“Cream?” She’d spoken so few words that the voice surprised her. Warm, deeper than Natalie remembered. Was there an accent, a hint of a roll on the r?
“Not if that’s what I think it is.” She sniffed more deeply. “Yergacheffe?” A cousin—older, well-traveled—taught her to pronounce it with a soft y, a rolled r, a hard ch and a breathy h at the end. It sprang from her lips with ease, a status marker in four syllables. The smell was unmistakable, a fruitiness and acidity that was nothing like other storied beans, the fullness of Blue Mountain, the acid fruitiness of bourbon. Her mouth watered.
“That’s what it said on the bag.” There was an accent, maybe Eastern European. Growing up, she’d heard a lot of those accents—kids whose parents made fortunes doing nonspecific “entrepreneurial” things. Like the true Redwater cousins, these kids had bodyguards, who also spoke with the accent, only thicker. “The cook sent down a grinder and a press.”
She sipped, eyes closed, lost in reverie. Natalie saw she was lovely in a predatory way. Not hot—not her type—but maybe someone you’d model a videogame character on in a specific type of videogame aimed at a certain kind of boy. “It’s the first coffee I’ve drunk in Canada. Only get it in Africa, usually. Chinese bosses always insist on it.”
There’d been a Chinese-Nigerian girl in high school, guarded more heavily than the Russian kids. She had a short temper, and woe betide anyone foolish enough to ask to touch her hair, which Natalie understood. Her name was Sophie. Natalie hadn’t seen her since graduation, but she sometimes thought about the stories Sophie told about the floating super-cities off Lagos where she’d been raised, hopping from one aircraft-carrier-sized walled garden to another.
Natalie reached for her coffee. Her hands shook. She wished they didn’t. She raised the cup and didn’t spill. She was out of practice with real hot beverages, but managed to sip. It was very hot, and flavorsome in a way that “bitter” didn’t capture. It tasted nothing like coffium, except you could see where one was related to the other in an indefinable way. There was an oiliness to it she hadn’t anticipated. Mouth feel. Another class marker, knowing those two words and having the confidence to use them without feeling bourgie. The dynastic Redwaters could say “mouth feel” without batting an eye, and memorably, cousin Sarah used it to describe a boy she’d met at boarding school in Donetsk.
She swallowed. Caffeine was so primitive, she expected it to cudgel her like a caveman, but the high, which came on fast, was surprisingly good, a tingling with a smooth peak and a mellow comedown. No one did caffeine anymore. There were options for getting up. It was such a genteel zotta thing, like sherry and cream tea. The zottas had been hoarding the best stuff.
She drank more. The up was so clean. It steadied her nerves, made her want to move.
“My name is Nadie.” The merc held out a strong, small hand that gripped hers with calibrated firmness.
“I’m—Iceweasel.”
Nadie smiled, small square teeth. “I know. We were inside your nets for two days before I took you. Wasn’t hard.”
“It’s not supposed to be,” Iceweasel said. “We want people to read the public stuff. Almost everyone isn’t a zotta, which means that almost everyone should join the walkaways.”
“Some zottas join, too.” Nadie had this Russian—Bulgarian? Belarusian?—deadpan thing, the corner of her mouth a precursor to a smirk, a deniable microexpression that registered nevertheless.
“Some do.”
“I’m interested in the information security aspect of our earlier conversation.”
“Does that mean we have a deal?”
“No.” Nadie’s microexpression flickered. “We don’t have a deal. Calm yourself.” She pointed to a readout on the bed that alerted as Iceweasel’s heart-rate and endocrine signifiers thwacked the red zone.
Iceweasel made herself breathe. Nadie was playing head games. That’s what she’d done from the start. It would be delusional to hope for anything else.
“I’m calming.”
“I want to know about infowar. I know you had no jailbroken devices you could use to probe and pwn the safe room. I searched you. No one who comes in is allowed to bring anything that could be used to launch an attack, except your father, and even he submits to an inventory whenever he leaves. The attack came from outside, which should be setting off IDS alarms. That’s not happening. There’s something very bad that I never noticed. This makes me feel foolish.”
“I don’t think less of you.”
A microexpression telegraphing dark amusement. The woman was a savant of emotion-hockey.
“I hope not. I hope you understand I’m a serious person, and I’m not your friend. I’m not your enemy, either, though I have been your opponent. I’m very good at what I do. Good enough that you want to be straight with me. Good enough that if we end up enemies, it should worry you.”
Her microexpression changed, a glint that made her feel frightened a centimeter below her navel. Like the fear she’d felt once, trekking near the B&B. There’d been a wolf. It looked at her in a way that made her certain it had mapped every possible thing she might do, anticipated countermoves. It effectively owned her. She was only breathing because it suffered her to. She tried to stay calm. The stupid bed-monitor ratted her out, its infographics redlining in her peripheral vision. She expected Nadie to smirk, or micro-smirk, but she held that badass look for another moment.
“I see you understand. Let us talk about the network.”
Iceweasel felt for her bravery. “I don’t think so. I’ve given you knowledge of the network situation. Why should I give you something more?”
She nodded, acknowledging the point. “More coffee?” Subtext How about this black magic; a fair trade, wasn’t it?
“Absolutely.” Black liquid poured in a silky river from carafe to pot. “I’m still not going to tell you more about the network. Not until we have a deal.”
“It’s not a stupid position, though you know that now I can get to the bottom of it myself. My employers have procedures. They’ll pull everything in the building in twelve hours, take it away for forensics while new patched and locked stuff is installed here.”
“I’m aware of that.”
“You’re counting on the fact I’ll get more money from freeing you than I would from helping your father.”
“I’m hoping for that. It helps that my father is an asshole. I’m hoping you find working for him so offensive that the chance to get away and fuck him over and help me and get rich is tempting.”
The micro-smirk returned: touché. “Your father is in a difficult position.”
“My father deserves to swing from a lamppost.”
“A difficult position, I think you’ll agree.”
“You didn’t disagree with my assessment.”
“I’ve seen people swing from lampposts. It’s not nice.”