Clean: A Mindspace Investigations Novel by Alex Hughes

Lieutenant.”
    She seriously considered it, and a chill ran through me. Was I really asking for this? Killer or no, breaking ethics or no, these were the people who kicked me out. Who humiliated me. And who might easily come after me for telling their secrets. I was not the guy I was ten years ago. I was not the golden boy, the genius professor, the idealist anymore. I was a drug addict, a cynic—a doubter. Pathologically. I knew all the things that could go terribly wrong, and if I reported every little violation of ethics, I’d never stop. People broke the rules. That was life.
    I took a breath, clamped down on all of my complex feelings about the Guild. I was probably making myself a bigger target by doing this, but I didn’t care. There was part of me that was still that idealist telepath. Part of me that thought killing with the mind was a sin worse than murder with a knife. A part of me that still lived by those ethics, those Guild ethics. I was in trouble, I thought. I was arguing for contacting the very people who made my life living hell. But I couldn’t take it back.
    Lieutenant Paulsen took a deep breath. “Get out of here. I’ll talk to Branen, but I don’t see why you can’tcall them for information if it’s so incredibly important to you.”
    I looked in the face of what I’d asked for, scary as hell. And I didn’t run away, not quite. I kept it to a walk. A sedate and dignified walk.

CHAPTER 6
    I was sitting on a small chair in the coffee closet, turned sideways to fit in the narrow space. The creaky table, coffeepots, and endemic stale donuts to my left had a comforting smell, the closet light above pleasantly dim. There were no desks for ten feet in any direction, so the minds of those around me receded to a dull whisper and I could think. Well, until Cherabino walked in my direction.
    She stuck her head in the door without knocking. “Want to grab some food?”
    At least I’d gotten half an hour to stew about the mess I’d somehow gotten myself into. Not long enough to come up with anything useful, but long enough to calm down.
    Her gaze flicked around the tiny space. “I don’t understand why you like it here. It’s like a coffee-scented coffin. Tiny.”
    “But delicious smelling,” I said. I forced myself not to rub my head, not to twitch, not to put any warning signs out for her to pick up. “My turn to buy, right?”
    “Guess that means Mexican again,” Cherabino said. She didn’t really like Mexican.
    There were no stars in the sky, but I could see the full moon through the haze of night pollution. Thestreetlights here were all either burned out or set on low to save the city money. We had another block up the hill and across the train tracks to the restaurant, a trek we’d made a hundred times. I was keeping my ears open in Mindspace, making sure I’d see trouble coming. I didn’t want a repeat of the junkie this afternoon. I was also trying
not
to think of the Guild,
not
to consider what I was doing. I would deal with it when it came.
    “Any news on the case?” I asked her, in an attempt at distraction.
    “Some.” She was walking slouched, her hands in her pockets, turned in on herself. “Fingerprints came in from a couple of the early scenes. There are some smears on the bodies, but otherwise no prints but the victim’s. He might be using gloves or skin sealant to hide his prints.”
    “A teleporter with gloves?” Really?
    “Lots of people actually watch television,” Cherabino said, tired. “Fingerprints have been around so long, the shows actually get that much right. Watch the fibers be generic cotton too. I’m telling you, this case is seriously pissing me off.”
    “That’s why we should call the Guild.” At her nasty look, I said, “What? Cause of death and the Mindspace evidence—”
    “Which no one can see but you.”
    “I have a rating of—”
    “Blah, blah, your fabulous rating. If we can’t put you in front of a jury, it doesn’t mean