Payoff Read Online Free Page B

erratic? Up and down?” I asked.
    “Sometimes. Look, he paid the rent on time. He’s not a bad roommate,” he said.
    “And the Plantation?” I asked.
    “It . . .” George paused.
    “Yes?”
    “Well, it doesn’t have a great reputation. My friends tend to stay away from that crowd. Listen, it’s getting late and I’ve got a paper due in an hour.” He looked at the door significantly.
    Cherabino handed him a card. “You’ll call us if you remember anything else?”
    “Of course,” he said, and stood up, obviously a prompt for us to go.
    “Anything at all?”
    “You got it, man.” He looked at the door again.
    “We’ll be getting out of your hair now,” I said.
    * * *
    Billy Oden’s campaign office was on the bottom floor of a large post–Tech Wars concrete condominium building, next door to a dry cleaner and a pizza place. The signs in his window—O UTSTANDING O DEN , V OTE O DEN , and other uncreative examples of the type—were printed in garish colors and blocky fonts so large you couldn’t possibly overlook them.
    The bell over the doorway rang dully as we entered. It was dim inside, the window largely covered by the signs, and it took a moment for my eyes to adjust. Long rows of tables filled the large room beneath another garish sign, each table filled with papers and people. In the back of the open space, maybe twenty feet back, a boxy office stood next to the restrooms. Its walls didn’t reach all the way to the ceiling, and its door closed with a
click
. The outside walls in the building, like most of the buildings built after the war, were three feet thick, and the acoustics as a result felt heavy and muted.
    There was also a security guard, as was traditional for this kind of post-war building, a hefty guy with a large gun seated in an alcove eight feet away on the right wall. I wouldn’t be surprised if a huge concrete cover sealed up the building’s front every night; after the Tech Wars, people got paranoid, and for good reason. Why a politician had chosen this particular building with all its paranoia rather than the newer grown-crystal open buildings told me something about his character.
    As we walked in, a hawkish guy in a far too expensive suit punctuated an order to another, then stood up. He came over, his hard-soled shoes making hollow
thuds
on the floor. “How can I help you?” In his mouth, the standard words became almost a curse.
    “DeKalb County Police Department,” Cherabino said, flashing a badge. “We’d like to speak with Senator Oden.”
    He adjusted his cuff links. “Of course,” he said, in a tone that said anything but. “His earliest available appointment is tomorrow.”
    “It’s in his best interest to cooperate with law enforcement. I’d like to speak with him now,” Cherabino said evenly, a kind of leashed expectation coming over the Link. “Who are you?”
    “Rafael Mantega, Senator Oden’s campaign manager,” he said smoothly. “And I’m afraid the earliest available appointment is tomorrow morning. I can offer you a slot at eight-thirty a.m.” He seemed pushy, and I wished I could read him to see why, but I felt nothing.
    Cherabino held her ground. Finally she shrugged. “Put us down for eight-thirty then. But it will be here, not at the capitol.”
    “Of course,” Mantega said smoothly. “Who should I attribute the appointment to?”
    She frowned.
    “Detective Cherabino,” I told him.
    “I’ll make a note.” He smiled an empty smile, his eyes following us as we exited the door. “You have a pleasant day.”
    In the steel-lattice-reinforced parking deck behind the building, I asked Cherabino, “Is it suspicious they won’t talk to us right away?”
    “Could be. Probably Mantega’s just being an asshole, throwing his weight around.”
    “You’re still going to run a background check on him, aren’t you?” I asked.
    She stared at me, her car door half-open.
    “Sorry, stupid question.”
    * * *
    The Plantation was