Black Man / Thirteen

“No. She’s freelance, we’ve used her in the past. I pulled her in because we needed someone who knows the Rim systems. Ortiz wanted to keep the Merrin end of things separate from the rest.”

“And Daskeen Azul. They’re your people?”

A shrug. “Associates. You know how it works, Human Cost did them some favors in the past, they owed us.”

“So who sent them up to find that corpse in the nets? You?”

Jeff shook his head. “Onbekend. He heard from down south that you and this COLIN cop were poking around. Told me to bring the denouement forward.”

Marsalis came back to the sofa, paperweight in his hand. He was frowning. “Against Ortiz’s orders?”

“Ortiz was in the hospital.” Jeff gestured wearily. “No one knew which way to jump. You ever met Onbekend?”

“Briefly.”

“Yeah, well, when he tells you to do something, you don’t argue with him.”

Marsalis hadn’t lost his frown. “And the soldiers?”

“What soldiers?”

“Someone sent a uniformed death squad after Ertekin and me. They pulled us over between Cuzco and Arequipa.”

“I don’t know anything about that. Maybe someone panicked down there.”

“Bambarén,” the thirteen said softly. He crouched to Jeff’s eye level. “Do you think Manco Bambarén knows that Merrin existed? The other Merrin?”

“I don’t know Manco Bambarén from a hole in the fucking ground.” Jeff stared bitterly back at Marsalis. He seemed completely drunk now. “How the fuck would I know what he does or doesn’t know?”

“That’s unfortunate,” said the black man softly. “Tell me, Jeff, did you set Onbekend on me when I got back from Bulgakov’s Cat?”

“No! That wasn’t me, I swear. Onbekend wanted you out of the picture, I think he’d maybe talked to Ortiz, but he was furious about something else anyway. I told him it was better to let things lie, but he wouldn’t listen. You don’t understand what he’s like. Once he’s decided, he doesn’t listen to anything or anyone who gets in his fucking way.”

“Right. And I don’t suppose you know where I can find him now, do you?”

Jeff knocked back the rest of his drink. Shrugged. “You guess right. Last I heard, he was on his way back to the altiplano with a shoulderful of holes from a Marstech gun.”

“You treated him here?”

“At a Human Cost walk-in clinic, yeah. Over on Carmel.”

Marsalis came smoothly back to his feet. Norton saw how the thirteen’s fingers tightened on the paperweight, saw the heft in the arm. He stepped swiftly across, blocked Marsalis body-to-body. His eyes locked with the black man’s stare.

“No,” he said, very quietly. “Please.”

Marsalis stood coiled. His voice came back, also barely above a murmur. “Don’t get in my way, Norton.”

“He didn’t kill Sevgi.” Norton looked back at where Jeff sat slumped in one corner of the sofa, staring listlessly into his empty glass. He barely seemed aware of the other two men. “Look, you want to go after Onbekend, I’m with you. Ortiz, too, if that’s what you want. But this is my brother, Marsalis.”

“He’s going down anyway, Norton. He’ll do thirty years in a RimSec facility for this, minimum. I’d be doing him a favor.”

But a little of the tension seemed to drain from the thirteen’s stance. Norton raised his hand, palm-out. The small gesture for enough.

“Marsalis, please. I’m asking you for this. He’s my fucking brother.”

Marsalis stood there locked for a moment longer. It was like facing off against a wall.

“Ortiz, and Onbekend,” he said, as if checking a list.

Norton nodded. “Whatever you need.”

And the moment passed. Marsalis let go; Norton saw it go out of him like dark water down a drain. He shrugged and lobbed the paperweight down into Jeff’s lap. Jeff jolted with the shock, dropped his empty glass, fumbled with both hands to catch the spherical ornament before it rolled to the floor.

“Fuck d’you do that for?” he mumbled.

“You’ll never know,” Marsalis told him. Then, turning away to the door, voice trailing back. “Keep him here, Norton. Don’t touch the phones, or use yours in here. We’ll need to freeze and store their whole net as it is. I’ll clean-call Rovayo from the street, get a RimSec CSI squad over here. Going to make her day—this should be enough to lever the Cat bust wide open all over again.”

“Right.”

He paused at the door, looked back. “And don’t forget. We’ve got an arrangement now.”

Norton listened to him walk away down the corridor. Then he turned back to face his brother. Jeff looked disinterestedly up at him.

“What now?”

Sudden, pulsing rage, up from the soles of his shoes and into the space behind his eyes. He bit it back as well as he could.

“You know,” he said, almost evenly. “I told Megan about you and Nuying.”

Jeff gaped up at him, eyes cognac-veiled and confused.

“Maybe that’s simplifying it. I guess you could say she got it out of me. Or maybe not that, either, maybe we both wanted it said and we just helped each other get it out. If I’m honest, I think she already had a pretty good idea something was going on.”

Clumsily, his brother started to get up.

“You fucking traitor,” he said thickly.

“Stay in your seat, Jeff.” Suddenly, the rage came washing up out of him, would not be contained. “Because if you don’t, I will fucking kill you myself.”

And now, here it was. The moment that had been festering inside him for over two years. His brother blinking at him, like a deer staring into the headlights.

He drew in breath. He really was going to do this.

“You want to know what Megan did when she found out?” Another hard breath. “She fucked me, Jeff. We went to some motel up near Novato, and she fucked me raw. All afternoon and night. Best sex I ever had.”

And now Jeff came flailing up out of the sofa, roaring, fists swinging. Norton blocked, twisted, and punched his brother in the side of the face. The first time he’d used his enforcement training in better than a year. It felt creakily unaccustomed, but it felt unexpectedly good as well. The blow co

And stopped.

No. You’re not Carl Marsalis.

Fist slowly unflexing, dropping away. He let go of the collar. Overpowering urge to shake himself, like a drenched dog. Instead he stepped away, leaned against the edge of his brother’s desk.

“This is going to be hard on her,” he said, still breathing unevenly. “Megan and the kids. But don’t worry. When they send you up to Quentin Two for what you’ve done here, I’ll make sure she’s okay. I’ll take care of her.”

A low, grinding howl came up out of his brother’s throat as he propped himself up on the sofa, as if he’d swallowed broken glass. Norton felt a peculiarly comfortable calm settling into place on his shoulders. His breathing eased.

“We’re good together, Jeff. She laughs when she’s around me. We’ll work something out.”

“Fuck you!” Spat out like blood.

There was a timid tap at the door. Norton glanced up, surprised. “Yeah?”

The door opened and the stout Asian woman peered around the edge. “Mr. Norton, are you…?”

She stared, eyes wide.

“It’s okay,” said Norton hurriedly. “I’m Jeff’s brother, Tom. Jeff’s been under a lot of strain recently. I’m sure you’ll have noticed. It’s, uh, it’s gotten pretty bad.”

“I, uhm—”

“He really needs to be alone right now, just with family, you know. We’ve made the calls. If you could—”

“Yes, of course, uhm…” She looked across at Jeff where he now sat on the floor with his back to the sofa. Blood-flecked tissue in his nose, face smeared with tears and rage, uncapped bottle on the table in front of him. “Mr. Norton, I’m so sorry, if there’s anything at all I can do…”

Jeff Norton stared back at her.