no one would be able to get a clear picture of anything we said telepathically; the field was just too disruptive.

Her eyes narrowed. “Must take a lot of power.” She was wondering about grid consumption and if they had a permit.

I sighed. “See how every third window or so is darker than the others, on both sides?” The skyscrapers
had interesting patterns because of it. “The darker windows are modified solar cells, mostly clear. The technology is old, just expensive.” You could do anything if you were rich enough, even these days.

She huffed, and asked, “Where are we meeting Kara?”

I looked across the fifty-foot green space toward the ice cream shop, finally able to concentrate on my surroundings rather than the low-level disquiet of the oscillating field. Kara was there all right, her blond head and navy blue business suit standing out even in this crowd. She had a way of doing that.

I turned back to Cherabino. “Would you mind waiting over here? I’m not—”

“Waiting?”

“You made me wait at the widow’s,” I said. “That was your expertise; this is mine.” I met her eyes square on. Was she really going to challenge me? “You can watch from across the way to make sure there’s nothing funny going on. I told you most of this you’re better off not knowing.”

“What about the ‘danger’ you keep telling me about?” she said. “Won’t the perp jump in and spirit me away if I’m not next to you? I mean, that is why you’re following me around.”

Great, trust Cherabino to make the situation work to her advantage. I ran my hand through my hair, frustrated. “You’re perfectly safe if you stay inside the courtyard. Nobody’s going to be able to Jump in through the magnetic field dissonance, and if he can focus enough to do anything in this mess, he’s better than I am.”

An idea hit her like lightning. “Can we install one of these in the department? You know, keep the telepaths under control while you interrogate them?”

If we installed one of these in the basement, I was
quitting. “The field generator’s as big as a house and way more expensive. Now, are you going to stay over here or not? Kara doesn’t like it when people are late.”

“Just how well do you know this woman?”

I clenched my jaw and gestured to the bench. Then moved away quickly. What was going on with Cherabino today? Hopefully she’d get the hint. If not, probably Kara would be over here in a minute anyway, and it would all fall apart. As I walked, there was a noticeable lack of footsteps behind me. Finally.

Now I just had to convince my ex-fiancée to listen. Swallow my pride. I set my jaw and started walking.

A few gray hairs dotted her blond hair, a few more wrinkles marred her face, but Kara was otherwise just as beautiful, just as poised as she’d ever been. Her heart-shaped face was currently pinched in an overly professional facade, but that I could take. The fact that she’d not gained an ounce and kept her impeccable fashion sense was a little harder. I knew I didn’t look nearly as good.

She stood and held out her hand. I ignored it. Telepaths didn’t normally touch unless they were very good friends, and we weren’t that, not anymore. She dropped the hand.

“You said you needed my help? I assume it’s an important matter since you wanted to meet here. Unless you just don’t want me to be able to read you.” Her eyes narrowed. “You didn’t used to be a coward.”

I slouched onto the bench. Considered defending myself but left it. She’d been notified at the first two trips to rehab and had chosen not to show up. She’d betrayed me to the Guild, the last domino in a chain that tore my old life apart. I didn’t owe her anything,
Swartz’s claims of apologies aside. I didn’t owe her a thing.

Might as well get to it. “The DeKalb police are tracking a killer who’s a teleporter and I believe also a telepath. Up until this morning I believed he was killing with his mind, a standard kill at that.”

Kara sat down next to me. Her body language relaxed a little. “And you don’t want to make an abuse claim through Enforcement, not with your history.”

I shrugged. “The police don’t want them taking over the case, and the stakes are high enough, I think they’re right. We have potential Guild secrets on the line here, yeah, but civilians are dying and you guys aren’t doing a thing. Somebody needs to get justice for these families.”

She blew out a long line of air. “What’s really going on? I don’t see you all that upset about justice.”

“Yeah, well, you don’t know me anymore.”

“Maybe I don’t.” She waited for a long moment. “You called me.”

I looked around, made sure none of the business types were close enough to overhear. “The Mindspace in the crime scene this morning was scrubbed clean—cleaner than I’ve ever seen it,” I said. “The only thing I can think—well, it seems like something from the vault. Something from those rumors that never would die out. You know anything about those?”

“The machines?” I could see the shock on her face, then she got pensive. “The vault hasn’t been touched in years.”

“Well, someone’s touched it,” I said. “You have a big problem here.”

“
If
you’re right. You don’t have the most credibility in certain circles anymore. You have to know that.”

“That’s probably true.” I looked straight ahead. “But it doesn’t matter. Tell me about the machines.”

She was quiet for a long time. “This can’t get out. You understand?”

I nodded.

“Can’t get out, at all.”

I nodded again.

She sighed. “There’s one. Something that can do what you’re saying. Another, bigger one—well, killing normals was a leading topic of research after the wars. Neither machine works, so far as I know. But I wouldn’t know.” She paused. “You asking isn’t going to be taken well.”

