Free Aneka Jansen 5: The Greatest Heights of Honour by Niall Teasdale

have a lot of blood vessels and the beam would boil the fluid.’
    Sharissa nodded. It made sense, to some extent anyway.
    ‘I’d like this room cleared. Now.’ The voice came from a man who had just entered the small suite. Tall, well-built, with blonde hair and cold blue eyes, and hard features which Sharissa recognised.
    ‘Edgerton, what are you doing here?’
    ‘A senior agent has died under unusual circumstances,’ Edgerton replied. ‘This is an IA matter, Torrence.’
    ‘Wilcox was a lead investigator in Internal Affairs. Agency policy dictates that investigations into the death of an agent are not investigated by their own department. And policy also says that the death of an agent is a security issue…’
    ‘Not anymore. This comes right from the top. IA is taking this.’
    Sharissa’s eyes narrowed, but she said, ‘Okay. I’ll be personally monitoring the case until I get it back.’
    ‘Sure, Torrence,’ Edgerton replied as Sharissa walked past him to the door. ‘Good luck with that.’
    Yorkbridge Mid-town, 15.10.528 FSC.
    ‘I know you were talking to Elaine about Wilcox getting murdered,’ Sharissa said, ‘but there’s really no evidence that it wasn’t a suicide.’
    The reason they were discussing the recently deceased agent was that Sharissa and Janna were over for dinner; Janna and Ella were in the kitchen, and Sharissa had mentioned the case. Aneka had looked distinctly dubious.
    ‘He was found dead in a hotel bedroom by the room service staff,’ Sharissa went on. ‘He was definitely killed by his own pistol. The weapon log indicates that no one else used it, and besides, there was no one else in the room with him.’
    Aneka’s eyes narrowed slightly. ‘How do you know he was alone?’
    ‘They went over the room with scanners. No genetic material from anyone else.’
    ‘You guys really don’t get many murders in this city, do you?’
    ‘Huh?’ Sharissa said, looking perplexed.
    ‘It’s a hotel room. How is it even vaguely possible that the only genetic material in it belongs to Wilcox?’
    ‘Uh… I hadn’t thought of that, but now you say it…’
    ‘Okay,’ Aneka said, her tone thoughtful, ‘what else… The laser burned through?’ Sharissa nodded. ‘What shape was the burn on the ceiling?’
    ‘Uh… Well, a laser burn. A point impact blurred by vapour diffusion.’
    ‘Short duration?’
    Sharissa frowned thoughtfully. ‘No. There was some wobble. It must have been about a one-second burst.’
    ‘Yeah, when he fired his gun, his body tensed from shock, locking his finger on the trigger for a second, but he would have either shifted back or wobbled. The ceiling track should have been a line… or a spiral. Someone was there, holding him upright. I’m guessing a woman. Someone had to persuade him into a hotel bedroom.’ She looked up for a second. ‘Well, in my day it’d have been a woman, but we’re talking Jenlay…’
    ‘No, I checked up on him after the inquisition. He’s never been known to have a male partner. It’s not impossible, but it’s unlikely. He must have met her in a bar…’
    ‘Probably something not too far away. One or two blocks. Walking distance, maybe even short walking distance. A bit of an urgent need to be alone and naked.’
    ‘IA are already classifying it as a suicide,’ Sharissa said. ‘Stress induced. No further need to investigate.’
    ‘And you’re going to leave it at that?’
    Sharissa grinned. ‘Vashma no!’
    ‘Okay, but be careful. I do not want to have to look at burn patterns on your ceiling and realise you didn’t commit suicide.’
    ‘They’d never do that with me.’
    ‘No?’
    ‘No one would believe it. First, that would be two high-ranking agents committing suicide in short order, and second…’ She turned to look toward the kitchen where Janna and Ella were giggling. ‘No one would believe it. If someone wanted to kill me they’d hit me on an op.’
    ‘You’d die when your subject was