Elizabeth Bonesteel - The Cold Between

The thought of what Katya might believe nearly drove him to despair.

The lock turned, and he tensed, lifting his head; but it was not Luvidovich who came through the door, it was Chief Stoya. Trey sat back, knowing better than to be relieved. Stoya was more observant than Luvidovich, and far more ruthless. He understood people where Luvidovich did not, and never had to resort to physical abuse. Even Trey was careful of him.

Stoya stood before the open door, frowning at Trey, his gaze thoughtful. “A woman has come here,” he said, “who claims you have not committed this crime.”

There was no way, he realized, that Stoya could miss his surprise. She should have trusted him to look after himself, should have left Volhynia to its own business. He thought of that dead boy in the alley, thought of her passion, her empathy: I know what people say. There is truth and lie in all of it.

Of course she had come back.

Deliberately, he straightened his shoulders, shifting in his chair as if he were stiff from sitting still instead of having been beaten. “Excellent,” he said. “When can I go?”

Stoya’s jaw twitched—a rare betrayal of emotion. “Luvidovich has taken her statement. We will be releasing you. For now.”

Luvidovich. Good God. Had it only been the night before that he had reminded himself he would kill Luvidovich one day? “There was no need for Luvidovich to speak to her, Stoya. She is a soldier. She knows how to make a report.”

“And now you are worried for her. This is curious, given that she says you did not meet until last night.”

Damn. He must have been more exhausted than he thought. He dropped all pretense. “Luvidovich is a thug,” he said seriously, “and she came here only to help. You know I am innocent of this.”

Stoya was younger than Trey by fifteen years, but even so Trey was taken aback by the man’s quickness. He was abruptly in front of the table, leaning toward Trey, his face so close Trey could see the shadow of stubble on his chin. “I know you are a killer, Captain Zajec, ” he hissed. “That woman may absolve you this time, but she does not know what you are. She does not even know your real name, the name you gave up when you fled this place. You cannot become something else so easily. You may not have committed this crime, but we will have you. Whether it is today or tomorrow makes no difference to me.”

Trey kept his expression mild, and when he moved he was slow and careful. He pushed his chair back from the table and stood, the ache of his legs keeping him focused. Standing, he was taller than Stoya, and he allowed himself to lean forward, just a little, to look steadily into the police chief’s eyes. “But you do not have me today, Stoya.” He straightened, then walked around the table, avoiding Stoya’s eyes, and headed through the cell’s open door.

She was still beautiful, Trey thought, tall and elegant and patrician, waiting for him by the main office door. But if the night before she had seemed self-conscious, here she stood with an unconcerned composure that suggested she had no expectation of being thwarted. A performance, almost certainly, but an effective one; he supposed it was an indispensable skill for a soldier. When he caught her eyes he saw her blush faintly, and he remembered standing with her in the moonlight and thought perhaps he had not been beaten so badly after all.

He stepped up to the desk, where Reya Keller had his paperwork ready. “Just here,” she told him, gesturing at the thumbprint square. When he moved to approve it, she spoke more quietly. “There are reporters outside,” she whispered. “A lot of them.”

He looked at her. Reya was a girl of about twenty, and considered a good police officer, if inexperienced. Unlike many of the others, though, she treated him with respect every time Luvidovich dragged him in. Once she had slipped him a small bottle of analgesic on his way out; he had plenty of the stuff back in his flat, but the gesture had touched him.

“Thank you,” he said, and she nodded, a smile flickering across her face before she backed away.

Trey turned, and took a step toward the woman. She looked guarded, and a little hesitant; he supposed he looked the same. He wanted to tell her he was pleased to see her again. He wanted to tell her to go home. Instead he said, “You did not have to wait for me.”

She looked away, and he wished he had been more welcoming. “I did, actually,” she told him. “It seems your police department has no intention of investigating properly.”

He was surprised Stoya had tipped his hand in front of her. “You believe you can make up for their deficit?”

“That’s my intent, yes. Does this place have a back door?”

“You wish to avoid the press.”

Her face warmed again. “I already have their attention. I’d just as soon avoid entertaining them again.”

He had missed more, it seemed, than just her arrival. “There is a rear exit,” he told her. “But we will need someone to let us out.”

In the end it was Reya who helped them, escorting them down a poorly lit back stairway. He fell into step next to the woman—the soldier, he realized. She moved differently here, confident and unhesitating. She was a good deal more forbidding than she had been the night before, and he wondered once again exactly who she was on her starship. At thirty-two, she was young for command, but she carried herself as someone accustomed to being obeyed.

Valeria’s voice echoed in his head. It is not women you like; it is power. He had laughed at her and told her it was powerful women. That exchange had been decades ago. It seemed his tastes had not changed.

Reya left them briefly at the back of the building to retrieve the woman’s weapon from the desk sergeant. She released the door’s voice lock, and Trey stepped through into an alley. He began walking toward the street, the woman next to him, the afternoon sunlight a balm against his face.

They had taken no more than two steps on the main sidewalk before he heard footsteps running behind them. “Hey, Chief!” a man’s voice called. Not all of the press had missed their surreptitious exit, apparently. Trey glanced at the woman; she neither slowed nor reacted, and he followed suit.

After a moment the man caught up, falling into step next to Trey. Tall, slim, with vid-ready good looks, he wore a perpetual manic grin that was almost absurd enough to distract from the shrewd gleam in his eyes. He held his hand out to Trey.

“You’re Treiko Zajec,” the man said. “Cholan Ancher, Corps press corps.” He laughed at his own joke.

Trey considered, then took the offered hand. “How do you do, Mr. Ancher?”

Ancher’s grin widened. “Better now. You’re a legend, you know. It’ll be something, telling people you shook my hand.”

“What do you want, Ancher?” the woman finally said.

Trey looked at her again. Her demeanor had not changed, but he thought he detected a hint of annoyance in her voice.

“You’re always so suspicious,” Ancher said cheerfully.

“That’s because I know you.”

“Are you still holding a grudge?” She said nothing, and this time the reporter didn’t laugh. “I was doing my job, Chief.”

“So was I.”

And damned if Ancher didn’t look uncomfortable.

“Well, maybe I can make it up to you,” he told her.

“How would you do that?”

“I have an ID on your dead man.”

And that stopped her. Trey watched her look over to the reporter, and wondered if she had the authority to back up the murder in her eyes.

But Ancher did not back off, or stand down. Instead, his face softened into something almost human. “I know who he was, Chief,” he repeated. “And I know who he was to you.”