The Administration Series (223 page)

He should've stuck at seven drinks he decided as he struggled to open the badly-repaired door to his flat. Seven since Warrick's flat, that was. Whatever he'd drunk before seemed a long time ago. Seven was always his lucky number, drinks-wise, when the alcoholic haze was thick enough to make any problems look better, but the depressant effect hadn't kicked in yet. He should know better than to keep going.

He wasn't even that drunk when they threw him out. However, he was obviously planning to be, and the bar staff clearly thought that it would be more responsible to throw him out early rather than watch him kill himself on their shift. He was sober enough to put up a fight anyway, even if it hadn't lasted long.

He hit the icy pavement on his right-hand side, of course, and the stab of pain from his abused ribs kept him down there for long enough for the cold to really soak through his clothes. After he'd picked himself up, wiped the blood from his lip and finished swearing at the impassive bouncers, he thought about trying somewhere else. He was still barely sober enough for a tiny voice of self-preservation to point out that by the time he was drunk enough to forget what Carnac had said, he
would
be dead.

It had taken him five minutes of shivering on the kerb side to decide whether that was a bad thing or not, then he'd caught a taxi home.

In the bathroom he pulled out the top drawer by the sink and dumped the contents on the counter top. Looters had stripped his stash out, but he'd filled up in a moderate way since he'd come back. He picked a combination of painkillers and things that might clear his head enough to think, washed them down with water and went to lie on the bed and watch the room spinning.

Carnac's words played over in his mind. It was, he knew, exactly what Carnac wanted, but he couldn't stop it.

'The pathetically little you can offer him will no longer be enough. And then he will leave you'.

It was true. That and everything else Carnac had said, but in a way the rest didn't matter, because they were the past and present, and this was the future. He knew it was true; he'd known almost from the beginning, the knowledge kept locked deep inside.

Now it was out in the light and he found that he couldn't look away.

'There is nothing you will be able to do to make him stay'.

He'd lied to himself, told himself that the fucking would be enough. He'd even believed it, even if only when they
were
fucking. When he felt Warrick shuddering with desire — when he said 'fuck me', and 'please', and 'I want you' — when the game was so good that he wept in the chains — when he'd wind Warrick up in public, whispering and touching, until he was desperate enough to let Toreth take him in the car on the way home. Even when Warrick had returned the favour and made him screw up Sara's tenth anniversary presentation . . .

That was what it all meant. He might stay. He will stay. I can make him stay because he needs me. He needs this. He needs it as much as I need him.

It was a lie.

'You're not
that
good a fuck, and really, what else do you have'?

Nothing. The answer was nothing. That was why the idea of Carnac targeting Warrick terrified him so much, because Carnac, bastard though he was, had so much more that Warrick might want. So much more than him.

Forgetting the cut, he bit his lip and winced, tasting blood.

'You can fuck me as often as you want. That won't make me love you'.

Warrick's voice, except that Warrick had never said anything of the kind to him. He couldn't remember where he'd heard the words, but their truth hurt.

He'd proved it himself, over and over, with countless men and women, just like he had with Payne. However much you wanted someone to want you, there was nothing you could do to make it happen. Whatever you did for them, whatever you gave them, whatever you let them take, it could never be enough. Never enough to be sure. Never enough to satisfy them. Never enough to stop them walking away.

Never enough to make them love you.

"How can they expect me to love you, Val?" His mother had asked him that to his face once, exasperated, annoyed with him as usual for fucking up something or other, for still breathing. "You're not a lovable child — you never were."

'You want Keir to love you, more than you have wanted anything in your adult life'.

For the first time, lying on the bed, sliding slowly from drunkenness to artificial sobriety, he saw it all clearly, everything whole and connected, before the sick fear overwhelmed everything and it was gone, leaving nothing more than fragments.

Carnac had shown him the future. One day, Warrick would be gone. Every day was another day closer to that day, until eventually, unbearable even to think about, there would be the moment he left.

