After supper the next day, I walked over to League HQ, deciding I might as well check for ssages. I arrived to find Vaughn watching Channel 10 News on the big screen in the main room.
A copy of the Grand Lake Sentinel lay next to a command console. I picked it up and looked at the front page.
The headline said, “Mayor Denies Influence” while the article argued that the mayor had received money from a group called “Michigan Citizens for Business” and then hired mbers of the group into his administration.
Much of the evidence ca from an “anonymous source”—Daniel, probably. Telepathy seed tailor made for gathering dirt.
The next story’s headline was “Storm King Continues War on Local Drug Pushers.” The picture showed police leading handcuffed n out of a house’s shattered doorway. As a forr client, Vaughn would have so insight into the local drug culture.
I skimd the article, but put the paper down as News 10 covered the sa story on the TV.
Vaughn grinned widely while a reporter interviewed a round-faced woman in a bathrobe about what had happened.
“The fog ca out of nowhere and surrounded the house across the street and then lightning shattered the front door. I always knew sothing was wrong over there, but I never did know what.”
“Got ‘em,” Vaughn muttered. Then, “Hey Nick, is that cool or what?”
“It’s cool,” I said, giving it just enough enthusiasm that hopefully Vaughn wouldn’t ask again. anwhile, I checked through our voicemail. We had about forty, so of them two week old complaints about my ride in Night Wolf’s car. Why didn’t anyone else bother to check for ssages? It wasn’t as if it was hard.
The most recent one had co just ten minutes ago. Mayor Bouman had left a voicemail asking to drop by his office because he had a few questions for . I called him back, letting him know that I was coming, put my suit on, and flew downtown.
For soone who can fly without help, I imagine flight must be all about air on your face and the roar of wind in your ears. For , it’s the warmth of the rockets on my back, and the sll of plastic, tal, and my own sweat.
The city of Grand Lake blurred beneath , all lights and suburban lawns at first, but ending in the mixture of glassy, modernism and turreted Victoriana we called downtown.
Within minutes I stood in the mayor’s office.
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He shook my hand, thanked for coming, and said, “I did what I could to make sure you could sit down this ti.”
The chair in front of his desk had no arms.
He gave a smile as he walked around the desk and sat down in his own chair. The sight of him in a high backed chair in front of windows that showed a dark sky gave a sudden flashback to scenes with the Emperor in Return of the Jedi or Revenge of the Sith.
I suppose that ought to have frightened .
Not that Mayor Bouman looked at all like the Emperor. Despite being in his forties, he could pass for thirty. Tanned, he had no wrinkles to speak of. I wondered if he used botox treatnts.
Next to the window hung a frad copy of the Grand Lake Sentinel. The headline read, “DynaChem Loses Appeal.” Before he beca mayor, he had been a lawyer, successfully suing DynaChem after people began to die of cancer near one of their storage facilities.
“It was one of my best monts,” he said, glancing toward the frad paper. “They’d gotten so big, they didn’t imagine an ordinary person could do anything to them. They thought they could hide evidence and lie on the stand. It turns out that they couldn’t.”
Inside the helt, I rolled my eyes. Even two years after the election, he still couldn’t stop campaigning.
“But enough about that,” he said, “I imagine you’re wondering what I wanted to talk to you about.”
I had been.
“You’ve heard about the scandal,” he said. “I’d like you to talk to your friends and see if you can find out who’s behind it.”
“I can talk to them,” I said, knowing that I didn’t have far to look to find the culprit. Turning him in was, of course, a completely different thing.
“Great,” he said. “That’s all I can ask for.”
As he spoke, I felt sothing in my mind. Growing up with Daniel as a friend, I’d long ago learned to recognize the feeling. Everyone in his family from his parents to his younger brother and sister had probably been in my head at so point.
Whoever it was lacked their skill.
I felt pressure, not a painful pressure, but a solid if slightly clumsy touch.
Mayor Bouman had stopped talking and held the edge of his desk with both hands.
I tried to think of what to do next.
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