The Girl Who Ran. Nikki Owen

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СКАЧАТЬ I mean, you don’t need one for this. It’s just embedded code.’ He turns to me. ‘I didn’t see it at first, it was hidden behind a series of encryptions that created the strike-through lines across the numbers, but I did a little digging and, well, it led to a place, just a file name header, but a place all the same.’

      ‘What place?’

      He hesitates, eyes flickering to Patricia then back to me. ‘The Office of the Ministry of Justice. In Spain.’

      ‘Doc, isn’t that where Ines used to work? Wasn’t she a member of parliament in that department?’

      ‘She was the Minister.’

      ‘Well, the subject numbers,’ Chris continues, voice hushed, ‘whoever the people were – they seemed to have been, like, generated from there, from the Justice Ministry. What d’you think it means? Do you think it’s all connected? Or is it just random, because Ines was always involved with the Project anyway?’

      I grab his phone, examine the data, but no immediate answer comes.

      ‘Er, Doc?’

      I scan the data again. It seems valid, but how are the subject numbers linked? How can the government Ines used to help run be involved? It may simply be that Ines stored the data at the department. Only facts will tell.

      ‘Doc?’

      ‘Yes?’

      ‘Doc, you need to look up, like, now.’

      ‘Why?’

      ‘Who’s she?’

      Patricia is pointing to the dough woman, striding down the aisle at a speed that betrays her age.

      Chris’s mouth drops. ‘What the..?’

      The woman moves quickly, unusually so for her height and build, her sight locked on us as she makes her way up the carriage. My pulse rises. I glance at the boys and the father where they lie asleep: the father’s arm drops to the side, loose, oddly limp.

      ‘What’s that in her hand?’ Chris whispers. ‘Is that… Oh, shit – is that a gun?’

      Prepare, wait, engage.

      I instinctively slam my two friends out of the way.

      ‘That is a Beretta 92-FS pistol with a 9mm silencer.’

      Chris rams himself behind me. He is close, but I cannot let the confined space bother me, not now, not with my friends at risk.

      ‘Doc,’ Patricia says, a wobble to her words, ‘I don’t like it.’

      She looks like a harmless grandma, her chest a plumped, padded duvet encased in a lilac gilet, the armholes encircled with delicate flower patterns. She smells of boiled sweets and lavender. Nice, sweet – except for the gun.

      ‘Do not move,’ the woman says. Her voice is a clipped typewriter of words, harsh, metallic.

      I stay walled in front of my friends, arms spread in an iron fence to either side. ‘Who are you?’

      ‘You know who I am with.’

      ‘If you’re MI5,’ Patricia says from behind me, ‘you can fuck off!’

      ‘I am from Project Callidus, not MI5, and there’s no need for such language. There are children present.’

      I glance to the father and the boys. Do they know? Do they know who they have been travelling near? My heart races. I feel the bodies of Chris and Patricia behind me, their heat and breath, the shake of Patricia’s arm, the warmth of Chris’s torso. I have put my friends in danger again and at every turn they have found me, so if I run, will this never, ever end? But the email, the email we sent from Madrid airport to the Home Secretary – the Project will be investigated and culled.

      ‘Who are they?’ I say, gesturing to the father and boys. ‘Are they the Project, too?’

      Her green eyes briefly flit behind her. ‘With the Project? Them? Oh, no, no.’ She sighs. ‘They are… collateral.’

      My blood chills.

      ‘What?’ Chris says.

      ‘Children,’ she says. ‘They can just get far too inquisitive sometimes. It can cause… problems. Sweet little poppets they were, though.’

      ‘Jesus,’ Chris says. ‘You… you mean you killed them?’

      ‘No,’ I say, panicking. ‘No, no, no…’ My sight goes straight to the little family. The father’s hand hangs over the edge of the seat rest, the boys’ heads are slipping downwards just a little more than sleep would normally allow. I start to sway, even though the train travels relatively straight. ‘The Project are for the greater good. How… how can this be for the greater good? I have to help them.’

      ‘No.’ She slams her arm across the walkway, blocking my path. ‘It’s time.’

      I stare again at the father, think of the way he smiled at his sons, ruffled their hair, the way his eyes creased when his lips upturned – a family, a real loving family. I clench my teeth, heart slamming against my chest, a rage in me burning. ‘I am not going anywhere with you.’

      She emits a small sigh, bosom rising then falling. ‘You have no choice, Subject 375. Project Callidus needs you.’

      ‘How do you know that number?’

      ‘Because I am here to see you back to our family. Our nickname – Cranes, remember? We represent peace.’

      ‘You are not my family.’

      She smiles and it confuses me – there are creases fanning from her eyes.

      ‘Doc, don’t listen to her.’

      Chris thrusts his head forwards. ‘The Project is over. The British government has all the information on the entire programme. It’s no longer a secret.’

      The smile remains on her face, but now her eyes droop downwards, making the creases deepen. I try to decode it, translate what it means. Eye creases with a smile mean happiness, doesn’t it? So, is that what she feels upon seeing me? Content, whole? If so, why?

      ‘Leave us the fuck alone,’ Chris says now, moving forwards a little. I feel his warm, moist fingers link between mine; I surprise myself by not pulling away.

      ‘The Home Secretary – she has an email,’ he continues. ‘An email with all the files stretching back thirty years on every twisted little thing the Project and MI5 have done.’

      ‘You mean this email?’ The old woman’s words are cashmere soft as she slips her hand into her pocket, pulls out a phone and holds it aloft with the full email and file sent to Harriet Alexander when we were in Madrid.

      Chris shifts forward, looks. His mouth hangs open. ‘What the fuck?’

      The woman switches her gaze to Chris. I do not move. The СКАЧАТЬ