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on her knee, then set it aside and dropped from the desk. "Darn, I'm
due to go on worldwide in sixteen minutes. Pinpointing the location of
the Devlin Guns will make such a terrific tag for this report." She
frowned at the vidphone atop the desk. "C'mon, Gomez. Call me, darn
it."
The phone remained silent.
You didn't count for anything," Almita told Jake. "Martinez is still
going to get these Devlin Guns and everything will go just the way
Carlos Zabicas wants."
"Not exactly," he said.
"Why not, asshole? I figured out where the guns must be once I heard
they were gone from the clinic," she said. "I've got them now and,
once I fix you for good and all, I'll phone Carlos to send a crew
to--"
"In a shade less than ten minutes there'll be a Newz, Inc." broadcast
going out." Jake took a step to his right. "They'll outline the whole
damn plan that your boss and Martinez and the OCO worked out. That's
really going to make it difficult for you folks to do a damn thing."
"Bullshit."
"What you really ought to be doing is packing," he suggested. "You're
going to have to hide out, because President Garcia is going to crack
down even more on the Tek cartels now." "We've got the guns. We can
still make a lot of trouble."
"Maybe, but you've sure as hell lost the element of surprise."
She shook her head from left to right twice, angrily. "No, I don't
believe you."
He pointed a thumb at the low, beamed ceiling. "There's avid wall up
in the living room of the villa," he said, taking another step to the
right. "Let's go up there and watch the Newz show when it comes on.
After that, Almita, you'll probably decide to--"
"You're just stalling, hoping someone'll get here to save your
miserable ass."
"It's your ass you ought to be worrying about."
She lowered her gun hand, eyes narrowing. "All right, cabrdn, we'll
watch TV together." She nodded at the doorway.
When Jake started to move, his feet seemed to get tangled with a spill
of chain on the old dungeon floor. He smbled, fell to one knee.
He came up clutching a length of the heavy rusty chain and swung it at
the young woman.
Almita brought up her lazgun and squeezed the trigger.
The end of the chain hit her wrist and the barrel of the gun tilted up.
The sizzling beam cut one of the wooden beams in two.
Jake snapped the chain again, knocking the gun from her hand. Diving,
he grabbed it up from the floor.
"Cochino!" she said, rubbing at her wrist. "Upstairs," he advised,
gesturing with the gun. Gomez was tiptoeing across the living room
when they got up there. "Ah, I'm too late for the festivities," he
complained.
Jake grinned. "Glad to see that you aren't dead," he said. "Almita
was under the impression she'd knocked you off, Sid."
"The senorita is far from being a topnotch marksman, especially at a
distance," explained his partner. "It seemed wise to dive into a handy
gully, and pretend to be defunct until she'd moved on. Then I headed
for here."
Almita made an angry spitting noise. "I thought I'd taken care of at
least one of you assholes."
"Alas, no, angelica," said Gomez sympathetically. "And this was the
last chance you're ever going to have, too." omez stepped out of the
sky port vidphone booth, shaking his head forlornly.
"Nada," he reported. "Sister Feliz hasn't been able to find out a damn
thing about the girl. And the op from Sober-ano's Maravilla detective
agency hasn't found a trace of her either."
Picking up his suitcase, Jake asked, "How important is this?"
"I don't know," his partner answered. "She's just a kid who helped me
when those hunter bastards were trying to turn me into a trophy. I
don't know--I'm just concerned about her."
"Want to stay in Madrid and find her?"
Gomez sighed. "Nope, I guess not," he said. "This isn't a romance
thing, amigo. What it really is--well, I'm getting old. I feel
paternal toward her and i'd like to be sure she's going to do okay."
"Soberano's likely to locate her before too long." Bending, Gomez
gathered up the bag he'd set down next to the booth. "Si, and when he
does, I can do something to improve her lot."
Jake reminded, "Our sky liner for Greater LA leaves in twenty
minutes."
"Paternity at a distance is more in my line anyway." He started
heading for their departure ramp.
Holocommercials for nearcaf, wine and botsoccer floated overhead.
"Hey, wait up, Gomez!"
He hunched his shoulders and halted. "Si, it's the telltale cry of my
nemesis."
Natalie, dodging around passengers and baggage bots was hurrying toward
them along the tinted plastiglass ramp. "Hello, Jake," she said when
she caught up with them. "Gomez, I'm glad I found you, and I won't
even take precious time, since the liner's about to depart, to
criticize you for scooting out of your hotel without so much as a
fare-thee-well or--"
"You're not booked on our flight, cara?"
"How could I be? I have to remain here in Madrid for at least two full
working days to follow up on this whole business. The failed
revolution, the locating of the stolen guns, the sinister links with
the OCO--the whole complex mess. I'm doing a nightly broadcast and a
whole slew of mini reports and a summing up for Newz's week end
service." Reaching out, she put both arms around him and hugged him
enthusiastically. "I really appreciate your help and particularly your
taking the time, after you'd been about as close to the brim of death
as you could possibly be, to vidphone me at our studios just forty
seconds before airtime to confirm the location of the Devlin Guns and,
honestly, I won't even mention that in the future i'd really appreciate
it if you could get me information like that at least five minutes
ahead of broadcast so that I can make sure it gets into my script in
the polished yet breezy style that my millions of viewers--"
"Chiquita," cut in Gomez as he extricated himself from her enthusiastic
embrace. "We have to take our leave."
"Certainly, don't let me detain you," she said. "I simply took time
out from my impossibly crowded schedule to rush down here to wish you a
heartfelt bon voyage, Gomez."
"Gracias and ad ids
She caught hold of his arm, pulling him back toward her. "Oh, and,
Gomez, I've been thinking about that strange and awful Tek-induced
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| Cytat |
Dobre pomysły nie mają przeszłości, mają tylko przyszłość. Robert Mallet
De minimis - o najmniejszych rzeczach.
Dobroć jest ważniejsza niż mądrość, a uznanie tej prawdy to pierwszy krok do mądrości. Theodore Isaac Rubin
Dobro to tylko to, co szlachetne, zło to tylko to, co haniebne.
Dla człowieka nie tylko świat otaczający jest zagadką; jest on nią sam dla siebie. I z obu tajemnic bardziej dręczącą wydaje się ta druga. Antoni Kępiński (1918-1972)
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