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“What?” I tried to push my surprise away. “Why? Conducting interrogations would be like waving a flag saying ‘I’m IPF!’”
“You have that deception detection stuff.” He waved his hand at me dismissively. “I saw you work last time, and you were scary accurate. We’d have never found the mercenary that fast without you.”
The praise was nice, but I still didn’t want to do it. “I’m sure my expertise can be put to use elsewhere.”
“If you’re worried about coming off like an IPF agent, then Steel can do the questioning and you can observe. All the men are scared of him.”
Steel gave him a hard look. “Not scared enough.”
“You slit the throat of one of their own in front of their eyes, not to mention what happened to the other one. They had to clean up the bodies. I think they have a healthy fear of you.”
The talk of murder was unsettling. “I don’t need his help. And I don’t think he needs mine. I’d rather chase down leads of another sort.”
Emerson’s look turned hard. “You will do as I ask. You will talk to my men and find out if any of them are involved in this. If you want my help, then you need to do what I say. Steel will ask the questions and you’ll sit there and watch. Any suspicions will be reported to me. Clear?”
My rebellious streak tried to push to the surface. It took me a minute to gain control of it and shove it down. Regardless of my feelings, I needed to rely on Emerson to survive. He was calling the shots, and I had to do what he said, even if I didn’t like it. I glared at him, but I managed to nod. He nodded back before looking at Steel. “If you want to help, then this is what you can do. Retired or not, you like a good challenge. And this doesn’t involve killing anyone. Think you can manage?”
Steel seemed amused by the sarcasm in his voice. “So much for this being a vacation.”
Emerson snorted. “I thought Cass kicked you out?”
He scowled. “No. She’s working on an important project. It’s taking up a lot of her time. I’m a distraction.”
“So, she told you to leave?”
“No. I suggested maybe I could check in on you. For some inexplicable reason, she seems to find you tolerable and thought it would be a great time to visit old friends. So here I am.”
Emerson looked doubtful. “Are you sure you didn’t fight?”
“We didn’t fight. Let it go, Emerson.”
He lifted his hands in surrender. “Fine. I just wondered with you talking about starting up this new security thing if you were back on your own. I’m sure we’ll talk about it later. You won’t hear me complain about the visit or the help.”
Steel glared at him. “You’re making me regret offering you a job if you ever quit being a mercenary.”
Emerson shrugged. “I may take you up on it one day.”
Ethan spoke again, interrupting them. “And what is it I’m supposed to do?”
“You can call up some Goliath contacts and see if they’ve had any problems with Archuleta or any of his men, or if there’s been any word going around about what happened. Think you can manage that?”
The hard look came back to Ethan’s face. He said nothing.
“Good.” Emerson looked back at me. “I think you need to get some rest. Both of you.”
“I’m feeling much better.” I tried not to scowl.
“I’m sure you are, but you still need to rest. I need to make some calls, talk to Archuleta, and get in touch with Reuben. He’s with the ship. We’ll meet up with him tomorrow and you can start the interrogations. There’s nothing else you can do until then.”
Arguing against him was fruitless, so I sighed. Sleep did sound amazing. Even though I was feeling a lot better, I was still tired. Mentally, if nothing else. A break sounded nice.
“Fine.”
“The next door to the right is the bathroom, and there are two bedrooms on the left from here. You two can have your pick.”
I glanced down at my clothes. Or rather, Ethan’s clothes. At least they had survived the day intact. “Do you have any spare clothes? Maybe something more my size?”
He eyed my baggy clothes and nodded. “In the master bedroom’s closet there should be some of her stuff. You can give them back to her next time you see her.”
