Highborn. Part 11

"So you were thinking Gavino could what, help you water?"

Mireva shrugged. "Something like that. He was telling me about fertilizer and soil balances, stuff like that. Like I said, he knew what he was talking about."

"Gavino talks a good game, but he gets sidetracked easily," Brynna told her, choosing her words carefully. "I'm pretty sure the last thing you want is to depend on him to take care of these for you, then come home from school one day and find them all dead because he forgot to do it." The teen's eyes widened, so Brynna pushed on. "If you need help with this, I'm available. I don't work every day, plus I live live in the building, so it's not like I'd be thinking it's too far or too much trouble to come over and do it." in the building, so it's not like I'd be thinking it's too far or too much trouble to come over and do it."

Mireva frowned slightly. "Why would you help me?"

"Why not?" Brynna countered. "If you need better than that, how about because I'm a friend of your uncle's and he's been really good to me." She paused. "I gotta tell you, those are better reasons than Gavino's."

"I know he wants to get in my pants," Mireva said bluntly. "The boys always do, but I'm not into hooking up with anyone yet." For a second she gazed in the other direction, as if she were seeing something Brynna couldn't. "I have ... other things to do with my life. I don't know what just yet, but I'll figure it out. Anyway, he likes me." A hint of longing made its way into Mireva's voice and Brynna had to wonder if, as strict as Abrienda was, Mireva wasn't kept pretty isolated from any kind of a social life. The realization sank in that Mireva was probably an outsider in her own world-too tall, too smart, too protected. An untold number of intelligent people fell to peer pressure every day, tempted by popularity, drugs, alcohol ... loneliness.

"Of course he does," Brynna said. "You're smart, pretty-what's not to like?" She resisted the urge to launch into a road map of Gavino criticism, knowing it would sound too much like a lecture. "So what are you doing here?" she asked, deciding to steer the subject in a more amicable direction. "You've definitely got the green thumb thing going."

"I'm concentrating on developing affordable organic food sources," Mireva said. "Taking advantage of the naturally occurring tendencies of certain types of insect DNA and pollen carriers to increase the output, but based specifically on the location of the test group and the density of the population in the growing area."

"Really." Brynna eyed the vegetation doubtfully.

Mireva gave her a tolerant smile, very much like one a tutor would give a student who just wasn't getting it. "See, it's not just about the plants. They're an important part of the experiment, of course, but the critical components are the insects. And they, in turn, depend on the location and the environment."

Brynna scrutinized the greenery again, this time letting her focus narrow. Yes, of course-bees, flies, little gnats. There were even a couple of yellow b.u.t.terflies, small, bright spots of beauty flitting erratically amidst the unexpected rooftop nursery. She couldn't begin to guess the complexities involved in Mireva's project, but she had an idea that if she asked, Mireva would take the time to patiently explain it. She thought the girl would someday make a great teacher.

Brynna bent and ran her finger along the edge of one of the long planters. She could sense the water there, smell it in the air. To her, after so many centuries of deprivation, it seemed like so much. But what did she know of the requirements for something green and alive, something that gave forth fruit and life of its own? "How often do you have to water?"

"In this heat and against this dark surface, at least twice a day." Mireva nodded toward a neatly rolled hose next to the doorway that led inside. "I water in the morning before I go. It wouldn't be a big deal except I'm taking free summer courses to earn extra college credit. The topsoil needs to stay moist, but I have to study and do my homework at the library, where there's a computer. Sometimes I don't get home until late." She tried on a brave smile. "It could be worse. At least there's a faucet."

"No kidding. Hate to have to haul buckets up the stairs."

"Yeah." Mireva went over and twisted the spigot, then unrolled the hose. On the end of it was a sprayer turned to a notch labeled SHOWER SHOWER. She looked at Brynna, who stood waiting. "You have to be really careful," she said finally. "Run out the water in the hose first, because it's really, really hot from the sun. Then water from the bottom so that the soil doesn't get washed to the side and expose the roots. And not too much, or the leaves'll start to turn yellow. You can give them a spray across the top to get rid of the dust, but only if the sun's already set. Otherwise the water magnifies the sun's rays and burns the leaves."

