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Caine focused on Silcox. "Why didn't you say anything about that earlier?"
"Because it wasn't any of your business," she retorted. "And because if Torch is doing something special, I didn't want a group of self-appointed heroes charging in and shaking up the cart."
Caine snorted. "Nice of you to come around a little, anyway."
"I don't have a lot of choice," she shot back, throwing a glare at Lathe. "I don't like the way you're bulling around Denver any more than Bernhard does. The sooner you get out of here, the better it'll be for all of us."
Caine looked at Lathe. "We just make friends everywhere we go, don't we?"
The comsquare shrugged. "Get used to it. There aren't a lot of people like Torch around who are willing to risk their comfortable existence for the chance to be free someday."
Silcox bristled. "If that's a slap at me—"
She broke off as Skyler slipped in through the door. "Well?" Lathe asked.
The big blackcollar nodded. "No problems. They're both on track."
"Who are on what?" Caine frowned, a familiar suspicion tightening his stomach. "Lathe, what're you up to this time?"
Lathe's lips compressed momentarily. "I promised our... local benefactor that in return for sending a laser message to a scout ship Lepkowski left us we'd find out who the mysterious Sartan is that Bernhard's blackcollars are working so closely with."
"So you've got two of your men tailing Bernhard?" Silcox asked. "That's crazy—he'll spot them within five minutes."
"Of course he would," Lathe said. "That's why they're tracking Bernhard from inside his trunk."
Caine felt his mouth drop open. "You are kidding. Aren't you?"
"It's the only way, Caine," Skyler said with a shrug. But he, too, looked uncomfortable. "The state Bernhard's in, it'll probably never even occur to him to check a trunk that obviously hasn't been touched."
"Unless there are alarms or warners on it—"
"There were. Hawking took care of them."
"Great," Caine muttered. "Just great. That laser message better have been damn important, Lathe."
"It was part of my promise to Pittman," the comsquare said quietly. "Come on—we'd better call the guard ring in and get out of here. A
She hesitated, then shrugged. "Sure, why not? I haven't got anywhere else to go... and I guess I'm pretty well committed now, anyway."
Lathe smiled faintly at her. "Welcome back to the war," he said.
Chapter 31
Mordecai hadn't really liked the idea from the start, and his opinion of it had been going steadily downhill ever since then. There were a limited number of ways in which two men in full kit could wedge themselves into a car trunk, none of them comfortable for both straight-line travel and sharp turns. Gritting his teeth, he did the best he could, hoping like hell Bernhard wasn't headed somewhere on the far side of town.
In that, at least, they were lucky. They'd been riding for no more than Fifteen minutes when the car glided to a halt and both doors opened. Two sets of footsteps, on concrete or something equally hard... a door opening and closing... the whine of a sliding door's motor... and then nothing.
Mordecai gave the silence three minutes, then carefully popped the trunk.
They were, as expected, in a garage, though its generous dimensions were something of a surprise. A
sliding door exited—presumably—to the street; more ordinary doors led out one side and to the rear, probably to an attached building and outside, respectively. There were no windows, and a quick flashlight scan of the walls and ceiling turned up no likely cameras or other monitors.
"A good low-tech blackcollar hideout," Jensen murmured as they eased out of the trunk and worked the kinks out of their muscles. "Nothing to attract Security's notice."
Mordecai stepped over to the building door, pulling a sound-catcher from his kit and pressing it against the panel. A low hum was all he could hear. "They've got a bug stomper going in there," he told Jensen, putting the instrument away. "I guess we do this the hard way."
Jensen nodded and stepped to the other door. He listened for a moment, then cracked it open carefully. Some light, not much, filtered in, and as the blackcollar opened it enough to slip out Mordecai saw that it indeed led outside. He gave Jensen a five-second lead, then followed.
They were at the back of what appeared to be a fairly large middle-class house. Several lights were showing in various windows; Jensen was already moving cautiously toward the largest of them, a ground-floor solarium set in the center of the wall. Mordecai took the other direction, circling the garage to try to find out just where they were.
The street out front matched the house: well lit, smoothly paved, with even some trees and other attempted landscaping in the narrow median strip. The surrounding houses, too, had the same reasonably well-off look as the one he was standing beside. He gave them a cursory scan, then peered down the street, looking for a street sign. He'd located one, and had just stepped away from the garage toward it, when a pair of cars glided down the street and came to a halt two houses down.
Mordecai dropped into a crouch and froze, trying to squeeze into what little shadow was available.
Security, was his first thought; but as a single figure emerged from each of the vehicles he began to breathe easier. A Security car would have been packed to the gills with armed men.
Abruptly, his lip twitched. The way the men walked—their feline grace, the sense of invisible awareness about them...
They were two of Bernhard's blackcollars.
Mordecai grimaced, aware that he was completely exposed to anyone coming up the walk, but to his surprise and relief, the newcomers didn't come any closer to Bernhard's house. Instead, they walked up to the house they'd parked in front of, two down from where Mordecai was standing. At the door they paused briefly, as if working a key, then disappeared inside.
Mordecai took a careful breath and permitted himself a smile. So Sartan at least was smart enough to play it cool: two houses, with a tu
Rising out of his crouch, he headed back to Jensen.
The other was lying propped up on his elbows outside the solarium, peering inside through the bottom pane of glass. "Company's starting to arrive," Mordecai whispered. "Two blackcollars, using the old shell-game approach."
Jensen grunted. "Wondered where they came from. Can't see much, but I heard two new voices join the party."
"How many in there so far?"
"Sounds like just your two plus Bernhard and Kanai. If Sartan's with them, he's being mighty quiet."
Mordecai chewed his lip. "Maybe this isn't his house after all. Well, we're here; might as well get something out of it. You stay put and keep counting; I'll go back and watch for visitors and bandits."
"Sounds good."
They stayed at their posts for nearly half an hour more. In that time a grand total of three more blackcollars arrived.
"That can't be all the troops Bernhard's got." Jensen shook his head when they met again and compared notes. "I got the impression he had at least a squad, more likely two or three of them.
We're talking, what, seven men total here?"
"Maybe he's just called in his top circle," Mordecai suggested. But something about that felt wrong.
"Or just the ones he thinks will cooperate in taking us out."
"No." Jensen was positive. "I can't hear any words out here, but the tones are clear enough—and that's not a nice simple war council. They're having a good healthy argument in there. Besides, if these are the troops he's going to hit us with, why is Kanai with them?"