TimeSplash (23 page)

“And this is what you’ve brought us?” Porterhouse’s eyes narrowed under heavy brows. “A teenage mental patient, trying to palm her fantasies off on us?”

Barry Overman lifted a hand, and Porterhouse subsided into his seat, glowering at Jay. The young agent hoped that Overman wouldn’t be leaving the room any time soon. “You can see how this looks, Jay,” Overman said, reasonably. “I don’t see how we could trust anything she said.”

“I trust her, sir. I’d—”

Overman’s compatch beeped and he listened for a moment. “We’ve got the file,” he said. He reached out and turned on the viewscreen. Sandra Malone’s head and shoulders appeared in the room, slowly rotating.

“I think I understand everything now,” said Porterhouse.

Jay winced at the pointed tone. It was the shot the hospital had used on her wanted poster and, even though it was an institutional shot and Sandra was looking glum, she still managed to make the picture look like it was copied from VogueOnline.

“Certainly an attractive young lady,” Overman murmured.

Jay rallied to his own defence. “Look, it doesn’t matter what she looks like. Her information is solid gold. She’s been keeping tabs on Sniper’s operation for months. She can lead us right to him. I don’t see what the problem is.”

“I agree that’s all useful intel—” Overman began, but Porterhouse cut in.

“It’s a load of bollocks. That’s what it is. This little cutie has got you wrapped around her little finger and she’s using you to get herself off the hook with the police. It’s a scam, that’s what it is.” His angry glare intensified. “I suppose you’re sleeping with her.”

Jay was on his feet in an instant. “No, I’m bloody well not. Not that it’s any of your damned business.” He turned to Overman. “What the hell is going on here? Good boss, bad boss? I’m offering you prime intel and you’re playing silly buggers!”

Porterhouse was on his feet too. “Sit down! Right now.”

Jay switched his anger back to the big man, not in the least bit inclined to go back to the interrogation he’d been enduring.

“Please do as he says, Jay,” said Overman in such a calm and relaxed way that it caught Jay quite off guard. It even made him feel just a little bit silly standing there red-faced and scowling. He sat down.

Overman switched off the viewer and stood up. “I think that’s all, don’t you?” he said to Porterhouse. The other man nodded his agreement and headed for the door. “If you’d just stay here for a little while longer,” Overman said to Jay. “Someone will be along in a minute.”

Jay watched them leave the room and stared at the closed door in confusion. It opened again thirty seconds later and Holbrook walked in.

“No, no. Don’t get up,” the Director said, bustling in. He took the seat Overman had been using. He chuckled. “Quite a performance those two gave, don’t you think?”

“You were watching?”

“Oh, aye.”

Jay began to protest. Holbrook talked over him. “It’s not a small thing you’re asking us to do, lad. To get the conviction against Ms. Malone dropped will require me to persuade the Minister. She will in turn need to persuade the Home Secretary. He is the only power in the land capable of quashing it, you understand. And of revoking the Custodial Rehabilitation Order. Your pretty friend is asking a high price for her information, if I may say so.”

He looked closely at Jay for a few seconds, long enough that Jay began to wonder if some kind of a reply were needed. “Nevertheless,” he went on. “I agree that this is a deal we have to do. I’ve scheduled a meeting with the Minister for this afternoon and I expect the whole thing to be sorted out before tomorrow lunchtime.” He gave Jay a thin smile. “You can tell your friend she’s a free woman again.”

“Thank you, sir, I will. There’s a couple more things though.”

Holbrook said nothing but raised a very eloquent eyebrow. Jay pushed himself on. He had expected to be dealing with Overman, not the Director himself. But it couldn’t be helped.

“I’ll have to be her handler, sir. She won’t accept anybody else.”

Holbrook regarded him steadily, his face giving nothing away. “Jay, you’re a good lad, and I predict that you’ll go far in the service, but you’re—what?—nineteen? Twenty? Handling an informant is a delicate business. It calls for experience. You’re barely out of the academy. You’ve been with us just a couple of years. And this is intelligence that all our lives might depend on.”

