Kris Longknife: Audacious Part 21

From somewhere, Fran produced a d.i.n.ky little pistol. Though small, held at the nape of Bronc's neck, it looked ready to do lethal business.

"Now we do some real talking," Fran snarled.

"Wrong," Kris snapped. "Longknifes never negotiate with hostage takers."

The look the woman gave Kris actually seemed like surprise.

But the other woman was out of her chair, and moving to take station beside the two, now a pistol in her hand.

"Lars, you get the Longknife broad here, and you p.i.s.s it all away. I always knew you were stupid, but, I thought here was something even you couldn't foul up. But you did!"

"Trixie, you're not supposed to talk like that in front of the gang," the red and yellow man pleaded, showing which color was really his.

Kris shook her head. She had walked into an intravarsity dustup! It was bad enough to have all these guns out, but to have the lines of command among those she was bargaining with go all poof! Bad day.

Enough of this.

"Snipers, do you have a shot?" she barked.

"I have the white one" and "I have the colored one" shot back. The snipers didn't have their long guns out, but looked over the sights of automatics with extended barrels and laser sights.

Kris blinked, and Nelly showed Kris what she wanted to see. Both lasers were solid on the foreheads of the two women.

"Put your guns down and step away from the boy or both of you will be dead before Fran can pull the trigger," Kris said. "Do this very calmly and very smoothly, because if the sniper that has Fran in his sights even thinks she might be starting to think of pulling the trigger, he will scramble her brain before she can form the thought."

"Yes, Your Highness" came from one sniper.

Fran took her eyes off Bronc for a second to look at Trixie. For a second longer, the two of them seemed undecided.

Then their gun trained from Bronc to the table where "their" men sat.

The boss men had been eyeing "their" ladies and seemed ready for this. It must have been clear to all that, having started something, there was no way to finish it with all four of them alive.

The boss men went for their guns as the women rounded on them. It looked like it would be a close run thing.

But two pistols fired from among those against the wall.

The women didn't go down easy. Six rounds as fast as a revolver could fire spun them around in a horrid dance.

Fran got off one round. Trixie two. The shots only tore up the floor.

Which left four men with guns out. And Jack and a Marine sergeant staring at them over sights. Maybe two snipers as well.

"Check fire, Marines," Kris ordered in a soft, but no less commanding voice.

"Holding fire" came from several points behind Kris.

"We came here for our man," Kris said. "He should not have been taken. We will leave now."

"He wouldn't have been taken," the Bone Man said. "But he was bugging us."

"Bugging both of us for you," Rocket put in.

"I have ordered no bugging of any establishments on Eden," Kris began slowly. "Young man, have you talked with me before?"

"No, ma'am, ah, Hiner."

Kris let the young man's problems of what to say to a princess go by. "Abby is my personal maid. She has visited this neighborhood. Abby, did you ask anyone to bug anything?"

"No, Your Highness. I specifically told Bronc and Cara to stay clear of you and anything involving you. You have always been adamant that we do not involve children, and I know better than to cross you on that."

"We're not children" came from two directions. Kris ignored that, but made a mental note to explore later just what areas Abby did feel fine crossing her on.

"Jack, Abby, are there any bugs operating in this room?"

"Captain, would you cover my quarter for a moment?" Jack said.

"My pleasure," the captain said, and metal sliding on leather told Kris what was going on behind her.

Abby and Jack both produced debugging gear and began to roam the room. Both of them soon reported negative findings, then Abby frowned and stooped to run her bug finder over the bodies of the two former gang-boss mistresses. "The only thing live here are two bugs, one on each of them, high-end, very expensive, and still transmitting. Do I burn them?"

Kris shook her head. "Capture them. Let's see if they tell us anything. Bronc, do you have your bug cleaner?"

The boy nodded.

"Take it over to Abby and see if your gizmo can find what she found."

He did, with no results.

"I'd say that your girls have been messing with you," Kris said to the two fellows across the table from her. They did not look happy at that.

"I wonder who they were pa.s.sing that info to? Who gave them bugs so good, so expensive? Interested in finding out?"

The two guys looked like they'd rather be stripped and whipped before their gang members than say yes, but they did.

"Abby, you able to corral those bugs?"

"Contained, Your Bossiness."

The gangs seemed to enjoy the irreverence. Kris shrugged it off. "Bronc, would you mind taking a contract to work with one of my techs, a chief by the name of Beni? He likes strange things that eat electricity."

"But Abby told me to stay clear of you," the kid said. But he was grinning.

"Don't look to me like you can," Kris said. She stood. "Gentlemen, it seems to me that our interests are flowing, if only temporarily, in the same gutter. I want to know who your girls were working with. I suspect you do, too. I remind you that Bronc and Cara are now under my protection. You don't want to have anything happen to them or the next visit from me and mine will leave n.o.body standing. You understand me."

