Read Online Market Forces by Richard K. Morgan - Free Book Online Page A

sitting up in bed beside him, buttering a piece of toast and wiping the knife casually on the sheets.
    “Breakfast in bed,” she was saying authoritatively, “is
so
sexy.”
    Chris looked down at the stains she was making and felt a hot lump of mingled guilt and sadness swelling in the base of his throat. There was no way he could hide this from Carla.
    He opened his eyes with a jolt. Daylight strained through chintz curtains just above his head. For a moment the chintz hammered home the dream—Carla hated the stuff with a passion. He really had gone home with Liz Linshaw, then. He turned on his side with the blockage of unshed tears still jammed in his throat and—
    He was in a single bed.
    He propped himself up, confused. Matching chintz quilt and pillowcase, massive hangover. Close behind this sensory surge, the events of the previous evening crashed in on him. The street. The jackers. Bryant’s gun in the quiet night. The relief made him forget the pain in his head for a couple of moments. Liz Linshaw was a dream.
    He hauled up his wrist and looked at his watch, which evidently he had been in no state to remove the previous night. Quarter past twelve. He spotted his clothes hanging on the door of the tiny guest room and groped his way out of bed toward them. The door was open a crack—beyond, he could hear kitchen sounds. The smell of coffee and toast wafted under his nose.
    He dressed hurriedly, stuffed his tie in his jacket pocket, and picked up his shoes. Outside the guest room, a white-painted corridor hung with innocuous landscapes led to a wide, curving staircase. Halfway down, he met a woman coming up. Auburn hair, light eyes. He made the match with Michael’s wallet photo. Suki.
    Suki had a cup of coffee, complete with saucer, in her hand, and there was a tolerant smile on her perfectly made-up face.
    “Good morning. It’s Chris, isn’t it? I’m Suki.” She offered one slim, gold-braceleted arm. “Nice to meet you at last. I was just bringing this up to you. Michael said you’d want to be woken. He’s in the kitchen, talking to work I think.”
    Chris took the coffee, balancing it awkwardly in his free hand. His head was beginning to pulse alarmingly.
    “Thanks, uh. Thanks.”
    Suki’s smile brightened. Chris had the disturbing impression that his hands and face could have been painted with blood and she would have smiled the same way.
    “Had fun last night, did you?” she asked maternally.
    “Uh, something like that. Would you excuse me?”
    He slipped past her and found his way down into the kitchen. It was a large, comfortable room with wooden furniture and tall windows along one wall letting in the sun. The scrubbed wooden table was laid for three and covered with an assortment of edible breakfast items. At the far end a two-year-old child sat in a high chair, belaboring a plate of unidentifiable sludge with a plastic spoon. Over by the window and well out of splash range, Mike Bryant watched her with a tender expression on his face and drank coffee out of a mug. There was a cell phone pinned between his ear and shoulder, and he appeared to be listening intently. He nodded and waved as Chris came in.
    “They certainly were. What, you think I imagined it? Who says that? Right, get him on the line.”
    Bryant cupped a hand over the phone.
    “Chris, call your wife at work. She’s been screaming down the Shorn switchboard since eight this morning. You sleep well?”
    He pointed at a videophone hung on the wall near the door. Chris put down his coffee, picked up the phone, and dialed from memory. He waved at Ariana, who regarded him in silence for a moment and then grinned and started bashing her breakfast again. Bryant went back to his conversation.
    “Yes, this is Michael Bryant. No, I’m not, I’m at home, which is where I’m likely to stay until you can promise a little more safety on the streets. I don’t care, we don’t pay you people to stand around scratching your balls. We were