Starbase Human Read online

  Then she’d had had the gall to tell him that he should probably double-check all of his work, considering its shoddy quality.

  She stood next to a crate, the only one of thousands that was open. She was rumpled—she was always rumpled—and her curly black hair looked messier than usual.

  When she saw him approach, she glared at him.

  “Oh, lucky me,” she said.

  Brodeur bit back a response. He’d been recording everything since he got off the train inside the warehouse’s private platform, and he didn’t want to show any animosity toward DeRicci on anything that might go to court.

  “Just show me the body and I’ll get to work,” he said.

  DeRicci raised her eyebrows at the word “work,” and she didn’t have to add anything to convey her meaning. She didn’t think Brodeur worked at all.

  “My biggest priority at the moment is an identification,” she said.

  And his biggest priority was to do this investigation right. But he didn’t say that. Instead he looked at the dozens of crates spread out before him.

  “Which one am I dealing with?” he asked, pleased that he could sound so calm in the face of her rudeness.

  DeRicci placed a hand on the crate behind her. He was pleased to see that she wore gloves. He had worked with her partner, Rayvon Lake, before, and Lake had to be reminded to follow any kind of procedure.

  But Brodeur didn’t see Lake anywhere.

  “Have you had cases involving the waste crates before?” DeRicci asked Brodeur.

  “No,” he said, not adding that he tried to pass anything outside the dome onto anyone else, “but I’ve heard about cases involving them. I guess it’s not that uncommon.”

  “Hmm,” DeRicci said looking toward a room at the far end of the large warehouse. “And here I thought they were uncommon.”

  Brodeur was going to argue his point when he realized that DeRicci wasn’t talking to him now. She was arguing with someone she had already spoken to.

  “Can you get me information on that?” DeRicci asked Brodeur.

  He hated it when detectives wanted him to do their work for them. “It’s in the records.”

  DeRicci made a low, growly sound, like he had irritated her beyond measure.

  So he decided to tweak her a bit more. “Just search for warehouses and recycling and crates—”

  “I know,” she said. “I was hoping your office already had statistics.”

  “I’m sure we do, Detective,” he said, moving past her, “but you want me to figure out what killed this poor creature, right? Not dig into old cases.”

  “I think the old cases might be relevant,” she said.

  Brodeur shrugged. He didn’t care what was or wasn’t relevant to her investigation. His priority was dealing with this body.

  “Excuse me,” he said, and slipped on his favorite pair of gloves. Then he raised the lid on the crate.

  The woman inside was maybe thirty. She had been pretty too, before her eyes had filmed over and her cheeks had sunk in.

  She had clearly died in an Earth Normal environment, and she hadn’t left that environment, as advertised. He would have to do some research to figure out if the presence of rotting food had an impact on the body’s decomposition, but that was something to worry about later.

  Then Brodeur glanced up. “I’ll have information for you in a while,” he said to DeRicci, trying to dismiss her.

  “Just give me a name,” she said. “We haven’t traced anything.”

  He didn’t want to move the body yet. He didn’t even want to touch it, because he was afraid of disturbing some important evidence.

  The corpse’s hands were tucked under her head, so he couldn’t just run the identification chips everyone had buried in their palms.

  So he used the coroner’s office facial recognition program. It had a record of every single human who lived in Armstrong, and was constantly updated with information from the arrivals and departures sections of the city every single day.

  “Initial results show that her name is Sonja Mycenae. She was born here, and moved off-Moon with her family ten years ago. She returned one month ago to work as a nanny for….”

  He paused, stunned at the name that turned up.

  “For?” DeRicci pushed.

  Brodeur could feel the color draining from his face.

  “Luc Deshin,” he said quietly. “She works for Luc Deshin.”

  FIVE

  LUC DESHIN.

  DeRicci hadn’t expected that name.

  Her gaze met Ethan Brodeur’s. Brodeur looked scared. He immediately turned his attention to the poor dead woman in the compost.

  DeRicci tugged on her gloves, thinking about what Brodeur had just told her.

  With Deshin’s involvement, everything changed.

  Luc Deshin ran a corporation called Deshin Enterprises that the police department flagged and monitored continually. Everyone in Armstrong knew that Deshin controlled a huge crime syndicate that trafficked in all sorts of illegal and banned substances. The bulk of Deshin’s business had moved off-Moon, but he had gotten his start here as an average street thug, rising, as those kids often do, through murder and targeted assassination into a position of power, using the deaths of others to advance his own career.

  Then DeRicci realized what was bothering her. It wasn’t that Deshin might have killed the woman. DeRicci firmly believed that was possible.

  It was something else entirely. “Luc Deshin needed a nanny?”

  “He married a few years ago,” Brodeur said, as he ran some kind of scanner slightly above the body. He watched what he was doing. He didn’t look at DeRicci. “I guess he and the wife had kids.”

  “And didn’t like the nanny.” DeRicci whistled. “Talk about a high stress job.”

  She glanced at that room filled with the employees who had found the body. There was a lot of work to be done here, but none of it was as important as catching Deshin by surprise with this investigation.