"I'm sorry." Warrick's voice in his head again, measured, regretful and, worst of all, kind. "But it was just a fuck, Val. It isn't enough any more."

That wouldn't be what he'd say, of course, but it would be what he'd mean.

How would he do it, really? How would you break up with a possessive fucking manic who'd been trained how to kill people? He caught himself smiling. Carefully. By comm and from a respectable fucking distance. In a peculiar way, the idea made him feel hopeful. Warrick might stay with him for a good long time simply because he was too afraid to leave.

For all he knew, it might even be the reason he hadn't walked away already. The morbid humour evaporated, leaving him cold all over.

Then he saw it. Problem and solution in one.

Walk away.

Walk away now. All the pain, all the drawn-out agony of anticipation, that could all be eliminated if he walked away.

He considered the novelty of the idea. He'd never walked away from anything like this before. Not anything that . . . mattered. Technically, he'd done it to dozens of people. Men and women, unimportant fucks he'd enjoyed explaining the situation to if they tried to pursue him. 'I'm bored. Once was more than enough. You're a lousy fuck anyway. Whatever made you think I wanted you again? It was just a fuck'.

But not Warrick. He'd never thought about it; he'd never even imagined that it was possible. Not that he would say any of those things to Warrick, but that he could leave him and that there was no higher power that could force him back into Warrick's bed unless he wanted — and agreed — to go back. It would be making permanent the feeling he'd had in the flat, the sheer relief of walking away from the inevitable, unbearable conversation.

Goodbye.

It was possible, that was the thing. Warrick couldn't stay with him, but he could leave Warrick. He could do it. The current feeling of resolution might be ninety-five percent chemical, but there was no reason he couldn't stick to it sober.

Somewhere inside, beyond the drink and the mask of the drugs, he could hear a voice screaming 'no'. He ignored it.

Sara had split up with plenty of boyfriends, and, while he couldn't fool himself that it would be that easy after five years, he'd seen how it worked. She was fucking miserable for a day or two, and then she got over it. It wasn't going to be the end of the world.

He pulled the suitcase he'd taken from Warrick's flat out from under the bed and started throwing in the new clothes Warrick had bought for him, and the towels he'd also borrowed when he'd left, and the toilet bag and hairbrush that . . . and he decided to leave the lot. He could buy some more.

Before he left the flat, he realised that he had to tell Warrick now. If he didn't do it straight away, he might not find the resolve to do it later. He sat on the edge of the bed, twirling the comm earpiece between his fingers, until he acknowledged that he couldn't do it like that. He couldn't speak to him. Couldn't even leave a spoken message, which meant sending a note.

Taking out his hand screen, he tried to compose something. In the end he was left with a sparse few lines:

It's over. Don't bother to try to get in touch. I don't want to see you or speak to you again, for any reason. Goodbye.

After further consideration, he changed
over
to
finished
and deleted
goodbye
. Then he sat, staring at the words, until the letters were imprinted on his retina and he saw them even when he looked away, closed his eyes and sent the message.

It was done. Decided. Irrevocable.

He wouldn't see Warrick again. He would never see him again.

In the morning, Toreth called in sick. To Sara it sounded far more like drunk, even though it was half past ten in the morning. Maybe he'd stayed up all night, rather than having gone to bed and started again when he woke up.

"Where are you?" she asked, and he hesitated. He'd never done that before.

"Not at the flat."

"Toreth, I need to know. In case something urgent comes up."

"I'm at a hotel. The, uh . . . " and there was a pause. Christ, he didn't even know.

"The Bowman," he said eventually. "The one in the Arden complex."

Not too far from work, anyway. "Do you want me to come round tonight?"

"No. And don't tell Warrick where I am."

"Of course not."

"I mean it, Sara." The kind of voice that gave her cold chills even when he used it to someone else. "Not one fucking word to him about me. About anything to do with me."

"Toreth —"

"No."

She decided to leave it. If Warrick came looking for him, she could stall until Toreth was willing to talk some kind of sense. "When do you think you'll be in?"