The two guys eyed each other, like scorpions...under the foot of a very big camel.

"Hey, if your enemy is our enemy, don't that make you our friends," Bone Man said.

"That's the usual way of looking at it," Kris agreed.

So all was ending well, Kris thought, as she turned to the captain.

But he was standing stiff, only his hand moved to tap his earbud. Kris caught the last half of a sentence spoken in Gunny's familiar drawl. "...alert message. Repeat, Red alert message. Two Marines down and dead. General Trouble's wife is gone."

29.

A white-hot rage the likes of which Kris had never felt in her life swept over her.

Kris whirled back to face the gang leaders. Had all this been just a ploy to lure her and half the Marines away from the emba.s.sy? If they had...

The same thought was pa.s.sing through a lot of Marines' heads, too. Safeties clicked off weapons. Slaughter was but a word away.

Before Kris's glare, the two gang bosses melted into boneless puddles.

One held up his hand, as if he might ward off her wrath with mere flesh. "I swear to G.o.d, Blessed Madonna, and Child, I don't know nothing about this other lift."

"Me, neither," the other said. "Two of my boys, they brought the kid in. They thought it would be fun. I swear. You want them, they're yours. Gordo, get them out here."

There was movement along the wall as two fellows were half pushed, half thrown out to fall to their knees between the gangers and the Marines.

But Kris had lost her interest in the gangs...for now.

Captain DeVar had said the words that held her. "Sarge, repeat your comments and expand."

"Four minutes ago, the two Marines escorting Mrs. Ruth Tordon went off net. When I got no reply to my call, I dispatched the backup squad, as per the order book. When the reaction squad arrived, they found the two Marines down. We are awaiting arrival of local EMTs to verify initial reading of no vitals for either Marine. Captain, they were put down awfully hard." It was a personal aside, one Marine to another.

"Continue, Gunny" was ice. Cold. Sharp. Full of death.

"A search of the area turned up no Mrs. Trouble, sir. She often kills her squawker, and had done so most of the day. We'd been tracking her by the Marines. We're getting nothing at all now, and we've done our best to activate her communicator and interrogate it. No joy, sir."

The pause was brittle. Pregnant. Explosive. Kris stepped into it.

"Gramma Ruth hired some local protection people. Have you found their bodies?"

"No evidence of them, their bodies or their presence, Your Highness. Like her, they're just gone."

"When we find them, they'll either be dead or lead us straight to her," Kris snapped. The captain nodded agreement.

Kris turned back to the gang leaders. Their eyes locked.

"Let's a.s.sume for the moment that this is as big a surprise to you as it is to me."

Heads nodded vigorously.

"Let's a.s.sume that we can keep on being friends. Business partners, maybe."

Heads nodded faster.

"You want some money? Money that you will live long enough to take to the bank. Not like that pot of gold on my head?"

Heads stopped nodding. Kris suspected they saw it as a trick question. Didn't know how to respond.

"Help me find my grandmother. Any little bit. Anything that leads me to my grandmother alive will be paid for very well. You'll like me as a friend. You don't want me as your enemy. Do we understand each other?"

They eyed each other, the gangers and the princess. Maybe her need was more understandable to them than her power. That was fine by Kris. She wanted her Gramma Ruth back. Alive.

Kris turned and marched out of the restaurant. Behind her, Marines did their retrograde movement with professional efficiency. The punks seemed to shrink as the chance that they would live to see the sunset increased.

There was talk in a low hum behind Kris as she went down the steps two at a time. The gangers had gotten too close to one of those d.a.m.n Longknifes. They'd dealt themselves into the situation. They had no one to blame but themselves. As so often happened around Longknifes, it was time to take sides.

The middle was washing away.

Only the Longknife side and the losing side would soon be left.

But there was always the chance that this time might be different. For the first time, the Longknifes and the losing side might be the same.

Among themselves, the gangs would decide where to place their bet. Who they thought would win.

Kris had already placed her bet. d.a.m.n the odds. Everything on Longknife to win.

30.

The Marines lay where they fell.

Verifying their death had not required moving them.

10-mm grenades in the face don't leave much chance that even a Marine can survive the initial attack.

The Marine techs and Chief Beni joined the local cops trying to sc.r.a.pe some evidence from a scene that offered little.

The other Marines joined the cops patrolling the perimeter, keeping out the gawkers. Officially, that was the job of the local police. But the police lieutenant detailed to tell the Marines to stand down took one look at Gunny Brown's face and quickly offered to share the patrol duty with the Marines.