The Administration Series (237 page)

"Don't go in," Toreth said suddenly.

Warrick stopped. "Why?"

"Because you don't want to see him."

Out of the corner of his eye he saw the medic watching them, her face expressionless. Dean had her attention fixed on the far end of the corridor.

"It might be the last chance," Warrick said.

"It makes no fucking difference. He'll be completely out — " Toreth's throat tightened. "And you can't touch him or talk to him, so there's no way he'll know whether you're there or not. Have you ever seen anyone with those kinds of injuries? No? I have. If he does die, you'll be glad not to have to remember what he looked like. Trust me on this."

Warrick seemed to be weighing up the idea. Finally he said, "Dilly saw him."

"Jesus Christ, it's not a bloody competition. You — " Why the hell was he bothering? His own pathetic fears? He had no obligation to follow Warrick through the door. "Fine, go in if you want to. I'm waiting out here."

Warrick hesitated a moment longer, fingers resting lightly on the handle, then nodded. "Very well."

Toreth wasn't sure what he meant until Warrick let go of the handle and turned back towards him. "Let's get back to the car."

All the way there, Toreth had to fight back the smile, annoyed with himself over the ridiculous feeling of triumph.

'Trust me on this'.

Dillian greeted them at the door of Kate's house, for once too distracted to disapprove of him. Dean's presence didn't seem to register. Of course, Dillian was corporate too, and used to ignoring minions. He'd bet any money that she wouldn't be able to describe Dean in an interview tomorrow.

"Did you see Philly at the hospital?" Dillian asked after she'd closed the door.

Warrick shook his head.

"You must have just missed her. She brought Val here, then went back to the hospital when we got home. She said she'd stay there."

"Good — that there's one of us there, I mean. How's Jen?"

"Keir, I'm so sorry. She called me before she went to the hospital, and by the time I got there she'd already gone in to see him, and she just . . . went to pieces. She told me she'd call you, and then when I got there she hadn't done it." She bit her lip. "I should have done it myself. I — oh, God. I'm sorry."

Warrick put his arms round her, dark head bowing down to hers, rocking her gently. "Shh. It's not your fault. I'm here now."

Dillian had obviously been crying, and as they went through towards the kitchen, Toreth reflected on how much more popular people became when they died.

Or, in this case, didn't quite die. However, the atmosphere was palpably that of a bereavement — neither Warrick nor Dillian was the sort of person who would take a ten percent chance and pin serious hopes on it. Ten percent was a backstop figure medics used because they hated it when patients they'd pronounced hopeless surprised them and lived.

Outside the kitchen door, Warrick paused, then turned to Dean. "I assume you want to check over the security?"

"If I could, please. If it's not acceptable, I'm afraid I might need to call some more personnel from SimTech."

"Do whatever you think is necessary. I sent your ID to the security system from the car, so you have full access for now. When you're done, wait in the living room. I'll be through to talk you later."

Dean nodded and faded tactfully into the background. Toreth wondered if functional invisibility was something they taught at security school. It would be a handy trick to learn.

Jen was waiting for them in the kitchen. Warrick went over at once, before anything was said, and embraced her with the ease and warmth that always left Toreth feeling uncomfortable, something between jealousy and distaste.

Other people's families.

Over Jen's shoulder, Warrick mouthed, "Tea." Toreth went to start it, but Dillian intercepted him.

"I'll do it," she said.

Busy with the tea things, and slicing one of the cakes that seemed to be a permanent fixture of the house, she nevertheless managed to spare time to direct the occasional unwelcoming glance at Toreth. Hadn't taken her long to get back to normal, Toreth thought.

Fuck her. He hadn't come here for her. He was supposed to be here providing . . . well, moral support for Warrick. Whatever 'moral support' was. With Sara it usually amounted to alcohol and light flirting, which unfortunately wasn't likely to do the trick here.

