Legacy (Sociopath Series Book 2)(46)

“Turns out people are really funny about who goes nosing through DNA,” she says, not without irony. “We’re not gonna get in here. You need to go back to your mom or something, get other stuff on this guy.”

I roll my eyes. “She won’t tell me anything. Hence having to DNA test my own brother to get his father’s identity. It’s a f*cking joke.”

“Maybe he’s real famous or something, and he paid her off.”

“I sincerely doubt it.”

“Or maybe she doesn’t know his name either, and just doesn’t want to admit it.”

“She knows. He was around more than once.”

I take a big gulp of beer, and focus on Miss Michigan’s nipples to calm myself—she’s frozen mid-pinch. Enlarged on the screen, the caramel peaks almost as big as my hand. Heh. On the downside, this level of magnification also treats me to the sight of her mauled, dry cuticles. Jesus. Maybe I’ll send her a manicure voucher; I like how I’d be creeping her out and doing other dudes a favor at the same time.

“It’s not like this was guaranteed to work, anyways,” she goes on. “I mean, it relied on him being in the database in the first place. Didn’t you say your Ma likes clean-cut types? He’d need to be a criminal to be in the database, right?”

“I said she liked pretentious *s. And yeah, this was hardly fool-proof, but I can’t see you pulling any other helpful suggestions out of your ass. So go find someone who’ll take money to play with CODIS, and I’ll wait here with my co-ed for company.”

“I already tried that, remember?” She pulls a compact out of her coat pocket and assesses the state of her glossy lipstick, tipping her chin to different angles in order to catch the light. “Nobody can find this guy. Your brother was officially sired by a ghost. If he wanted money, he’d have already come to us with his blackmaily knuckles dragging along the floor. You need to let this one go.”

“People don’t just disappear,” I say bluntly. “They go someplace, and they leave shit behind.”

She pauses. Deliberately looks into her little mirror, rather than me. “But your dad did. Didn’t he?”

“That was different.” He didn’t really disappear; they just never found him. I know exactly where he is.

Or what’s left of him.

“Look. So your mother had a one-nighter, and the guy couldn’t deal. I know it dredges up old crap, but you need to stop projecting your own issues—”

“I’m not projecting anything. I just want to know where he is, and why he isn’t manning the f*ck up and taking care of his business.” I set the bowl of chips down on the floor before I give into the slow froth of my temper and launch the stupid thing across the room. “It’s not my fault that grown men go missing every day and the police don’t give a shit.”

She clicks the compact shut with annoying finality. “You know what they say about guys who’re gone for this long. He’s probably dead.”

He probably is. And I have to know if my mother was behind it; have to know if she did it again.

I always thought what happened to my father was an accident. She got mad one night, got carried away, he pushed her too far with…something…she didn’t plan to kill him. Sure, heat of the moment murders are hardly unicorns and candy floss, but there’s something a lot more genuine about them than the pre-meditated kind. Something easier to forget, if not forgive.

“You know how it would look if we were caught trying to access the database,” Tuija says quietly. She prods at my knee; I warn her off with a glare. “In our line of work, we’d be hauled into court so fast we wouldn’t have time to grab our own asses.”

“How ignorant do you think I am?”

“You’re lying on your couch on a Friday night, zooming in on some strange girl’s boob.”

I’m treating a symptom. “I’m bored.”

“So we’ll play Scrabble.” She arches an over-plucked eyebrow.

“Unless you have delectable 34Bs, I’m good.” I wave her off the couch and reach for my beer again. “Now get out of my apartment, and don’t come back until you have a DNA match for Ash’s father.”

Tuija splays her fingers across her tits; they sit high in her tight dress, just a little too round and full to be real. “You said D cups were the ideal.” Her tone hitches in suspicion.

“Ideal on your frame. She’s thinner.”

When Tuij and I sat down with Dr. Price and designed her new body, I went for Jessica Rabbit. I wanted cartoon tits and ass, and boy, did she get them. Miss Michigan here is quite the opposite; shy, subtle beauty, the kind of girl who knows she’s attractive enough to give a guy a boner, but will never have a supermodel’s confidence. In other words, perfect for this particular purpose—a sordid game of cat and mouse—and Tuij, bloated with silicon as she is, is perfect for hers.

Of course I can’t say this kind of shit out loud. But I’d like to.

Wouldn’t you?

“We’re not gonna get the match,” Tuija says eventually. “We’re just not. All you have on this guy is a freaking freeze frame from a CCTV camera—I don’t know what else you want me to do.”

“I need a bigger f*cking forensics department, evidently. You can start hiring.”