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“I’m sorry if the tour was too long. Efficiency is my passion, and I’m proud of the measures we’ve put in place to make this facility what it is.”

“Not at all, Mr. Cooney,” Kumar said. “I was fascinated. I’ll admit, I never thought about what it would take to care for all these people.”

“The prisoners?” Pace grunted. “It isn’t easy, but if it was, more people would’ve wanted to take the job. Opportunity lies in doing what no one else is willing to do.”

He opened the door to his office and motioned for her to enter. When she was sitting down, he offered her a drink.

“Water, please,” she said, “if you have it.”

He passed her a bottle, then hesitated before deciding to sit in the chair beside her, rather than put his desk between them.

“What did you think, Ms. Kumar?”

“I think that you’ve done a brilliant job here, Mr. Cooney. I’m impressed. Even more impressed when I think about the fact you personally involve yourself in running your facilities. Are they all like this?”

Pace shrugged and cracked open his water bottle. “The rest are all smaller, and I only allow a certain percent of inmates to represent violent crimes.”

“Oh?”

“They’ve found that keeping the ratio of violent criminals below a certain threshold makes it far less likely that there’ll be riots or violent offenses in the prison. When I worked out the numbers, it turned out to be cheaper to have one dump—I’m sorry—one high-risk, high-security facility, rather than try to spread the load.”

“So, out there, today…”

Cooney nodded. “The rest are run in a similar fashion, but there aren’t as many guards or precautions.”

“Interesting.” Kumar leaned forward. “Why is your office at this penitentiary?”

“This one’s my largest. I already needed a lot of affordable land, so adding all the auxiliary buildings was—”

“More efficient?” Kumar shook her head with frank wonder. “Pace Cooney, you’re a man in a million.”

Cooney almost smiled. The corner of his mouth twitched up into the flat slate of his cheek. The unfamiliar motioned seemed to upset his train of thought. “Senator, really though, why are you here?”

Devi raised an eyebrow.

“You’re not on the inspection team,” he said, “and they aren’t due again for another two years.”

“You were surprised by my request?”

“You could say that.”

Kumar shut the lid to her bottle and dropped it into her lap. “Mr. Cooney, my friends have been telling me about you.”

For a moment the man’s face scrunched in confusion, then he looked away. “Ah. The other senators.”

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“I admit, I was wondering if you were going to introduce yourself to me. Am I not good enough for you, Mr. Cooney?”

“It’s not that.” Cooney realized how defeated his voice sounded and tried to gather up a scrap of enthusiasm. “It’s not you, Ms. Kumar. No, I gave up.”

“Gave up?”

“They didn’t tell you why I introduced myself to them?”

Kumar made sure her eyes were wide and innocent.

“I was hoping to run for one of my planet’s senate seats, Ms. Kumar.”

“Oh!”

“They didn’t tell you?”

“I’m not sure they knew, Mr. Cooney.”

Pace grunted.

They’d known. They’d rolled their eyes and smiled while talking about how obvious some people were. They’d reveled in the fact they were powerful enough to grant favors and enjoyed the petty pleasure that came along with denying them. Devi had gone home, looked up Cooney, and been amazed at how short-sighted they were.

But now that she’d met Cooney, she could understand why the other senators had balked. There was something about him that put you off. If you didn’t know how to work with people, working with him would be difficult.

“I guess it doesn’t matter,” Cooney said. He glanced up at her with narrowed eyes. “But I don’t think you’ve answered my question.”

“Maybe I was jealous that you’ve been ignoring me.”

He sputtered and blushed until he saw her smile. Then his already red face darkened.

“Oh, Mr. Cooney,” Kumar said, “forgive me for teasing you. The truth is, I have a favor I need to ask of you.”

Cooney’s shoulders sank as his suspicion drained away. This was something he was used to. “Money?”

“Are you offering to buy me lunch?” Kumar laughed at his expression. “Although, really, I should offer to pay for yours. After all, I’m the one asking for a favor.”

“But if it’s not about money, I don’t know what you could want from me.”

“Mr. Cooney—” She paused. “Do you mind if I call you Pace?”

He shook his head.

“Pace, I think you underestimate yourself. You have certain commodities available that others don’t.”

“Everything I buy is legal and above…board…” His voice trailed off when he saw the senator shake her head. With an exasperated sigh, he said, “Really, Ms. Kumar, the only thing I have is buildings full of criminals!”

“Exactly.”

“I’m sorry?”

When Devi spoke, her voice was low and quick. “Pace, there’s a project I’m helping to oversee, buried in MI. I can get the signatures needed to move forward, but there’s something else we’re going to need.”

“Criminals?”

Kumar nodded.

“Why would you want criminals?”

Devi tried to figure out if Cooney was naturally slow, purposefully being obtuse, or so used to thinking of them as cattle that he’d stopped seeing them as anything else.

“We need people who can go missing and not be missed,” she said.

Cooney sat back in his chair. His head seemed to be shaking itself, taking him along for the ride. “No, no, no, no. Ms. Kumar, are you serious?”

Devi watched him without answering.

“You’re talking about killing them?”

“It’s not something we want to do, Pace. But it’s the only way the project can move forward.”

“This can’t be approved by the Senate.”

“It’s a small project for MI. I’ll get all the signatures—”

“That’s not going to make it legal! If anyone found out, they’d string us up!”

“They aren’t going to find out about it. I know you follow the senate, Cooney. Do you have any idea how many projects get signed, sent out, and never looked at again? Hundreds. And that’s each year. The senate can’t effectively run a government and wage war at the same time.”

“You’re asking me to risk everything on the hope that no one will look at it.”

Kumar smiled. “You should see the damn thing. It’s this thick.” She held her hands almost a foot apart.

“The person who wrote it—”

“Was me. I used to be a lawyer, you know. You have to read for a week before you figure out anything worth knowing.”

“Is this a joke to you?”

Kumar hummed as she stared at the corner of the room. “Pace, I’m not worried. Because I’m not worried, I can see the humor in it. I’m sorry, I should’ve seen you were…bothered.”

In the short hesitation, before Kumar settled on the word “bothered,” Cooney discovered he was scared. That did bother him. And from the tone of the senator’s voice, he knew that she knew it. He made a sour face.

“It’s that important to you?” he asked. “You’re willing to risk everything?”

“It’s important to a friend of mine,” she said. “And, as I’ve said before, I don’t really see it as a risk.”

Cooney’s face was an agony of indecision. “I don’t know, Ms. Kumar.”

“There’s an opportunity here, Pace. I’m not a nobody, and I would owe you a big favor if you’re willing to help us. What was it you said? ‘Opportunity lies in doing what no one else is willing to do.’”