Abigail’s expression told her everything she needed to know.
‘Thanks for staying so late.’ Grace dumped her coat and bag on the grey work surface and moved over to look at the scans, hoping to discover something Abigail hadn’t, something that would give her hope that the therapy had worked.
‘Shit,’ Grace said finally.
‘I’m sorry. I thought there might be better news,’ Abigail said, ‘but it wasn’t a complete failure.’ She swiped at the screen with her pale fingers. ‘Here’s the pre and the post images from the nano-scanners.’ A fan of various images of the brain spread out like a deck of cards and Grace began flicking through them as though trying to find the ace.
During the treatment the empathy centres of Penny’s brain had lit up to some degree, but not nearly enough to effect the change Grace had hoped for, and the change hadn’t lasted. At one point, there had been a weak glow in the supramarginal gyrus, but it had faded like dying embers. If she couldn’t show a clear and definite change, then how could she prove that the treatment had worked?
‘Is Conrad around? Have you told him?’
Abigail shook her head. ‘You should be the one to do it.’
She reached out and rubbed Grace’s arm, whether in consolation or pity, Grace couldn’t tell. It was the first time they’d had physical contact and her skin prickled beneath her sleeve. Was Abigail trying to apologise for questioning Grace earlier? Maybe she was making the point that the treatment wasn’t going to work.
‘It looked as though something was beginning to happen,’ Abigail said, the bright images from the screen reflected in her marmalade eyes.
‘Yeah, something, but just not enough.’ Grace sighed.
‘Not enough to convince the Department of Justice that we got it right,’ Abigail added.
Grace couldn’t decipher her tone. Disappointment? Or did she feel sorry for Grace that the experiment failed?
Grace couldn’t care less about the Department of Justice. Her priority was curing Remy.
‘Do you want a coffee? Help you stay alert?’ Abigail offered. Another first.
‘Er… yes, please.’ Grace hoped she didn’t sound too surprised.
Abigail smiled and Grace found herself smiling back. Maybe it wasn’t pity, but Grace’s fallibility meant Abigail could relax, let her guard down.
The thought depressed Grace further.
She perched on the stool that Abigail had vacated and studied the screen.
Not enough to convince the Department of Justice…
Then it struck her. She didn’t need to convince them, only Conrad. Could she lie to him, tell him she’d solved the problem, even if she hadn’t? If Conrad believed that Grace had found a cure, surely he’d sign the papers to release Remy?
And if Grace could convince Remy that Conrad was going to get him off the hook with the authorities, then she could persuade him to come to the clinic and go through the motions, couldn’t she?
Convincing Conrad that she had a cure wouldn’t be too difficult. He was full of himself, too interested in his own ego to think about the small details. He just wanted to win, to make money, to boost his reputation. He couldn’t care less about the offenders. He’d shown himself to be someone who’d ignore protocol, take hefty risks, use unlicensed drugs and condone Tier Four. Surely it would be easy to fool a man like this, a man whose own ambition blinded him.
But what would she do after Remy was freed and then Conrad expected her to fix others? What would happen to her job then? Could she say Remy’s cure was a one-off and then go back to Tier Two?
And how would she be able to convince Abigail to go along with her plan? Unless she somehow faked the results and convinced her? Although hadn’t Abigail said herself that she didn’t exactly know how to read the scans? Grace would be able to lie about the results.
Maybe she couldn’t save Penny, or Mikey, or anyone else in Tier Four. She might have to cut her losses, accept her limitations and just try to save Remy alone, leave behind those in Siberia. Frustration burned in her.
A click heralded a message on her work shell and her phone pinged at the same time. She picked it up, her mind immediately distracted, but also acutely aware of Abigail’s presence as she returned to the desk with two cups. Grace still hadn’t set her password. Abigail wouldn’t be impressed if she found out.
Was it Remy, decoding the cryptic venue he’d suggested in his last message? Why was he afraid to come out with it? Was he paranoid about surveillance?
She rode a brief wave of adrenaline before it crashed when she saw the email icon. Abigail placed the two cups on a nearby surface and Grace stood up to be out of her eyeline as she opened the email.
The title read HACKED! The sender name was a series of letters and symbols.
Grace scrolled down to the message.
We know what you’re doing you torturing bastards!!! We’ve hacked this computer and we’re in your system. We’ve seen all the confidential files and we’re going to go public with them! Desist! Your treatment of these people is wrong and evil!! They are humans and should be treated like it. We can see what you are doing in your torture lab and we will stop at nothing to make sure that EVERYONE knows!
‘Are you okay?’ Abigail asked.
‘Look at this.’ Grace pushed her shell towards Abigail. ‘Protestors. They’re going to go public.’
Abigail put her hand to her mouth.
‘Call Conrad’s personal line,’ Grace told her, as she flicked through the emails to see if anything else had been sent. Nothing.
