Back A Local Habitation Save as PDF
Chapters (38)
  1. Title Page
  2. Copyright Page
  3. Dedication
  4. Acknowledgements
  5. ONE - June 13th, 2010
  6. TWO
  7. THREE
  8. FOUR
  9. FIVE
  10. SIX
  11. SEVEN
  12. EIGHT
  13. NINE
  14. TEN
  15. ELEVEN
  16. TWELVE
  17. THIRTEEN
  18. FOURTEEN
  19. FIFTEEN
  20. SIXTEEN
  21. SEVENTEEN
  22. EIGHTEEN
  23. NINETEEN
  24. TWENTY
  25. TWENTY-ONE
  26. TWENTY-TWO
  27. TWENTY-THREE
  28. TWENTY-FOUR
  29. TWENTY-FIVE
  30. TWENTY-SIX
  31. TWENTY-SEVEN
  32. TWENTY-EIGHT
  33. TWENTY-NINE
  34. THIRTY
  35. THIRTY-ONE
  36. THIRTY-TWO
  37. THIRTY-THREE
  38. Teaser chapter

Jan looked up, and actually grinned. At least one of us was enjoying this. “That might matter if we were, y’know, in the mortal world. But getting electricity in the Summerlands is hard enough that it never works quite right, so we have to deal with kludges. Generators instead of ground power, lights on timers . . . computers that don’t realize they’re supposed to forbid network access when they’re turned off.” The laptop made a sharp pinging sound. “We’re in.”

“In what?”

“Barbara’s computer. I have full access.”

Now we were getting somewhere. “Can you do some sort of search for things that might have to do with Dreamer’s Glass?”

She looked at me, amused. “I can make this computer dance the polka if I want it to.” Her typing picked up speed, only to stop when the laptop pinged again. “And . . . whoa.”

“Whoa? What whoa?” I craned my neck to see the screen. “What did you find?”

“Only everything,” she said, mouth compressing into a thin, hard line. She tilted the laptop so that I could see the screen; it was covered by a list of file names so long that it scrolled off the bottom. “This is what I get when I search for files with the words ‘Dreamer’s Glass,’ ‘report’ and ‘confidential.’ ” She tapped the screen with the tip of one finger, and the first title lit up for a moment before a word processing program took over the screen, opening the file. “She was a busy little girl.”

“Yes,” I said. “It looks like she was.”

The file Jan had opened was a financial overview of the company, the County, and their performance over the last few years. It was annotated, showing where Barbara had interfered with the County to the advantage of Dreamer’s Glass. I glanced to Jan.

“We couldn’t figure out where the money was going,” she said. “Another two years and she’d have closed us down.”

“Would someone have killed her over this?”

“Possibly,” she admitted. “I might have strangled her myself. But . . .”

“But you wouldn’t have killed the others. Can you print Barbara’s records for me?”

“Of course.” She shook her head, frowning. “This is so . . . wow. Babs was our friend.”

“She was a cat. The Cait Sidhe have never followed the rules.” I shoved my hair back again. “Would Dreamer’s Glass have anything to gain by killing you all?”

“Just the land.”

“There’s nothing special about the knowe?”

“Not a thing. We dug the Shallowing ourselves.”

“Great.” Another dead end. “Make those printouts, and we’ll keep working. Just be careful. Getting yourself killed won’t bring anyone back.”

“Don’t worry. I won’t storm over to Dreamer’s Glass and confront the Duchess.” Her smile was mirthless. “Although when this is over, I’m kicking her ass.”

“Totally fair.” I paused. “Is there any chance Gordan was working with Barbara?”