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“Then you—”
“Couldn’t move until my tech department linked the senator to his victim’s financial data, if I can even call them victims. We could have dealt with the matter privately, spacing out the arrests so we did not draw the ire of the poorer classes, just as we’ve always done. Instead, we find ourselves here. It is a travesty that Ms. Randolph’s name and reputation have been besmirched in the press, that she’s been made to sit here like a criminal when she nearly single-handedly saved us from the unrest we bear witness to today. She risked her neck to help Bullstow, and I owe her father and her matron my life for what has happened. I never should have put her in this position, but to be frank, Bullstow should not have put me in this situation. We should never have needed help to begin with, or we should have made allowances to contract out for it when the need arises. Legally.”
“You can contract it out legally,” Masson countered, “but consultants do not come from highborn families. It is
a conflict of interest of the highest order. It is—”
“Are you not listening to me?” Shaw asked. “How was I supposed to know if I’d be hiring the very person I needed to find? There are only a roomful of people in the state who could have found La Roux. I picked the one person I knew it wouldn’t be.”
“Is all this true, Ms. Randolph?”
“I have tried to do right by you and your brothers and Saxony,” Lila replied carefully. “I apologize for not working quickly enough after La Roux passed. I had no idea he’d set up a dead man’s switch, and I didn’t have enough time to properly investigate his personal files and accounts before it flipped two mornings later. When he did not stop it, evidence against the highborn and the hackers leaked to the media. Be thankful the press doesn’t know about everyone in La Roux’s clutches. It could have been much worse.”
It would be much worse once she finished working through the data, especially for two of the lowborn senators now eating lobster and truffles in a restaurant across the compound. They’d both paid well for their seats on the committee, or at least their families had paid, and they still sent money to a dead man’s account, all to keep the secret quiet.
“La Roux tried to make several deals with me that night,” Lila continued. “He—”
“After he nearly strangled her and beat her half to death.”
Lila’s eyes flicked to Shaw. She hadn’t wanted anyone to know that.
The senators’ expressions changed from rapt attention to disgust and pity.
She might as well have been some weak child.
But she was, wasn’t she? La Roux never should have bested her. She should have been better than that, stronger than that, able to defend herself or at least able to put up a fight. She was a militia chief, for gods’ sake. She’d had training.
“La Roux said that if he went down, everyone else would go down with him,” she said. “Chief Shaw wasn’t dealing with a bored teenager or a random hacker. La Roux planted a sophisticated trap in the fabric of the network itself. I’ve closed that trap, but it doesn’t change the fact that La Roux made himself into a puppet master. I haven’t found all the puppets yet. Some still walk free.”
“Why didn’t he leak the others, then?” Hardwicke asked.
“Because there’s a second dead man’s switch, maybe more,” Masson answered. “Those rounds will expose far more interesting players.”
“More interesting players, indeed,” Lila said. “Make no mistake: La Roux planned the switch to flip. If he ever died or got caught, this was supposed to happen. He didn’t send the reports to Chief Shaw or the governor. He sent them to the press.”
“You’re saying my cousin wanted to destroy Bullstow?”
“I think you should draw your own conclusions, Senator Masson. He had plenty of time to tell us about the switch. He did not. He wanted everyone to pay while he spared himself and his family from the stain of dishonor. How’s that for hypocrisy?”
Senator Hardwicke snatched up his pen and set to clicking. “It troubles me that you know so many secrets about the senate, Ms. Randolph.”
“Chief Shaw does not inform me of such secrets unless I need to know them. I can assure you, they are no secrets of mine to pass along at dinner parties.”
The senators swiveled back and forth upon their chairs, whispering. Masson bent his head down to capture the conversation, but he did not take his eyes from Lila and Shaw.
Lila matched his gaze and did not look away.
“Enough,” Masson said at last. “Ms. Randolph, I have no words. Even if you acted only as a consult to Bullstow under Chief Shaw’s direction, then… Well, I find myself wishing you had been more successful. I can’t have that feeling and charge you like the rest. What have you stolen that has not been freely given?”
“You neglect the obvious,” Shaw replied. “She is not done. What lowborn business can we hire to finish the job when some of the very hackers in our holding cells work for those same businesses? Do you see now why we need her?”
A pen clicked in the silence before being tossed away. “I move we drop all charges against Ms. Randolph,” Senator Hardwicke said.
“Agreed,” said the senator on his right.
“Me too,” the other two murmured at the same time.
Senator Masson ducked his head with a great sigh. “Ms. Randolph, the committee drops all charges against you. Gods help us all.”
