Read Online Sucker Punch by Pauline Baird Jones - Free Book Online

safely breach the tracking device. It was heavily protected.”
    â€œBy it?” Vi asked.
    â€œNot all of it,” the nanite admitted. “But some of the protections appeared to be more recent in origin.”
    â€œSo Afoniki is the host?” she pressed him.
    A hesitation. “I am not certain. Despite the protections, I was able to monitor his vital signs without breaching the alarms. He reacted with extreme unease to your questions. He did believe he had not visited the MEC. His responses show strong belief in that. His uncertainty appeared later.”
    Vi frowned. “So if it’s in there, why would he be reacting?”
    â€œAfoniki is a very powerful individual. It is possible that it has been unable to secure its possession of him. Or…” Lurch’s recital paused, as if he were thinking.
    â€œOr,” Vi prompted.
    â€œHe was infected with non-sentient drones.”
    Vi gave a shudder. “Creepy. So your bad ‘it’ went in long enough for a look around and do some memory wiping, but decided not to stay? I would have thought Afoniki would be its match made in hot places.”
    â€œPerhaps it did not like the legal monitoring. It may have even foreseen the threat the ankle bracelet posed from me,” Lurch said. “It is clever.”
    â€œCompounding our difficulty in finding it,” Joe grumbled. They needed it to make a mistake. He’d hoped this was it.
    â€œSo when Afoniki gave us the card…” Vi prompted, her brows creased.
    â€œI would postulate that the arrival of the MITSC troubled him.”
    Vi nodded thoughtfully. “If anyone is as good—or better—at making people disappear, it would be the boys in not-black. And no one would hunt that hard for Afoniki, not even his own people. But why that card? I mean, I get he wouldn’t ask us for protection, but Bubba? He’s more likely to disavow any knowledge of him.”
    â€œIt is possible the card triggered a remnant of memory. Or it could be an attempt to throw us off the real trail.”
    â€œWe are hardly on the trail, real or imagined,” Vi grumbled. “He probably is trying to mess us over.”
    â€œThat would be my suspicion, but there was an element of fear present in his responses there at the end. I do not believe he is a man who fears lightly.”
    â€œI would concur with that assessment,” Joe said, noting Vi nodding out of the corner of his eye.
    â€œSo Afoniki could be fighting back—against it or its drones?”
    â€œThat is a possibility,” Lurch admitted.
    â€œOr…” Vi’s voice trailed off.
    Joe waited a few seconds before he prompted, “Or?”
    â€œIt could have been Nod.”
    Joe didn’t speak. Neither did Lurch.
    â€œI know you both think it’s gone, but what if it isn’t? Is there some way you could, I don’t know, tell?”
    Another pause. Finally Lurch broke the silence.
    â€œI have never tried to—overwhelm a host and wipe out their personality, so I cannot answer your question.”
    â€œWould Wynken know?” When Lurch didn’t respond quickly, she added, “I know it’s a tough question to ask, but I think Wynken would, well, want you to. If they were…close. I’d want to know if it were one of my family. Do you have a way to ask him—it?”
    â€œI will inquire. In the meantime, I believe the next step is to talk to the councilman.”
    Joe was not certain if Lurch was deflecting or proposing the real next step.
    â€œHe won’t be on any sort of tracking.”
    â€œNo,” the nanite agreed. “You will need to use traditional methods of interrogation.”
    â€œBecause it is so easy to tell when a politician is lying.”
    â€œIs it?” Joe looked at Vi.
    â€œIf they’re talking, they’re lying, at least most of the ones in this city,” she said. “And Bubba’s rep is