Abigail picked up her phone. ‘Conrad, you need to see this, right away,’ she said as soon as he’d answered. ‘A security breach, email.’
Grace couldn’t hear his reply.
‘Sent it already… Okay… will do.’
She ended the call and dialled again. ‘He’s coming back now. I need to speak to the head of IT. Conrad wants to shut down the main computer immediately until we know if it’s a genuine threat.’
As the screen went blank, Grace felt like screaming. It was yet another obstacle in the way of helping Remy.
Mal felt as though the whole world was closing in on him.
This wasn’t what he’d signed up for. This was not who he was, what he did, was it? The parameters had all shifted in the last few hazy, horrifying hours.
Bizzy, on the other hand, seemed to be almost happy about what had finally transpired at the big house. Lance Corporal Jackson Bizant of some battalion or other, called to serve his country, decorated in the Cobalt Conflict for heroism in the Democratic Republic of Congo, was really just a rapist with a taste for violence. Mal wondered if Biz had got that taste in the Congo, or was it something that war had brought out in him.
But it was Sarge who worried Mal the most.
Sarge, who had taken him, poor Malachi Peterson, off the streets and given him a home, stability, a mission. Sarge – of whom Biz spoke in reverential whispers and regaled tales of his bravery and the care he showed for his men when they were still in the army.
Sarge’s actual rank was only a corporal, but his ego had relished the nickname. Had there always been something dark underlying his apparent goodness? Had he taken Mal off the streets only to give him a false sense of security and then groom him into becoming a killer?
Mal had fallen for it. Thinking he was doing something noble by delivering justice to those who’d evaded it. But the woman in the big house, she’d been innocent. And he’d been there, he’d been a part of that.
‘How was your shift this afternoon?’ Bizzy asked, snapping Mal out of his anxious thoughts.
‘What do you care?’
Biz looked up from the screen he was working at and scowled. ‘Who’s pissed on your fire?’
‘Sorry, just had a tough shift on a crime clean-up.’ He immediately regretted apologising but after what had happened at the big house, he was trying to keep the peace.
‘Yeah?’ Bizzy focused on him. ‘Anything interesting?’
‘No, unless you call the blood-spattered living room of a young mother killed by her partner “interesting”.’ The woman from the big house came to mind and Mal felt a wave of despair.
Bizzy shrugged and turned his attention back to the screen.
Mal had been shaken up at the scene. One of the other cleaners had asked him if was he okay, and he’d been furious with himself. It was that sort of weakness that got you noticed, made people suspicious.
But he’d been shaken up all right. Not because he’d never seen a body before, nor a murder scene, nor blood – so much blood – but because it had reminded him of the woman from the big house. If it hadn’t been for him, she would never have seen their faces, heard them talking, heard him say Bizzy’s name.
It was his fault she was dead.
Sarge hadn’t spoken to Mal, looked at him even, since that job. If Mal hadn’t found a connection between Grace and Remy – his insurance – who knows where he’d be buried now? Maybe under a building like Josh. Or alongside that poor mother. Mal had been the one to bury her. His punishment, Sarge had told him, and he’d wept until the last shovelful of soil. If he’d let Bizzy have his way then maybe she would still be alive.
He couldn’t bear to think of her children, but the memory of them crushed his chest: the blonde hair, the cartoon pyjamas on the older one, the dummy and the baby-gro on the little one, obediently, innocently lying down, when the strange man told them to, when he told them their mummy and daddy would be okay, they were just having a cup of tea…
Him and Layla had talked about having kids, a boy and a girl, the names they’d give them, the places they’d take them.
How could he ever be a father now after what he’d done?
And even though Sarge had said one of them had to go, Bizzy was still here. Maybe Sarge realised he needed both of them to complete the mission. Then what would happen to them?
‘Lofthouse brothers have been arrested,’ Bizzy said, looking at his shell.
They’d be done for murder – another thing weighing heavily on Mal’s conscience.
‘Look, Sarge doesn’t want us scrapping,’ Bizzy said reluctantly. ‘We’ve just got to get on and make the best of…’ He waved his two index fingers between the two of them.
Mal decided he should go away for a while. Try and make a life without them, like Remy had. But for now, he would just have to play ball, keep under the radar. His father’s voice echoed in the back of his mind: You never stick with anything! You’re a loser, Malachi!
‘What are we going to do about Grace?’ asked Mal. ‘She’s not going to die, is she?’
Bizzy’s eyes switched to Mal. ‘You got a soft spot for her? You shouldn’t get so attached, you idiot.’
Mal shrugged. ‘I was just wondering.’
‘Yeah, well you’d better make good on that promise that you can find where Remy is, or you know what will happen.’
Mal knew all right. It would be a toss-up between the two of them – him and Grace. Either he kept his mouth shut and Sarge and Bizzy would kill him, or he told them where she was and another innocent woman would die.