"Got it." Brynna walked with the girl again, this time watching carefully and taking note of how Mireva slipped the hose beneath the plants and how long she sprayed each one. "I'll check them every day, I promise."

Mireva looked at the ground shyly, then finally raised her gaze to meet Brynna's. "That would be a humongous help. Thanks."

"No problem." Brynna waited while Mireva finished, then walked downstairs with the teenager, following the girl into her apartment without being invited. Ramiro was there, sitting at the tiny kitchen table and having Mexican coffee and churros with his sister. A small fan labored from left to right in the far corner of the living room, pushing the hot air from one room to another. Mireva disappeared into her room without saying anything else; the three adults watched her go and didn't speak for a few moments, each wrapped in their own too-warm mantle of silence and private thoughts.

"I saw Mireva's science project on the roof," Brynna finally offered from where she leaned against the wall. "It's really something."

Abrienda glanced over her shoulder. "I hope it's enough," she said in a low voice.

Brynna raised her eyebrows. "Enough?"

"To get her the scholarship she wants," Ramiro finished.

Abrienda's cheeks flushed and she wouldn't look at Brynna as she pushed around a barely nibbled piece of churro. "She will not get to the kind of college she wants without it," the older woman said bluntly. "Even after all these years, what I have will not be enough. The tuition rises much faster than what I make. She has her heart set on the best, and they are the most expensive. But we are not in such a position to get the kind of student loans she would need in order to completely devote herself to her studies like she wants."

Ramiro patted his sister's hand awkwardly. "I can help."

"With what?" Abrienda demanded. "You barely make enough anymore to keep the restaurant open." Her gaze flicked to Brynna and she sat up straighter, as if deciding they were getting a little too personal in front of someone who wasn't family. "We'll manage," she said shortly. "One way or another."

"I'm no expert, but Mireva's work seemed to be really good," Brynna put in. "She's extremely smart, and she knows what she's doing with it."

"Yes, she is very smart," Ramiro said. "She has a good, level head."

Brynna hesitated. "There's a boy-"

"The one in the hallway!" Abrienda's chair sc.r.a.ped backward as she pushed abruptly to her feet. "I knew it!"

"There's nothing going on between them," Brynna said quickly, but she was afraid it was already too late. She should have found a different way to bring up the subject of Gavino, or waited for a time when the mood was better-the heat was intense and nearly overpowering, magnifying every emotion, and not at all in a good way.

"Pah," Abrienda nearly spat. "There is always something with the boys. She is too young for boys, too innocent." Her eyes darkened. "I won't have her throw everything away for a boy or make the same mistakes that I did. She will have better than me." Without asking her silent brother if he was finished, she swept up both dishes and carried them to the kitchenette. When she sc.r.a.ped the leavings into the trash, her movements were almost savage. "There is plenty of time for boys, but not now. She will have a good life, babies if that's what she wants, a husband who will be there for her. But some other day, not now."

Brynna leaned against the wall and said nothing. She didn't need to ask questions to know the history. It had been the same thing for thousands of years. An innocent woman, almost always a virgin, courted and swept off her feet-an archaic term, but the meaning would always be the same-by a celestial being, an angel masquerading as a human man. One night, two at the most, and then he was gone forever; seven months later, never more than that, and a child was born. Full-weight and healthy, long of limb, and always with something something about it that made it irresistible to the mother and wiped away any notion of giving up the child for adoption. about it that made it irresistible to the mother and wiped away any notion of giving up the child for adoption.

