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“The best.” Max led her through a glass corridor. He always claimed the soundproofing was better inside the kitchen, covered with some new glass from Asia. Glass and stainless steel appliances filled the kitchen, everything clear and sparkling. “Let’s have some Sangre, my darling, before we muse about poor Oskar Kruger and the scoundrel who gave you that nasty bruise on your jaw. How long has it been since you had a glass?”
Lila smirked.
“Ah, you bought a crate from Natalie recently? One of these days your mother will catch you at it.”
“I had breakfast with my father. Bullstow doesn’t care about my mother’s ban. Have I mentioned how much I love visiting my father?”
Max picked up a bottle of wine on the counter. “I hope you plan on visiting your father a whole lot more this week, because I fear your source has dried up.” He dug through a drawer for a corkscrew. The serving spoons and spatulas rattled against one another.
Lila shrugged and sat on the barstool across from him. “I know, but it won’t be hard to acquire a new source. Natalie was merely the cheapest option. I don’t have much sympathy for the woman. She’s difficult.”
“Women always are.” Max popped the cork with a hollow thunk. “Especially when they’ve been disowned. It happened right after her arrest warrant came down from Bullstow on Tuesday, and no one has seen her since. By the way, my sources tell me that you were right in the middle of that kerfuffle.”
“Kerfuffle? No one uses that word anymore, Max.”
“Kerfuffle, kerfuffle, kerfuffle.” He raised his eyes to the ceiling, unable to peer through the metal floor. “Mr. Vimes, please use the word ‘kerfuffle’ in a sentence for our darling Lila.”
A muffled voice came from somewhere upstairs. “I’ll get into a kerfuffle with my boss if I do not use this word in a sentence. I’ll get into a worse kerfuffle if I remind him that rich people do not shout.”
“Thank you, Mr. Vimes.” Max winked at Lila. “Chef Ana always said the same thing. I think the only reason why the rich do not raise their voices is because the poorer among us do not wish it. They train us as easily as spoiled puppies with diamond collars.”
“I didn’t say I didn’t know what kerfuffle meant, smartass, I just said no one uses the word.” She shove
d her empty glass closer to the wine.
Max held the bottle back. “You didn’t answer my question about Natalie’s arrest. Did you have something to do with it?”
“I have no intention of answering. It’s more fun to watch your little wheels work.”
“Brat. All of New Bristol is buzzing about what part you might have played in Natalie’s arrest, as well as the Wilsons’ downfall, and you won’t tell me? Me, Lila? I’m your oldest friend.”
“Alex is my oldest friend. You’re merely the most annoying.”
“Even after she assaulted you before the High Council?”
“How do you know about that already?”
Max grinned. “I know everything, my darling Lila, except where Natalie is. What do you know?”
“What makes you think I know anything about her arrest or her disappearance?”
Max stared at her for several long seconds, studying her face.
Lila didn’t flinch, and searched his face at the same time. They’d engaged in such contests frequently over the years, each claiming they knew when the other told a lie.
This time it was Max who pulled away first, finally pouring the wine, leaving Lila to wonder what he had gathered. “You usually know what I do not, and vice versa. That’s why I think you know. Of course, maybe you don’t. The rumor is that Chairwoman Holguín’s blood squad disappeared Natalie for dishonoring the family.”
Lila raised a brow. Every matron had a blood squad, reserved for violent and serious crimes against the family, usually perpetrated by the family itself. The group punished assassins and thieves, closing the gap between a family’s safety and what the law could prove. So long as the blood squad only operated on a family’s property and left no physical evidence behind, Bullstow left them alone. They even found a little innocent blood acceptable, so long as it kept their matrons, mothers, lovers, and children safe.
“Since when does that family care about dishonor?” Lila asked. “Even if the chairwoman did send her brutes, Natalie would have slipped away before they closed in. Follow the Sangre if you wish to find her. She still has a whole warehouse full of it.”
Max stopped mid-pour. “Where did you hear that?”
“It’s basic human psychology. A woman like Natalie will have an insurance policy set up somewhere. Mark my words, she has plenty of wine set aside to tide her over. She just won’t sell it here. There are other families in the commonwealth who boycott the Holguíns.”
“It’s almost as if you have firsthand experience with such insurance policies.”
“Now who’s fishing?”
