Sockpuppet: Book One in the Martingale Cycle Read Online Free PDF Page B

jacket pocket and for a second she glimpses something lodged under his armpit. She can’t be sure but she is sure. A patterned grip on a cold heavy shape. Danger. First time she’s seen a gun in the real but her eye is trained by first-person shooters to know one in a flash-frame.
    She looks from cop to cop. Unconnected fragments force their way from her mouth, spilling like cards from a pack. The policemen turn and look at her expectantly. Pieces fall away.
    )) word salad ((
    Then Jonquil is there. Like the hero who only ever arrives in the nick of time her boss, Jonquil Carter, stands in the door, bringing with her the certainty she carries like a designer clutch – though even she double-takes at finding this unlikely trio in her demo pod.
    The police stand to attention and Dani hears at last their proper handles.
    ‘DS Raeworth. This is DC Ackroyd. Parliamentary Branch.’
    Wonderful normal names that have stared in her face the whole time like the solution to a cryptogram. The cops align themselves before the new arrival – the whole male gender having evolved to seek out authority and fawn on it.
    In one charming motion Jonquil prises everyone from the room, giving Dani a look that communicates how uncool it was to give a bunch of strangers the run of the building, and ushers everyone up to her office. En route they pass Acne’s weekend-casual team, who are standing chastened at the bottom of the stairs. Guess Jonquil got to them already. On the way upstairs Jonq nips Dani’s arm and hisses, ‘ Why the FUCK did you not CALL me? ’
    Oh, thinks Dani, why didn ’ t I? She never uses the phone part of her phone, only ever sends people whispers on Parley; forgetting over-thirties like Jonquil. What other self-evident things have strolled by unnoticed in the past half hour?
    While Jonquil magics coffee, juice and pastries, Dani slides into a chair, concealing herself behind the green plastic rim of the meeting table, keeping Raeworth (not Racist) in her eyeline. She blinks away sleep, then blinks again to erase the image of the gun. Jonquil places herself at the head of the table and makes a cathedral with her hands. She and Raeworth talk but Dani can barely hear above the sound of her own neurons firing. Who brings a gun to a software house in the early hours of the morning?
    )) brain jam ((
    Far away, at the other end of the table, Jonquil and the policeman play a game of verbal Asteroids. Raeworth launches phrases into the air – close down – official business – disruptive element – and Jonquil shoots each one down; but more and more of her shots are missing the mark. Any other time, Dani would love to watch the indestructible Jonquil Carter lose a battle of words but this pains her.
    ‘Listen, friend,’ Jonq pulls on the Bronx rasp, though she’s actually from Ohio. ‘You guys may not have a First Amendment but I’m telling you: the government cannot send a gang of thugs to accuse my staff on the back of zero evidence, and curb the free speech of a legitimate organisation.’
    ‘This is not a free speech issue, Ms Carter,’ Racist says. ‘It’s a question of confidential Parliamentary information. We are requesting that you cease publishing this information.’
    ‘We’re a goddamn channel, not a publisher. This is unwarranted. I’m calling lawyers on your ass.’
    Before Jonquil can follow through, the door falls open like a badly sealed parcel and from it spills a breathless red-faced person, who stops short and stares at them one-by-one. He’s overweight and appears to be wearing his dad’s unpressed suit and shirt. A folded bike hangs from his left hand.
    ‘Ah . . .’ says this person. ‘The lady let me in?’
    He uses the bike to indicate the door, as though unaccustomed to being admitted into buildings. He places the bike by the wall and sheds a backpack.
    ‘What the hell are you?’ says Jonquil. Dani never knows whether her boss does this on purpose. They say geeks are autistic