city blues 02 - angel city blues (26 page)

My escort led me over an arched wooden footbridge that was a little too elegant for anyone’s good.

“She’s quite the little
bijin
,” Dancer said.

“The little
what
?” I kept my voice low, hoping that my kimono-clad escort would assume that I was talking on the phone. Which—come to think of it—was exactly what I was doing.

“Bijin,” Dancer said. “That’s Nip slang for a hottie. You know… a
glam
. Hot babe.”

“Since when do you speak Japanese?”

“I looked it up on the web.”

“How?”

“I’m plugged into your phone, shithead. You have net access.”

“I didn’t know you could do that.”

“Neither did I,” said Dancer. “I’m new to this whole brain-in-a-can thing. Still discovering the possibilities.”

“Let me know if you spontaneously develop any more superpowers,” I said.

She laughed. “I just found a couple of smoking hot girl-on-girl porn feeds. Does that count?”

“No,” I said. “That definitely doesn’t count.”

Dancer said something else, but I tuned her out.

The landscaping was designed to draw attention away from the manmade geometry of the habitat ring. The walkway wound through gently hilly terrain, with periodic hollows that sheltered tea gardens or tiny bamboo groves. I remembered reading somewhere that the colony’s “dirt” was mostly regolith shipped over from the moon. The upper half-meter or so was topsoil brought up from Earth, to support the grasses and other plant life.

The “ground” was banked up to either side of the tubular enclosure, creating higher hills, and making the Edo district feel more like a naturally occurring valley than a tube. Most of the buildings were concentrated on and around the hilltops, numerous rice paper doors and windows backlit with the flickering yellow glow of firelight or lanterns.

More design trickery, of course. The rice paper was undoubtedly some translucent polymer that resembled paper, but could take the continual abuse of tourist fingers, elbows, and luggage. The narrow slats of lacquered wood that framed the faux rice paper panes were probably foam steel, or one of the Kevlar analogs. Something with plenty of structural strength, that could be skinned to emulate natural wood.

All fake, but convincingly so. As I breathed in the subtle aroma of cherry blossoms that floated on the stimulated breeze, I found myself wanting to let go of my disbelief and lose myself in the beauty of my surroundings. But I wasn’t here to enjoy myself. I had come in search of answers, and a couple of nasty specimens of humanity who had attracted my personal attention.

We occasionally passed other people out for evening strolls, a few dressed in Japanese period garb, but most wearing ordinary street clothes like me. I assumed that the former were Chiisai Teien staff, and the latter were paying guests. Although some of the tourist trade would probably costume themselves for a more immersive experience, so perhaps dress and appearance weren’t a reliable way to sort out the customers from the employees.

Nine-fingers and Messenger-boy didn’t spring out of the shadows, so I decided that my escort might actually be leading me to a hotel, instead of an ambush involving my favorite muscle gang.

The Shogun turned out to be a magnificent stone and timber edifice dominating the top of a low hill. It looked more like a pre-industrial Japanese palace than a hotel, which was probably the intent.

I followed my escort up broad stone steps, through a gabled archway and past a pair of faux rice paper doors that politely slid out of our way.

The Japanese girl paused at the entrance to slip out of her wooden sandals, leaving her feet clad in ankle high white socks with a separation between the first and second toes. I shucked my shoes. My own socks weren’t as quaintly stylish, and my unsegregated toes were forced to make due with sharing the same envelope of fabric.

If there was a front desk, I never saw it. We padded across woven reed mats in our stocking feet, down a longish lantern-lit hallway to a heavy teak door studded with fist-sized bronze rosettes. At my escort’s urging, I held my right palm against the rosette in the center of the door. This was apparently some kind of lock scanner, as the door whispered obligingly out of my way.

Ms. Kimono gave me a final nod, and gestured for me to enter what was apparently my room. I gave my best attempt at a return bow, and stepped through the doorway.

The door slid shut behind me, leaving me standing in a shadowed room, lit only by the flame of a single candle.

“Come in, Mr. Stalin,” said a husky voice from the shadows. “I’ve been expecting you…”

CHAPTER 20

I went instinctively for my Blackhart, which wasn’t there of course. Hand groping under the left side of my jacket, and finding only fabric.

“If you’re searching for that cannon of yours,” the voice said, “I rather expect you left it at home.”

There was a subtle splashing noise, and what sounded like several droplets falling into water. But my attention was focused on the voice. It was female, and I recognized it.

Before I could say anything, she spoke again. “Shogun, bring the lights up to ten-percent, please.”

Two hanging paper lanterns and a half-dozen strategically placed candles sprang instantly to life, muted holographic flames casting warm circles of soft yellow light around the room.

Vivien Forsyth reclined lazily in a sunken Japanese bath that seemed larger than my kitchen at home. Tendrils of steam rose from the water; her face, neck, and the tops of her shoulders were slick with clean perspiration from the penetrating heat of the bath. I could see the upper curves of her breasts just beneath the surface.

