Overthrowing heaven, p.13
Overthrowing Heaven, page 13
So either something she was wearing—it could be anything—or a friend in the police station was feeding her images and sensor data.
“We could move to burst transmissions,” Lobo said, “but if she continues to monitor you, as from her statement we must assume she will, then she’ll catch us soon enough. We should have sent you with local recording ability.”
“Now we know why you gave me so little notice,” I said aloud. “I reacted like an idiot. I apologize.” I shook my head slightly at my own stupidity; you had to admire the woman’s protocols.
She took a sip of her drink and again spoke without turning to face me.
“You now know the rules, Mr. Moore, and you clearly understand the protective value to me of this location. You’ve discussed the situation with whomever you have protecting you. You have all the data you’re going to get before you must choose your next step.” She drank some more of her beverage and laughed lightly. “You even have a delicious snack. So, will you finally come sit with me?” She paused and dabbed her lips with a napkin. “Or is our interview at its conclusion?”
Chapter 16
Disable all transmissions,” I subvocalized to Lobo via my main comm. “And don’t trigger any bursts. I’ll call you when the meeting is over, or earlier if I need help.”
“Done,” Lobo said.
I headed toward Matahi, walked around the table without touching her, and stood behind the chair across from her. Her posture was perfect. She took a bite of the muffin she was eating, each of her movements leisurely but precise.
When she didn’t speak or acknowledge me for almost a minute, I finally said, “I’m no longer transmitting.” I grabbed the back of the chair and added, “I really don’t understand the need for these games.”
She tilted her head slightly and smiled. Her lips were full, her mouth wide, and her smile as perfect as one would expect. Her chin was narrow, and even with the sunglasses hiding most of her face her wide and pronounced cheekbones were evident. “Of course you do,” she said, her tone as light and pleasant as before, “and now you’ve lied once. Three is your limit. Refusal to answer may be acceptable; that depends on the question.”
“Acceptable to whom?”
“To me, of course,” she said, still sounding nicer than her words, “and now you’ve been intentionally stupid once. You get only two of those.”
I clenched the chair tighter. I didn’t like playing by her rules. She was maddening. I wanted to push back, knock over the table, and make her tell me how to get Wei. Doing so would accomplish nothing, though, other than to land me in trouble with Entreat’s police.
“Finally,” she said, leaning back slightly and smiling again, “some genuine emotions: frustration and anger. You’d prefer to do this your way, but that’s not an option.” She waved her gloved hand toward me. The wrap rippled as she moved, but like a burqa minus the head covering it gave no clue about her shape beneath it. “So, why don’t you stop throttling that innocent piece of furniture and instead relax—or leave; that’s always an option for either of us.”
I inhaled slowly and deeply, exhaled even more slowly through my nose, and sat. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I’m not used to anything like this.”
“And a bit of truth,” she said. “Excellent.” She took another nibble of her muffin.
I ate a bit more of my roll and chased it with a swallow of the juice.
We continued that way, neither of us speaking. Commerce proceeded on its relentless course all around us. Tourists pointed this way and that. Mothers and fathers stood watchful guard over cookie-fueled children dashing about the square. Noise was everywhere except at our table. Matahi finished before me, but I was only a couple of bites behind her.
She remained quiet.
“I thought this was my application to see you,” I said. She opened her mouth to speak, I realized what I had said, and I held up my hand to stop her. She closed her mouth. “Sorry about that. I don’t want to use up my second stupid credit quite yet. What I meant to say was that if this is my application to see you, don’t you want to ask me questions so you can evaluate my suitability as a client?”
“I have been evaluating you,” she said, “as you have been considering me, and, yes, I will have a few questions. You’re supplying so much information already, though, that I won’t need to ask you much.”
I hadn’t expected her to be so observant or so interested in mind games. Though she clearly enjoyed them or found them useful, I saw no benefit to me in continuing to play them, so I followed an old but often useful rule: When no other path is clear, charge straight ahead. “Do you mind, then, if I ask you a few questions?”
“Of course not,” she said. “They’ll be a rich source of information about you.”
She was right, of course, so I paused to consider my goals and my approach. To learn where she and Wei spent time and to get as much information as possible about him from her, I first had to win the chance to become her client. To do that, I had to ask questions that would appear reasonable for the person I was supposed to be.
I needed to approach this as if I really wanted to be with her.
Finding that desire in myself was easy enough. I’ve never sustained a close, personal, non-work relationship with a woman. Because I can’t afford to let anyone know about my past, and because I don’t age, I can’t stay in one place for too many years. If I got involved with a woman, I’d have to live a lie with her, and I’d rather not do that. Being alone is so much easier and less complicated, but it doesn’t mean that a big part of me wouldn’t rather things be different. They simply can’t be. I’ve also never paid for sex, though I have considered doing so and have nothing against the concept. I just don’t think it would address any of my non-physical needs, and the risks of being alone with a stranger are great, so I’d have to research the woman first—and then I’d be back in the land of complexity. But I’ve been tempted, so I searched inside myself for those feelings before I spoke.
