Kris Longknife's Assassin Read online

  “Longknife is not an objective of the Peterwald Empire on Eden. We have more important work to concentrate on. You will make no further attacks on Kris Longknife.”

  Victoria shrugged. “If you say so, Uncle Grant.”

  He glared at her. She did her best to look properly cowed. He had two of his guards trail her to her room. Her maids put her to bed then left her, but she could hear at least one of the guards talking to one of her maids. They talked for a long time.

  Vicky’s computer found more spies in her room that night. It suborned them and recorded nice pictures of her sleeping soundly.

  Chapter 10

  Kiefer came through the window at his usual time. He was in her bed in a flash, but she batted his hand away from her breast.

  “You’re not going to find a way to kill Kris Longknife on my boob. Come up with a good one or go home.”

  He backed off, but he cradled her head in the crook of his left arm as his right hand stroked her neck.

  “Do you know that Kris Longknife has a great-grandmother?”

  “So?” Vicky said. Grandparents were a vague idea with Vicky. She had Daddy. She knew her mother had died when she was born. Daddy’s mother and father had died before she could have any memories of them. Older folks like grandparents or great-grandparents existed; just not so much for her.

  “Well,” Kiefer said, stroking her cheek bone, “Kris Longknife’s great-grandmother is visiting here on New Eden. She’s actually teaching at Eden U.”

  Vicky mulled that for a moments. “And?”

  “And I know the people she rented her security guards from. She went cheap. I guess she wasn’t expecting trouble. Anyway, I can buy up her contract and they’ll deliver the old lady, tied up with a nice bow.”

  Vicky thought about that for only a second before ideas started sparking off even as Kiefer’s hand started roving lower on her neck and onto her collar bone.

  “If we kidnap the old lady and send Kris Longknife a ransom demand that has her bring the money herself and leave those hairy assed-Marines behind . . .” she said.

  “Then we have her,” both she and Kiefer finished together, even as he slid his hand down past her breast to the jackpot between her legs.

  “Oh, yes,” Vicky said, and gave herself over to the enjoyment that was hers alone.

  The next day at breakfast, Vicky only scanned the news. The Spring Charity Art Extravaganza made the social page, with a comment about a gas main explosion and remarks that the local gas company really should be privatized and its union employees replaced with more competent people.

  Vicky smiled. No doubt the new workers would be lower paid and even less competent. That was not her problem.

  Grant looked up from his reader. “It seems that you did manage to hurt Kris Longknife. She’s been admitted to the embassy clinic for observation. The same for her security guard. What did you say yesterday? A near miss? Well, this miss is likely to take that young lady out of reach of any further attacks. Now, ignore her and go about your business of learning the business?”

  “Yes,” Vicky said. It was the most meek she’d ever been with anyone but Daddy.

  Grant eyed her for a moment, but she kept meek on. He seemed satisfied.

  Only when Vicky was done with her light breakfast and out of the sun-lit buttery did she smile.

  Kris Longknife, you can hide in your hospital bed, but I’ve got something that will bring you limping out to where I can put a bullet between your eyes.

  Kiefer was absent that day. No doubt he’d gotten an early version of Vicky’s schedule. She spent the entire day with accountants. Surely, there was no blood in the veins of this human subspecies. They talked numbers until Vicky’s head swam. She fell back on smiling graciously, nodding, and offering vague comments . . . while all the while thinking of Kris Longknife in the crosshairs of a nice rifle.

  There was nothing special for this evening, but Vicky found it going slowly. Kiefer had nothing to say to her when she passed him in the hall. Was he having problems getting the old lady’s guards to haul her off?

  He did not come that night.

  Vicky insisted on sleeping in the next day. She was supposed to spend time with the network support staff. No doubt, they had code in their veins as bad as the numbers the accountants used for blood. She simply had to have a day off between those two.

  Around ten, her computer beeped. “If you can get away from von Schrader, I’ve got a surprise for you,” came from Kiefer.