It should have made for the ideal home life, but humans being what they were-freedom of choice and all that-sometimes, okay, a lot lot of the time, things didn't always turn out so well. Through the ages Brynna had seen all the facets of nephilim mothers: bitterness at their own gullibility, hatred toward men because of the abandonment, resentment toward the child for trapping the woman in a life she hated but inexplicably couldn't surrender, protectiveness to the point of paranoia, a thousand other emotions and most of them not good. Brynna couldn't help but wonder if things would change in this more enlightened age where a woman who bore and raised a child alone might still, if she fought for it, have a chance at a good life. Maybe ... probably. of the time, things didn't always turn out so well. Through the ages Brynna had seen all the facets of nephilim mothers: bitterness at their own gullibility, hatred toward men because of the abandonment, resentment toward the child for trapping the woman in a life she hated but inexplicably couldn't surrender, protectiveness to the point of paranoia, a thousand other emotions and most of them not good. Brynna couldn't help but wonder if things would change in this more enlightened age where a woman who bore and raised a child alone might still, if she fought for it, have a chance at a good life. Maybe ... probably.

But not today, here in this apartment. And not in Abrienda Cocinero's life.

Thirteen.

"Look here," Bello Onani said. He was a tall and gangly African guy with a complexion the color of wet leather and almost no body fat. Right now he was hunched over a keyboard-one of four currently snaking out of his sprawling workstation-and jabbing a long finger at one of the monitors in front of him. "This screen shows the raw data I extracted from the jewelry store computer. Dude has some heavy-duty encryption going on. I wasn't getting anywhere without a pa.s.sword. I tried some of the obvious stuff-his birthday, family birthdays, s.h.i.t like that-but no go. Then I moved on to a basic dictionary attack, even though I figured the guy was too smart for that. I worked up to a precomputation hash combined with a custom parsing algorithm to compensate for salts and memoization-"

"I don't mean to be impatient, but can we skip the geekspeak and go straight to the English part?" Redmond gestured at the hardware fragments, screws, and wires that were layered like driftwood in every available s.p.a.ce. "I do okay with e-mail, the Internet, and the department's system, but beyond that I start sweating."

"Yeah, sure. So I finally get into the data, right? And I start going through the files, sorting them into categories."

Redmond saw Sathi's face brighten. Organization they could understand. "Such as?"

"Dull, duller, and most boring, mainly." Onani was zipping his cursor around the screen at no less than manic speed. "Lots of doc.u.ments and e-mails about financial c.r.a.p that might or might not be of interest to the IRS."

"Is this the list you mentioned?" Redmond asked. "You could just send that stuff over to fraud."

"I will, sure. But first I figured you guys would want to see what else I found." The display on the main monitor flashed a couple of times as he went back and forth between a couple of open folders. "In fact, I'm thinking you'd d.a.m.ned well shoot shoot me if I sat on this." me if I sat on this."

Redmond raised one eyebrow. "What the h.e.l.l's so hot that it might move me to bodily harm?"

Onani twisted his head and gave the two detectives a grin filled with crooked but brilliantly white teeth. "This," he said simply, "is the hit list I told you about." The screen was filled with short lines of text and he used the b.u.t.ton on his mouse to scroll it up and down for effect.

Sathi scowled at the monitor, then at Onani. "Why do you call it that?"

"Stop," Redmond said abruptly. "I see it." Onani's movements with the mouse froze, then he lifted his hand and let Redmond take over. The detective went up a couple of lines and let the cursor hover over a name on the screen.

Sathi leaned over their shoulders, trying to see. "What?"

"Matthew Dann. Sound familiar?" Redmond's voice rose. "And here-Dorothy Southard."

Sathi's dark eyes widened. "Wait, those are-"

Redmond zipped the cursor down to a third name. On the surface it seemed random until he read it aloud. "Tobias Gallagher."

"These are all shooting victims," Sathi said. "What possible reason can there be for a jewelry store owner in Andersonville to have these names on his computer? Especially when one of these people is a fourteen-year-old boy from the other side of the city?"

"Now that is is the question, isn't it?" Onani sounded almost gleeful. the question, isn't it?" Onani sounded almost gleeful.

"I think," Redmond said slowly, "that if we were to check, we might find all of the victims' names, right here in this file."

