Titan Song Dan Stout (top 20 books to read txt) 📖

the back. “Let her be.” We didn’t need to be seen getting into a literal shoving match with the press.

I turned toward the bar, trying to put my back to her, but Klare pressed closer.

“Are you happy to let the overgrown muskrat loose on the city? Do you get off thinking that you can catch her again? Or are you only making an exception because Serrow killed a reporter?”

I was doing my best to ignore her, and Jax was more level-headed than me. But he’d brought Talena along, and she wasn’t the sort to back down from a fight.

“What the Hells is your issue?” She’d turned, one hand gripping the paper, the other on the bar stool seat. Her feet were on the floor, where she’d have better leverage. She was ready to use her fists, the stool, probably my bottle if need be. My little girl, all grown up and ready to beat up a reporter.

Klare’s jaws snapped shut. “My problem is corrupt cops not doing their job.”

A Gillmyn floated behind Klare, and tugged on her shoulder. “Um, maybe we should let them be?” His head was stooped, and he wasn’t looking me in the eye. I squinted at him. He looked familiar. Klare shrugged off his hand.

“Glouchester was on to that fraud, and she killed him for it. And you let her skate.”

“You don’t know your ass from a hole in the ground,” said Talena. She hadn’t moved, but she was like a coiled spring.

Jax cleared his throat. “She lost a friend, Talena. Let her slide.” He kept his voice calm. The Gillmyn nodded, agreeing silently.

Now Klare looked at Jax.

“That’s right, I lost someone. A man you all disrespected because he told the truth.” Her biting jaw trembled slightly, and I wondered if she’d been drinking to her partner’s memory. “I told you Glouchester was on to something big. He knew the Barekusu were funneling cash to radical groups. That’s why Serrow killed him.”

“She killed him because she heard the buzzing,” I said. “The Buzz Kills, like your reporter friends call them. A little sizzle to sell some papers.”

She angled her shoulders, addressing me once more. “You know why we add in the sizzle?”

“To sell papers?” I thought I’d already said that, and briefly wondered if I’d had too much to drink.

“Because we give a shit about getting killers off the street. Headlines like that,” she pointed at the paper clenched in Talena’s fist, “bring readers. And readers turn into witnesses. So you keep sitting around passing judgment. If that’s the price I have to pay to see a killer behind bars, I’ll make it any day of the week. Morning and evening editions.”

“I respect that.” I struggled to keep my balance on the stool. “But that doesn’t apply to Serrow.”

“Of course it doesn’t.” She half turned, as if ready to leave.

“You know why the city attorney files charges, and not cops?”

She didn’t answer.

“It’s because they’re the ones who have to prove it in court. We almost always know who did the dirt.” I licked my lips. “I got a double homicide sitting on my desk right now, twin brothers killed in front of a dozen witnesses. The witnesses know who did it, I know who did it, and you know what? No one will testify. If it were up to me, we’d go arrest those bastards today, put them in Sequendin prison and let them rot. But I can’t do that. The CA’s office won’t let me because here’s not a chance in Hells that we’ll get a conviction.”

“And that’s good?”

“It’s necessary. Because sometimes those bad guys we’re so sure are guilty? Turns out they weren’t. Not all the time, but enough. And if we got to drop people in jail just because we think they’re guilty . . .” I stared at a neon sign behind the bar, thinking of Paulus.

“But Serrow’s guilty as all Hells. She even confessed, and you handed her back over to Weylan and his caravan.”

“You don’t know what she confessed to.”

“Get off it. I’m a reporter, you really think you can keep something like that under your hat?”

“I suppose not.” I studied her Gillmyn companion. He looked away, and I placed him. He was the patrol cop I’d asked to escort her from the hardware store crime scene. So now I was a matchmaker, too? At least I knew her source.

I drained my beer and displayed the empty glass to the bartender. “Just one more,” I called, and thought to myself, The drinker’s greatest lie.

I managed to return my focus to Klare as I waited for my next round. “If it were up to me, I’d have stuck Serrow in a wagon and hauled her hairy ass to the Bunker. The CA decided not to, because they saw something else they had to serve.”

“Politics.”

“Could be. Could be they want to be sure that the Barekusu won’t get their hump-shaped backs up and claim some kind of immunity.” I nodded my thanks as a new round magically appeared on the bar. I couldn’t remember ordering one. I took a long draw, letting the hops bite my tongue. “They’re playing a political game. But if that’s the trade they have to make?” I threw her words back at her. “They’ll do it any day of the week.”

Klare clacked her biting jaws, and Jax said something in Kampi, words and clicks that had a rhythm and melody and sounded like a sorrowful litany.

“Save your sympathies,” said Klare. “Just put that bitch behind bars, before someone else settles the score.”

“Hey,” I said, mostly not slurring my words, “you can do it better? Enroll in the academy, we’ll see if you can do it better!”

She stormed away, tailed by the Gillmyn. I sighed. My beer was almost gone, and I wondered if I should order another.

“That was surprising,” said Talena.

“What?” I shrugged. “She’s mourning a friend. We get that sometimes.”

“I suppose you do.” Her eyes darted to Ajax, then back to me. “But I meant your defense of the