  Vicky called for her maids and was dressed in no time. She ordered the car brought around front and was in it fifteen minutes after the message from Kiefer.

  She was just rolling away when her computer beeped again.

  “Mr. von Schrader wishes to see you.”

  “I don’t want to see him,” Vicky snapped. “I have business of my own.”

  “It seems your business impacts mine and your father’s,” was Grant talking. “You come to my study or my men will carry you.”

  “I will drop them before they lay a hand on me,” Vicky said. She didn’t actually have a pistol, but Grant didn’t know that.

  “Then the armored security guards will collect you and you can sample the hospitality of my lower basements until such time as your father asks about you. I expect that might be a very long time, all things considered.”

  While Grant talked, the limo had taken one turn and then another. Vicky found herself delivered back to the mansion’s front door. Only now, guards, a few in armor, waited for her.

  Victoria Smyth-Peterwald stormed into Grant’s study. Four security guards trailed her warily, as if she actually had that pistol.

  “You don’t have the right to stop me,” Vicky shouted as she crossing the threshold.

  “I imagine your brother told his mentor that about the time he tried breathing vacuum,” Grant said, sounding so maddening calm and collected.

  “It was that damn Longknife,” Vicky spat as she leaned on his desk, glowering down at where he sat.

  “So you were going to get her,” Grant said, actually sounding reasonable.

  “Her and that old bag both.”

  Grant sighed and shook his head. “That old bag, as you call her, was surviving Iteeche killer pods long before your father was born.”

  “And I caught her up like a blind cow at feeding time,” Vicky said, adding to her story with a bit of a guess.

  “No doubt. However, your father and I cannot afford another kidnaping bandied about human space at the moment. Her husband, General Trouble, is not a man who takes offense well.”

  “He’ll never know what killed her. Her and that Longknife brat.”

  “Ah, but I know. And you just bragged about it in front of four security guards. That is not how your father or I arrived at our places in human space. If your right hand slits a throat, your left hand knows nothing about it. You should meditate on this.”

  Vicky stomped her foot in rage. “I don’t have time to waste doing that meditating thing of yours.”

  “I’m afraid you do.” Grant raised his voice slightly. “Ms. Rotterdame.”

  “Yes sir,” Vicky’s chief of maid’s voice answered immediately on net.

  “I am sending Miss Victoria up to her suites. She is to stay there, meditating on the meaning of security. I do not want her out of your sight for any reason. You understand me? Any. Reason.”

  “Perfectly, Mr. von Schrader. She will be under the personal observation of either me or an assistant at all times, no matter how personal or odoriferous her activity. I will bring out the shock cane if she proves too headstrong.”

  “We understand each other,” he said, then frowned at Vicky and her rage. “I will also have guards at your door and on the grounds below your suite. You were quite good at slipping out of the nursery back on Greenfeld. Do not mistake my house for such a recreation area. You have created a problem that I must now solve. Go to your rooms while I do.”

  Vicky kicked an end table on her wa
y out. It, however, proved heavier than it looked and hardly moved. She slapped the lamp on top of it. Somebody had bolted the damn thing to the table, all she did was knock the shade askew.

  When Grant added, “I would have expected better from a Peterwald,” it was too much for Vicky. She whirled around to face him and screamed as she had never screamed before.

  She bent over as she screamed, putting every last breath she had into her primal rejection of Grant and his worthless opinion of her.

  He just looked at her from where he sat, as unmoved as a stone statue.

  Exhausted, Vicky stomped out.

  Four guards followed her to her room. Ms. Rotterdame was waiting for her at the suite. Usually she stood placidly with her hands folded before her.

  Now the old biddy stood, a shock cane in her right hand, slapping it purposely into her left.

  Vicky halted.

  A guard behind her made to push her through the door.

  Vicky grabbed hold of the door jam.

  Two guards shoved her. Vicky held on tight.

  Only when the other guards pried her hands loose was she sent sprawling into her sitting room. The lush green carpet that had caressed her bare feet now made friction burns on her hands.