Onani picked up a small sheaf of papers and snapped them smartly against one palm. "And so, here is a printout for you to check exactly that. We do, of course, have to wonder about something else."

Redmond took the list from the younger man. "Which is?"

"What was he going to do with the rest of the names?"

REDMOND AND S SATHI STOPPED at the entrance to the cell block, unholstered their weapons to leave them with the guard, and went inside after signing in. The jewelry store owner's son, Kwan Seung-or the more modernized Seung Kwan, as his driver's license read-had already been taken out of his cell and put into one of the consultation rooms with his lawyer. The attorney was a slender man about the same height as Redmond, maybe ten years older. He had a salt-and-pepper mustache and slightly curly hair above stylish gla.s.ses that probably cost more than one of Redmond's paychecks. Both men looked up in surprise when Redmond and Sathi opened the door. at the entrance to the cell block, unholstered their weapons to leave them with the guard, and went inside after signing in. The jewelry store owner's son, Kwan Seung-or the more modernized Seung Kwan, as his driver's license read-had already been taken out of his cell and put into one of the consultation rooms with his lawyer. The attorney was a slender man about the same height as Redmond, maybe ten years older. He had a salt-and-pepper mustache and slightly curly hair above stylish gla.s.ses that probably cost more than one of Redmond's paychecks. Both men looked up in surprise when Redmond and Sathi opened the door.

"Afternoon," Redmond said as he shut the door behind them. "I'm Detective Redmond and this is Detective Sathi." He inclined his head toward the Asian man on the other side of the table before giving the older man his full attention. "I'm sure your client has told you that we've already met."

The attorney rose slightly and offered his hand, eyeing them warily. "James Tarina," he said. "I wasn't made aware that we would be having a conference-"

"Call it a spur-of-the-moment decision," Sathi said.

Tarina's brow furrowed slightly but he didn't protest as he settled back onto his chair. "Sometimes those are the best kind."

Redmond gave him a vague smile as he and Sathi pulled up chairs of their own. "Sometimes." He placed the manila folder he'd brought with him on the table and folded his hands on top of it. "So you have quite the dilemma here, Mr. Kwan. It seems the charges against you are racking up like symbols on a slot machine." When neither of the men across the table said anything, Redmond continued. "Kidnapping is only the beginning here, I think. a.s.sault with a deadly weapon, attempted murder, torture-there's one we only see once in awhile."

"As I understand it, the alleged victim doesn't recall any of the crimes you mention," Tarina put in. "The burden of proof becomes substantially more difficult without a direct witness."

Sathi stared at him. "From what I saw when I walked into that bas.e.m.e.nt, it was pretty obvious the girl was being held against her will, drugged, and tortured."

"Circ.u.mstantial at best. Did you ever consider that the girl was a willing partic.i.p.ant? That she wanted wanted whatever drugs might-and note that I'm not admitting to anything on behalf of my client-have been in her system." whatever drugs might-and note that I'm not admitting to anything on behalf of my client-have been in her system."

Redmond wasn't moved by the claims. "Then perhaps Mr. Kwan would like to explain how Miss Kim actually came to be in the bas.e.m.e.nt of his father's jewelry store to begin with. We'd love to hear the details."

Seung Kwan smirked. "You cops wouldn't understand. You're not Korean. And you're in way over your head."

Sathi sat forward. "Then enlighten us."

"I have nothing to say."

Redmond studied him for a moment. "As I'm sure you expected, the computer in the store's office was seized. In the course of the investigation, we discovered that you're quite the computer whiz, Mr. Kwan. You have more than a pa.s.sing familiarity with software and programming."

Kwan shrugged. "Welcome to the twenty-first century."

Sathi's dark eyes glittered. "An interesting statement, considering the items we found on the ... what would you call it? Altar. Altar. Yes, that would be appropriate. The Yes, that would be appropriate. The altar altar that was in the bas.e.m.e.nt with Cho Kim." that was in the bas.e.m.e.nt with Cho Kim."

The prisoner said nothing.

