Serafina and the Virtual Man

CHAPTER Six



Elspeth had phoned ahead to make sure their visit was convenient. But there was another car parked in the drive when they arrived. A bright red sports car.

This time, the door was opened by Dale Ewan, who invited them in cordially enough, although another guest was still standing in the big entrance hallway with Petra.

The guest wore stylish black, all traily lace and silver chains, almost like a punk Victorian. Apart from the sunglasses and the length of her skirt. And the fabulous boots. She had a pale, dramatic face with natural black eyebrows and red, luscious lips, and although she wasn’t actually beautiful as such, Jilly doubted anyone noticed or cared, so forceful was her overall style.

Despite her glamour, she spared Jilly and Sera a quick smile. Perhaps it was this which obliged Dale to introduce them. “This is an old friend of ours, Roxy May. Roxy, this is Sera McBride and Jill—er…”

At least he remembered my first name. Jilly’s initial sardonic thought got suddenly lost as the name of the other woman penetrated her brain. Roxy May. She knew that name. A singer, pretty good, sang a unique mixture of rock and folk that had a large cult following across Europe and America. Jilly had some of her stuff on her personal stereo.

Sera, who’d obviously caught on before Jilly did, said, “Love your new album.”

“Thanks, I was pleased how it turned out.” Roxy May’s voice was low and throaty, almost the way she sang. She took off her sunglasses and offered her free hand to Sera. “Nice to meet you.”

Jilly gazed at the newly unshaded face as memory fought its way up. A portrait on Adam’s drawing room wall. This girl. Roxy May, with a guitar in her lap and a log fire behind her.

Jilly managed to close her mouth before the singer’s gaze and friendly hand came to her. Roxy May had soft skin and rough, careless nails, an odd failing that somehow made her more appealing, more human. And yet some strange, unrecognisable feeling struggled up from Jilly’s stomach. It might have been excitement.

Roxy dropped Jilly’s hand and turned back to Petra. “Thanks for the watch. I still can’t believe he’s gone.” She gave Petra a quick, spontaneous hug from which she broke away to exchange cheek kisses with Dale, and then with a husky, “Good-bye,” she strode out of the house.

Dale closed the glass door behind her, and Petra heaved a sigh.

“She seemed upset,” Jilly observed.

Petra, who still looked surprised whenever Jilly opened her mouth, glanced at her wide-eyed. “Oh yes. Well, she would be. It’s the first time we’ve seen her since Adam died. I met her for lunch, and she wanted a keepsake, so she came back with me to collect the watch.”

“She was a good friend of his?” Sera asked casually.

Petra shrugged. “They had a thing.”

A thing? What the f*ck was a thing?

“She’s Adam’s ex-girlfriend,” Dale said dryly. “They kept it out of the press, but they went out for years, off and on, before she dumped him.”

Petra snorted, though what that signified, Jilly was at a loss to guess. It crossed her mind that Petra was jealous. What had Dale’s wife thought of his brilliant friend and partner? That odd feeling in the pit of Jilly’s stomach tightened, forcing her to wonder, appalled, if it wasn’t she who was jealous.

Of a dead man’s relationship with a rock singer? Or his partner’s wife? Come on, Jilly, get a grip!

“Why did she dump him?” Jilly asked.

Dale shrugged. “The drugs, I suppose.”

“Then she wasn’t responsible for getting him into that scene?”

“She might have dabbled. I don’t know. She certainly has friends who’re more deeply involved, and Adam will have known them. But Roxy was in America while most of the shit happened. She’s only just got home. Why? What’s all this got to do with our…problem?”

Sera said bluntly, “We think your poltergeist might be Genesis Adam.”

It didn’t quite have the effect Jilly was expecting. Dale glanced over at his wife, who stared back at him.

He sighed. “Sit down.” He led them over to the sofas, speaking as he walked. “We had another visit from the…problem last night. It…it contacted me on the computer.”

Jilly’s breath caught.

Sera asked calmly, “What makes you say that? What happened?”

“I’d been talking online to one of our major distributors in the US. And his name just suddenly popped up in chat. And then everything started up as usual, throwing things around the room just like—”

“What did he call himself?” Jilly interrupted. “When he contacted you on chat?”

Dale blinked. “What he always did: Exodus.”

Jilly swallowed and sat down with her laptop bag dangling from her right shoulder.

“What did he say to you?” Sera asked.

Dale’s lips quirked to one side. For the first time, Jilly caught a faint air of regret from him, the first sign that he missed his old friend and partner. “He said, ‘Fancy a pint.’”

Poltergeists didn’t hold discussions, not with words, at any rate.

“You’ve been hacked,” Sera said.

So have I. Somehow…

“By someone pretending to be Adam,” Sera continued.

Or by Adam himself.

“Who?” Dale shot back. “Who else would know that’s what he always said when he wanted to discuss something with me?”

“Someone who’s been hacking you for a long time,” Jilly said. “Any leaks about your new system?”