He leaned forward and clasped his hands together. “Listen, lad, on the strength of what you’ve said already, I’ve put emergency plans into effect that will move the King and the Parliament out of London within the next couple of days. After Beijing and Mexico City, no one is taking any chances. Certainly not me. How can I leave the fate of the nation’s capital in the hands of a boy who’s only just started shaving regularly?”

Jay shifted uncomfortably. The trouble was, Jay couldn’t agree more with what Holbrook had just said. He was too young for all this to be on his head. And inexperienced. Yet… “You said yourself how delicate this is. Sandra is living right on the edge. If we give her the slightest reason not to trust us, she’ll bolt, and I doubt that we’d find her again. I don’t want to be in this position any more than you want me to be, but I’m the only one she’ll talk to. It has to be me, sir. I’m sorry.”

Holbrook didn’t look happy. He spent a long time looking into Jay’s eyes—a scrutiny Jay managed to sustain without backing down. “Okay, lad, you’re the handler. Report directly to Overman. Tell him everything. Absolutely everything. He’ll supervise. Listen to what he tells you and don’t do anything too stupid.”

He stood up and made for the door. Jay stood too. “Thank you, sir.”

Holbrook stopped and looked back. He shook his head sadly. “God help us all, eh lad?”

“Amen, sir.”

* * * *

“I want you to replace him. He’s unstable and unreliable.”

Camilla paced the sumptuous sitting room in Sniper’s Surrey mansion. Sniper was sprawled on a white leather sofa, watching her. As she spoke she glanced at him to gauge his reaction. Her expression grew a fraction more sour at the sight.

“You’d be safer without him,” she said, changing tack. “I don’t think you can trust him any more.”

Sniper looked away, bored.

“What’s so good about him anyway?” she wanted to know. “The world must be full of tekniks just as good. Ones that aren’t planning to stab you in the back. Let me talk to the investors. I’m sure we can find you an excellent replacement.”

“Klaatu stays.”

Camilla tried to hide her anger. “I know you’ve been together a long time. You’re used to him and how he works. He’s like a…comfort blanket or something. I’ll be happy to tell him if you don’t want to.”

She looked to him, imploring him to be reasonable, but when his eyes turned to meet hers, she saw only implacable determination.

“Klaatu stays,” he said again, more firmly this time.

Her temper snapped and she gave up the effort of trying to appear calm and professional.

“For God’s sake, why? You know the little creep wants to back out. He’s a danger to this project and I want him off the team.”

Sniper smiled, happy now that she was thoroughly riled. “What did he do, make a pass at you?”

She pursed her lips at the insult to her professionalism. “I can’t work with that jumped-up little rodent. Who the hell does he think he is? I insist that you get rid of him!”

Sniper shook his head, smiling sadly. “For you? You’re the office temp, remember? One call to your precious investors and I’ll have your replacement on the next plane from Hong Kong.”

He got up and walked across the big room, restlessly prowling along the big windows that opened onto the gardens. “You need to grow up, Camilla, my sweet. Klaatu will stay until I let him go. He knows I’d kill him if he tried to leave before I wanted him to. More importantly, I know he will do the best job he can on this splash because he wants it as much as I do.

“You’re right that we go back a long way. And I’ll tell you the secret of our success. We both want the same thing and we both need each other to get it. You, on the other hand, I don’t know at all. You’ve got no interest in what we’re doing here. For you, it’s just another job. You should keep in mind that you’re here to make my life easier, to smooth things out, to pander to my needs. And, of course, to spy on me for the investors. It’s a convenience I can easily live without.”

He was looking directly at her now, challenging her to contradict him. Her nostrils flared and her eyes narrowed but she kept her mouth shut and forced herself back under control. “Very well,” she said, her eyes slipping away from his in her moment of humiliation. “Klaatu stays.”

She took a breath, pulled herself up, and brought her expression back to neutral. “Did you see the files he sent on the target?”