“I honestly don’t know how this works,” I said, “so I’m confused. Other than checking for possible risk, why is this interview useful for you?”
“What you want from me is irreplaceable,” she said, “and intensely valuable to me. Why wouldn’t I consider carefully whether to give it to you?”
“Sex is irreplaceable?”
She laughed, the sound richer and deeper than her voice. “From most people, I’d consider that the second and last of the allowable stupid questions. Judging from your tone and expression, however, I believe you’re honestly confused. No, of course I’m not saying sex is irreplaceable; sex is one of the most joyfully renewable of resources. No one, though, pays my price for sex alone. In fact, no one ever really pays for only sex, but that’s another conversation. What you want is my time and attention, and nothing is more precious than those two. I understand that if I agree to sell you the first, I will be committing myself to give you the second, so I must consider the issue carefully.”
“Are all your interactions so formal?”
“Another borderline stupid question, but another one I’ll allow.” She leaned slightly forward, lowered her voice, and said, “If they were, do you imagine many people would pay a fee as high as mine?” In that moment, in that slight change in position and tone, she transformed from cold and hidden to hot and tempting. She resumed her perfect posture and in her normal voice said, “I’d ask you if all your interactions were so guarded, if you were always such a tightly sealed box, but then I’d have used up one of my own stupidity points. Your next question?”
As maddening as I found her, she absorbed my attention completely. It was as if the square had vanished in a flash of light and we were alone in a featureless landscape. I closed my eyes for a second, then opened them and slowly surveyed the shops and people and streets within view. I’m sure I appeared even more guarded than before, but I didn’t care; I needed to regain control of myself.
After about a minute, I focused again on her. She remained still, as motionless as if she were knocked out but at the same time completely present, simply waiting for me to return. She reminded me of Slanted Jack, the best con man I’ve ever known but also someone who’d caused me a lot of trouble about a year ago. He had an amazing ability to be still and completely present, as well as to make each person he met feel like he or she was the most important human alive.
With that memory came the understanding that at some level I was, of course, being conned. She sold time, and however precious that resource might be, some of that time must be available or she wouldn’t have bothered to meet me. Thinking of this situation that way helped me focus on my side of this con—and also made me realize that I hadn’t prepared as well for my job or paid as close attention to it as any decent con man should.
When running a con, stick to the truth whenever you can, and believe in your lies as if they were true. With Matahi, that meant being myself as much as possible. I cared about risks and locations, so I decided to indulge myself.
“Aside from the police station,” I said, “why this square?”
A slight shift in her position made me wonder if I’d finally surprised her in a good way. Then again, nothing in the little bit of her face that I could see gave away any reaction, so perhaps I’d imagined it.
“The many different types of buildings that line it,” she said. She waved her hand slowly to encompass all the structures running along the edges of the square. “In this one little bit of this entirely artificial old-world tourist mecca, we have plain boxes, ornate façades with balconies, two places of worship, and many other monuments to our ability to build structures both functional and ornamental in which we can take shelter from the universe—and sometimes from each other.” She paused, and when she spoke again her voice was softer. “It serves to remind me of how even within the narrow confines of any society’s limits we will always find our own paths to fulfilling our most basic needs.”
I waited for her to continue, but when she remained silent for almost a minute I spoke, going again for a question that was bothering me. “If you accept me as a client,” I said, “must sex be a part of our relationship?”
She nodded the tiniest bit, a teacher congratulating a student on finally spotting the path to an answer, and said, “No. Whatever we decided to become would be up to us, to both of us. Nothing would happen unless we both wanted it.”
I nodded in return. “You said I was guarded; fair enough. This setting, though, is not exactly designed to help me relax. I would prefer to be somewhere more private.”
“As would I,” she said, “should I decide to accept you as a client.”
I continued with honest questions. “Why is so much of you covered? It’s not at all what I expected. You said I was a tightly sealed box; are you any more open?”
Again, she nodded. “To answer your first question, why does my appearance matter to someone who implies he would like a non-sexual relationship? As for your second, of course not, not yet—nor will I be unless our relationship continues beyond this conversation.”
“And will it?” I said. “I’m out of questions.” I hadn’t realized that was true until I said it, but it was; I didn’t know what else to ask her.
“Maybe,” she said. “You would have to agree to two conditions, neither negotiable.”
“And they are?”
“First, a simple business term: You would have to pay in full in advance for each meeting.”
“And if I’m not happy with how a meeting goes?”
She shrugged. “That’s a risk for both of us, but it’s not one with insurance. You would have lost your money and your time, and I would have lost my time.”
I shouldn’t need more than one or two meetings to study her place, and Shurkan and the CC were paying me well enough that even Matahi’s outrageous fees wouldn’t put a dent in my take from this mission.
“Okay,” I said. “I’m willing to do that. Your other condition?”