“You must have the best travel agent in existence,” Dancer said in my ear. “Nobody ever booked
me
a room with built-in pussy…”

She said something else, but I was already hitting the power button on the ear bug with its little fly-eye camera. Whatever was going to happen next, I didn’t want Dancer watching or listening in. She could pass the time by surfing the net or something.

Vivien shifted languidly, lifting a very long and very wet leg to the surface of the bath. Then the leg disappeared into the depths, and a mischievous smile stole over her Vivien’s lips. “When a gentleman finds himself in this situation, he either drops his clothes, or bows out gracefully and gets the hell out.”

“I’m not sure I qualify as a gentleman,” I said.

Vivien raised an eyebrow. “And we can safely assume that I don’t qualify as a lady. But those are still your choices.”

“What if I decide on option two?”

She sighed. “The hotel AI delivers your luggage to another suite, and you walk out of here with a raging hard-on.”

She arched her back, baring more of her breasts and bringing her nipples to the surface of the steaming water.

“Do you always seduce your employees?”

“Never,” she said. “But I don’t think of you as an employee. And anyway, this doesn’t count as a seduction.”

“It doesn’t?”

“No. It’s an outright offer of sex. Either get your ass in this tub, or tell the AI to move your luggage.

I shucked off my jacket and reached for the buttons of my shirt.

A minute or so later, I was lowering my body into the bath. The water was hot, but well short of the near-scalding temperature that many Japanese traditionalists still prefer. Either the AI was familiar with the bathing preferences of gaijins, or Vivien had chosen a temperature she thought was conducive to relaxation and/or foreplay. Regardless of who had made the choice, I could feel the heat go to work on my muscles, unravelling knots of tension and soothing away the adrenaline that had surged through my veins just moments before.

I chose a spot directly across from her, legs outstretched, with my back against the sloping wall of the tub. I thought we would start with a tête-à-tête, exchanging playfully sexy banter across the expanse of steaming water until one (or both) of us felt the urge to take things to the next level.

Vivien clearly had something different in mind. She was in my lap before I had finished settling in. Her arms sliding around my neck, face tilting up toward mine, breasts pressed against my chest as a wave of hot water from her sudden movement sloshed over both of us. Then our lips were together, tongues playing tag.

Her mouth tasted faintly of cinnamon and salt, and her skin seemed hotter than the water.

She was at least twenty years older than I was, but her body was much more toned and youthful than mine. I had originally pegged her apparent age at about twenty-nine. As my hands passed over the water-slick smoothness of her form, I was tempted to subtract another couple of years from my estimate.

She was lithe and beautiful. Pleasant curves underlain by muscle. And she was very
very
impatient. I was just beginning my exploration of her body when she shifted her legs to straddle me more directly. A heartbeat or so later, she was sliding her mons up the length of my erection.

She brought her mouth close to my left ear. “I’m wet,” she whispered.

I knew what she meant, but I decided to tease a little. “We’re
both
wet.”

“No,” she whispered. “I’m
wet
…”

She proceeded to prove it, by taking me into her.

And then we were falling into a rhythm as old as our species. That strangely primal dance, where intellect is conquered by subliminal imperatives shared by animal and man alike.

My voice was ragged when I found it. “You… took me… by surprise… I think… this is… going to take… about… two minutes…”

“I only need half that,” she hissed.

I lasted a while longer than two minutes, but Vivien wasn’t kidding about not needing much time. She made it over the hump somewhere around forty-five seconds, and was coming around for a second pass well before the two-minute mark.

Some uncounted time later, we lay tangled in each other’s arms on a pneumatic contour bed that was cleverly crafted to resemble a traditional Japanese futon.

I brushed a strand of still-damp hair from her Vivien’s forehead. “What are you doing here?”

She smiled without opening her eyes. “Resting up for the second round.”

“I’m serious,” I said. “Why are you here?”

“I own this hotel,” she said. “This is my personal suite. When I come to high orbit, this is where I stay.”

I sighed. “How many ways are you going to find to avoid my question?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “How many times are you planning to ask it?”

“I’m not complaining about your…
hospitality
,” I said.

She nudged me in the ribs. “You damned well better
not
be!”

“I’m not kidding. I’ve gotten myself on the bad side of some very nasty people. Being around me could be dangerous.”

Now it was Vivien’s turn to sigh. “Have you ever been rich, David? I mean
really
rich… Scary rich… So much money that it becomes a mental abstraction?”

“No,” I said. “Not even close.”

“Ever been involved in politics?”

“No,” I said again.

“That’s what I thought,” Vivien said. “Well the only thing more dangerous than being scary rich, is being scary rich with political connections. And do you want to know what’s even worse than
that
? Being scary rich with political connections, and
female
.”