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

system. I didn’t see any, but I had to assume that I was being monitored. Just in case, I made sure to keep my movements calm and measured as I exited the vehicle. I wanted to ensure any potential record of my behavior didn’t come back to haunt me.

Searching for the side door Guyer and I had found during the Bobby Kearn investigation, I passed the array of rental housing, seeing only a few bleary-eyed festivalgoers moving around in heavy coats. I guessed that most of the other rentals were occupied with revelers sleeping off the night before. It took a little while to locate the entrance, mostly because the bulky box trucks were no longer scattered around the festival site. They must have been hidden away during the show, as if the fact that all the performers and equipment had been delivered would spoil the magic for the concertgoers.

Securing my coat, I entered the bitter cold and dashed for the employee entrance. I pushed into the side door unhindered and moved down the hallway with a purposeful amble. I reached the end of the outbuilding and entered the maze of tented hallways, looking for the doghouse headquarters of the rig. I confirmed my earlier suspicion that the tent maze was intended at least in part as a security feature, as I repeatedly wandered down a wrong branch of the path. I grew more and more confused, and the green and tan fabric rippled and swayed around me, giving the impression that I was wandering the bloodstream of a great, angry beast.

My anxiety rose with every wrong turn. I only had a limited time on the property, and if it was going to be effective, I needed to find and confront Vandie Cedrow as soon as possible.

“Detective Carter.”

I turned, and found Dinah McIntire and a pair of attendants striding down the tented corridor. Beneath a thick calf-length fur coat, she wore a yellow leotard, cut high at the hips, and dark brown nude-look leggings. The aqua sweat bands on her wrists and ankles color-matched the leotard’s decorative belt and the laces on her sneakers. Her forehead was beaded with sweat.

“There you are,” she said. “CaDell told me you were here, and I said to leave you be. No need for you to put up with his tedious questions when I wanted to see you myself. I even cut short my morning training to find you.”

“You always wear furs to exercise?”

“I do when the temperature outside could kill me.” She passed me, adding, “Walk with me a moment.” She was accompanied by two assistants, a man in a bulky sweater and a woman in a conservatively cut suit. Each holding a clipboard, each remaining a few steps behind, like attendants following their queen. Which was, I guess, accurate enough.

I kept pace at her side. “I’m surprised you’ve got in a workout already. Most of your audience isn’t even awake yet.”

“Good,” she said. “This festival is for them to enjoy themselves. For my team and me, this is business.” She glanced at me. “When we play, we play. But when we work, we work.”

“I’ve never had a particularly good balance between work and life, myself.” I unbuttoned my coat, already sweating in the heated environment.

“It’s a hectic schedule, and things can slip between the cracks. For example, I never got the chance to thank you for coming when you did. It was a difficult time, and Bobby’s death was—” She winced. “It was horrible. And I wasn’t in the mindset to deal with it properly.”

“You had a lot on your plate.” She’d tracked me down to fish for validation. We get that sometimes, a survivor or someone on the periphery of a crime, who wants reassurance they’re not at fault.

“Exactly. And now that the shows are almost over, I can catch my breath a little.”

“You certainly made an impact on the city,” I said. “Between the crowds and the hair . . .”

She smiled, and it was like standing in a sunbeam. Her face practically blazed with pleasure. “I’m so glad to hear that. The whole point of performance is to bring something to the people.” The woman had a reservoir of charisma. I might even have bought her depiction of herself as a self-sacrificing angel if I hadn’t overhead the ruthlessness with which she drove her crew.

“If you don’t mind me asking,” I said, “why Titanshade? You could draw a crowd anywhere. To drive across the continent and set up a concert venue here?”

“Haven’t you ever done something simply because it’s hard to do?”

I considered that. “I don’t think so. I’ve done some difficult things. I’ve done lots of stupid things. But I don’t think I’ve ever done anything simply to prove I can. But it’s no harder or easier to set up a concert out here now than a year ago. But you weren’t here a year ago, were you?”

She laughed. “Fair enough.” We came to a fork in the path, and she guided me with a gesture. We moved into a slightly brighter tent corridor, one that I hadn’t discovered yet. “I came out here for two reasons. The first is that the eyes of the world are on your fair city. All of Eyjan is watching to see what will happen with the manna well. And most of those people buy albums.”

I nodded. “Smart. And the second reason?”

“Vandie asked me to.”

“You’re friends?” I was surprised. “How do you know her?”

“From social events, I suppose. Parties, fundraisers, maybe a getaway or two on Edgar Banterro’s yacht. Vandie’s quite a likable person, and when she had her . . . family tragedy,” McIntire’s phrasing was the most distancing description of having an uncle go on a killing spree that I could imagine, “and her financial situation changed, some of the social circle turned on her.”

“Because of her uncle, or because of her lack of funds?”

“Depends on which one of our friends you ask. But Vandie’s always been resourceful. And when she found herself managing an oil