"Not sure. What's Carnac doing?"

"The word is that he's gone already. Handed his resignation to the Administrative Council first thing this morning. They're supposed to be trying to persuade him to stay, but there is a story that he's not even in New London any more — walked straight out of the building and caught a flight to Strasbourg. I'm not sure I believe that one."

"I wouldn't trust the bastard to stop interfering if he was dead." There was a short silence, then Toreth said, "Sara, how did he know about my parents?"

She froze. Couldn't speak, couldn't think, couldn't breathe.

"You told him, didn't you? When he was writing his bloody report." She wished he didn't sound so calm. "It had to be you, 'cause you're the only one who's met them. You're the only one I've ever told anything much about them. Not even Warrick and, like Carnac said, who the fuck else would I tell? So, really, it has to be you, doesn't it?"

Oh, God, please, Christ, no. "Yes," she managed, wondering if he'd hear the whisper.

"I'm taking the weekend off. I'll be in on Monday." Then the connection went dead.

Sara stared at the blank screen, seriously considering following Carnac's example of resigning and catching the next available flight out of New London, without leaving a forwarding address. But that would mean leaving Toreth in the lurch, and even if he killed her when he came back to the office, she couldn't do it. The least she could do for him was to hold the fort while he took the time to sort himself out.

Toreth wasn't in on Monday. Sara arranged for his hotel bill to go onto expenses, because the Division was still paying for accommodation for staff whose homes were uninhabitable. In her opinion, Toreth's flat came close to uninhabitable at the best of times, so she didn't see why he should be out of pocket now.

In Toreth's absence, life at I&I began to return to a strange kind of normality. Every day, the number of Service people in the building diminished, and more staff who had been listed as missing slowly filtered back. Nagra was amongst the first, B-C having contacted her to say that the coast was clear. The junior para didn't seem at all guilty about her long absence, and Sara didn't have the heart to blame her. For one thing, she was too grateful that she hadn't had to make out a death report for Nagra. It felt weird to appreciate someone simply for surviving.

On Friday, as she sat waiting at her desk, the comm chimed.

It was Tillotson, of all people.

"Yes?" she asked, surprise making her forget the 'sir'.

"Is Toreth there?"

"No." Was that relief on his face?

"Then I'd like to see you in my office."

"Okay." She looked at the time on her screen. Two minutes to ten. "I'll be a few minutes."

That really ought to have been politer too, and she thought he might bring her up on it. In the end he merely nodded.

Sara sat back, wondering what Tillotson was up to. Obviously, he'd decided that I&I was safe again and crept back. Probably wanted to check out the new politics and who he needed to suck up to now.

However, she couldn't find out right away, because she was waiting for Warrick to call. He'd called every morning, punctually at ten o'clock, for the whole week. She'd wondered why ten, until she remembered that was when Toreth usually had coffee in his office. By now, their conversation had developed into something of a ritual.

This time, when the call came through, he seemed to be in the corner of a meeting room — behind him, she caught glimpses of Asher Linton and other people around a table, and he kept his voice low.

"Good morning, Sara. How are you?"

"Fine. You?"

"Tolerable. Is Toreth back in the office yet?"

"'Fraid not."

"Have you seen him?"

"No, but I've spoken to him, just like every other day." Maybe she could record a message and run it automatically. "He's fine."

"Do you know where he is?"

"Still no." The lie was easier, since Toreth was still adamant that he wouldn't see or speak to Warrick under any circumstances.

He nodded, clearly expecting the answer. "Thanks. Let him know that I called, if it's not too much trouble."

The picture vanished before she could answer.

Tillotson's reception desk was empty, and Sara realised she had no idea what had happened to Jenny. She didn't recall her name on any of the lists. Surely she must be all right? Another name to worry about, another face to dream about. She squashed the morbid thought, and knocked on the door.

When Tillotson offered her a coffee, the surprise temporarily robbed her of speech. She managed a nod, and sat down before she fainted.