She laughed. Then she didn’t. She sat and stared at him.
He fought down a surge of shivers. ‘Maybe some tea?’ he asked.
‘Yes, but decaf. You don’t need any more stimulation. You won’t sleep at all tonight.’ She got up and microwaved two cups of water and stuck a decaf English Breakfast teabag in each cup. He watched the steam curl and stayed silent while he let her process his confession. She produced a bottle of brandy from her cupboard and raised eyebrows at him and he nodded. Ricki dosed both cups.
He thought she might keep quiet. She would never go to the police, not at all. But now he had to win her sympathy to earn her continued help. She came looking for you, he told himself. She must want to help you. At least, until she finds out how dangerous this could be.
‘The man was sent to kill me. I have to vanish for a while. I’m not so scared of the cops but the cops can’t protect me, and I’m not going to jail. They won’t let people like you and me have a computer in jail. Ever.’
She folded her arms as though his dire prediction made her cold. She was immediately weighing her options, he could tell. She wasn’t easily given to shock.
‘Will you help me?’ he asked.
‘Who wants you dead?’
‘Nic got me involved. He did work with a group called Novem Soles. Or Nine Suns?’
She shook her head. ‘What, they’re Catholic computer hackers?’
‘Uh, no. They’re afraid I might know more than they think I do. I’m a loose end. I’m a mouth that could talk.’
‘Do you really know anything that could hurt them?’
‘No,’ he said. It wasn’t exactly a lie. The notebook – Nic’s self-described nuclear weapon – there was no point in mentioning it to Ricki. The less she knew, the safer she was.
‘So, what, you run for the rest of your life? This guy you killed, it was self-defense, right?’ Her voice rose slightly. ‘You won’t be able to finish school.’
‘I was kind of bored with school. You and me, we’re not suited to day jobs.’
She gave him a shy smile and sipped her tea. ‘So you run and to begin with I equip you.’
‘Well. If you can. I’ll pay, of course.’
‘What do you need?’
‘A laptop. I need to be able to transfer my money to a new account. I need to get documentation so I can get out of the country under a new name. And I know somebody who might be able to hide me from these guys, and I need a way to contact him without him finding me after I give him a call. I want to see him on my own terms.’
‘I can spare you a laptop, a year-old MacBook Pro with the latest operating system. I have an anonymiser program on it that can shield you from being easily traced. Is that good enough?’
‘Thank you.’ To hackers laptops were like racehorses; they always preferred the most muscle. A year-old computer was an antique to Jack; he routinely bought a new system every six months. But it would do.
Ricki tapped her lip. ‘A passport and credit cards? I know a guy in Brussels who works wonders, but he’s not cheap. He can probably have you a passport in three days, another day to overnight it.’
‘All right.’
‘Your money, I can ask a guy in Russia. He moves a lot of funds for me. But I can’t promise. Could you just withdraw all the cash?’
‘Yes, but I’d prefer to keep it electronic, less likely to lose it.’ He did not want to add that he didn’t care to keep tens of thousands of euros he’d earned hacking for Nic’s criminal ring about his person. He wanted the money moved, cleanly, hidden where he could reach it under a new name. And where he wouldn’t have to worry about customs, or the police freezing his accounts if they figured out Jin Ming was a lie. He was a potential murderer in their eyes now, everything had changed. He needed to keep as many of his secrets close to him as he could.
‘Okay, this guy you need to contact. He doesn’t want to be found?’
‘He is part of a bureaucracy that can hide me.’
‘Government?’
‘Yes.’
‘Dutch?’
‘No. American.’
Ricki stared. ‘You want me to penetrate a top-level American government network. Did you go to a smoke bar after you left the hospital?’
‘No. I’ll do it. But if I run into a wall I will want your expertise.’
Flattery was the most potent currency in the hacker world. That and respect, acknowledgment of skills. She didn’t smile until she’d lifted the tea cup and she thought Jack couldn’t see her grin. ‘I thought you might have some programs to help me chisel my way in.’
‘I might. You hungry?’
‘Yes. Very.’
‘I can cook some pasta, open some wine. Oh, I didn’t think about giving you more alcohol, are you on meds?’
‘I would very much like a glass of wine. And, no, I have no meds.’
‘Now that would be a challenge,’ she said. ‘Get an online pharmacy to send you what you need, without placing an actual order.’ She laughed and so did he, and for a moment the memory that he had killed a man, albeit an assassin, edged from the center of his thoughts. He was always happier when he had a problem with which to play.
‘Is that all you need?’
‘Yes,’ he said. But it was a lie. He knew where Nic lived. And Nic being dead, and the police would have had all his computers confiscated since he was a known con artist and trader in online filth. So had the police found the notebook and taken it? Surely that would be news, if a murdered man’s notebook could blow open an international crime ring. But the police could keep the discovery silent, the same way they’d shielded his name and location while he recovered.
Ricki brought him wine and sat down next to him. Close to him. She smiled at him, warmly. Was surviving a shooting… was that sexy? He’d avoided most girls at Delft because he didn’t want to risk blowing his cover story. Girls always wanted to know about you, to delve into secrets. But Ricki had secrets of her own. She might not ask too many more questions.
They drank the wine and before he knew it, before he could analyse it, he’d taken her wine glass and set it on the coffee table and he was kissing her warm mouth. She kissed him back. He was alive. He’d forgotten how good it could feel. So he did all the things necessary for living; he kissed her, he laughed with her, they ate dinner, they made love. Then they lay in bed and watched a movie she’d stolen from a studio’s laptop, a film that wasn’t hitting theaters for another three weeks.
When she fell asleep and the movie was over, Jack began to think. He needed a way to figure out where Nic would hide his most potent and powerful secret of all, and he would have to start by breaking into Nic’s house tomorrow morning.
8
Las Vegas
I hit the ground wrong.
I rolled too sharply, and felt a pull in my shoulder. I stopped and the early morning desert sky loomed above me. Back in my London days I ran parkour – extreme running, where you vault up walls and use handholds and drop from heights without breaking bones (hopefully). It had been my release from the tension of work, exploring abandoned spaces, turning walls into roads, using precision to power through a space in a more efficient way. But I was out of practice; when your child is missing you don’t really want to take the time for exercise. I’d arrived around midnight Las Vegas time last night, and couldn’t sleep, too wound with excitement and tension. Today was a waiting game, with the rest of the day to kill before Anna Tremaine arrived for our meeting. So I’d gotten up early to try my luck against gravity. It was 5 a.m. and the quietest hour in Vegas, and no one around to see me run.
I’d decided to run through an unfinished building not far from my bar. The last thing I needed to do before capturing Anna – and I had every intention of taking her prisoner – was to hurt myself so I wouldn’t be at peak condition.
But the parkour helped my head. When I had to plan a run, a vault, a leap that I could barely make, only then I didn’t think of Daniel. Then I didn’t think of Lucy. Distraction is a sure way to break a leg or an arm. I got up, dusted off my butt. Looked at the wall before me, five feet high; beyond its rim was air.