He shook his head, and fished a handful of M&Ms from the packet in front of him. Ho’s Hos. And how he looked after them was, he began with a basic assumption, that each would have a presence on social media, the chances of which he put at a conservative 100 percent. After that, it was straightforward image-recognition, which was where the technology came in. Matching a Facebook profile, a Twitter glimpse, to a photo-shoot: basically, once you’d scanned and uploaded the image and made a cup of tea, your job was done. And sometimes, too, other photos came to light; other photo-shoots these perfume and clothery girls had signed up for, which might or might not involve perfume but had little to do with clothing. These too he downloaded and saved and printed out: all part of the dossier-building. And once a dossier was thick enough, Roddy dispatched it directly to the girl in question—first class delivery; no penny-pinching—so she’d know she had a well-wisher; someone intent on alerting her to the dangers a saddo predator could represent. He did this anonymously. Heroes work in the dark. But he liked to think of these girls—women—receiving his packages, and realising how much care and attention had gone into them; how focused some unknown but totally woke stranger was on their well-being, to compile these warnings about their vulnerability. He imagined their grateful tears as they reconsidered their online options. Fewer selfies emailed to boyfriends. A little less online sharing. A bit more wary in general, really, and as he thought about that something shifted on one of his monitors. Not the Wicinski turd; that remained static. The CCTV feed. There was someone at his door.
A blonde woman in a long dark coat.
Roddy blinked.
Nah, couldn’t be.
Couldn’t be.
But it was.
He headed downstairs, pausing at the hallway mirror. Looking good, man. Looking fine. He practised a quick boyish grin: not the full wattage, because he didn’t want to cause damage. “Phasers to stun,” he murmured, then opened the door.
On Emma Flyte, former Head Dog.
“Mr. Ho.”
“Hey.”
She gave him a puzzled look. “Are you all right? You seem to be in pain.”
“No, I’m fine.”
“Okay.”
“. . . I was grinning, that’s all.”
“Oh . . . Mind if I come in?”
He switched the boyish grin off. Stick to business, to start with. But really, like, yeah, right: business. She was no longer Head Dog; no longer Park. No kind of business could bring her to Roddy’s door.
“I don’t mean to be rude, but your mouth is open.”
Closing it, he led the way inside.
Downstairs was a kitchen and a living room he barely used—storage, mostly; lifestyle like Roddy’s, you wound up with a lot of cardboard boxes—so he went straight up the stairs, and she followed. Stood in the doorway of his workspace a moment, taking it in. A faint burble leaked from his abandoned headphones, and a louder hum from the monitors. The feed from the street showed his empty doorstep, a quiet pavement.
Flyte said, “You remember me, I take it?”
Roddy gave a curt but meaningful nod, and wiped dribble off his chin. Sure, babes. I remember you. Until recently she’d been in charge of the Service’s internal security: chicks did all sorts of important stuff these days, which was great. And he’d encountered her before, of course. There’d been an interrogation situation, long story, but clearly he’d piqued her interest. Kind of inevitable. Of course, the downside of being in that role, head of security, was she couldn’t get involved with active personnel. Had to keep herself aloof. Anyway, here she was, no longer in the job. And here she was, in Roddy’s house.
“I do indeed.” Smooth. “Can I offer you a drink?” He consulted a mental list of his fridge’s contents. “I have Malibu.” Women dig Malibu, so Roddy always kept a bottle handy. Better check the best-by date, though.
“No thanks.” She looked at the monitor displaying the central London streetmap. “You’re running a surveillance.”
He nodded. Man of few words.
“From your own house.”
He nodded again.
“That’s not strictly allowed, is it?”
He shrugged. Then decided a fuller answer was called for. “I don’t always play by the book,” he said.
Flyte nodded, as if she’d heard that about him.
“It’s kind of interesting, actually,” he said. “That little, uh . . . that avatar—”
“The pile of shit.”
“Um, yeah. He’s somewhere he shouldn’t be.”
shall not, until investigations have been completed to the satisfaction of this department, have contact with colleagues
Flyte said, “That’s not far from the Park.”
“Yeah.”
“One of your crew?”
“That’s right.”
She shook her head, momentarily lost in admiration.
And she was awesome, thought Roddy. The blonde hair, the dark blue eyes, the creamy skin: she could have played a robot on Westworld. Not to mention walk straight into Ho’s Hos, no audition required. Bump an existing member, even. As it happened, he knew for a fact there were no dodgy photos of her on the internet. A very careful lady.
He wondered whether it was too soon to call her babes. Kim—his ex-girlfriend—had liked it when he called her that. An empowerment thing.
She said, “You’ll have heard I’m no longer in the Service.”
Roddy gave his curt but meaningful nod again.
“No. What I meant was, you’ll have heard I’m no longer in the Service.”
Oh—kayyy . . .
She said, “Sometimes it’s best to have certain stories get around. If it’s generally thought I’m no longer on the job, then I have greater . . . flexibility.”
Roddy nodded again. Emma Flyte’s flexibility was something he’d given thought to in the past; the fact that she was here, now, talking about it, made the day special.
“But it also means I have to work behind the lines. Using resources I don’t have to account for. Doing things I might have to deny later. Are we on the same page here, Roddy?”
“Sure thing.”
[Babes.]
“And seeing how you’re one of those guys who doesn’t play by the rule book, well. Maybe you could help me out with something.”
And this was his moment. This was where he’d shine. So he forgot about his Rules of Cool, laid aside his trademark Treat-’em-Mean protocol, and instead flashed on the maximum wattage Roddy Ho bedroom smile, way before she’d done much to deserve it.
Because sometimes, just turning up was enough. “Babes,” he said. “I can help you out with anything.”
And the look on her face told him that, as usual, he’d said exactly the right thing.
Lamb said, “Once upon a time, I was Charles Partner’s joe.”
Catherine closed her eyes, and felt the dark sparkling: all her glass. All her bottles. And now Lamb among them, like a dragon nestling in someone else’s gold, ensuring that it would never be pure again. She’d have to get rid of them, every last one. And she wasn’t sure she was ready to do that.
He was right, the bastard. The bastard was right. This fortress, the one that might so easily topple and crush her, she’d built it because of what Diana Taverner had said.
Tell me, Catherine. Something I’ve always wondered. Did Lamb ever tell you how Charles Partner really died?
She forced herself to speak. “This isn’t something I want to talk about.”
“Who cares? You were off your face at the time. Anything that didn’t escape your attention came in a glass or had its hand up your skirt.”