“Meaning others have?”
He nodded. “Most of the shops between here and the club have been empty for a while. Apparently someone is in the process of buying them out.”
“That someone being the club?”
“Actually, no. Stane reckons it’s some corporation intent on re-energizing t
he area.”
I snorted. Re-energizing was another way of saying building heaps of tiny apartments, adding a small shopping precinct, and charging a fortune to live there.
“So who else is holding out?”
He shrugged and pushed the front door open. A tiny bell rang cheerily and a camera buzzed into action, tracking our movements into the shop. Light shimmered briefly around the small entrance then flickered out, and I realized Stane had a containment field around his doorway. People might be able to walk freely into the shop, but they couldn’t get any farther unless he let them.
“Besides the club?” Tao said, catching my hand and tugging me forward. “A milliner and a general store.”
The shop was small and smelled of dust and mold, which was weird considering neither was good for computers. There were shelves everywhere, all packed with boxes, old and new computer parts, and ancient-looking monitors of varying sizes. Organized it wasn’t.
I shook my head, wondering how he found anything as I said, “Why the hell would a milliner want to work in an area like this?”
“Because,” a voice said as a figure appeared out of the gloom, “we are all fools. And you have the Bollinger. Well done, you.”
I smiled. Stane, like his shop, was an unholy mess. Given the cobwebbed brown hair, thick gray cardigan, and wrinkled, ill-fitting jeans, he resembled something the cat had coughed up and forgotten. He certainly didn’t look like someone who’d put up any sort of fight—until you actually gazed into his honey-colored eyes. Stane, like Tao, was smarter and harder than he looked.
Tao handed him the champagne. Stane thanked him, but his gaze was on me. “You know, if Tao was any sort of friend, he’d help you out with that ache.”
“The whole friends-with-benefits deal is off,” Tao said, before I could answer. “It’s heartbreaking, I tell you.”
I slapped his arm, then gave Stane a steely look. “One more smart remark about my state and I really am going to hit someone. Hard.”
He grinned. “Warning heeded.”
“Good. Did you manage to find anything out about Marcus Handberry?”
“Yeah. He’s a nastier piece of work than even I realized.” His grin grew, but the amusement that had been crinkling the corners of his eyes faded as he added, “And he apparently didn’t exist until a year ago.”
“NO ONE CAN JUST POP UP OUT OF NOWHERE fully formed,” I commented. “He had to exist somewhere, even if it wasn’t in this incarnation.”
He smiled and glanced at Tao. “She’s smarter than she looks.”
“I keep telling you to look deeper than the skin,” Tao said drily.
“But the skin is so pretty—even when it’s not her usual one. This way, my friends.”
We followed Stane as he weaved through the shelves and dust, then climbed the set of stairs at the back of the store and entered another world. A world that was clean, dust-free, and bristling with all sorts of shiny electronic equipment.
“God, it looks like the bridge of the Enterprise,” I commented.
Stane spun around. “You know about Star Trek?”
“Watched every series, old and new.”
“Favorite?”
“The latest incarnation.” I grinned. Tao and I had this argument all the time. “Better beefcake.”
Stane groaned. “And I had such hope for you, too.”