"The Transgenic Falcon"

I was sitting in my office on Monday afternoon. The sun was not shining. Instead there was a massive thunder storm over my city. It’s good to have variety.

The Fifteen Steps says in Chapter 15 that after any investigation you should put your notes together and wrap things up. I was doing exactly that.

I’d been a little surprised at how well all the players in the parlor scene had accepted a lifetime of work at Gen-Tech, but they had all heard Otho’s unsubtle threat to have anyone who didn’t go along killed. I guess that kind of thing is a motivator.

I might have some future problem with Logue. He couldn’t be happy about having his mole exposed. Still I didn’t rat him out, and if Lynn Delfore knew what was good for her she’d play along with Johnson, but keep her former employer to herself.

Looking out the window, I could just see Gen-Tech through the gray rain. Under the window was the Eolin-I-made model of the acrology. It had arrived on Saturday with a note for Simone Fergusson stating the Mother and the tribe had asked that I have it as a thank you. I was pretty sure my return gift of kids sized aloha shirts would be as big a hit with them as the model was with me.

I was enjoying the warm feeling of a case solved, a healthy bank balance and most everyone off my back when the door burst open. An Avenging Angel charged through and slammed a thick paper-back book onto my desk.

“You son of a bitch! You wrote that damned book!” Belinda bellowed in my face.

Oh, boy, I was caught.

“All this time waving it in everyone’s face, like it was the Bible you live by. And you wrote it!”

“I can explain!” I said holding both hands up in front of me. She gave me a look, then I saw her lips start to move. Oh shit!

“Don’t count! It’s going to take longer than a ten count!” I pleaded. She gave me an angry nod but didn’t move. I had one chance to explain this.

“Yes, I wrote the book. I probably should have pulled it off of Amazon, but it’s got some good stuff and newbie detectives could do worse than reading it.”

She started to tense, this was not what she was pissed about, so I got to the point.

“I carry it around for the same reason I wear loud shirts,” I said quickly. That captured her attention, and gave me a slight reprieve.

“And that reason is?” she grated.

“Look, the word on me is I am super smart, yes?” She nodded so I continued, “That’s why people come to me, but it’s a problem of its own. If people keep thinking I’m a Sherlock Holmes type genius, they are going to be very guarded about what they say to me, even the ones that want my help. So I have to have a distraction or two. The shirts are a visible one. But they aren’t always enough. So I use the book to make me look like a doofus, and put them at ease. It’s camouflage, nothing more.”

The set of her shoulders loosened, not completely, but enough that I figured I was out of danger of becoming a homicide victim.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I don’t tell anyone, ever. It’s not personal; it’s just something I need to do to be successful. I really wasn’t trying to make you or anyone else look silly. Fact is, you’re the first client that has ever looked the damn thing up.”

That helped even more and she took her hands off my desk and stood up.

“Why did you order it, anyway?” I asked.

She rolled her eyes. “I’d seen you using it so much and figured I might as well read it. Maybe there is a career in PI work now that I’m not part of Gen-Tech.”

“You want to be a PI?”

“Sure, why not? You can do it, how hard could it be? Besides I thought Morris and Hunt Investigations had a nice ring to it.”

“Not bad, but shouldn’t it be Hunt and Morris? Alphabetical order and all that?”

“No, Morris and Hunt is much better.”

Morris and Hunt, I guess I could live with that if it meant that Belinda was back in my life full time. But it’s not too good to give in too fast.

“Well, I guess we can talk about it. What say I take you to dinner?”

The Angel’s smile blazed to life. How the hell had this office ever been bright enough without it?

“Sounds good, but make it some place nice. I know you can afford it.”

My own smile probably could have met in the back it was so wide. I had no idea this case would turn out so well. I stood up and grabbed my hat. “Fair enough.”

“Only after you take me apartment hunting though; Johnson made me move out of G-T yesterday.”

Hunting for apartments isn’t even close to my idea of a good time, but with the Angel by my side, it probably wouldn’t be all bad.