eimarra | Serial: Bodyguard of Lies, episode 57: Bailing Out a Friend (Reply)

Bodyguard of Lies is a serialized science-fiction novel updating once a week on Tuesdays. If you missed last week’s episode, Dirt Exposed, it can be found here. You can catch up on the entire serial on this page with a description of the story and links to all published episodes.

Bodyguard of Lies
Episode 57
Bailing Out a Friend

Charly hadn’t expected it to be this hard to get into the police station. Iris scans, fingerprint matches, voice prints, scan of all the chits she was carrying — and even then, the cops wanted to know precisely who she was going to see, what she wanted, how long she was going to be, and whether she’d ever had any unarmed combat training. As if she’d tell them if she had.

Or rather, that she had. Dating glads had some wonderful fringe benefits. Her bed mates wanted to make sure she didn’t get hurt. And given some of the other, jealous, glads, it was a wise precaution.

Finally, a bored cop waved her through the entrance to the jail wing. She prepared to go through the entire procedure all over again. Good thing she’d encrypted her chits; carrying copies of Johansen’s calls into the station probably wasn’t the brightest thing she could have done. Still, no one really cared what information she was carrying in, so long as she wasn’t carrying more information out.

She’d thought the previous search thorough. If so, this one was downright humiliating. An imaging magnetic scanner — nothing so simple as a metal detector — displayed the inner cavities of her body for all to see. Nothing to see here, move along now, officer. The man behind the counter grinned at her and zeroed in on her breasts. He wasn’t worth glaring at; she just stood still until he waved her through.

The fem on the other side of the scanner said, “You’ll have ten minutes to visit. If you should want more time, that’s just too bad.”

“Who do I see about posting bail for the prisoner?”

The fem glared. “You should have mentioned that back at the first screening.”

“I did. Quite clearly.” Charly glared back. The records would back her up. “Take it up with them if they steered me wrong.”

Another cop came up. “Problem here?”

“She says she’s here to post bail, not to visit.”

He crossed his arms. “Why’d you get into the wrong line, then?”

“This is where I was told to go.” Charly was losing her patience, and this wasn’t a good time for that. She’d be calmer if she’d gotten a full night’s sleep. But maybe she wouldn’t be here if she had, if none of the other had happened.

“I doubt that.” He stepped back and motioned her to a private cubicle. “If you were trying to bypass security, you picked the wrong people to try it on. Step in here and we’ll discuss it.”

Shit. What was with them? She’d followed instructions. It wasn’t her fault if the cop at the front line had screwed up. But the damn coppers had to stick together. If there was an error, she must have made it. She sighed and turned around. “I’ll just start all over again.”

“I don’t think so, bitch.” The man smiled. “You come in here, we got the right to do whatever we want. You don’t leave until we say you do.”

Charly rolled her eyes but stepped toward the cubicle. It wasn’t as though she had a choice.

“What’s going on?” Johansen.

The rumpled cop strode toward them. Should she be grateful to see him? He knew who she was, but he might get off on seeing someone of corp blood having to go through this kind of crap.

The man said, “Nothing you need to worry about.”

“Really? Like the time you decided that the captain’s cousin was smuggling weapons?” Johansen slid his hand onto Charly’s elbow. She resisted the urge to pull away.

“This is nothing like that.” The man didn’t back down.

“So you got a good reason for taking one of my witnesses for questioning? Cap sure wouldn’t be happy you screw those cases up.”

The policeman looked Charly up and down. “She might remember better after a little chemical help.” He shot a look at Johansen. “Or is it something else you’re interested in?”

Charly repressed a shudder. She could imagine what the other cop thought Johansen might be after; he’d made no effort to hide his leers during his visit to her apartment.

“I need something that will stand up in court.” Johansen tugged on Charly. “You’ll have to get off on someone else today.”

The policefem spoke up. “But she said she was here to post bail for a prisoner.”

“Really?” Johansen asked. “I’ll have to escort her to the proper line when I’m done, then.”

The fem glared at Charly. No question that Charly didn’t want to come back through here. Anything that brought her to the coppers’ notice would be bad. Charly followed Johansen’s urging and walked away with him.

He didn’t say anything until they were into the station proper. “How you planning to post bail? You going to spill to cooking the books after all?”

“I got the creds, and they’re legal.” She pulled her elbow out of his grip. She wouldn’t say anymore. He might guess where the creds came from, and that was fine. But if he figured out that she’d put a trace on a police network, chemicals would be the least of her problems.

He stuck out his hand. “Let’s see the chit.”

“You switch departments, copper?”

“I could take you back there, let the plebs shake you down. No telling what happens to your creds then.” His smile was as slimy as his touch.

She forced herself to shrug. “You think you can access it, go ahead.” She pulled the chit from her belt pouch.

He snatched the chit and turned it over in his hand. She waited for him to hand it back, but he dropped his hand to his side and nodded toward an open doorway. “Let’s go talk about who’s got a grudge against Flynn, and why you’re going to tell me it couldn’t be Sabra.”

Click here to continue reading with Episode 58, Questions at the Station.

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Originally published at Erin M. Hartshorn. You can comment here or there.