  Ms. Rotterdame stalked forward to rest the tip of her shock cane on Vicky’s stinging hand. “That will be enough, gentlemen,” she said to the guards. “Leave Ms. Peterwald to me. Entirely to me.”

  The senior of the four guards got a tight grin on his face. The guards withdrew and the door slid closed with a firm click.

  The shock cane bit Vicky’s hand.

  “That hurt,” she yelped.

  “I imagine it did. Now, will you stand up like the lady you are supposed to be and sit down on the sofa for a civilized conversation? Or will we have it in a more painful fashion?”

  Later, Vicky would wonder at how cowed she was. Was it the shock cane or being shoved around by her guards? Maybe it was both. She’d never had to put up with anything like this except for Daddy.

  Vicky Peterwald stood, smoothed her plum colored sun dress, and walked to the couch. Like a proper lady, she sat upon it.

  “Good. Maybe you can learn,” Ms. Rotterdame said, and went to sit in the armchair across from Vicky.

  “Now, while you were stomping your way here, Mr. von Schrader arranged for me to be briefed on the kidnaping of Professor Tordon. You, no doubt, arranged it.”

  Vicky considered several replies, before swallowing them all and settling for silence.

  “Good, at least you are learning not to blurt out confessions to the average bystander. The professor was successfully kidnaped yesterday.”

  Vicky blinked, but refused to nod or recognize her part in any of it.

  “Unfortunately, for the last few days, Commander Tordon’s security had been augmented by two very armed Marines.” Ms. Rotterdame spoke of this as if it presented a serious problem.

  Vicky allowed herself a hint of a frown, but again, kept her mouth shut.

  “While the security guards were thoroughly suborned, you can’t buy Marines with money. Admittedly, that is strange, considering how poorly they are paid. Still, the only way this kidnaping could be pulled off was to kill the Marines.”

  Vicky was getting tired of this lecture and its slow pace. “If they’re dead, how can that be a problem?” she put in.

  “Dead Marines bring live Marines, and you don’t want a Marine for your enemy. Someone is, no doubt, in the process of learning that lesson.”

  Vicky had enough. She snapped, “But if Kris Longknife is told to bring the ransom money for her great-grandmother herself and with no Marine guard, it will put her out where Kris Longknife will die.”

  The shock cane snapped across the space between Ms. Rotterdame and Vicky in a split second, biting at Vicky’s exposed arm.

  “Ouch, damn it! Don’t do that!”

  The cane shot out again.

  “That is to teach you not to blurt out your guilt.”

  Now Ms. Rotterdame was standing above Vicky, slamming the cane down on her bare shoulders time and time again.

  Vicky screamed. She screamed for the guards.

  No guards came.

  The cane kept coming. It stung Vicky’s shoulders, arms, legs, body.

  Vicky curled up in a ball on the couch, trying to protect herself.

  “Learn, young woman! Learn!” Ms. Rotterdame repeated over and over. “You do not mess with things you know nothing about. You do not make enemies of people that can do more to you than you ever dreamed in your young life that you can do to them. Ask questions! Learn, young woman! Learn!”

  The pain increased. Vicky screamed. Then she cried.

  Only then did the pain cease and the voice go away.

  Vicky stayed curled up in her protective ball, still hurting even after the pain had ended. Somehow, she fell asleep.

  Much later, Ms. Rotterdame awoke her. “You will now dress for travel. Mr. von Schrader has ordered you tickets for the next liner with connections to Greenfeld.”

  “Why?”

  “He didn’t tell me,” Ms. Rotterdame said, tapping the floor with the shock cane.

  Vicky moved slowly to wash her face, replace her makeup and dress. She seemed in a haze. The pain was gone, but the memory stayed loud and clear. Maid bustled about her, packing. Even guards were brought in to help, although the senior guard stood at the opposite end of the room from Ms. Rotterdame and kept his eye on Vicky.

  She did what she was told. The shock cane continued to tap the floor.

