Lock In (Lock In, #1)(8)

Vann blinked. “I wasn’t told you’d asked for a lawyer,” she said.

“I didn’t,” Bell said. “I called him while I was still in the hotel room. Before the police zapped me.” Bell tapped his temple, indicating all the high-tech apparatus he had stuffed into his skull. “Which I recorded, of course, just like I record almost everything. Because you and I agree on one thing, Agent Vann. Being in a room with a dead body complicates matters. Being electrocuted before I could exercise my rights complicates them even more.”

At this, Bell smiled and looked up, as if paying attention to something unseen. “And that’s a ping from my lawyer. He’s here. I expect your life is about to get much more interesting, Agent Vann.”

“I think we’re done here, then,” Vann said.

“I think we are,” Bell said. “But it was lovely talking food with you.”





Chapter Three

“SO, TO RECAP,” Samuel Schwartz said, and held up a hand to tick off points. “Illegally stunning my client when he was not offering any resistance, detaining him without cause in a holding cell, and then two separate law enforcement agencies, one local, one federal, question him without making him aware of his rights and without his lawyer present. Have I missed anything, Captain? Agent Vann?”

Captain Davidson shifted uncomfortably in his desk chair. Vann, standing behind him, said nothing. She was looking at Schwartz, or more accurately, at his threep, standing in front of the captain’s desk. The threep was a Sebring-Warner, like mine, but it was the Ajax 370, which I found mildly surprising. The Ajax 370 wasn’t cheap, but it also wasn’t the top of the line, either for Sebring-Warner or for the Ajax model. Lawyers usually went for the high-end imports. Either Schwartz was clueless about status symbols or he didn’t need to advertise his status. I decided to run him through the database to see which was the case.

“Your client never expressed his right to remain silent or his desire for a lawyer,” Davidson said.

“Yes, it’s strange how getting hit with fifty thousand volts will keep a person from verbalizing either of those, isn’t it,” Schwartz said.

“He didn’t ask for them after he got here, either,” Vann noted.

Schwartz turned his head to her. The Ajax 370 model’s stylized head bore some resemblance to the Oscar statuette, with subtle alterations to where the eyes, ears and mouth would be, both to avoid trademark issues and to give humans conversing with the threep something to focus on. Heads could be heavily customized, and a lot of younger Hadens did that. But for adults with serious jobs, that was déclassé, which was another clue to Schwartz’s likely social standing.

“He didn’t have to, Agent Vann,” Schwartz said. “Because he called me before the cops stunned him into silence. The fact he called a lawyer is a clear indication that he knew his rights and intended to exercise them in this case.” He turned his attention to Davidson. “The fact your officers deprived him of his ability to affirm his right does not mean he refused his right, even if he did not reiterate that fact here.”

“We could argue that point,” Davidson said.

“Yes, let’s,” Schwartz said. “Let’s go to the judge right now and do that. But if you’re not going to do that, then you need to let my client go home.”

“You’re joking,” Vann said.

“You can’t see me smile at that comment, Agent Vann,” Schwartz said. “But I promise you the smile is there.”

“Your client was in a room with a dead body, the guy’s blood all over him,” Vann said. “That’s not the mark of complete innocence.”

“But it’s not the mark of guilt either,” Schwartz said. “Agent Vann, you have a man who has no previous police record. At all. Not even for jaywalking. His line of business requires him to surrender control of his body to others. As a consequence of that, from time to time he meets clients he does not personally know, who conduct business with others he also does not personally know. Such as the dead gentleman at the Watergate.”

“You’re saying your client was integrated at the time of the murder,” I said.

Schwartz turned and looked at me for what I suspected was the first time in the entire conversation. As with Schwartz’s threep, mine had a fixed head, which showed no expression. But I had no doubt he was sizing up my make and model just as I had sized up his, looking for clues as to who I was and how important I was to the conversation. That, and taking in my badge, still in my chest display slot.

“I am saying that my client was in that hotel room on business, Agent Shane,” he said, after a moment.

“Then tell us who he was integrated with,” Vann said. “We can take it from there.”

“You know I can’t do that,” Schwartz said.

“Vann tracks down creeps with threeps all the time,” Davidson said, motioning at Vann. “That’s nearly her whole job, as far as I understand it. There’s no law against tracking a person back from information on their threep.”

Out of reflex I moved to correct Davidson’s bad comparison, then caught Vann’s glance at me. I stopped.

Schwartz was silent for a moment, then Davidson’s tablet pinged. He picked it up.

“I just sent you ten years of case law about the status of Integrators, Captain,” Schwartz said. “I did it because Integrators are relatively rare and therefore, unlike Agents Vann and Shane here, who are currently being wholly disingenuous, you might be speaking out of genuine ignorance and not just your usual levels of casual obstructionism.”