However, his uncertainly didn't seem to matter. It quickly became apparent that his contribution, moral or otherwise, would be limited. The conversation now underway in the kitchen didn't concern him. Practical arrangements, who needed to be contacted and told what, discussions about Valeria and Tarin's wife Philly — family matters, and he wasn't family. He didn't need Dillian to tell him that. Hanging around on the edge of things, feeling unregarded and unwanted, he wondered whether he shouldn't just go and leave Warrick in Alicia Dean's capable hands. Warrick didn't need him, Dillian didn't want him, Jen seemed scarcely to register his presence. Why the hell had he come here at all?

He stopped picking currants off the cake on the work surface beside him and thought about that. Shorn of the disgusting self-pity, it wasn't a bad question. Why had he come? He didn't usually feel a need to trail around after Warrick like a puppy on a leash, and although it was tempting to wrap it up in some stupid association with the new flat, it wasn't that either.

Partly it was the same feeling he'd had in the flat: the attraction of seeing Warrick helpless, faced with something he couldn't push aside with a mask of indifference and a cold smile. Something that couldn't be smoothed away with the magic touch of money and status, or solved by cleverness or corporate contacts. Something levelling.

So Toreth had seen it, and now he should go, before the shine of the experience tarnished in the face of Warrick's composure and competence.

However, there was also a professional angle here — someone who, if he wasn't technically a corpse, was a close approximation of one. An accident, or an attempted murder — there was nothing to choose between them at this point. There were, at most, suggestive circumstances: Warrick was corporate, Tarin had some interesting political views. He wouldn't submit an Investigation in Progress based on that vague a suspicion unless the victim was important enough to merit it.

Justice would doubtless think the same thing, assuming they even heard about it. The Transport Safety Division would have first call on the investigation. Only if they found signs of illegality would Justice take an interest. At that point, Tarin's unwitting link to Int-Sec might flag up a blazing stop sign as soon as Justice pulled his file. Toreth would probably be able to tell that by how quickly and enthusiastically Justice dropped the case.

Or maybe there was no flag, now that Kate was gone. An investigation might end up digging too deep and revealing Tarin's resister connections. That led into such a world of shit he didn't want to think about it.

All hypothetical anyway, until the accident was proved to be something more.

Leaving it alone would be the sensible thing for him to do too, but a nagging compulsion wouldn't let him. Toreth didn't believe in intuition — feelings like this were usually triggered by sound reasons that he hadn't consciously put together yet. Almost reflexively, he began assessing the group in the kitchen, looking for guilt, for aberrant reactions, for knowledge out of place.

Jen interested him. From Warrick's partial comm conversation and Dillian's words when they'd arrived, he'd expected their aunt to be hysterical. Certainly the obviously shaken woman in the kitchen made a contrast to the sharp, sardonic Jen he'd met before. However, she seemed controlled enough. Possibly she'd pulled herself together for her nephew's benefit. At the moment she was stubbornly resisting Warrick's gentle suggestions that she might want to lie down for a while.

Dillian looked at least as upset as Jen. Toreth would have expected her to deal reasonably well with a shock like this — certainly better than she seemed to be. On the other hand, it was only a few weeks since Kate's disappearance, which complicated the situation, so perhaps her distress was partly due to that.

Warrick was — Toreth caught himself before he extended his assessment farther. No one in the kitchen was a realistic suspect — he needed to be more methodical. Talking to witnesses was the first step.

What did children drink? Sweet things, probably. He poured a glass of tonic, then made himself a gin and tonic. As he picked up the drinks, he glanced at the group around the table — still engrossed in their conversation, and paying no attention to him.

He murmured a vague "Won't be long," and slipped out of the kitchen.

To his relief, Dean was nowhere in sight. Finding Valeria's room proved no challenge to his investigative powers — her name was painted on the door. He balanced the glasses in one hand in order to knock. When there was no reply, he knocked again, then opened the door and went in.

Valeria sat on the bed, with a screen balanced on her knees. She didn't look up.

It had been a long time since he'd taken the introductory paediatric interrogation course. However, as far as he could recall, the basic principles were no different to adult interrogation — certainly not at level one.

He managed to close the door without spilling anything and tried a neutral opening. "Hello, Valeria."