"Our tech found some interesting items on the computer, things that would seem to indicate your father was a little less than forthcoming to the IRS about his financial status." Redmond flipped open the manila folder but thumbed past the first couple of pages. "Kind of interesting, but really, not my department. But this-" Suddenly he thumped his forefinger hard against a stapled set of papers. "-this made for some made for some really really captivating reading." captivating reading."

"May I see that, please?"

Tarina reached for the doc.u.ment but the detective pulled it out of reach. "Not just yet." Redmond eyed Kwan. "The way things stand now, I think we could squeeze a good ten to fifteen years out of a jury." Tarina started to say something but Redmond waved off his words. "And that's just on the circ.u.mstances. circ.u.mstances. But this little list of yours, Mr. Kwan, really ups the ante on that verdict slot machine." But this little list of yours, Mr. Kwan, really ups the ante on that verdict slot machine."

"What list is that?" Kwan's voice had dropped a little and gone slightly hoa.r.s.e.

Tarina was openly scowling. "Don't talk to him, Seung. Not until we see exactly what's on that doc.u.ment."

"In fact," Redmond continued as if neither man had spoken, "I think we might even be headed for the death-penalty jackpot."

"That's absurd," Tarina snapped. "And I'm not going to continue this conversation unless I know exactly what you're talking about."

"We're talking about a hit list, Mr. Tarina," Sathi said. His face was grim as Redmond pushed it toward the attorney, who s.n.a.t.c.hed it up and began flipping through the papers. "Four single-s.p.a.ced pages of names, including the names of every single person shot over the last several weeks."

"Coincidence," Tarina spat. He dropped the list on the table distastefully, as if he couldn't believe he was wasting his time on this.

"Interestingly enough, our tech picked up a pattern here," Redmond said. "A strange one, but it's definitely recognizable. Oh, and there are a number of people on the list who are also dead." This time Redmond's gaze fixed solidly on the attorney. "But not a single one of them died by natural causes."

Tarina blinked, then picked the doc.u.ment up again. "I'll have to look this over-"

Redmond plucked it out of his hand. "All in due time, Mr. Tarina. After all, it'll be introduced as an exhibit in discovery once we get around to filing charges. Unless, of course, Mr. Kwan wants to talk about a quid pro quo."

"Bargaining does make the world go around," Sathi put in.

"And what would you be looking for?" Tarina asked carefully.

"A name would be a good start." Redmond turned his head so that he could stare hard at the young Korean man. "We know you wrote the program that generated these names, and we know how you used it. We know the search criteria you coded into it-once you feed it all into a computer and reverse it, the commonalities are strikingly apparent. You might be good, but the department's cryptographers are better. Still, as scuzzy as you are, we're not quite convinced you've been going around the city and shooting people."

"So we are presuming that someone paid you to generate this list," Sathi put in. "Perhaps they paid you a lot, or offered you something else in return. What we don't know is why, or who, and these are the things that we are obviously expecting to find out from you."

"Expecting," Kwan said. "Isn't that a lot like a.s.suming?"

Redmond tapped the table. "Your point?"

Kwan's answering grin was strained, but still just to the side of nasty. "Everyone knows the old saying about a.s.suming. a.s.s and you. you. Need I say more?" Need I say more?"

Redmond slammed his fist on the table in front of the prisoner, making both Kwan and his lawyer jump. "You'd better say more, more, Mr. Kwan. You'd better say a Mr. Kwan. You'd better say a lot lot more." more."

But Kwan only made a motion in the air, like he was waving away an annoying insect, and settled back. "Whatever."

"We were able to connect doc.u.ment generation dates and print times on your computer to more than two dozen deaths," Sathi said bluntly. For the first time, Tarina looked visibly rattled. "And that's just so far. What are we going to find as we go deeper into our files?"

Tarina's face had gone a couple of shades paler. "Perhaps we could come to an arrangement," he began. "We-"

"There's no arrangement, arrangement," Kwan interrupted. He sent his attorney a withering look. "I don't have any name to give up. And neither does my father."