“Oh, that’s clever of you,” Alex said, and it sounded admiring. “And not very nice of him, to take credit for your work. No wonder you started your own project.”
“I need to start telling himnoand completely break away,” she said, sighing. “My dad’s a giant fucking hypocrite and I hate it. So was Senator Hathaway. She claimed to hate empaths because of privacy violations, but then voted for all these bills that let the police monitor citizens and corporations buy up our data. She was voting away all our protections, it’s right there in public records, but my dad never cared as long as she kept up her anti-empathy rhetoric. Cedrick Stone was the same way. The three of them would have dinner, parties, vacations—expense it all to Stone Solutions, of course, which means it got funded by the Empath Initiative, which means it was all actually taxpayer money. They used to laugh about it.”
“Charming,” Alex said, in a voice that suggested the opposite.
The waitress dropped off Alex’s juice and Gretel’s cappuccino. “I’ll give Senator Hathaway this, though,” Gretel said, as the waitress left. “Unlike the rest of them, at least she was anti-war. You ever go diving into the military connections behind most of the people at Stone Solutions or the Empath Initiative?”
Alex shrugged. “I’m probably more familiar with those connections than most people,” he said lightly.
“It’s wild, right?” she said, reaching for the cappuccino like it was a caffeinated lifeline. “Like why would you ever need all those military ties when the empaths are such pacifists? I feel like there’s a story there, like there’s something someone isn’t telling us.” She shook her head. “Sorry,” she said sheepishly. “I got lost in research last night and now I’m off on a tangent.”
“And I’m hanging on every word,” Alex said. “I invited you here because I wanted to listen to whatever you had to say.”
That made her smile. “Tell me about your blog,” she said. “What’s it called?”
“I haven’t been bold enough to name it,” he admitted. “It’s just a place for my thoughts right now, really.”
“But you’ve got to be working on a story,” she pressed.
“Well,” he said, “I was actually thinking about writing a piece on Stone Solutions’ security. Supposedly it’s this state-of-the-art empath defense company but we were both there the night an empath broke in during the AMI strategy meeting.”
“Oh, I’d definitely read that,” Gretel said. “Because it does make you wonder, doesn’t it? Their security can’t be very good if Reece Davies managed to get past it.”
Alex tilted his head. “You don’t think Reece is very smart?”
She snorted. “I don’t want to be mean, because I don’thatehim. But have you heard the kind of shit he says? Seen the comments he leaves on my blog? It’s like his brain doesn’t even work.” She paused, replaying her words in her head, then winced. “Ugh, you know what? I take that back. Reece is just being an empath, wearing his heart on his sleeve, and Iambeing mean.” She made a face. “I sound like my dad when I trash him like that, but Reece has never done anything to deserve it. To be honest, he’s the only one in the city who’s ever noticed thatEyes on Empathsis its own thing that I run myself. Well.” She smiled again. “Until you.”
“I bet Reece has a lot of hidden depths that no one’s ever seen. Most empaths do.” Alex reached for his orange juice. “You mentioned AMI and Cedrick Stone. I hope it’s okay if I ask—do you think your dad knows anything about Stone Solutions’ security?”
“I bet he does; he’s there all the time,” she said, picking up her coffee. “You want to ask him tonight? He’s having a dinner for some colleagues at the steak house in the Leviathan Hotel. I could drop by and you could be my plus-one.”
“Could I really?” Alex said. “Are you sure I don’t need to, I don’t know, joust with ten other bloggers to win the privilege first?”
She laughed. “All you have to do is let me read the story.” And if it was any good, she could invite Alex to guest post it onEyes on Empaths. Maybe ease her readers into the idea that she might be posting more critical and analytical content. Hell, if Alex’s article was accompanied by a picture that showed how hot he was, her readers would probably eat it up; they loved eye candy, couldn’t get enough of her picture of the Dead Man.
He raised his glass. “It’s a deal,” he said, and they clinked their cups together.
Jamey and Liam had been five minutes outside of Port Angeles when Stensby finally sent the details about the missing empath. And it turned out to be a flood—the empath’s name and at least a dozen different addresses for various houses and businesses he had visited over the past few days.
Jamey had shown the list to Liam, frowning. “This is going to take all day. At least. We’re going to need a hotel.”
“I told Lieutenant Parson I’m here as long as you’re here,” Liam had said. “Stensby’s the one who asked you to come on this goose chase and everyone on the SPD knows you just gave back your car. Parson can deal.”
They’d gotten a room for the night and Liam had stayed there to catch up on work. Now Jamey was sitting in Liam’s car, looking over her list again. The missing empath was from Victoria, according to Stensby’s notes. Mr. Rodriguez had spent three days visiting national parks before disappearing.
It wasn’t Jamey’s preferred hiking weather, but maybe this particular empath loved the snow. Maybe he’d gotten lost or stranded. Olympic National Park was about as far as you could get from Vermont in the continental United States, so maybe this Canadian empath’s disappearance from Port Angeles had nothing to do with the Canadian empath found murdered in Burlington.
Maybe.
Jamey forwarded the information to Aisha. Hopefully Grayson’s team could dig up better information while Jamey followed the trail.
Victor Nichols sat in the backseat of Cedrick Stone’s Maybach, letting the driver deal with the I-5 traffic as they crept north. Marist was at her hotel, working on her keynote speech for AMI’s privacy conference, while Director Traynor was in Bellevue, visiting Stone Solutions. Obviously Cedrick himself wasn’t using his car these days; shame to let it go to waste.
Shame to let any of Cedrick’s other things go to waste as well—namely, his research projects. Research projects like Cora Falcon.
And if Ms. Falcon was known to be one of Cedrick’s projects, then the same could possibly be true of Reece Davies.
Nichols reopened the police report on his phone, from Officer Stensby. Stensby had arrived onto the Stone Solutions rooftop and seen Davies next to Cedrick Stone’s bloody and unconscious body, in a position of surrender at Agent Grayson’s feet. None of that sounded like the actions of an innocent.
