Chapter VI
The Brokers of Extralegal Acts
Bald-headed and dressed in a dark gray bodysuit, Alicia Martinez crept inside a copse of oaks and knelt beside a tree. The luminous crescent that was the newly risen moon wove a chiaroscuro through the dark branches around her and lighted the plump and perfect mansion that stood nearby, lording over a finely manicured eastern Connecticut lawn.
Settled, the woman double-tapped her lily and said, “Locate: Carlo Burgacci.” Micropixels that were the size of individual rods and cones shone within her left contact lens and displayed an aerial vector map of the surrounding thirty kilometers. Upon it, a red dot advanced down an avenue toward her own green mark. A demure female voice said into her right ear, “Estimated convergence: four minutes.” Her qua
