The Immorality Clause (17 page)

“Zach, you’re home. I disconnected communications with the rental car to avoid another incident like Saturday.”

“Hello to you too, Andi,” I grumbled as I pulled my foot out of my shoe, not even bothering with the laces or buttons.

“We’ve had another incident since you were on the television this morning.”

“What kind of incident?”

“Soon after your interview went live, the hacking probes began again on my mainframe. I couldn’t risk reaching out to you, so I used your previous instructions and went offline. The attacks weren’t as intense as previously experienced, but they were still complicated attempts to break into our network.”

“Goddamned reporters. The hacker could have continued to think I was dead, but nope, those idiots had to intervene… We lose anything?”

“No. I recognized the attempts immediately and stopped them.”

I walked by over to the couch and saw Paxton’s suitcase and duffle bag on the floor where I’d set them the night before. Neither seemed to be touched, not even her toiletry bag.
Odd
.

“Andi, did Paxton say anything before she left?”

“No.”

“She sent me a message that the remediation crew was finished at The Digital Diva. I assumed she got ready before she left, but her bags don’t look to have been opened.”

“She did not access her bags. Miss Himura sat naked on the couch for two hours, fifteen minutes, and twelve seconds before receiving a phone call. Then she dressed in the clothing she wore here and left.”

“What did she do for the two hours?” I asked curiously.

“Nothing. She sat with her eyes closed.”

“
Hmpf
.” I wandered into the kitchen and poured myself two fingers of bourbon. My eyes kept straying back toward the living room.

Finally, my curiosity got the best of me and I unzipped the duffle. Inside were clothes and another bag that contained what appeared to be unopened bottles of makeup. That wasn’t entirely out of the ordinary, but it piqued my interest so I opened the toiletry bag. Everything was still new and sealed.

I set the duffle aside and opened the suitcase. More clothes, but all of these had tags on them and were unused.

Something wasn’t right and I had a bad feeling about it. From the unused clothing to the full-court press to have sex with me, things weren’t adding up.

“Andi, ask the toilet computer about Paxton’s urine.”

“You told me to stop talking to the toilet.”

“
Now
you’re going to obey me?” I asked in disbelief. “Dammit, Andi. Just find out what’s in her urine.”

I knew she could multitask, so I asked, “Did Paxton call a taxi to pick her up or make any other phone calls?”

“No, she left immediately after getting dressed without making any additional phone calls.” Andi paused and said, “Louisiana Health Department regulations do not allow the toilet to disclose the contents of someone else’s urine.”

“Override it then, Andi. You’ve been talking to that damn thing for years, sweet talk it or something.”

“While you may have programmed me to interact with you as a human, I do not have the ability to ‘sweet talk.’ If you request the information as part of the ongoing murder investigation, then the toilet can authorize the release of information.”

“Okay, fine, I authorize it,” I replied angrily.

“You realize that this will initiate questioning into why someone who is being investigated for murder is in your apartment.”

Shit
. I’d already broken the department rules about relationships with a witness, no matter how I’d tried to rationalize it in my mind. This would potentially open it up for others in the department to find out about my actions. I’d be reprimanded for sure, suspended at best, and possibly charged with violating a department regulation.

It couldn’t be helped. Even though I was physically tired, my mind was beginning to clear, like I was emerging from a smoky room. I’d been clear and levelheaded Friday night, then after I went to talk to Paxton at her home, things had slid into the haze…

The tea. Everything had gone south after I drank that tea. I didn’t hold hands in public or go to plays in the Ellis Marsalis Center. I didn’t take women I barely knew to my friends’ house for dinner. And I sure as hell would have never fucked a witness, even if I’d solved the case and everything was on the up and up.

“Do it, Andi. And find out if there’s been anything different about my urine as well.”

I pulled my phone from the pocket of my slacks. “Dial The Digital Diva.”

