Dark Light by Randy Wayne White Page B

there’s the male side of the family tree.”
    â€œI know something about them. Father is CEO of McIntyre Industries. Two of her brothers work in the business. The other teaches, I think.”
    â€œMathematics.”
    Cooper roared with laughter. “Sounds like you’re marrying into a family of overachievers. Serves you right, seeing as how you qualify as one yourself. Congratulations.”
    â€œYou can save the congratulations. I doubt that the marriage will last very long after Sierra’s relatives discover that she’s married to a Guild chief who also happens to be a genuine bastard.”
    â€œDon’t jump to conclusions,” Cooper advised. “From what I’ve heard, the McIntyres as a clan resonate to a different frequency.”
    â€œI don’t care how independent-minded they are. People that rich and that influential don’t let their daughters marry outside their social circles, let alone marry bastards.”
    There was no need for either of them to comment further, Fontana thought. Although the laws theoretically protected children born out of wedlock and were designed to try to ensure that both parents took equal responsibility for their illegitimate offspring, there was no avoiding the fact that being born a bastard still carried a stigma. In a society that placed a massive emphasis on marriage and family ties, there was little room for someone like him.
    His story was one of the oldest in the book. His mother had been a cocktail waitress. His father had been a wealthy man in a Covenant Marriage who had been looking for a little fun.
    â€œSierra agreed to cooperate with your investigation?” Cooper asked.
    â€œYes.”
    â€œSo this MC is purely a business arrangement?”
    â€œRight.”
    â€œShe must be very hungry for the story if she’s willing to marry for it,” Cooper said thoughtfully. “Any idea what triggered her interest in Jenner and the drug operation in the first place?”
    â€œIt started with some negative pieces she did on the Guild. There were a lot of stories about how many retired Guild men were living on the streets of Crystal and how the Guild ignored their plight.”
    Guild men tended to begin their careers early, usually in their late teens; not surprising since dissonance energy para-rez talent was strongly correlated to testosterone and other male hormones. That basic biological fact also went a long way toward explaining the very small number of female hunters in the ranks, although it was considered politically incorrect to point out the connection.
    Pensions and so-called “fry pay”—disability benefits—were of vital importance in the Guild organizations. Hunters not only started out early, they usually ended their careers within twenty years; many quit long before that. It was no secret that frying ghosts for a living provided limited long-term career options. In addition, the work took a psychic toll. Guild men who hung around the catacombs too long lost their edge and got careless. Getting careless underground could not only get you badly burned, it put the clients in jeopardy. That was not good for the organization’s image.
    The end result was that if a hunter did not move up into management within the Guild, he usually retired before the age of forty. That meant that a lot of used-up hunters found themselves unemployed with no useful work skills. The retirement benefit plans were generous, but ex-hunters had a bad habit of blowing their monthly checks on the same traditional vices they had enjoyed during their working years: women, gambling, and booze. And now, here in Crystal, on juice.
    â€œAfter the attacks on the Guild’s failure to look after their retirees, Sierra started doing pieces on the ghost juice problem,” Fontana continued. “She pointed out that most of the addicts were ex-hunters. Then came the stories about the disappearances. The headlines