Robert smiled and gave her a brisk hug. “Good,” he said. “You’ll start tomorrow. I’ll tell them right away.”
Richard had warned Ellie during the ride on the ostrich-saur that Nakamura might try to use her in some way, most likely to justify his continued prosecution of the war. Ellie knew that by agreeing ostensibly to help the New Eden
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government she was committing herself to a very dangerous course.
Nikki was unfamiliar with her old bedroom at first, but after an hour or so of playing with some of her toys, she seemed quite content. She came into the bathroom, where Ellie was taking a bath, and stood next to the tub. “When will Daddy be home?” she asked her mother.
“He’1! be late, darling,” Ellie replied. “After you’ve gone to bed.”
“I like my room, Mommy,” Nikki said. “It’s much better than that old basement.”
“I’m glad,” Ellie replied. The little girl smiled and left the bathroom. Ellie took a deep breath. It would have served no purpose, she rationalized, if I had refused and we had been returned to confinement.
4
K;
katie had not finished with her makeup when she heard the buzzer sound. She took a drag on the cigarette burning in the ashtray beside her and pushed the TALK button. “Who is it?” she said.
“It’s me,” came the reply.
“What are you doing here in the middle of the day?”
“I have some important news,” Captain Franz Bauer said. “Buzz me up.”
Katie inhaled deeply on the cigarette and stubbed it out. She stood up and looked at herself in the full-length mirror. She adjusted her hair slightly just before the knock on her door.
“This had better be important, Franz,” Katie said, letting him into the room, “or your ass is mud. You know I have a disciplinary meeting with two of the girls in a few minutes and I hate to be late.”
Franz grinned. “You caught them skimming again? Jesus, Katie, I’d hate for you to be my boss.”
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Katie looked at Franz impatiently. “Well?” she said. “What was too important for the telephone?”
Franz had begun to walk around the living room. The room was tastefully decorated, with a black and white sofa and loveseat, two matching chairs, and several interesting objets d’art on both the end tables and the coffee table. “There’s not any chance that your apartment is bugged, is there?”
“You tell me, Mr. Police Captain,” Katie said. “Now, really, Franz,” she added, glancing at her watch, “I don’t have—”
‘There is a reliable report,” Franz said, “that your father is in New Eden at this very moment.”
“Whaat?” said Katie. “How is that possible?” She was stunned. She sat down on the couch and reached for another cigarette from the coffee table.
“A lieutenant of mine is close friends with one of your father’s guards. He was told that Richard and one of those octospider creatures are being held in the basement of a private residence not far from here.”
Katie crossed the room and picked up the telephone. “Darla,” she said, “tell Lauren and Atsuko that the meeting today is off. Something has come up. Reschedule for two o’clock tomorrow afternoon. … Oh, that’s right, I forgot. Dammit. … All right, make it eleven in the morning. No, eleven-thirty. I don’t want to wake up too early.”
Katie returned to the couch and picked up her cigarette. She took a huge drag and blew smoke rings into the air over her head. “I want to know everything that you have heard about my father.”
Franz informed Katie that, according to his sources, her father, her sister Ellie, her niece, and an octospider had suddenly appeared, carrying a white flag, at the troop encampment on the southern edge of the Cylindrical Sea about two months ago. They had been quite relaxed and had even joked wim the soldiers, Franz said. Her father and sister had told the troops that they had come forward with an octospider representative to see if an armed conflict between the two species could be avoided through negotiation.
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Nakamura had ordered that the entire affair be kept secret and had taken them.
Katie was pacing around the room. “My father is not only alive,” she said excitedly, “he is here, in New Eden. Have I ever told you, Franz,” she said, “that my father is absolutely the smartest human being who ever lived?”
“About a dozen times,” Franz said. He laughed. “I can’t imagine how anyone could be smarter than you.”
Katie waved her hand. “He makes me look like an absolute idiot. He was always such a dear. I could get away with anything.” She stopped her pacing and inhaled on her cigarette. Her eyes sparkled as she exhaled the smoke. “Franz,” she said. “I must see him. I absolutely must.”
‘That’s impossible, Katie,” he said. “Nobody is even supposed to know that he’s here. I could be fired, or worse, if anyone ever found out that I told you.”
“I’m pleading with you, Franz,” Katie said, crossing the room and grabbing him by the shoulders. “You know how I hate asking anyone for favors … but this is very important to me.”
Franz was delighted that for once, Katie was requesting something from him. Nevertheless, he told her the truth. “Katie,” he said, “you still don’t understand. There is an armed guard around the house at all times. The entire basement is bugged with audio and video monitors. There is just no way.”
“There’s always a way,” Katie said emphatically, “if something is important enough.” She reached inside his shirt and began tweaking his right nipple. “You do love me, don’t you, Franz?” She kissed him, a full open-mouthed kiss, with her tongue darting teasingly across his. Katie pulled away slightly, continuing to play with his nipple.
“Of course I love you, Katie,” Franz said, already very much aroused. “But I’m not crazy.”
Katie marched off into her bedroom and returned less than a minute later with two stacks of bills. “I am going to see my father, Franz,” she said, throwing the money on the coffee table. “And you are going to help me. You can bribe anyone you want with this money.”
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Franz was impressed. The money was more than adequate. “And what are you going to do for me?” he said almost jokingly,
“What am I going to do for youT Katie said. “What am I going to do for you?” Katie took him by the hand and led him to the bedroom. “Now, Captain Bauer,” she said in an accented voice, “you just take off all your clothes and lie here on your back. You’ll see what I am going to do for you.”
Katie’s apartment had a dressing room adjacent to her bedroom. She walked into the smaller room and closed the door. With a key she unlocked a large decorated box on the top of the counter and pulled out one of the full syringes she had prepared earlier in the day. Katie lifted her dress and tied a tight tourniquet around her upper thigh with a piece of small black tubing. She waited momentarily until she could clearly identify a blood vessel in the mass of bruises on her thigh, and then she deftly inserted the syringe. After pressing all the fluid into her bloodstream, Katie waited a few seconds for the fantastic rush and then removed the tourniquet.
“What am I supposed to do while I’m waiting?”
“Rilke is in my electronic reader, darling,” she said, “both in German and English. I’ll only be a few more minutes.”
Katie was flying. She started humming a dance tune while she threw the syringe away and returned the tourniquet to the box. She took off all her clothes, stopping twice to admire her body in the mirror, and put them in a pile upon the vanity stool. Then she opened a large drawer in the vanity and pulled out a blindfold.
She paraded into the bedroom. Franz’s eyes feasted admiringly upon her lithe body. “Look carefully,” Katie said, “’cause this is all you’re going to see this afternoon.”
Katie draped her naked body casually across his and kissed him intermittently while she attached the blindfold. She made certain that the blindfold was snug and (hen jumped down from the bed. “What happens now?” Franz asked.
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“You’ll just have to wait and see,” Katie said teasingly as she rummaged through a large drawer at the bottom of her dresser. The drawer contained a smorgasbord of sexual paraphernalia, including electronic aids of all kinds, lotions, ropes and other bondage equipment, masks, and assorted models of genitalia. Katie selected a small bottle of lotion, a vial of white powder, and some beads strung along a piece of thin cord.
Still humming and laughing to herself, Katie rejoined Franz on the bed and began to run her fingers over his chest. She kissed him provocatively with her body pressed against his and then sat up. After pouring the lotion on her hands and rubbing them together vigorously, Katie spread his legs, crawled onto his stomach with her back toward Franz’s face, and began to apply the lotion to his most sensitive parts.