The Jennifer Morgue - Charles Stross [12]
It’s more tactful than I’d rather bed a king snake and sounds less pathetic than my girlfriend would kill me, but the instant I come out with it I know it’s a gut reaction, and true: What’s under that glamour? Nothing I’d want to meet in bed, I’ll bet.
“Good,” says Ramona, closing the door very firmly on that line of speculation, much to my relief. She nods, a falling lock of flax-colored hair momentarily concealing her face: “Every guy I’ve ever slept with died less than twenty-four hours later.” It must be my expression, because a moment later she adds, defensively: “It’s just a coincidence! I didn’t kill them. Well, most of them.”
I realize I’m trying to hide behind my beer glass, and force myself to straighten up. “I’m very glad to hear it,” I say, a little too rapidly.
“I was just checking because we’re supposed to be working together. And it would be real unfortunate if you slept with me and died, because then we couldn’t do that.”
“Really? How interesting. And what exactly is it you think I do?”
She puts her glass down and removes her hand from her bag. It’s déjà vu all over again: instead of a gun she’s holding a three-year-old Palm Pilot. It’s inferior tech, and I feel a momentary flash of smugness at knowing I’ve got the drop on her in at least one important department. She flips the protective cover open and glances at the screen. “I think you work for Capital Laundry Services,” she says matter-of-factly. “Nominally you’re a senior scientific officer in the Department of Internal Logistics. You’re tasked with representing your department in various joint committees and with setting policy on IT acquisitions. But you really work for Angleton, don’t you? So they must see something in you that I—” her suddenly jaundiced gaze takes in my jeans, somewhat elderly tee shirt, and fishing vest stuffed with geek toys “—don’t.”
I try not to wilt too visibly. Okay, she’s a player. That makes things easier—and harder, in a way. I swallow a mouthful of beer, successfully this time. “So why don’t you tell me who you are?”
“I just did. I’m Ramona and I’m not going to sleep with you.”
“Fine, Ramona-and-I’m-not-going-to-sleep-with-you. What are you? I mean, are you human? I can’t tell, what with that glamour you’re wearing, and that kind of thing makes me nervous.”
Sapphire eyes stare at me. “Keep guessing, monkey-boy.”
Oh, for fuck’s sake—“Okay, I mean, who do you work for?”
“The Black Chamber. And I always wear this body on business. We’ve got a dress code, you know.”
The Black Chamber? My stomach lurches. I’ve had one run-in with those guys, near the outset of my professional career, and everything I’ve learned since has taught me I was damned lucky to survive. “Who are you here to kill?”
She makes a faint moue of distaste. “I’m supposed to be working with you. I wasn’t sent here to kill anyone.”
We’re going in circles again. “Fine. You’re going to work with me but you don’t want to sleep with me in case I drop dead, Curse of the Mummy and all that. You’re tooled up to vamp some poor bastard, but it’s not me, and you seem to know who I am. Why don’t you just cut the crap and explain what you’re doing here, why the hell you’re so jumpy, and what’s going on?”
“You really don’t know?” She stares at me. “I was told you’d been briefed.”
“Briefed?” I stare right back at her. “You’ve got to be kidding! I’m here for a committee meeting, not a live-action role-playing game.”
“Huh!” For a moment she looks puzzled. “You are here to attend the next session of the joint-liaison committee on cosmological incursions, aren’t you?”
I nod, very slightly. The Auditors don’t usually ask you what you didn’t say, they’re more interested in what you did say, and who you said it to.1 “You’re not on my briefing sheet.”
“I see.” Ramona nods thoughtfully, then relaxes slightly. “Sounds like a regular fuck-up, then. Like I said, I was told we’re going to be working together on a joint activity, starting with this meeting. For the purposes of this session I’m an accredited delegate,