looked briefly shocked, but her professionalism managed to restore her smile quickly enough and, gesturing at the bed she said, come on in.
I lay down on the bed, let her cuff my right hand to the bedstead, and as she lent back to admire her handiwork, I caught her left wrist with my free hand and
jumped.
“Hey there,” I said, as the body beneath me blinked bleary, unfocused eyes. “I think we should talk.”
Chapter 22
The scars on my arms itched.
Hidden beneath my tights were fresher scars on the inside of my thighs, still burning, crying out for the scalpel and the antiseptic wipe.
Nathan Coyle – or at least the man whose Canadian passport so proclaimed him to be – lay handcuffed to the bed beneath me. I sat down beside him, crossed my legs, put my chin in the palm of my hand and said, “You’ve got some text messages.”
His eyes focused on me, and with clarity of vision came clarity of thought.
Clarity of thought, it seemed, was not impressed with its conclusions.
His jaw tightened, his fingers tensed.
“I’m guessing,” I said, “that they’re security checks. The first was
Circe
, the second
Aeolus
. Having no idea who to reply to or what to say, I didn’t respond. Your colleagues must know by now that you’re in trouble. Good news for you, unless they shoot you like you shot Josephine.”
He lay motionless. Flat. The angle of his arm cuffed to the bedhead couldn’t have been comfortable, but he was a tough guy. Tough guys don’t fidget.
“I read the Kepler file,” I added, fighting the urge to scratch my arms. “It’s mostly correct – I’m impressed – but you don’t appear in my file, and based on what I can remember I’m reasonably confident I never touched your body, right up to the point you shot me with it. So it can’t be personal. Met any ghosts before now, Mr Coyle?”
Silence.
Of course.
Tough guys, they wake up handcuffed in strange places, gun down women in stations, get possessed and marched halfway across Europe by an invading consciousness, but it’s nothing they can’t handle.
“I considered mutilating you,” I breathed, barely aware of the words as I spoke them, and had the satisfaction of seeing something twitch in Coyle’s face. “Obviously not while I was inhabiting, I have never had a taste for such things. But I still hope that your colleagues, whoever they may be, may hesitate to kill you, as you killed my Josephine, and that hesitation could yet save my life.”
Silence.
“In Edirne I asked two questions. Having spent some time in your body I now have a couple more, though the direction of the enquiry hasn’t changed. Who are you working for, and why did they lie about Josephine?”
He levered himself, just a tiny bit, further up, and for the first time his eyes met mine, and stayed.
“It’s lies,” I breathed. “Most of the file is fine, but then it gets to Josephine and it’s lies. Your employers wanted her to die as well as me. Why is that, do you think? Who are these people she’s meant to have killed? People have always tried to kill my kind, down the centuries. It is inevitable, given what we are. But you shot Josephine in the leg, and even though I fled, even though you
knew
I’d fled, you still put two bullets in her chest. And I don’t understand why. I want this to end well. You’re a murderer, but you didn’t act alone. You’re alive because you’re the only lead I have.”
I waited.
So did he.
“You’ll be wanting to think,” I concluded. “I understand.” My fingers crawled against the soft inside of my arms, tracing scars, wanting to scratch. I pulled my hand away, stood up, hoping that motion and speed would distract from the physiological urge. He watched me. I smiled. “This body –” I gestured head to foot at my skin “– she’s maybe seventeen? Self-harm, drug use, prostitution and schoolbooks under the bed. Not my problem, of course. This is just a rest stop, no business of mine. Tell me:
I lay down on the bed, let her cuff my right hand to the bedstead, and as she lent back to admire her handiwork, I caught her left wrist with my free hand and
jumped.
“Hey there,” I said, as the body beneath me blinked bleary, unfocused eyes. “I think we should talk.”
Chapter 22
The scars on my arms itched.
Hidden beneath my tights were fresher scars on the inside of my thighs, still burning, crying out for the scalpel and the antiseptic wipe.
Nathan Coyle – or at least the man whose Canadian passport so proclaimed him to be – lay handcuffed to the bed beneath me. I sat down beside him, crossed my legs, put my chin in the palm of my hand and said, “You’ve got some text messages.”
His eyes focused on me, and with clarity of vision came clarity of thought.
Clarity of thought, it seemed, was not impressed with its conclusions.
His jaw tightened, his fingers tensed.
“I’m guessing,” I said, “that they’re security checks. The first was
Circe
, the second
Aeolus
. Having no idea who to reply to or what to say, I didn’t respond. Your colleagues must know by now that you’re in trouble. Good news for you, unless they shoot you like you shot Josephine.”
He lay motionless. Flat. The angle of his arm cuffed to the bedhead couldn’t have been comfortable, but he was a tough guy. Tough guys don’t fidget.
“I read the Kepler file,” I added, fighting the urge to scratch my arms. “It’s mostly correct – I’m impressed – but you don’t appear in my file, and based on what I can remember I’m reasonably confident I never touched your body, right up to the point you shot me with it. So it can’t be personal. Met any ghosts before now, Mr Coyle?”
Silence.
Of course.
Tough guys, they wake up handcuffed in strange places, gun down women in stations, get possessed and marched halfway across Europe by an invading consciousness, but it’s nothing they can’t handle.
“I considered mutilating you,” I breathed, barely aware of the words as I spoke them, and had the satisfaction of seeing something twitch in Coyle’s face. “Obviously not while I was inhabiting, I have never had a taste for such things. But I still hope that your colleagues, whoever they may be, may hesitate to kill you, as you killed my Josephine, and that hesitation could yet save my life.”
Silence.
“In Edirne I asked two questions. Having spent some time in your body I now have a couple more, though the direction of the enquiry hasn’t changed. Who are you working for, and why did they lie about Josephine?”
He levered himself, just a tiny bit, further up, and for the first time his eyes met mine, and stayed.
“It’s lies,” I breathed. “Most of the file is fine, but then it gets to Josephine and it’s lies. Your employers wanted her to die as well as me. Why is that, do you think? Who are these people she’s meant to have killed? People have always tried to kill my kind, down the centuries. It is inevitable, given what we are. But you shot Josephine in the leg, and even though I fled, even though you
knew
I’d fled, you still put two bullets in her chest. And I don’t understand why. I want this to end well. You’re a murderer, but you didn’t act alone. You’re alive because you’re the only lead I have.”
I waited.
So did he.
“You’ll be wanting to think,” I concluded. “I understand.” My fingers crawled against the soft inside of my arms, tracing scars, wanting to scratch. I pulled my hand away, stood up, hoping that motion and speed would distract from the physiological urge. He watched me. I smiled. “This body –” I gestured head to foot at my skin “– she’s maybe seventeen? Self-harm, drug use, prostitution and schoolbooks under the bed. Not my problem, of course. This is just a rest stop, no business of mine. Tell me:
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