Шарон Ли - Agent of Change

"Brother, I cannot say how the greatness of your heart makes glad my own." He bowed to Edger, then to the rest of the silent Clutch. "Gather much wisdom, oh, my brothers, and use what you have gathered well."

"A long life to you, young brother, and much joy in it," Edger replied, releasing him.

Val Con moved, not running, but quickly, the door opening and shutting like a conjuring trick—then he was gone.

Edger turned back to his kin, motioning that Selector should pour him a beaker of beer. "Our brother," he said, taking a draft, "is a very great artist."

* * *

JUSTIN HOSTRO NODDED. "Yes, I see. A happy circumstance, Sylvia, though I am sure it is very sad that she has chosen to rob your friend . . . ." He let his voice fade out as he glanced down at his desk and shifted papers. His daughter, used to his ways, held her tongue and waited with what grace she could muster.

He looked up again, smiling faintly. "Sylvia, my dear, I shall be sending a group of my associates to your hyatt to escort this lady to my office. In the meantime, please do me the favor of keeping her—available."

Her perfect brows twitched together. "Available, Daddy?"

He moved a hand, banishing details. "Available. Buy her a drink, invite her to your room, seduce her—but keep her in that hyatt for twenty minutes more. Then you may let her go. Understand?"

"Yes, Daddy."

He smiled. "Good. You and your friend are still planning to dine with me this evening, are you not?"

"Of course," she said, surprised.

He nodded. "Till then, my dear ... Oh, and Sylvia—"

She paused with her hand on the disconnect. "Yes, Daddy?"

"Do be careful, dear. The lady in question has rather an—uncertain—temper, I fear. You don't want to make her angry with you." He smiled again and cut the connection.

Sighing, Sylvia left the booth and started back across the lobby.

* * *

VAL CON SUMMONED a lift, thinking hard. She would have gone across the street to Murph's hyatt, of course. To wait? Or had she arranged to meet him? The lift's door swished open and he entered, directing it to the lobby.

When the lift stopped, bell dinging, the door slid away and he took two steps out.

"There he is!" yelled a voice that had become all too familiar.

Val Con froze, his gaze flicking over the crowd of carefully placed individuals. Too many had guns. Far too many were pointing them at him. Directly before him stood Peter Smith.

In the charged silence, he heard the safety click off on Pete's gun.

He kicked, spinning as his foot connected with Pete's hand, diving back toward the open lift. A pellet whined past his shoulder as he hit the floor and rolled the rest of the distance. Another got through the doors before he had ordered them closed and slapped the 'rise' button.

At the fifteenth floor, he stopped, wedged the door open with a Terran half-bit, ran to the summons box, and demanded more lifts.

Three came immediately—one discharging a middle-aged couple who walked hand-in-hand down the hall, never seeing the slight young man who slid behind them and wedged open the lift's door.

Four out of seven lifts accounted for and the odds were nigh on to perfect that the three remaining were going to be bringing him lots of company in just a little while.

Well, then, what next? Into a room and out the window? He grimaced. From the fifteenth floor, with people no doubt shooting from below? No need to calculate that one.

Down the service ramp? If there was one. He had not committed every detail of this building to memory, more the fool he. He'd allowed himself to believe that he was secure, protected from harm by Edger's reassuring bulk.

He shook his head. It would have to be back the way he'd come then, striking for the Grotto and its dozen or so exits.

He spun slowly on his heel, surveying the empty hallway. Surely there must be something to aid him? Memory stirred after a moment and he moved off to the right, down a short dead-end hallway.

The cleaning station was locked, but that was easily remedied; he made his choices quickly, ears cocked for the sound of an elevator arriving on the floor, wishing he had a partner with eyes on that lift bank.

Gathering up his collection of bottles and paper, he went back to the lifts, leaving the door to the station unlocked and swinging gently to and fro.

* * *

THEY WERE LEAVING the alcove as she came near, and she could see Angus's shoulders drooping in depression. The little woman kept up with his pace easily, silent in her leather boots.

Hidden by an ivy-covered pillar, Sylvia watched them cross the lobby to the lift bank. When they claimed their car she followed and stood watching the floor indicator. Fourth floor—back to their rooms! The little bitch wasn't satisfied with taking what he had on him; she wanted more.

Shaking with rage, Sylvia summoned a lift.

* * *

VAL CON FROWNED at the telltale. For reasons best known to the police, the three elevators not currently with him were grounded—two at lobby level and one at the Grotto. He had a theory regarding this maneuver, but it bore checking out.

Wadding paper into a tight roll, he soaked it with alcohol and touched it with flame. It flickered and caught, smoking nicely.

Gingerly, he tossed it into the first of four elevators and unwedged the door.

* * *

MURPH SIGHED AS the door to his room slid back. He sighed again, more deeply, as he went to the desk and inserted his finger in the lock. A drawer made a sudden dimple in the smooth plastic side, and Murph removed from it a money pouch, which he offered to the woman at his side.

She nodded at the desk. "Count it. I know you got the best intentions going, but your memory's rotten, my man."

He did as he was told, unsealing the pouch with a jerk and upending it over the desk. Bits rolled and clicked; one escaped to the floor.

Irritably, he bent and captured it, adding it to the first stack of ten.

There was a sound at the door.

Murph looked up as the panel slid back and his fiancée entered, lithe and elegant and high-colored in an evening dress picked out with gemstones. He was on his way to embrace her when he heard the unmistakable sound of a safety being thumbed off.

Sylvia froze, eyes wide, nostrils slightly distended.

Murph spun. "C'mon, Sarge, what d'ya think, she's got a bomb in her pocket?"

Eyes on the woman at the door, Miri shook her head. "Finish counting, Angus." She motioned slightly with the gun, indicating that Sylvia should close the door.

"Nice dress," she said, when this was done. "Me and Murph're just finishing up some business. Shouldn't be more'n a few minutes, now, and then I'll be gone and you two can comfort each other."

Sylvia swallowed, decided to ignore the gun, and turned her attention to her beloved, who was completing the last stack of coins.

"Four fifty-seven fifty," he said, straightening.

The woman with the gun spared a brief glance at the piled cash and nodded, eyes back on Sylvia. "Fine. Back in the pouch."

"Angus," Sylvia demanded in throbbing accents, "is this woman robbing you?"

"Robbing?" the woman in question repeated. "Not at all. Murph owes me money—his severance from the Mercs, plus interest, like we agreed when I made him the loan. He's been a little backward about paying, but I think we're all right and tight now, don't you, Murph?"

Angus held the refilled pouch out to her. "I still think it'd be better if you let me call in the transfer, Sarge, rather than taking all that jewelry. You're not going to get half what it's worth—"

"But I'll get it now," she cut him off, sliding the moneybag into her pouch. "And I need it now! Hard cash—not a bank note I might not be able to collect on for awhile." She spared him a withering gray glance.