“Absolutely none. Security is—” He broke off, staring at her. “How do you know about the new system?”

“I guessed,” Jilly said breezily. “A company like yours doesn’t stand still even when its founding genius is gone. Besides, your big launch in March is hardly a secret. And there has to be a reason you were hacked.”

“Then you think I was hacked by someone pretending to be Adam in order to get at company secrets, and that we have a poltergeist who is also Adam?”

Jilly looked rather wildly at Sera, who said, “Who else knows about the poltergeist? Besides us.”

“Trust me, it’s not the sort of thing I bandy about at work,” Dale said bitterly. “Or among friends who’d have me certified.”

Petra looked at her nails, saying nothing. Clearly the poltergeist was not a total secret. So, the Ewans really could have a hacker, and Jilly’s hacker surely had to be the same person.

And yet she’d almost convinced herself it was some shade, even some program representing Genesis Adam.

“The thing is,” Sera went on, “if I’m to get rid of this poltergeist for you, it would really help to understand how it came to be in the first place. We’re not here to judge you, or report you. You were promised discretion at Serafina’s, and you’ll always get it. I just need to know what happened the night of your break-in.”

Petra’s nails were just not that interesting, but she didn’t look up. Her husband, however, lifted his eyebrows in mild surprise.

“Break-in? God, I’d forgotten about that. What with this other stuff and Adam’s death, it went right out of my mind.”

Sera leaned forward across the glass table to touch his arm while gazing earnestly into his face. “Did you fire the shot?”

“Shot?” Dale frowned in bewilderment. “There weren’t any shots! We hadn’t switched the alarm on, and these two jokers had managed to wander into the house. When they heard our voices, they bolted. They weren’t even armed. Small-time habitual criminals, according to the police.”

Sera sat back again. “Was Genesis Adam here that night?”

“Adam? No, of course not, why would he be here? He was in Australia by then. Or at least on his way. To be honest, he wasn’t really welcome in our home by that time.”

“And yet he left you everything,” Jilly observed.

Petra glanced up at that, blinking as if she’d never seen Jilly before. “How do you know that?”

“It isn’t a secret.”

“No, it isn’t,” Dale agreed. “Maybe he forgot to change his will, which would have been just like him. Or maybe in spite of everything, he still knew we were his best friends. Which would also be just like him.”

There was honesty in that, Jilly thought. It was there in the odd frustration of his voice, the only half-annoyed flick of his hand through his hair. A genuine if much-tried affection.

“Okay,” Sera said. “I want to try this again with what we know now. But you have to leave the house, or it will feed off your fear. Even just for a few hours. Go to Edinburgh, have dinner, whatever. You don’t have to stay away all night if you don’t want to, but I don’t stand a chance of dispersing this thing with you here.”

The Ewans exchanged looks.

Dale stood up. “Excuse us for a few moments. We’ll discuss it.”

“Be my guest,” Sera said.

The Ewans moved away toward the arch, talking in low voices.

Jilly looked at Sera, who was watching them without blinking. “What do you think?” she murmured. “He seemed pretty plausible to me.”

“Yes,” Sera agreed, “but all the same, he was lying through his teeth.”

“Did you fire the shot?”

“Shot? There weren’t any shots!”

Sera had been touching his arm. She’d sensed the lie.

So was Exodus telling the truth or any part of it?

Dale strode back toward them. “How much access to the house would you need?” he demanded.

“As much or as little as you’re prepared to give. The important thing is that you aren’t in any of it.”

“You’re no doubt aware I keep very sensitive material in the house. Such as stuff relating to the new system.” His glance flickered to Jilly, who smiled beatifically and gazed back.

“We won’t need to be anywhere near that kind of stuff,” Sera soothed. “We just need access to the normal haunts of the poltergeist. Feel free to lock any doors you want off limits.”

“Lock and alarm.” Dale looked directly at Jilly, and she knew she’d been rumbled. She’d known too much, said too much that she could only have known by accessing files she’d no business to see. It was almost worth it to see that Petra’s supreme indifference to her presence had now changed to a distinct wariness.

****



Genesis Adam’s heart was lightened by the sight of his beautiful computer hacker stepping out of a beaten-up old Citroen at Dale’s front door. It had been hard seeing Roxy so upset, and so, in desperation, he’d turned his attention to the outer cameras to look out at the grey clouds and misty rain instead.

This house had always been a mystery to Adam. He could understand Dale and Petra building something to their own taste, and he could understand their desire for country living and privacy. But the house stood out like a sore thumb, and now Dale seemed to have practically moved his entire operation here, dishing out projects in a piecemeal sort of way that might well bite him in the bum when it came to actual production. He seemed to have the big launch planned for spring.

It depressed him that Dale might mess up this baby, which was the most fantastic thing Adam had ever come up with or ever would. This would change the face of a lot more than just gaming, and yet Dale was risking its failure by excessive secrecy.

