Vin of Venus (14 page)

Don't get involved
, Vin told himself.
Track down the professor.
But no one else in the courtyard seemed to pay much attention to the trio, and he found himself falling in step behind them.

The wrestler turned around and saw him. He said something to his partner. They had been hurrying towards the side-gate, but switched course and turned abruptly into a narrow alley between two smaller buildings.

Vin knew it was a trap before the bracelet pulsed another warning. He leaned back just as he entered the alley. A heavy cosh swished through the air, missing the bridge of his nose by inches. The wrestler had swung it. Vin registered ivy-covered bricks and the girl's pale face hovering some distance away. His reactions were automatic. He triggered the spring-release on his cane and drew the sword. The wrestler was already cocking back the cosh for another swing, pivoting his thick torso sideways. Vin slashed the ulnar artery on his right wrist. Blood jetted out and struck the ivy. The wrestler froze as if electrified. The next moment he'd dropped his cosh and was clutching at the wound with his other hand, eyes wide. Vin stepped past him. The thin-faced Romanian had a knife in his hand, and seemed unsure whether to swipe at Vin or threaten the girl as hostage. Vin stabbed him deep in the thigh. He jerked the blade out before the Romanian could counter with his knife, and pressed the tip against the man's neck.

"Drop it," he said.

The knife clattered to the bricks.

Behind Vin, the wrestler groaned. Blood was seeping out around his fingers. He'd turned paler than the girl.

"You've killed Giorgio," the thin-faced one said.

"He'll live, provided you get him to a hospital soon. Same for you. The wound in your thigh will bleed out if you don't have it staunched."

"Do you realize what you've done?"

"Prevented a kidnapping, it looks like."

The man jerked his head at the girl. The movement drew a thin red line across his neck, where the sword's tip was still pressed. "That's Anica Dinescu. Her father's head of a crime family in my country. He deals in the trafficking of Romanian women. Sells them as slaves."

"And you were going to extort money from him for his daughter's return? How noble."

The thin-faced man said nothing.

Vin spoke to the girl. "Get out of here. Go someplace safe and lock the door behind you."

Her mouth quivered, like she wanted to say something. She turned and ran.

"I won't forget you," the thin-faced one said, clutching at his thigh. "Giorgio and I—"

"Shut up." Vin replaced the sword with a click. He was very aware of being on a crowded campus, in the middle of the day. He backed out of the alley. Luckily, Giorgio's blood hadn't splashed him. He hustled over to the side-gate. The Romanians, as soon as they were spotted, would prompt attention. He slipped through the gate and started walking up the street. Random direction. He passed the white panel truck.
I should've taken their keys.
Nothing for it. He wasn't going back.

The consequences spiraled through his brain. If he was nabbed here, he could be traced to Dorian's attack in London. Dozens of people had seen him on campus. He'd have to abandon Oxford, quick as possible. Another lead down the toilet.

If
he could leave Oxford.

He looked at the cane in his hand. Evidence. Thick shrubbery ran along the sidewalk ahead. He could toss it in there. As he prepared to do so, a tan coupe came roaring up the street and braked next to him.

The driver's window rolled down. A bald head thrust out. There was a divot in the top of the man's skull, and his nose hung crooked like a door on a busted hinge. "Vinnie, hurry up and get in," he said, speaking with a faint Glaswegian accent. "Got someone waitin' on you, and there's hostiles about. You must be daft, walkin' out in the open like this."

The man's face was familiar. Vin felt part of a memory dislodge, further back in his brain. A name came bubbling up.
Turnbull.
Dangerous? The bracelet only tingled. But here was a real opportunity: someone he'd known, much better than Dr. Gallagher. Someone with a getaway car, too.

Vin circled around and got into the passenger's seat.

The coupe smelled of scented talc. Turnbull wore a black raincoat, similar to his. "Like the cane," he said, flashing a brief rictus Vin realized was a smile. "Nice touch. Looked like you were just about to pitch it, though."

"I changed my mind."

"Yah." Turnbull hit the gas. Eltonbridge College receded in the rear-view.

