Thicker Than Water

‘How do you know until you try?’

There was a time when bullshit like that would have made me dig my heels in, when I would have turned around and walked away rather than play a command performance with a blindfold on. But at this particular time there was something like an unsettled debt between me and Coldwood, dating from an occasion - quite recently - when I’d almost got himf Dlmost g killed: that one incident explained both the limp and the scar. And right about then, when I was more or less evenly balanced between giving him a tune and telling him exactly where and how deeply to shove it, the blonde woman came striding up to us, walking right past me without a glance to address herself to Coldwood.

‘This isn’t right,’ she said without preamble. Her expression was grim and tight.

Coldwood nodded. It wasn’t a nod of agreement: he was just acknowledging an argument he’d clearly already heard. ‘You’re down on record, Ruth,’ he said, ‘so you can stop banging the drum any time you get sick of the sound.

But you don’t have any seniority on me here and this is the way we’re doing it.’"

"The blonde woman turned now and favoured me with a cold, clinical stare. She was beautiful - really beautiful - but in a hard and austere way that told you more clearly than words how little she cared about what you thought of her. She wore her hair short, and her blue eyes stared out at you pale and unframed, without the benefit of mascara. She favoured greys and blacks, with occasional concessions to blue.

Maybe she thought warm colours would be provocative. Tonight she was at the darker end of her spectrum, and her subtle curves were reined in to leave as straight-edged an outline as possible.

‘Hey, Basquiat,’ I said to her.

‘It’s not even fair to him,’ she said, which threw me for a moment until I realised that she was still carrying on her conversation with Coldwood as though I hadn’t spoken - and that the ‘him’ in question was me. ‘Or are you finessing the case before it even gets started by making sure it gets thrown out of—’

Coldwood cut in before she could finish.

‘I just want Castor to read the scene,’ he said. ‘I’ve used him before, and I’ll probably use him again. It’s custom and practice, and there’s nothing for anyone to hang an objection on. And you’ll notice that we’re standing way over here, not inside your perimeter. Not even close to it. You can even stick around and chaperone me, if you’re worried.