“I’m not asking; you’re asking,” I said. “There are people dead, Kara. The killer is likely Guild. It’s time for you to help me catch him. Ask to see the vault, ask to have it opened. You know they’ll listen. You can make them listen. You play the politics well. You always have.”

She looked down. “How many dead?”

I paused, not wanting to repeat my screwup with Joey and the numbers. “More than six, less than a dozen,” I finally said. “The profiler thinks there’s more coming.”

Kara sighed. “Let’s say I do this. What is it you want exactly?”

“I get your help with the murder case. We shut down the killings, you, the police, everybody. No fighting. You treat me with respect.”

She nodded. “I’ll do my best. Do you have any leads?”

I told myself I was getting what I wanted and not to screw it up now. I filled her in about the vision and my identification of Bradley, with Cherabino attacked and
myself killed by Bradley in that indefinite future time. “I don’t go around making enemies of teleporters,” I said. At her frown, I added, “At least not anymore.” Kara was a teleporter, and while I hoped we weren’t enemies—as angry as I still was, that would hurt far, far too much—I knew we also were not friends. We could not be friends, not after all that had happened.

I shifted on the hard bench. “But in the vision he acted like it was personal, and he went after Cherabino, specifically. I don’t see any reason for Bradley to do that unless he’s at least half of the team killing these guys, and from what he said in the vision, I think it’s all him. I think he’s the mastermind of this—whatever it is—and it’s starting to feel like he has some agenda I can’t see. Some gain, past just the thrill of killing those people.”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t want to know.”

“You aren’t a member anymore.” Kara held up a finger at my protest and barreled on. “I’m not saying it to be cruel, just to let you know you’re an unknown factor for the leadership right now. You haven’t been tested in years, and we don’t know whether your visions are calibrated enough anymore to be relied on. Unless you have evidence against Bradley that would corroborate…” She looked at me questioningly.

I shook my head. “We have some physical stuff, but nothing specific to him right now—at least, not without searching his home. You could always let us search his home. It wouldn’t take long.”

“You won’t get that, I can tell you. I don’t remember who this guy is you’re talking about, but I can cross-check and find him if he’s in the city. But what you’re talking about is a privacy issue. Nobody searches
Guild property—or the property of our members—except Guild Enforcement. If you don’t have hard evidence, there are limits to what I can do for you. Your credibility issue is a major stumbling block.” She sat back, the lines on her forehead getting more pronounced as she thought. “You’re sure he’s a teleporter?”

“At least a Level Three,” I said. “He carried two guys through with him, one mostly dead—I saw the pucker, and I saw the results.”

She nodded. “Telepath too?”

“There was a telepath there, somebody who felt vaguely familiar. He was strong, right at the edge of compulsory. Our profiler thinks since the pattern of the killings is changing, there’s a second guy too. But I still think it’s the first who’s the strong telepath. Bradley is both and in the public records; that’s how I found him to compare with the face in the vision.”

“How much more information can you give me about the killings?”

“Not much more than I have, unfortunately. But it’s in the papers, and they mostly have it right—what they have, anyway. You can do your research; the mayor wants this thing solved, so I doubt anybody’s going to stand in the way of questions.” I frowned. “Try not to get me in trouble if you can help it. I like this job, and I’d like to keep it if I can.”

She shook her head, her expression almost…amazed. “Never would have pegged you for the detective type,” she said. “It suits you, though.”

“Consultant,” I corrected, “but thanks.”

Kara glanced at me. “How are you…otherwise?”

“I’m okay. You?”

“I’m good,” she said. “Very good. I did tell you that—”

I cut her off with a gesture, not wanting to know. Too angry to care. At least in this place, I didn’t have to know—the one upside of the nauseating fields that made me head-blind. Some things I didn’t want to know. “Kara, I need to put this guy away. These killings can’t go on—they can’t. If I have to start talking about some of this to the cops to put him away—if I have to leak the Guild’s secrets, I will.”

She sat straight up. “There’s no need to threaten me. You asked for my help and I intend to give it to you—whether or not you’re being civil. One of our people abusing civilians is unacceptable. Period.”

“Good,” I said, and held up a finger so Cherabino would pause just a moment longer before she came barreling over. “Then we understand each other.”

I stood up and walked away. Some part of me was dying inside to see her like this, but most of me was very, very glad. I was walking away with the upper hand, and with Kara, that was a hard, hard thing to get. If I could put her in her place a few times…but, no, I told myself. This was about the case. It had to be about the case. And I’d trust her exactly that far.

Cherabino sat on the bench, arms crossed. When I approached, she asked, “Did you get what you needed?”

“Yeah.” I fished out my sunglasses to have something to do with my hands. “She’s going to help us.”

“Good.”

“You ready?” I asked, trying to keep my voice casual. I really, really wanted out of here. I wanted away from Kara, away from anything that smelled like Guild. Away from this place where we’d had our date, so long ago.