Ballistic (The Palladium Wars), стр. 88
Solveig closed the door behind her and stepped out of her shoes. Then she walked over to the seating arrangement in the middle of the living space. The ambient floor and ceiling lights came on with a soft blue-white glow.
“Room, open blinds,” she said.
The multi-segmented blinds in front of the panoramic window moved aside soundlessly. Beyond, the city was a sea of lights. It seemed brighter out than it had been at midday in full sunshine. She tried to imagine what Coriolis City looked like right now from the outside, floating among the dark clouds with all the buildings and streets illuminated, a bubble of moving light in the swirling darkness of Acheron’s night side.
There was an ample supply of security-screened refreshments in her suite, water and snacks and a variety and quantity of alcohol that would have been enough to fuel a decent dormitory party back at the university. Solveig made herself a little plate with salted almonds and grapes and poured herself a glass of Gretian red wine. Then she took her drink and snacks over to the seating arrangement and sat down. The wine was a good dry grape and vintage, captured sunshine squeezed into a vat and left to ferment for a little while.
She was halfway through the glass and the bowl of almonds when her private comtab hummed with an incoming request for a vidcom. She checked the ID code of the caller.
Here we go, she thought. Time for me to report on what I’ve learned in school today.
Solveig put the wineglass on the table in front of her and brought up a screen at eye height above the table surface. Then she leaned back on the recliner seat and accepted the incoming vidcom.
“Hello, Papa.”
“Hello, daughter of mine,” Falk said. He was sitting in his usual spot at the bar in the main house. Behind him, Solveig saw the flickering from his multiple news screens, silently blasting content into the room.
“I see that it’s wine hour where you are,” he said and nodded at her half-full glass. He raised his hand, which had his own glass in it, this one with two fingers of Rhodian whisky over ice cubes. That was one area where she knew she was not like him at all—she didn’t mind whisky, but she’d never pour an expensive one over ice. And expensive ones were the only kind he drank.
“We just got back from the Hanzo dinner,” she said. “Gisbert got so loaded that his poor little assistant had to help carry him home. She’s half his size. If that doesn’t merit bonus pay, I don’t know what does.”
“Gisbert’s a bumbling idiot,” her father said. “But he has one redeeming quality. He does what he’s told.”
“Are you even supposed to call me like this?” Solveig asked.
“It’s a loophole,” Falk said. “Neither of us are on Ragnar property, and you are off the clock. And we’re not talking business. I’m just a father checking in on his daughter, who’s on her first trip to a new planet. How was your day?”
“Perfectly all right. If I could tell you about the business, I’d probably complain about the Hanzo people taking three hours to ask a direct question. I could be on the way home already if I could find just a single subdirector among them who can say and understand the words yes and no.”
Falk laughed. His teeth looked very white in the semidarkness of her suite’s living room.
“Welcome to the Acheroni business world. Where intent and semantics are everything. Gods, I miss mixing it up with those little bastards.”
He looked at her intently and took a slow sip of his whisky. She could tell that he had something on his mind, and he did her the favor of getting to the point right away, unlike the Hanzo negotiators.
“I know who you’ve been meeting,” he said. The smile that followed was his usual toothy dominance display, without a trace of good cheer or humor in it. He took another sip from his glass as he waited for her reaction.
Solveig felt the shock of alarm trickling down her spine. She sat up and reached for her glass to give herself the second she needed to smooth out her composure.
If he knows, then he knows. And then at least I don’t have to pretend anymore.
“You do,” she said. “And how do you know that?”
“Some little birds told me, Solveig.”
Birds, she thought. More like weasels.
Now that his surprise was out of the bag and failed to make her crumble with the shock of it, his expression switched from predatory cheer to restrained anger.
“I expected better from you. I never would have thought that you’d have such abysmal judgment.”
“I did what I thought I had to do,” she said evenly and took a sip of her wine, giving him another second or two to start showing his hand without folding hers.
“You thought you had to sleep with the police detective who’s investigating our company? Oh, Solveig. Maybe I have overrated your critical thinking skills.”
He’s talking about Berg, she realized, feeling a wild wave of relief coursing through her that she was equally careful to keep out of her expression.
“He closed the investigation. He said it was a dead end. They handed it all off to the military investigators. It’s not our concern anymore. He’s no longer involved in any cases that touch Ragnar.”
“So he figured he’d do some touching of his own, I guess. What if that’s all part of the investigation? What if it’s still in progress? Have you thought of that? What if he wants to see if you’re holding anything back? You’ve given him backdoor access to the company’s pulse, Solveig. You don’t sleep with the enemy.”
“He’s not the enemy. I haven’t even slept with him. We’ve gone out a few times for dinner. That’s it. Not that it’s any of