‘I was still in the med-bay when that Shoal-member came on board,’ he said, sounding heated. ‘And since then I’ve listened to all your arguments about why he’s here, but I don’t get the sense you’re anywhere near as much in control as you seem to think you are. Merrick didn’t show herself until we were already on board, even though we needed her around well in advance of the launch. The way it seems to me, she doesn’t give a damn what anyone else on this ship says or thinks, and now we’re one man down, which means we’ve got a killer somewhere on board. Let’s just say you’re not inspiring my confidence in your leadership skills.’

Corso felt his jaw muscles tighten. ‘I told you already why things are the way they are.’

‘And yet I keep asking myself the same question again and again: who’s in charge of this expedition? You or Dakota?’ Martinez raised his eyebrows a fraction. ‘Or maybe Trader’s the one who’s really running things?’

‘You’re saying you could have done things better?’

Martinez sighed. ‘Once word about this gets around, everyone’s going to be wondering if they’ll be next. What you need to do now is make them feel like you’re in control of things, because you’re the reason we’re all here. And if you thought your job was hard before, it’s about to get an awful lot harder. I mean, you do realize Dakota’s going to be top of everyone’s shit list when they start looking for someone to blame for his death? Assuming,’ he added, ‘that she didn’t do it herself

Corso let his shoulders sag. ‘All right,’ he conceded, ‘what do you suggest?’

‘Talk to Dakota – Lamoureaux as well. See if their stories add up, and if they do we can get on with finding out who actually did do this.’

‘Fine. I’ll talk to Dakota first.’

‘We’ll both talk to her.’

‘No,’ Corso shook his head fiercely, ‘I’ll talk to her alone. The rest we can interview together.’

Martinez fixed him with a look that made Corso wonder if he was asking for too much this time.

‘All right.’ Martinez nodded at Olivarri’s corpse. ‘We’ll play it your way for now, but just for now. Just show me you’ve got a handle on things.’

‘Thank you, Eduard. Right now she needs to work with Ted to get the rest of the data-space back online, but I’ll talk to her as soon as they’re finished.’

‘No.’ Martinez shook his head slowly. ‘Don’t try to thank me. Just figure out what the hell’s going on before anyone else ends up like this.’

‘Are you serious?’ Dakota looked offended. ‘You think I had something to do with Olivarri’s death?’