A Fistful of Trouble (Outlaws of the Galaxy Book 2) Paul Tomlinson (reading strategies book .TXT) 📖

“How do you get weapons like that from the military? Do you want that last roast potato?”

I shook my head. “Theft or bribery,” I said. “Not that I have any experience in this particular area.”

“What are we going to do?” he asked.

“We?” I said. “You’re the lawman. I’m merely an unjustly accused prisoner.”

“All right, I’ll rephrase it. What would you do in my position?”

“Run.”

“But what about all the folks in Cicada City?” he asked.

“They should run too.”

Sheriff Galton shook his head. “There has to be something else we can do.”

“Call for reinforcements,” I suggested.

“From the military? They seem to be helping the other side.”

“Good point. Did Madam Fifi send dessert?”

“Chocolate profiteroles and a pint of whipped cream.”

“That woman certainly knows how to make a man happy,” I said.

“Yes, she does,” Sheriff Galton said, grinning.

“I was talking about the food.”

“I wasn’t.”

“You and Madam Fifi?”

He nodded. “Her real name’s Gabrielle. I asked her to marry me. She said she’d think about it.”

“When was this?”

“Ten years ago. I’m still hopeful.” He divided up the little choux pastry parcels and drizzled chocolate sauce over them. I say drizzle, but it was more of a monsoon and a flash flood.

“Incredible,” I said, scraping the last of the chocolate sauce off my plate.

“Best food in town,” the sheriff said. “A lot of folks just go there to eat. Take their wives with them.”

“How long are you going to wait for her answer?”

“As long as it takes. Right now she’s got all on running her business and being on the town council. But someday soon we’ll both hand over our jobs to someone younger and then we’ll have time just for the two of us.”

As retirement plans went, I’d heard worse.

“Have you been in Cicada City your whole life?” I asked.

“Moved here with my folks when I was six. That’s why I can’t just up and run away.”

I couldn’t imagine being in one place for that amount of time. But most of my family lived where they’d always lived, so I understood the sheriff’s attachment to his home town.

“I know someone who might be able to help you,” I said. “I would need to make a long-distance call.”

“How long-distance?” he asked, licking chocolate off his fingers. There was a thin line of white cream along the bottom of his moustache, like fresh-fallen snow.

“Interstat,” I said.

“Who might this ‘someone’ be?”

“ACID,” I said.

“You, Quincy Quigley...”

“Randall,” I corrected.

“You, Quincy Randall, a common criminal, have a friend in the Alliance Criminal Investigation Division?” There might have been a hint of scepticism in his voice.

“She’s not exactly a friend,” I said. “She’s sort of assigned to apprehend me. But we keep I touch.”

Sheriff Galton wiped his moustache, his eyes staring into mine. “I stand corrected,” he said. “Not a common criminal.”

All I could do was shrug.

“Our only interstat connection is at the council house,” the sheriff said. “I’ll have to talk to the Mayor.”

“I’ll just stay here, shall I?” I said. “I don’t want to complain, but my cell is a bit draughty. On account of the missing wall.”

“You’re staying at Madam Fifi’s tonight. They’re going to handcuff you to a bed. She has better handcuffs than me.”

I thought he was joking. He wasn’t. I’d never been handcuffed to a bed in a whorehouse before. Not for a whole night.

Chapter Seventeen

Consuela Aurelia Romero Rodriguez was ‘Connie’ to her friends.

“Agent Rodriguez,” I said.

She leaned forward, peering closely at her screen. “It is you,” she said. “I thought they were joking.”

Facial and voice pattern matching would have confirmed to her that I was the real me. And ACID technicians would have started tracing the call the moment we were connected.

“You don’t have to try and keep me distracted with small talk,” I said. “I’m on Saphira in a town called Cicada City.”

“What are you doing out there?”

“Hiding.”

“I’m not coming to rescue you again,” she said.

“That wasn’t much of a rescue.”

“It wasn’t supposed to be, we planned to arrest you.”

“How did that work out?”

She peered at the screen again. “What happened to your face? Did someone hit you in the mouth?” She seemed to think this was amusing.

“Are you finished? Have they completed the trace yet?”

“Yeah, you are where you say you are. Now tell me what you want.”

“I’m trying to stop a war.”

“You’re forty years too late. The Gators packed up and went home.”

“Not the war, a war,” I said. “The kind that men fight against each other. They still happen occasionally, don’t they?”

“Not on squit-hole planets like Saphira,” she said. “There’s nothing there to fight over. And not enough people to raise an army.”

“Someone is trying to get their hands on two-dozen robots from the military,” I said. “I don’t think he’s putting together a chorus line.”

Connie frowned. She didn’t believe me. But I could tell from the movement of her shoulders that she was accessing data to see if what I was saying could be true. Either that or she was sending an Interceptor to my location to arrest me. Most likely she was doing both. I think she still hasn’t forgiven me for the money I ‘accidentally’ took from her agency when she wasn’t looking.

“Twenty-four robots is a lot of hardware for a local gangster,” she said.

“You know what ex-military types are like,” I said. “They love their war toys.”

“Give me a name, I’ll check him out.”

“Colonel Damian Hodge,” I said. “He’s a Saphira native – or he moved here more than twenty years ago.”

“He’s not coming up on our database,” she said. “No known criminal connections. I’ll have to make nice to the men in uniforms to see if they’ll share what they have.”

“The people here are going to need your help,” I said. “I’m not sure when the shipment of robots is due, but it won’t be long.”

“I’m not seeing anything to suggest that any military robots have been stolen,” she said.

“Maybe they haven’t been taken yet. If and when they are, they’re destined for Saphira.”

“You haven’t given me a lot to go on,” Agent Rodriguez