She stood, the shimmery burqa still revealing nothing about her shape. “When you would like to see me again, and when my schedule permits, you will pay the fee, and we will meet here. You must bring a present that you believe I will like. If you’re right and I like it, your fee will cover our first meeting at my studio. If I don’t care for the gift, I’ll leave, and you’ll lose the fee.”
“That’s ridiculous,” I said. “Do you find fools willing to go through all this, to pay you twice and not even be sure they’ll get time alone with you?”
“Obviously,” she said, turning as she spoke, “and enough that I don’t need you to succeed, though I confess I hope you do. Like you, by the way, these people are not fools. They simply enjoy a happy marriage of need and resources.”
She started walking away.
“How am I supposed to know what you’ll like?” I said. “We’ve barely met.”
She stopped, turned, and smiled. “You’re clearly capable of contemplation, and you pay close attention. Now, let your conclusions and your data fuel your creativity.” She tilted her head ever so slightly to the right, and her smile flowed into a more serious expression. “And in the process you will get a glimpse of the challenge I face regularly, one I assure you I always meet.” She paused, smiled again, and said, “Always.”
She headed away.
I stared after her and wondered how I was going to figure out what she would like and where I would find such a present.
When Matahi was almost out of earshot, she paused for a moment and spoke, her voice clear even though she was facing away from me, her tone managing to be both warm and teasing.
“I hope you meet yours.”
Chapter 17
As soon as Matahi turned the corner, I raced after her. Though none of the online data had revealed the location of her home, if I could follow her there, I’d at least be able to survey the area and spot possible places to snatch Wei when he left after visiting her. I lost a few seconds getting around the people in front of the shops, so by the time I reached the corner where Matahi had turned, I was a good ten seconds behind her. I stopped, crouched, and glanced around the building’s edge.
Her burqa was nowhere in sight.
“Tell me you’re close enough to follow her,” I said to Lobo over the comm.
“Of course,” he said. “Scouting and mapping Wei’s possible routes took very little time. Unfortunately, I can’t see her.”
“What?” I spoke so loudly several nearby people stared at me. “I’m sorry,” I said to them.
“How nice of you to apologize for yelling,” Lobo said, “and how very unusual.”
I walked down the street slowly, checking the sides as I went, but I didn’t see her.
“I wasn’t talking to you,” I whispered. “And why can’t you see her?”
“The moment she was out of your line of sight,” Lobo said, “she ducked into a doorway on the right. From the few floor plans that are publicly available, I believe that many of these buildings connect on interior walls. I’ve been watching the people entering and leaving via all the exterior doorways in a five-block radius, but no one wearing her outfit has emerged.”
“No luck with her heat signature?”
“Give me some credit,” Lobo said. “Of course not. The outfit in which she met you blocked everything; from my height she read so cold she might have been dead.”
I shook my head in both defeat and admiration. “So she anticipated the possible surveillance, minimized the data we could accumulate about her, ducked into a building, and somewhere along the line changed clothes. Nice job.”
“It would appear so,” Lobo said. “Did you do something to alarm her? I wasn’t close enough to be able to record your conversation.”
I considered the question for a few seconds. “I don’t think so. I showed anger once and frustration often, but I never let either emotion control what I did. I was basically just myself.”
Lobo’s sigh over the comm unit was as clear as it was annoying. “Perhaps in future interactions with females you should consider trying to act like someone else.”
“And what in your extensive experience with women has endowed you with such wisdom?” I said.
“Nothing, of course,” he said, “though my ability to monitor vital signs in real time, my perfect memory, and my access to an enormous library of the most romantic human works does give me a bit of an edge over a man who couldn’t tell if a woman was interested in him unless she hit him with a sign telling him so.”
“Look, I’ve spent a long time—” I stopped. The day might come that I’d have to tell Lobo about my past, but we weren’t there yet. “I’m heading back to the rendezvous site. Track me, and meet me there. If you spot Matahi, call me. Otherwise, leave me alone.” The challenge she’d given me felt impossible. I didn’t even know where to begin to learn about buying gifts for any woman, much less a woman I’d met only once. “I need to think.”
“It’s an interesting idea,” Pri said, a trace of admiration obvious in her tone. She paced back and forth in the front of Lobo, thinking it through. “She forces the focus back on her, learns more about you, and makes money regardless of how it turns out.” She smiled. “It would make a great test prior to a second date.”
“You would test someone you were dating?” I said, shaking my head in frustration.
“Where did you grow up?” Pri said. “Of course! Dating contains a long series of tests.”
I ignored her question, because I sure wasn’t going to answer it. “Let’s focus on the problem: How am I going to pass? I have no clue what to get her.”
“Assuming your rendition of the conversation is correct,” Lobo said, “she portrayed this task as difficult. We may therefore assume that none of the classic gifts will suffice.”
“Thank you, Mr. Logic,” I said. “I’d figured out that much before I left the square. Given the vast universe of possible purchases, however, I don’t think excluding a few of them helps much. What I need is an idea Matahi will like.”
