Evidently his companion didn't because he decided to start searching. He was big and bulky even for a troll, no doubt chromed to the max. He carried the weighty laser pistol with no discernible effort.

"There's a door over here, Shayx." Dion drifted into place alongside it almost below Skater, his laser pistol lifted and ready. Like most elves, he was tall, with the exaggerated slenderness of that race. His dress was fashionable and expensive, a sharp contrast to his partner's street slouch.

Shayx put out a hand and tested the heavy wooden door. "Locked. But I can take it down."

Dion hesitated, scanning the alley. "You think he could have secured the damn door after him?"

"Maybe."

"I don't like it."

A snarl of mirth Framed the troll's lips. "You want to call the big man and tell him that?"

"No." The reply was thoughtful, with no reaction to the taunt. 'Take it down. He acted like he knew where he was headed. Maybe he had a key."

Shayx drew back a massive foot, then smashed it into the door, sundering it from its hinges with a series of snaps and metallic screeches.

"Go on," Dion said, pointing his pistol inside. "I've got you covered."

Shayx moved lithely into the room, following his weapon. "Nada, chummer. Room's full of dust. I spend any time in here, I'm gonna hack up a hairball the size of a Trailblazer truck."

The elf lowered his guard as he scanned the alley again. Eventually, his gaze wandered up in Skater's direction. His almond eyes widened in surprise and he tried to bring his weapon to bear.

Too late. Skater had already released his hold and dropped, hitting the elf as his weight knocked them both to me ground. Pushing himself up on one elbow, he extended the Predator before him, targeting the approaching Shayx bellowing a challenge. Skater snapped off six rounds and reduced the troll's head to a confused hunk of blood, bone, and ripped flesh. He didn't think anything less would have stopped the attack.

The augmentation kept the dead gillette on his feet for a few more staggered steps while Skater thrust the Predator's muzzle under the elf's chin. The elf froze at the touch of the heated metal. Reluctantly, Shayx's corpse dropped to its knees, then fell forward on what was left of his face.

Anger blazed in the elf's eyes, then his gaze flicked briefly toward the butt of the laser pistol only centimeters out of his reach.

"I really wouldn't advise that," Skater said. "I've had a long, hard night, and I won't hesitate a tick to shoot you. Roll over on your face. Slowly."

Dion did as he was ordered.

Skater kept watch over the alley exit to Cherry Street. He expected Lone Star to arrive any second now. But first he wanted to find out for sure if the elf and the samurai were working solo. He levered one of the elf's arms up behind his back, making it impossible for him to move well unless he was double-jointed. Skater didn't rule that out. The Predator lingered against the elf's skull.

"Who're you working for?" Skater demanded.

"Ask my friend," Dion suggested.

"Your friend's kind of dead right now."

"Well, he was always the talker."

Skater pressed the Predator a little harder against the base of Dion's skull. "Maybe it's time you start learning."

"Or else?"

"You and Shayx get a chance to pair up again in the next world."

The elf laughed delicately, not moving too much. "I appear to have an advantage over you. See, I know quite a lot about you. I know you're the kind of guy who'd rather cut a deal than use a gun."

"I'm not exactly adverse to using a gun," Skater pointed out. "You can check with your friend on that."

'True. But I'm just as dead if I talk. That, I can guarantee you, is a fact. And I really don't think you'll shoot a man who's so obviously at your mercy."

"What if you're wrong?" Skater nudged him again with the pistol barrel.

"Chummer," the elf said with a wry grin as he looked back at Skater, "will my face be red."

Still holding the Predator against the elf's skull, Skater searched his prisoner with his free hand.

"No credstick, I'm afraid. Never carry while I'm on assignment. You'll leave me knowing nothing about me."

"I know about Synclair Tone."

"Oh? Just what do you think you know?"

"Enough to start looking for him," Skater promised.

"If I should meet him, I'll be sure and tell him that."

Ignoring the jibe. Skater found the power-down button on the elf's Ares laser pistol harness and faded the present charge. It would take the soft-pack batteries a few minutes to power the unit back up. He planned on being gone by then. He did the same for the dead troll's.

"Do yourself a favor," Skater said, "and stay out of my way, I see you again, I'll figure a gun's the only way to set things straight between us."

The elf nodded. "I don't make the same mistake twice."

"Stay there." Skater pushed himself up and moved away, keeping the Predator trained on the elf. "Until you can't see me anymore." He kept backing away, noticing the hot white strobe lights of a Lone Star Northrop PRC-44B Yellowjacket helo descending on Cherry Street.

Holstering his weapon he moved at a fast walk and flagged down a cab. No one was following him.

Larisa's Bellevue address was a high-rise in Beaux Arts, just across a short expanse of Lake Washington from Council Island. The building was forty stories high, well landscaped and probably just as well protected by private security.

"This the place, bub?" the troll cabby asked, shifting a toothpick the size of a pencil around in his slash of a mouth. He wore a faded and stained plaid beret with a candy-striped pink button announcing I BRAKE FOR BLONDES.

"Yeah." Skater shoved his credstick into the pay slot and added a modest tip. The wind whipping in from the lake was cool and wet as he got out and stood for a moment looking up at the building. Skater took a deep breath and tried to shake off the fatigue he felt creeping up on him.

"You want to be careful in this neighborhood," the cabby advised. "Knight Errant does the general upkeep on security."

'Thanks. I will." Skater didn't bother to correct the cabby's assumption that he was here for some illicit reason.

The cabby touched his hat and pulled into the light traffic, within moments vanishing into the stream of ruby lights warring against moonlight and shadow.

Skater turned his duster collar up against the wind, then walked across the street and up to the door of what an elegant sign proclaimed as the Montgomery Building. The foyer was well-lit, glass on stainless steel, all buffed to perfection. The double doors were secured by cardkey locks, and were recessed enough that Skater figured a cage would form around anyone who tried to scam them.

Every nerve in him screamed to run as he ascended the seven short steps toward the front of the building. But it didn't matter. He couldn't leave Larisa in danger, no matter what had gone down between them.

He arrived at the door as an older couple also came up, and made a show out of retrieving his card from his wallet. They offered him the door and he took it, thanking them.

A public-service desk was to his right, prim and proper and polished, but totally deserted. A large framed watercolor print by Adam Alone depicting a forlorn troll gondolier in Venice covered the back wall between two electrical torch sconces. Potted pine trees stood formation around the outer perimeters. Grayish colors spewed from the security camera monitors running inside the small office behind the desk.

His senses clamoring a warning, Skater veered away from the old couple as they headed for the bank of elevators. As he approached the desk, he tasted the metallic stink of blood on the air even before he saw the first of it. Two bodies lay limbs akimbo behind the big counter, soaking crimson into the plush sand colored carpet. The man wore professional dress and had Night Manager on his name tag. The woman was ten years older, well into her forties, and outfitted in the light-blue and gray uniform of Knight Errant Security. She'd been lasered through the abdomen, and part of the stylized KE belt buckle was missing.