It further depressed him that he couldn’t help, that even alive he’d have had no right to, because, according to JK, he’d sold his share to Dale.

Why the f*ck would I have done that?

And yet, stupidly, what hurt him most was the rejection of a stranger, who’d turned on him for an innocent and honest comment about her smile. Of course she’d already been freaked by his presence in the first place and by the fact that he could see her, but still…

Perversely, her overreaction only intrigued him more. He wanted and needed her help, and admittedly it was soul-numbingly boring hanging around Dale’s lab and shooting about his electronic circuits, but there was something about this beautiful girl with the deceptively hard eyes and voice…

He thought so again as she emerged from the scruffy car with her friend, presumably the psychic. They both looked at Roxy’s smart sports car—that was new. America must have gone well for Roxy. He was glad of that.

He couldn’t resist zooming in on JK’s face. She wore makeup like war paint, at once emphasising her beauty and masking her personality. The lipstick somehow hardened the lines of her mouth which, free of makeup, was one of her most appealing features—soft, expressive, and eminently kissable. Likewise, the sharp eyeliner and dark mascara lent her lovely if haunted blue eyes something the impression of a doll’s, without warmth or feeling. Yet when they were unadorned, as they were yesterday evening in the supposed privacy of her own home, you could more easily see the character and sheer intelligence shining out of them.

The hacker was hiding more than her illegal hobbies. The gamer in him was challenged.

And when she began asking Dale questions about the night he was shot, he found himself grinning at the monitor. If she’d come only to deal with the so-called poltergeist, surely they’d just get on with it? But JK was still investigating for him, and she’d got her supposedly psychic friend involved.

Which meant he could contact her again, according to his own sense of honour.

When they’d driven Dale and Petra out of the house and closed the door firmly behind them, the women linked arms and performed a short jig that made Adam smile.

“Okay, what’s the plan?” the other woman, Sera, said after only a few seconds of this horseplay.

JK dropped her arm and stood still. “I suppose you’d better try and get rid of the poltergeist. Do you need me, or can I snoop?”

“Oh, snoop, by all means,” Sera said. “I intend to do a bucketload myself. Where were Andy and George when they heard the shot? Which room?”

Andy and George? The burglars? How come the women were on first-name terms with them?

JK shook her head. “No idea. It’s a big house to search.” She picked up her laptop bag, fiddled unnecessarily with the strap on her shoulder. “What did you get off Roxy May?”

“She’s grieving and bewildered. It upset her coming here.”

Didn’t need to be psychic to spot that much, Adam thought derisively.

“And Dale?” JK pursued. “I actually thought I saw genuine affection, genuine loss today. I wasn’t sure of it before.”

“I’m still not,” Sera said flatly. “There’s truth and lies so muddled up in there, I doubt even he can separate them anymore. Grief, maybe; worry and excitement, definitely. You go and wiggle your way into his secret laboratory. I’m going to scare up a poltergeist and maybe even a vision or two.”

JK sighed. “He’s alarmed it, so it’ll take some time to get past. If I can. Sera? Keep your phone at the ready. That thing could bury you, and I wouldn’t even hear from in there.” She pointed up to the gallery.

Sera waved one hand and wandered through the arch into the bowels of the house, trailing her fingers along the walls as she went. Adam stayed with JK as she turned and ran lightly upstairs to the gallery.

His heart was doing a steady but accelerated drumming, like when a game got interesting. Which was amazing. That VR program was f*cking good.

“God, I was such a genius,” he murmured with derisive self-mockery and switched cameras so that he could see her entering the outer study. She looked at the camera above the secret door and sighed as she extracted the laptop from her bag. “So which way, JK?” he urged. “Try and hack into the alarm system? More satisfying to accomplish but harder. In fact, probably impossible in the time available. Or ask Exodus? Go on, ask. You know you want to…”

Or had he really scared her off? How creepy was he right now? The trouble was, being disembodied tended to separate you from the norm too.

Well, even alive, he’d never pretended to be normal. Come on, JK, just ask me. Five seconds, and then I’ll help you out…

Her fingers on the track pad hovered. She had elegant hands, small and slim, the nails shapely and beautifully painted. How would they feel on a man’s body?

You’ll never know, will you?

F*ck, I don’t want to be dead.

Two seconds, JK. Come on, you know it makes sense.

She opened a program he’d never seen or heard of before.

Oh well, can’t win them all. He ran his mouse over the chat icon. And before he could click, it flashed to life. “JK has invited you to chat.”

Yes!

Exodus: Ignore the camera. The alarm won’t go off until you touch the keypad. Make sure you hit # first, followed immediately by 9845. Wait for the click, then 7698.

A smile flickered across her face.

JK: I hate you.

While he grinned, she marched to the keypad without hesitation, laptop clutched in one hand in tablet form so she could check the numbers. With only a couple of glances, she hit the keys with swift precision, waited as instructed, hit the rest, and then she was in.

The door slid open, and he turned slowly to face her.