  If he killed this Sonja Mycenae, then he would be expecting the police’s appearance. But he might not expect the police so soon.

  Or maybe he had always used the waste crates to dump his bodies. No one had ever been able to pin a murder on him.

  Perhaps this was why.

  She needed to leave. But before she did, she sent a message to Lake. Only she sent it using the standard police links, not the encoded link any other officer would use with her partner. She wanted it on record that Lake hadn’t shown up yet.

  Rayvon, you need to get here ASAP. There are employees to interview. I’m following a lead, but someone has to supervise the crime scene unit. Someone sent Deputy Coroner Brodeur and he doesn’t have supervisory authority.

  She didn’t wait for Lake’s response. Before he said anything, she sent another message to her immediate supervisor, Chief of Detectives Andrea Gumiela, this time through an encoded private link.

  This case has ties to Deshin Enterprises, DeRicci sent. I’m going there now, but we need a good team on this. It’s not some random death. This case needs to be done perfectly. Between Brodeur and Lake, we’re off to a bad start.

  She didn’t wait for Gumiela to respond either. In fact, after sending that message, DeRicci shut off all but her emergency links.

  She didn’t want Gumiela to tell her to stay on site, and she didn’t want to hear Lake’s invective when he realized she had essentially chastised him in front of the entire department.

  “Make sure no one leaves,” DeRicci said to Brodeur.

  He looked up, panicked. “I don’t have the authority.”

  “Pretend,” she snapped, and walked away from him.

  She needed to get to Luc Deshin, and she needed to get to him now.

  SIX

  LUC DESHIN GRABBED his long-waisted overcoat and headed down the stairs. So a police detective wanted to meet with him. He wished he found such things unusual. But they weren’t.

  The police liked to harass him. Less now th
an in the past. They’d had a frustrating time pinning anything on him.

  He always found it ironic that the crimes they accused him of were crimes he’d never think of committing, and the crimes he had committed—long ago and far away—were crimes they had never heard of.

  Now, all of his activities were legal. Just-inside-the-law legal, but legal nonetheless.

  Or so his cadre of lawyers kept telling the local courts, and the local judges—at least the ones he would find himself in front of—always believed his lawyers.

  So, a meeting like this, coming in the middle of the day, was an annoyance, and nothing more.

  He used his trip down the stairs to stay in shape. His office was a penthouse on the top floor of the building he’d built to house Deshin Enterprises years ago. He used to love that office, but he liked it less since he and his wife Gerda brought a baby into their lives.

  He smiled at the thought of Paavo. They had adopted him—sort of. They had drawn up some legal papers and wills that the lawyers assured him would stand any challenge should he and Gerda die suddenly.

  But Deshin and Gerda had decided against an actual adoption given Deshin’s business practices and his reputation in Armstrong. They were worried that some judge would deem them unfit, based on Deshin’s reputation.

  Plus, Paavo was the child of two Disappeareds, making the adoption situation even more difficult. The Earth Alliance’s insistence that local laws prevailed when crimes were committed meant that humans were often subjected to alien laws, laws that made no sense at all. Many humans didn’t like being forced to lose a limb as punishment for chopping down an exotic tree, or giving up a child because they’d broken food laws on a different planet.

  Those humans who could afford to get new names and new identities did so rather than accept their punishment under Earth Alliance law. Those people Disappeared.

  Paavo’s parents had Disappeared within weeks of his birth, leaving him to face whatever legal threat that the aliens his parents had angered could dream up.

  Paavo, alone, at four months.

  Fortunately, Deshin and Gerda had sources inside Armstrong’s family services, which they had cultivated for just this sort of reason. Both Deshin and Gerda had had difficult childhoods—to say the least. They knew what it was like to be unwanted.

  Their initial plan had been to bring several unwanted children into their homes, but after they met Paavo, a brilliant baby with his own special needs, they decided to put that plan on hold. If they could only save Paavo, that would be enough.

  But they were just a month into life with the baby, and they knew that any more children would take a focus that, at the moment at least, Paavo’s needs wouldn’t allow.

  Deshin reached the bottom of the stairwell, ran a hand through his hair, and then walked through the double doors. His staff kept the detective in the lobby.

  She was immediately obvious, even though she wasn’t in uniform. A slightly disheveled woman with curly black hair and a sharp, intelligent face, she wasn’t looking around like she was supposed to be.

  Most new visitors to Deshin Enterprises either pretended to be unimpressed with the real marble floors, the imported wood paneling, and the artwork that constantly shifted on the walls and ceiling. Or the visitors gaped openly at all of it.

  This detective did neither. Instead, she scanned the people in the lobby—all staff, all there to guard him and keep an eye on her.

  She would be difficult. Deshin could tell that just from her body language. He wasn’t used to dealing with someone from the Armstrong Police Department who was intelligent and difficult to impress.

  He walked toward her, and as he reached her, he extended his hand.

  “Detective,” he said warmly. “I’m Luc Deshin.”

  She wiped her hands on her stained shirt, and just as he thought she was going to take his hand in greeting, she shoved her hands into the pockets of her ill-fitting black pants.

  “I know who you are,” she said.