  As they herded her and her luggage toward the front door, Vicky glanced at the wing with Mr. von Schrader’s office. “Can I say goodbye?” Maybe find out why I’m being shuffled away so suddenly and what I’ll find when I get home.

  “Mr. von Schrader is busy,” was all Ms. Rotterdame said.

  The ride to the space elevator and up was enveloped in painful silence that was a relief after the other pain. Only the occasional tapping of the shock cane interrupted it. Vicky was taken directly to her rooms on the liner Queen of the Stars. Mr. Rotterdame finally broke the silence when she handed Vicky a reader. “You might want to read that.”

  “Why? Nothing of worth is ever there.”

  “Apparently not today. There has been a coup d’etat on New Eden. A very bloody coup that appears to have failed miserably. The media is taken up with it full time.”

  “And why does that mean anything to me?”

  “It seems that your Kris Longknife and her Marines were at the heart of the coup’s failure.”

  Ms. Rotterdame spoke slowly, as if to a stupid child. Vicky wanted to spit something back. Instead, she took the words in, let them walk about in her brain. She gave a different response when she finally spoke.

  “What did Kris Longknife and her Marines do to trip up the coup?”

  “Among other things, they killed Mr. von Schader,” was again spoken so calmly. So matter-of-factly. Vicky found herself wondering if Ms. Rotterdame was in shock.

  Was Vicky?

  Vicky sat back in her chair, let the supper her guards had brought get cold and watched the news scroll by on her reader. Occasionally, she let some video fill the screen.

  There was a brief video of Kris Longknife and her Marines forming up before their fallen comrades. They saluted their dead. From somewhere a single bugle began to fill the air with clear notes.

  Vicky had never heard that tune before, still, it brought tears to her eyes. She watched as exhausted, battle scarred Marine men and woman stood in their carefully spaced place in lines and ended their salute on a single word.

  Again, under orders, they turned and marched off. Somewhere, a single voice began a song. Vicky couldn’t understand the words, but the song was taken up by those marching. They must have been battle weary, but the song roused them.

  They didn’t march as the tired and dirty bunch they were. Rather, they swaggered off as victors.

  And I thought I could cross those people
and kill Kris Longknife.

  Vicky found herself concentrating on the news feed. Daddy had little respect for the guttersnipes of the media. “They never get anything right,” and more often than not, Vicky learned very little from the time she spent with the news.

  Today, she learned a lot. She listened as people who actually knew something about the attack on Government House described what they’d done and seen. Each one had a tiny bit of the truth, mixed in with confusion and lies, but taken as a whole, Vicky began to see how Grant’s attack had come apart as it collided with Kris Longknife and her Marines.

  Vicky stared at the ceiling during a commercial.

  Kris Longknife. You aren’t any older than I am. How did you manage to do this?

  How can I manage to do things like that?

  Yes, Vicky liked that idea.

  Can I be like Kris Longknife? I want you dead, but I also want to be like you. Strange, that.

  Chapter 11

  The trip to Greenfeld was different from any trip Vicky had ever taken in her life. The guards were always there, but never under foot.

  They said not a word to Vicky.

  Ms. Rotterdame was always close. She didn’t hang over Vicky, but she could well have been her shadow.

  A silent shadow.

  Any other time, a silence treatment would have had Vicky throwing fits. She always wanted to be included in any games her playmates were up to. She was Victoria Peterwald; she deserved to be at the center of anything she wanted to be a part of.

  For three weeks, Vicky was a part of nothing that went on around her, but totally a part of herself. For as long as they got a news feed from New Eden, she took it all in. What was the phrase she’d heard but not really understood? Signal to noise ratio?

  Most media she’d known was a lot of noise. Sometimes a signal with information actually came through, but not very often. In the wake of the coup, the media on New Eden was sending a lot of signal. There was plenty of noise as well. One politician had spent the attack squirreled away in a corner with a lovely young woman not his wife. The young woman was milking her moment of fame for all it was worth and some media was serving it out to anyone interested.