Sniper sauntered back to the sofa and sprawled into it again. “I can’t believe you guys let Flash keep all that stuff secret from you.”

“That’s why I’m here spying on you, I suppose,” Camilla said, her anger turning to bitterness.

“So it doesn’t happen again. The investors feel that Flash had far too much freedom.”

“Good choice of target, though.” Sniper had read the decrypted files like a gourmet savouring an excellent meal. “It’s perfect,” he said. “The target details, the analysis of the repercussions, the calculations of the size of the splash… It’s beautiful. Just think what an impact on the timestream this is going to have. And the date! 1902! Almost a full one hundred and fifty years. Flash was a stupid tosser with ambitions well beyond his capabilities, but the choice of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin is inspired.” He closed his eyes, perhaps imagining meeting the man.

“You should get on to Klaatu and hurry him up,” he said, as if Camilla’s earlier complaint had not happened. “Keep the little prick focused. He’ll spend weeks working out the lob parameters to the twentieth decimal place if you let him. I want his tekniks putting the equipment together now, not waiting around for him to find the perfect solution.”

Camilla was thinking about the next time she spoke to her bosses. There was going to be a big bonus in this for her or these arseholes could find themselves another punching bag. “The equipment’s no problem,” she said distractedly. “Flash’s people had already acquired most of it. Lots of it is already assembled. It just needs finishing.”

“Take it apart,” Sniper told her. “Strip it right down and start again. I don’t trust anybody but Klaatu to build my rigs.” He waved a dismissive hand. “Ach, don’t worry about it. Klaatu wouldn’t trust anyone else’s tekniks either. He’ll rebuild it anyway. Just keep the pressure on him. He’s too much of a perfectionist. He’ll take forever if you let him.”

“You want him to rebuild…” God, they were such
prima donnas
! Never mind. Some messages would be passed to Klaatu. Some would not.

“We’ve got more important matters to worry about than schedules,” Sniper said, moving to stand by the window. “The girl is still out there.”

Now what? Camilla went and sat down, feeling cross and agitated. This man’s mind was like a child’s. It leapt from topic to topic, never resolving anything. “You mean your bitch?” His latest neurotic obsession.

“My ex-bitch. Patty. She’s still out there.” He gazed across the fields as if he might see her lurking among the distant shrubbery.

“So what? She’s a child. A girl. What can she do?”

He whirled to face her. “She nearly killed me in Berlin. She’s followed me here. She’s stalking me, asking questions. People have seen her. She’s always looking for me, hunting me.”

Camilla eyed him with distaste. “This is the one you told me about, yes? The escaped lunatic?” Sniper nodded. “You don’t have any reason to believe it was her in Berlin. How could it have been? She’s on the run from the police. She was only seventeen at the time you say she shot at you. You’re getting worked up over nothing.” She shook her head impatiently. Nursemaiding paranoiacs was not part of her job description. “You need to get out more. You sit in here week in week out, surrounded by armed guards, it would drive anybody nuts.”

Sniper snarled at her and turned away, but behind his eyes there was the need for reassurance.

”I know Patty. She’s beautiful, clever, cunning. I don’t want her sneaking around trying to kill me. I want her dead!”

Outside were the sun and the lawns, the trees and the little white clouds, all the bright apparatus of a lovely summer’s day, but none of it could dispel the darkness which hung about Sniper like a shroud. Camilla sighed. Oh yes, it would so much better if the girl were dead.

* * * *

Jay got home late but it was still light outside. Unlike the previous evening, it was warm and pleasant. He looked forward to seeing Sandra. She would be there at his flat as they had agreed. He planned to take her out for a meal, then maybe to a club. They could dance. It had been a long, long time since he’d danced, even longer since he’d been on a date. Not that he should really think of it as a date. He was her handler now. She was his informant. They had a professional relationship. Besides, he hardly knew her. He’d seen her a few times, spoken to her for a few hours. Hardly the basis for anything, really.