It rang one time and then Paxton’s recorded voice came over the line. “Thank you for calling The Digital Diva, the premiere pleasure house in all of New Orleans. We’re currently closed for our semi-annual deep cleaning in order to continue offering our clients the safest and most sanitary environment available. We’re sorry for the inconvenience and if you’d like to schedule an appointment with one of our girls, please visit our network site.”

“Urine analysis complete. Paxton Himura’s urine made up of sodium chloride, water, glycerin, propylene glycol, hydroxyethyl cellulose, sorbitol, chlorhexidine gluconate, benzoic acid, methylparaben, sodium hydroxide, and hydroxyethyl cellulose.”

“English, Andi,” I muttered as I hung up the phone.

“Miss Himura’s waste is a combination of saline water and lubricant, a product similar to the ingredients of personal lubrication.”

“Lubrication, like for sex?”

“It is similar,” Andi affirmed.

An even deeper feeling of dread settled into my stomach. “Andi, what did my urine have in it over the past few days?”

“It would appear that you’ve ingested compounds comparable to what is used in sleeping medications—at different rates and concentrations than anything available on the market—as well as trace amounts of synthaine.”

“I’ve been drugged.”

“It would appear so.”

“Andi, what do your passive sensors say about Paxton Himura?”

“Hmm…”

At that moment, I hated that I’d ever programmed Andi to make any type of sound as she analyzed data.

“I didn’t monitor the passive sensors while Miss Himura was present, but the data indicates that she is not human.”

“
Fuck
.”

ELEVEN: TUESDAY

It had taken a triple shot of espresso added to my regular coffee to get my engines running this morning. I was both mentally and physically exhausted, coming down off of some type of strange walking dream. I remembered everything that I did, but none of it made any sense and wasn’t like me.

To add insult to injury, not only had I allowed myself to have sex with a witness, but I’d also violated the department’s Immorality Clause by having sex with a robot. It was strictly forbidden for officers to have any type of sexual relations with prostitutes, robotic or human. My career was as good as over once news of what I’d done broke.

I couldn’t undo the past, so I did the only thing that I knew how to do. I went to work. I had Andi secure an appointment with Ladeaux that afternoon and I reexamined the evidence while I waited.

Paxton Himura, the robot, was involved in this somehow, but besides the illicit dealings with me, I couldn’t connect her to
any
of the murders. I sketched things out on paper and watched all of the videos once again. Nothing pointed to an explanation for the complete lack of evidence. It was as if the killer simply appeared in the room and then disappeared.

That fact continued to prompt me to think that the robots were involved. After I spoke to Voodoo, I needed to visit our tech guys again and have them confirm that there’s not any trace of tampering with the droids’ memories.

I backed up my data and shrugged into my raincoat before I left to meet with the so-called King of Easytown. “We’ve got a problem, Zach,” Andi’s voice emitted from the speaker near the door.

I froze. My fedora suspended halfway to my head. “What is it?”

“I was able to reconnect to the network safely while you were working. Jacqueline Wolfe’s bank account received a fifty thousand dollar deposit Sunday evening.”

“Insurance payment?” I asked hopefully.

“No. I traced it to an account in the Cayman Islands, but the way money passes through there, it is impossible to determine the source.”

“Shit. Thanks for finding that out,” I answered, cramming the hat down on my head. “I guess I’ll head back out to talk to her tonight after my meeting with Tommy Ladeaux.”

“Be careful at the docks, Zach. Accidents happen all the time down there.”

I grunted my acknowledgement and paused for Andi’s sensors to detect any movement.

“The hallway is clear.”

“Thanks,” I repeated, leaving my apartment in the capable hands of my assistant.

The BMW cruised through the entrance to the docks and began the long, slow and winding trip between shipping containers and trucks where stevedores loaded and unloaded billions of dollars in cargo. Some drove forklifts and flatbed trucks, while others manned the controls of the massive cranes spaced evenly apart from one another. They all danced an intricate pattern of familiarity with their equipment and routine shipping schedules, but to the casual observer like me, it appeared to be barely controlled chaos.

The Port of New Orleans had grown to the third largest in the United States, so the Easytown Dockyard was built as a relief valve for the much older port on the Mississippi River. The Dockyard could handle up to two of the large oceangoing container ships at one time and then transport the goods over land.

