Leviathan Wakes Read Online Free Page A

primary station house for Star Helix Security, police forceand military garrison for the Ceres Station, was on the third level from the asteroid’s skin, two kilometers square and dug into the rock so high Miller could walk from his desk up five levels without ever leaving the offices. Havelock turned in the cart while Miller went to his cubicle, downloaded the recording of their interview with the girl, and reran it. He was halfway through when his partner lumbered up behind him.
    “Learn anything?” Havelock asked.
    “Not much,” Miller said. “Bomie got jumped by a bunch of unaffiliated local thugs. Sometimes a low-level guy like Bomie will hire people to pretend to attack him so he can heroically fight them off. Ups his reputation. That’s what she meant when she called it a dance number. The guys that went after him were that caliber, only instead of turning into a ninja badass, Bomie ran away and hasn’t come back.”
    “And now?”
    “And now nothing,” Miller said. “That’s what I don’t get. Someone took out a Golden Bough purse boy, and there’s no payback. I mean, okay, Bomie’s a bottom-feeder, but… ”
    “But once they start eating the little guys, there’s less money coming up to the big guys,” Havelock said. “So why hasn’t the Golden Bough meted out some gangster justice?”
    “I don’t like this,” Miller said.
    Havelock laughed. “Belters,” he said. “One thing goes weird and you think the whole ecosystem’s crashing. If the Golden Bough’s too weak to keep its claims, that’s a good thing. They’re the bad guys, remember?”
    “Yeah, well,” Miller said. “Say what you will about organized crime, at least it’s organized.”
    Havelock sat on the small plastic chair beside Miller’s desk and craned to watch the playback.
    “Okay,” Havelock said. “What the hell is the ‘forgotten arm’?”
    “Boxing term,” Miller said. “It’s the hit you didn’t see coming.”
    The computer chimed and Captain Shaddid’s voice came from the speakers.
    “Miller? Are you there?”
    “Mmm,” Havelock said. “Bad omen.”
    “What?” the captain asked, her voice sharp. She had never quite overcome her prejudice against Havelock’s inner planet origins. Miller held up a hand to silence his partner.
    “Here, Captain. What can I do for you?”
    “Meet me in my office, please.”
    “On my way,” he said.
    Miller stood, and Havelock slid into his chair. They didn’t speak. Both of them knew that Captain Shaddid would have called them in together if she’d wanted Havelock to be there. Another reason the man would never make senior detective. Miller left him alone with the playback, trying to parse the fine points of class and station, origin and race. Lifetime’s work, that.
    Captain Shaddid’s office was decorated in a soft, feminine style. Real cloth tapestries hung from the walls, and the scent of coffee and cinnamon came from an insert in her air filter that cost about a tenth of what the real foodstuffs would have. She wore her uniform casually, her hair down around her shoulders in violation of corporate regulations. If Miller had ever been called upon to describe her, the phrase
deceptive coloration
would have figured in. She nodded to a chair, and he sat.
    “What have you found?” she asked, but her gaze was on the wall behind him. This wasn’t a pop quiz; she was just making conversation.
    “Golden Bough’s looking the same as Sohiro’s crew and the Loca Greiga. Still on station, but… distracted, I guess I’d call it. They’re letting little things slide. Fewer thugs on the ground, less enforcement. I’ve got half a dozen mid-level guys who’ve gone dark.”
    He’d caught her attention.
    “Killed?” she asked. “An OPA advance?”
    An advance by the Outer Planets Alliance was the constant bogeyman of Ceres security. Living in the tradition of Al Capone and Hamas, the IRA and the Red Martials, the OPA was beloved by the people it helped and