Page 121 of Lone Wolf

“The First Commandment.”

“Of fucking course.”

She nudged him aside and he rolled in the Aeron and she hit her knees and her hands blurred across the keyboard, and the screens danced and obeyed like virtual puppets on virtual strings.

Three names of the recently deceased came up.

Martin Quinn, Warehouse Shopping Fulfillment Advocate.

Peter Savodnik, Public Relations Intern.

Anwuli Okonkwo, Senior Software Engineering Manager.

“Let’s look at causes of death,” Evan said. “Solventry has eight hundred thousand workers. Some folks are gonna die for normal reasons.”

Joey’s hands were at it again, a profusion of databases sprouting before him—the Los Angeles County Department of the Medical Examiner-Coroner, the Register of Cremations, the Office of Decedent Affairs. “Quinn died in a … autoerotic self-asphyxiation mishap. Gross.” Another flurry of fingers, the Das Keyboard thrumming with the sound of a heavy rain. “Savodnik died of pancreatic cancer. Hard to fake. And Ms. Okonkwo…” The windows leapt and loaded. “Accidental drowning in her bathtub.”

She cocked a skeptical eye at Evan. “Quinn and Okonkwo.”

“Seems likely,” Evan said. “So let’s go with that for now. Question: Why would Friedhoff want to pick off more Solventry workers?”

“From what you told me about what Allman’s up to,” Joey said, “I can’t see why anyone wouldn’t want to kill his employees.”

“But why these ones?”

“So Friedhoff’s feeling the heat of competition,” Joey said. “Or he’s trying to slow the progression of the technological monster he helped build and unleash. Then he performs some targeted strikes on his biggest rival to slow them down, too.”

“Why?”

“To make sure Youtopia, his own company, leads the way with more, dunno, moral responsibility or whatever compared to Allman. To give humanity a fighting chance against AI.”

Evan said, “A warehouse worker?”

Joey said, “Maybe Quinn had an unusual skill set or something. I don’t know.”

“Can you reach back further? The past year?”

“To see who else at Solventry might have ‘accidentally’ died?”

“Maybe this wasn’t Friedhoff’s first foray into targeted strikes on Solventry’s personnel.”

“I can do that,” Joey said. “And I’ll be into the internal network by day’s end so we’ll know exactly what Doc Hill was up to.”

That would work well. Evan had to cycle through his safe houses and make sure they were lined out in the event that Jayla Hill landed in his lap before this was over. It took some prep to 2.0 a witness-protection plan, and he didn’t want to get caught scrambling. Plus he had to attend to a personal matter.

He checked his Vertex fob watch, gauged the necessities he needed to handle. “Day’s end? You sure?”

Her phone dinged in her pocket. She took it out, turned it off without looking at it, and set it facedown on the sheet metal. Focused.

“It’s a self-imposed deadline,” she said. “But I’m over it. I’m cracking the motherfucker before I head out. That way I can disco-bowl with these Karennials in peace.”

“Meet back here at seventeen hundred for a sitrep,” Evan said. “Let’s break this open.”

54

Nowhere Anyone Wants to Be

Evan’s safe houses were scattered across Greater Los Angeles, and it took the better part of the day to service them properly and make them look lived-in. Changing automated sprinkler and lighting schedules, bringing in mail, moving vehicles from driveway to garage or vice versa. Some of the surveillance cameras had gotten glitchy, so he worked through the bugs and upgrades to make sure he’d have eyes up on everything should the need to stash Jayla arise.