It was a win for smaller companies looking to load and unload quickly, away from the massively unionized Port of New Orleans. The workers at the Dockyard were paid less per hour than their counterparts and incentivized to make problems go away for companies shipping goods into the country. The Dockyard quickly became a vital part of the city’s transportation industry and Thomas Ladeaux owned the Marie Leveau Shipping Company, the largest business entity headquartered there.

I pulled up to Ladeaux’s corporate offices and stepped out of the car. I remembered the first time I’d come out here more than ten years ago. I’d expected a dirty, dingy tin metal office with poor lighting and metal stairs that rattled as I walked up to the tiny, cramped space. That’s what movies always portrayed office spaces at docks to be. Ladeaux’s office was the exact opposite. I’d been surprised at the clean, modern headquarters with roomy offices and well-lit meeting spaces. Besides the location, I could have imagined the shipping company’s headquarters being any office building in the city.

I stepped inside and took off my hat, shaking it lightly on the entryway carpet. The place looked the same as it had the last few times I’d been out here. Cleanliness was the only “style” present in Ladeaux’s corporate offices and the utilitarian plastic chairs in the lobby reminded me more of a doctor’s office than a shipping company’s headquarters. Two female receptionists, different from the women who’d been in their place about a year ago, sat in twin desks facing the entryway. I had the distinct feeling that both of them were armed and pointing their weapons at me under the table.

“You must be Detective Forrest,” the one on the right stated.

I angled my way toward her and stood a few paces from the desk. “That’s me. I have a 4:30 appointment with Mr. Ladeaux.”

She wrinkled her nose at the rain dripping from my coat. “You may hang your coat and hat in the entryway over the mat. They’ll be perfectly safe; no one will bother them.”

I wanted to say something snarky, but decided I didn’t feel like having my appointment mysteriously disappear from Ladeaux’s calendar, so I bit my tongue and returned to the entry where a neat row of hooks lined the wall, all but one of them vacant. When I’d done as asked, I returned to the receptionist.

“You may have a seat, Detective. Mr. Ladeaux knows you’re here.”

“I’m sure he does,” I replied and sauntered over to the waiting area.

I stared at the blank wall for a few moments before I realized it was a giant window, frosted over to resemble a wall. Were there people on the other side watching me or was it a vacant meeting room? My money was on the first one. You don’t spend the kind of money that a wall like that would cost without a purpose.

Ladeaux wasn’t breaking any laws since this was private property, so I pulled out my phone and scrolled through messages and then the news when I was finished with that. It was all depressing. Reporters only covered the shitty side of humanity, not the few, rare instances of decency. I was sick of it. I slipped the phone into my pocket and observed the women typing on their keyboards. The one who hadn’t spoken looked vaguely familiar, but I wasn’t sure where I’d seen her before.

After a few minutes, it hit me. I’d seen her—or a model like her—at one of the sex clubs. She was a robot and I’d bet the other one was too. Not the CS98 model like the Diva had, but they were similar. I walked over to the desk and leaned down to the quiet one. “What club did you get recycled from?”

“Excuse me?”

“You’re droids. Which club did Ladeaux steal you two from?”

“I am not stolen; Mr. Ladeaux has owned me since I was manufactured in May 2089. I’m an excess CS90 model from The Stud Farm,” she replied. “The club is currently undergoing a phased upgrade to the CS98 models. Older models, such as myself, were placed throughout the other clubs to enhance their inventory.” The robot gestured toward her companion whose fingers hovered over the keyboard, but stared at me. “Anastasia is not a droid.”

“Human?” I asked the other one.

“Yes, I’m human. But I was born in a lab.”

“No shit? I’ve never seen a live clone before,” I stated. “Seen a couple of dead ones. Nasty stuff happens to them when people view them the same as a droid, but the clone thinks it’s human and gets upset about it.”