  She deliberately failed to introduce herself, probably as a power play. He could play back, ask to see the badge chip embedded in the palm of her hand, but he didn’t feel like it.

  She had already wasted enough of his time.

  So he took her name, Noelle DeRicci, from the building’s security records, and declined to look at her service record. He had it if he needed it.

  “What can I do for you then, Detective?” He was going to charm her, even if that took a bit of strength to ignore the games.

  “I’d like to speak somewhere private,” she said.

  He smiled. “No one is near us, and we have no recording devices in this part of the lobby. If you like, we can go outside. There’s a lovely coffee shop across the street.”

  Her eyes narrowed. He watched her think: did she ask to go to his office and get denied, or did she just play along?

  “The privacy is for you,” she said, “but okay….”

  She sounded dubious, a nice little trick. A less secure man would then invite her into the office.

  Deshin waited. He learned that middle managers—and that was what detectives truly were—always felt the press of time. He never had enough time for anything and yet, as the head of his own corporation, he also had all the time in the universe.

  “I’m here about Sonja Mycenae,” she said.

  Sonja. The nanny he had fired just that morning. Well, fired wasn’t an accurate term. He had deliberately avoided firing her. He had eliminated her position.

  Deshin and Gerda had decided that Sonja wasn’t affectionate enough toward their son. In fact, she had seemed a bit cold toward him. And once Deshin and Gerda started that conversation about Sonja’s attitudes, they realized they didn’t like having someone visit their home every day, and they didn’t like giving up any time with Paavo.

  Both Gerda and Deshin had worried, given their backgrounds, that they wouldn’t know how to nurture a baby, but Sonja had taught them that training mattered a lot less than actual love.

  “I understand she works for you,” the detective said.

  “She worked for me,” Deshin said.

  Something changed in the detective’s face. Something small. He felt uneasy for the first time.

  “Tell me what this is about, Detective,” he said.

  “It’s about Sonja Mycenae,” she repeated.

  “Yes, you said that. What exactly has she done?” he asked.

  “Why don’t you tell me why she no longer works for you,” the detective said.

  “My wife and I decided that we didn’t need a nanny for our son. I called Sonja to the office this morning, and let her know that, effective immediately, her employment was terminated through no fault of her own.”

  “Do you have footage of that conversation?” the detective asked.

  “I do, and it’s protected. You’ll need permission from both of us or a warrant before I can give it to you.”

  The detective raised her eyebrows. “I’m sure you can forgo the formalities, Mr. Deshin.”

  “I’m sure that many people do, Detective,” he said, “however, it’s my understanding that an employee’s records are confidential. You may get a warrant if you like. Otherwise, I’m going to protect Sonja’s privacy.”

  “Why would you do that, Mr. Deshin?”

  “Believe it or not, I follow the rules.” He managed to say that without sarcasm.

  The detective grunted as if she didn’t believe him. “What made you decide to terminate her position today?”

  “I told you,” Deshin said, keeping his voice bland even though he was getting annoyed. “My wife and I decided we didn’t need a nanny to help us raise our son.”

  “You might want to share that footage with me without wasting time on a warrant, Mr. Deshin,” the detective said.

  “Why would I do that, Detective? I’m not even sure why you’re asking about Sonja. What has she done?”

  “She has died, Mr. Deshin.”

  The words hung betwe
en them. He frowned. The detective had finally caught him off guard.

  For the first time, Deshin did not know how to respond. He probably needed one of his lawyers here. Any time his name came up in an investigation, he was automatically the first suspect.

  But in this case, he had nothing to do with Sonja’s death. So he would act accordingly, and let the lawyers handle the mess.

  “What happened?” he asked softly.

  He had known Sonja since she was a child. She was the daughter of a friend. That was one of the many reasons he had hired her, because he had known her.

  Even then, she hadn’t turned out as expected. He remembered an affectionate, happy girl. The nanny who had come to his house didn’t seem to know how to smile at all. There had been no affection in her.

  And when he last saw her, she’d been crying and pleading with him to let her keep her job. He actually had to have security drag her out of his office.

  “We don’t know what happened,” the detective said.

  That sentence could mean a lot. It could mean that they didn’t know what happened at all or that they didn’t know if her death was by natural causes or by murder. It could also mean that they didn’t know exactly what or who caused the death, but that they suspected murder.

  Since Deshin was facing a detective and not a beat officer, he knew the police suspected murder.

  “Where did it happen?” Deshin asked.

  “We don’t know that either,” the detective said.

  Deshin snapped, “Then how do you know she’s dead?”

  Again, that slight change in the detective’s face. Apparently he had finally hit on the correct question.

  “Because workers found her in a waste crate in a warehouse outside the dome.”

  “Outside the dome…?” That didn’t make sense to him. Sonja hadn’t even owned an environmental suit. She had hated them with a passion. “She died outside the dome?”

  “I didn’t say that, Mr. Deshin,” the detective said.

  He let out a breath. “Look, Detective, I’m cooperating here, but you need to work with me. I saw Sonja this morning, eliminated her position, and watched her leave my office. Then I went to work. I haven’t gone out of the building all day.”