Now she looked up, her expression brightening briefly. "Uncle Val!"

Nice to be wanted by
someone
. "We'll make a para-investigator out of you yet. How are you?"

Her expression closed down, making her look disconcertingly like Warrick. "I'm fine." She had the family talent for packing a lot of feeling into not many words. These two clearly said, 'go away and leave me alone'.

"Is there anything you want?" he asked. "Anything I can get for you?"

"No. And I don't want to."

He considered the statement for a moment. "You don't want to do what?"

"I don't want to cry."

"Fine by me." Snivelling kids were even worse than the standard kind.

"Auntie Dillian said I ought to," she said, concentrating fiercely on the screen again.

Memories surfaced, unpleasant and unwanted, of what it was like to be a child, trapped in a world of adults with incomprehensible rules and impossible demands that could never be satisfied, imposed with absolute and uncaring authority. Anger he couldn't control welled up, directed at Dillian.

Christ, but he hated paediatrics — he always had.

"Well, Auntie Dillian," should mind her own fucking business, the stupid bitch, "probably meant you could if you wanted to."

She shrugged. "Maybe."

But they both knew that Dillian hadn't said that. He took a deep breath and reminded himself of the level one rules: make yourself a friend to the prisoner, someone who isn't as frightening as the guards and the cells and all the distant noises. Be someone who can help them.

He walked over to the bed, trying not to loom over her. "How about a drink instead?"

That produced a spark of interest. "What is it?"

"One of them's tonic, and one of them's gin and tonic. Guess which is yours."

"Gin," she said promptly.

"If you like."

As he expected, she took a single sip and wrinkled her nose up in disgust.

"It's an acquired taste." He swapped the glasses. "Means you have to drink a lot of it before you get used to it."

"I know what acquired means."

"Well, good for you." Precocious as well as obnoxious. Useful in the current situation, however. He sat on the bed and glanced round the room, which seemed to have all the mod cons a nine-year-old might want, and all surprisingly tidy. Jen's work, or did Valeria share Warrick's neatness?

"Nice room," he said.

She nodded. "It's big. I like it more than my other room, but I don't say that to Mummy. Her flat is really teeny."

He didn't actually know anything about the domestic arrangements. "You don't live here all the time, then?"

"No. I live with Mummy, but I come here to see Daddy lots. And Auntie Jen and Granny, before Granny went away." She frowned at him. "Do you know where Granny is?"

He ignored the question. "Can I ask you something?"

She set the glass down carefully on the table by the bed and pulled her knees up against her chest. "Okay."

"Do you always get a taxi home from school?"

The question didn't seem to surprise her. "Only on Tuesday."

"Why Tuesday?"

"Because I have band practise. I play the violin. Usually I go home with Sarah's mum, 'cause Sarah lives near Mummy and me. But Sarah isn't in the band, so Daddy picks me up and I come here with him. Mummy comes for me later, or sometimes I stay all night."

Routines, which were always the first point of danger. It would be interesting to know how many people had access to that information. Toreth wondered if he dared look to see if it was noted in Tarin's security file.

"Did you see the accident?"

She shook her head. "Some people at school did. Katty did."

"Who's Katty?"

"She plays the flute in the band. She's really good, lots better than me. She's my best friend." She looked down at the screen again. "We wait outside together after band, because there are some other girls who don't like her and I look after her. But yesterday I stayed inside."

"That's very nice of you — to do that for your friend." Praise if you can, he remembered, as long as you don't praise answers to direct questions. "Why didn't you wait with her today?"

"There was a man outside the school fence. When we went outside first he was watching us. And — " She shrugged. "It was creepy, so we went and waited inside. We took turns to go out and look to see if Daddy was there."

"Was the man there every time you went out?"

She nodded. "I told Ms Plaice and she said it was okay. But
we
thought he was creepy. We thought if only one of us went outside, then whoever was inside could tell a teacher if he did anything bad."

"Very clever," he said absently. Someone watching the school on the one day Tarin would be there? Slim, tenuous link, but it might be worth chasing up. "Did you see the man's face?"