3
er skirt was short and Syd forced himself not to stare. The girl wore the necklace of The Followers of Kenna, and Kenna's girls did not like men staring at them.
Or men at all, Syd thought.
"I was on my way out," Syd said, "I don't have time for negotiations. I have some good stuff, green and not too tasty, but it'll give you the shakes like the hangover from a week long whiskey bender. Only much more pleasant."
The girl touched the necklace which hung above her artificially raised cleavage subconsciously, and stood with her legs slightly crossed.
She's trying to manipulate me, Syd thought; she's not new at this exchange.
"Do I look like the kind of girl that would be happy with green?" she said.
"I really was on my way out," Syd said, "you want brown, it's four dollars a spoon. I don't have any white, no one here can afford white and not enough of your types come down to my apartment to make it worth the risk to have around. You in or out?"
"Three dollars," she said.
"Done. How many spoons?"
"Twenty."
They made the exchange. When she was gone Syd put the money in the box under his bed which was filled with money and waited for the alarm in the ceiling to go off, and for the doors to automatically lock.
He saw the girl outside walking quickly up the street. When she turned a corner Syd pictured her giving the bag to an agent from the MP and waited. Nothing happened.
You're not going to get arrested, not on your wedding day, he thought. He waited ten more minutes to make sure he wasn't going to be under arrest and got up. He put his coat on and left for the agency.
Jennifer sat on the round wooden bar stool and tried to ignore the music around her. Bodies sweated, lights flashed, and the whole place shook with the noise of drunken college students.
She swiveled in her bar chair, her glass of straight vodka half empty. The students looked young to her, almost babyish, although she could remember being