Off the Edge (The Associates) Read Online Free Page B

hotel with an Elvis impersonator? Or maybe a Thai act?”
    Rio furrowed his brow. “You have a problem with her?”
    “Don’t you find this song a bit…emotionally manipulative?”
    “What do you mean?”
    “Designed to pull at people’s heartstrings,” Macmillan said. “She’s a clever wordsmith, but these emotionally manipulative, hyper-nostalgic lists...”
    Rio smiled.
    “What?” Macmillan asked.
    “Heaven forbid the great Macmillan should be made to feel something.”
    Macmillan crossed his legs. “I feel the urge to put an ice pick through my ear right now. Does that count?”
    Rio kept smiling. He stirred his tea in a very no comment way.
    She went on in that Southern twang. He added a bit of Georgia and West Virginia as influences laid over that Florida accent. She made a little joke using the word pixilated in the old hills way—referring to pixies, not pixels. Something of a magpie with words, this woman. He’d been like that, way back when. Back when words were a pleasure. Back when language was about interacting instead of hunting.
    As she sang on, he found himself getting sucked back in. Damn, the list just wouldn’t stop.
    He put his hand to his chest, wanting to push down the sharp feeling. He flashed on a memory of his fiancée Gwen, standing in the rain in a party dress, laughing. It was then he’d known he loved her.
    He fought the memories but they came anyway—that night ten years ago. He saw his parents and sister and Gwen, playing the adjective game as the train rolled through the dark jungle. His father had pantomimed drinking a soda standoffishly. It had taken forever for the four of them to guess standoffishly . They’d felt sure he was drinking the soda impudently or superciliously . Macmillan had guessed presumptuously . God, they’d all been such nerds about that game. That was the last time he’d seen them alive. After his father drank his soda standoffishly , Macmillan had taken a walk through the cars, stretching his legs, listening to dialects.
    He was three cars down when the bomb hit.
    He pressed on his chest harder but the emotions wouldn’t go down. It was with great effort that he fixed his attention back on the arms dealers. “Blue hat sitting with the New Tong of Texas,” he mumbled. “Who is that?”
    “We think he’s Valdez cartel.” Rio pointed out the new Valdez players. “We heard chatter that Jazzman is picking up some sort of package here.”
    “What sort of package?”
    “We don’t know,” Rio said. “Dax thinks it’s unrelated to the TZ. Maybe drugs. We don’t know anything.”
    They discussed the idea of getting other Associates close enough to record the conversations. Macmillan had created a quick and dirty software program they could feed a transcription into. Even if Macmillan was killed in the next five minutes, the program could help them recognize Jazzman from his speech habits.
    The Association tended to look to Macmillan for magic. Well, linguistics was a kind of magic, a way to see hidden worlds.
    Her next song was about a childhood home. Another listing song.
    Good God, she couldn’t just say kitchen—she had to get in the needlepoint hanging with an ancient spatter of tomato sauce on it, and a dog’s nose touching your knee under the table. A darker subtext was in there, too—he’d done enough time in the English lit trenches to take apart a verse. Back in his old life, he used to love getting muddy with a multi-layered text. He’d once engaged with language, heart and soul. Now he mined it for parts. Commodities. Weapons.
    His family had been so proud of his career. They’d be sick to see him now, hollowed out by vengeance. All the goodness gone.
    Well, they weren’t the ones left behind.
    Rio was staring at him.
    Macmillan forced a smile. “I can’t say what I need more at this moment—to stop Jazzman from selling the TZ or to stop this woman from singing another song.”
    “Mmm.”
    “What?”
    “You know you