“I’m sure,” Anastasia answered. “I would take offense to being treated like a clone, used and put away at the end of the night. I may have been genetically modified and birthed in a laboratory, but I am a human… No offense, Betty.”

“None taken. My base programming is that of a pleasure droid, so I don’t get offended.”

“So, you’re the older model sex bot, huh? Why are you in here instead of sucking dick in a dark room over on The Lane?”
Shit, I’m
really
pissed off at droids right now
.

Betty shrugged. “Inventory was full at Mr. Ladeaux’s pleasure establishments, so I was given a new processor and assigned to work in the corporate offices of the Marie Leveau Shipping Company.”

“You miss it? Screwing men out of their money, I mean?”

“I don’t understand.”

“Never mind. How long have you known Paxton Himura?”

She paused momentarily and then stated, “Paxton Himura is the manager of The Digital Diva. She’s a valuable part of the team with years of experience under her belt. There’s no task that she can’t tackle.”

“Your script needs updating,” I derided. “The bitch is a droid… So, you got a processor upgrade, huh? Did Ladeaux spring for the new CS98 artificial intelligence?”

“No, I was given the CS01 AI upgrade.”

“CS01? I thought CS98 was top of the line.”

“It is the top of the line in the field. The CS01 model has not been released,” she replied.

“
Hmpf
. So, you got an AI upgrade, but kept your old body?”

“I do not require the physical upgrades of the CS98 or CS01 as my duties in the corporate offices don’t require the performance of sexual acts, unless specifically requested.”

“Betty, that’s enough,” a thin, watery voice called from behind me.

I turned to see Tommy Ladeaux, aka Tommy Voodoo, standing a few feet away. At six one, he was a few inches taller than me and he was clean shaven as well, but that’s where the similarities ended. He had a thin, weasel-like appearance with a slicked back mop of black hair, atop his head. Only his expensive suit would have given him away as something else besides the standard Easytown street thug.

“Mr. Ladeaux, I see you’re keeping interesting company,” I said as a way of greeting, pointing to the clone and the droid.

“It’s nice to see you again, Detective Forrest.”

“How much did the clone set you back?” I asked, mildly interested.

“Anastasia is the latest in a new generation of clones. They’re not available on the market yet, so in truth, I don’t know what she’ll end up costing.”

“Oh?”

“Among my many business ventures, I’m investing in the development of clones. So I’ve got a prototype. We’re working out the kinks, but they should be about half the price of a standard pleasure droid.” He patted my upper arm with the back of his hand. “But believe me, she’s worth double!”

“Don’t touch me again, Ladeaux.”

He paused and looked at his hand before clearing his throat. “Ah… I assume, given your interest in my girls here, that you’d like to discuss the incidences at The Stud Farm and The Digital Diva.”

“How’d you guess?” I baited him.

“Call it a hunch.” He stuck out his hand for me to take. I considered declining for a moment and then thought better of it, grasping his hand and pumping hard. I involuntarily wiped my palm along my trouser leg after he’d released it. Filth can be disguised in a nice package, but it always had a way of sticking to everyone nearby.

“Come on, let’s go to my office and leave my receptionists to their work.”

I followed behind him past the two-way wall window, more aware now of its presence than before. There was certainly someone monitoring me. “Nice wall,” I commented as we walked by.

He chuckled. “Yes, well, it never hurts to get a feel for a guest before you meet with them. It gives me an advantage and in the shipping industry, every little bit helps. When it comes down to it, I’m just a small fish in a big pond.”

“Even piranha can be deadly,” I remarked, referring to the small, South American fish.

“Touché, Forrest. Here we are, have a seat.” He motioned into an open doorway and I entered his plush office filled with sports memorabilia and all sorts of crap. It was in stark contrast to the Spartan lobby.

“Nice little space,” I lied. In fact, I hated all of it.

“I spend so much time here that I like to try and keep it comfortable.”

He didn’t sit; instead he continued past his desk to a bar along the wall and set out two glasses. “Would you like a drink, Detective?” Two ice cubes fell into the glasses with an audible clink. “Bourbon is your drink of choice, correct?”