"How was Spain?" Turnbull asked, fifteen minutes later. Industrial buildings rolled past the coupe's windows. "Christ, you were gone long enough."

Vin's memory convulsed.
Running. A strip of sun-bright sand that could've been a beach. Bullets whizzing left and right, passing within inches of his ear.

Is that where he'd been attacked? In Spain?

"You don't have much of a suntan," Turnbull went on. "You're paler than me, in fact. And you look like you've lost a few pounds."

"I lost more than that."

"More than your virginity, eh?" Another rictus. "Ah, Vinnie. Cryptic as ever. I'd ask what you'd been doing, walking with that quadriplegic earlier, but I doubt you'd tell me."

The coupe passed over a bridge, then turned down a broad, modern street. "We're heading for the old motorworks. The punter who wants to see you comes across like he's MI6 or something, but he's not government. Not officially, anyway." Turnbull glanced at him. "I'm not grassing you out. Honest. But this is someone could cause us trouble, we don't co-operate. Calls himself Pender."

Vin twisted the cane on his lap. In the space of half an hour he'd stabbed two Romanians and lost all hope of recovering his past here in Oxford. Now, answers were coming faster than he could think. Answers he didn't like.

The coupe slowed and pulled into the shadow of a worn structure built from cinderblock and corrugated aluminum. Old, but not completely abandoned. Construction rigging hugged the walls. From inside came the clang of tools.

"They're remodeling," Turnbull said, shutting off the engine. "Krauts bought the place out. Want to make electric hybrids or some such."

"Pender's meeting us in here?"

"We both agreed to it. Sort of neutral territory. There's people, but not too many people, you know?"

"I guess."

"You strapped?"

"Ah ..."

Turnbull gave him a quizzical look. "That's not like you. I've got a spare Beretta in the glove compartment, but no rig. Best take that."

Vin rooted around until he found the automatic. His fingers seemed to adhere to the grips as soon as he touched it, and the heft felt intimately familiar. So he knew guns as well as swords, apparently. Having no other place to put it, he thrust the pistol into his raincoat's inner pocket.

"What's the matter with your left arm?" Turnbull said, watching him. "It's just hanging there. You get injured in Spain?"

"You're very observant."

"I was a copper before I took up the life. You know that."

Vin thought about telling him everything. Well, not everything. The amnesia part, mainly. But could he trust him? "I caught a bullet," he said. "There's been some nerve damage. Nothing too extensive."

"Christ, Vinnie. Still taking plenty of chances, I see."

They got out. Turnbull walked around to the boot and opened it. He handed Vin a white plastic hardhat and a day-glow vest with INSPECTOR across the front. "Put those on," he said. "Don't want any trouble with the working-types, do we?"

Turnbull had arranged a similar costume for himself, plus a clipboard. Disguised, they stepped past a row of sawhorses and orange cones, into the shell of the old factory. A grinder echoed. Showers of white sparks fell from the scaffolding overhead. At least a dozen men labored on the interior, mostly pulling out rusted metal panels and bolting on new ones. Further back, the old assembly-line machinery stood frozen in the shadows.

None of the workers paid them any attention. Plastic tape marked off a cleared area in one corner, where a crude plywood table had been set up. A man sat with hands folded. Poker-faced, his lips dour like a Puritan's. White, washed-out hair.

He nodded at Turnbull and tapped his watch.

"Sorry for our tardiness, governor." Turnbull sat down on a nearby spool of wire. Vin took a folding chair across from Pender.

"I'll try to make this brief as possible," the man said, eyes boring into Vin. He didn't offer to shake hands. "I represent Wamsley-Foote, an intelligence gathering organization. I trust Mr. Turnbull has explained we are
not
government."

"Is that supposed to reassure me?" Vin said.

"That would depend on your orientation towards authority." Pender hefted an attaché and pulled out a thick manila file. "In your case, I would assume the less official scrutiny, the better. We have been tracking your activities for quite some time. To be blunt, we are aware of your origins."

Vin felt his pulse quicken, but didn't change expression.

"What do you mean, his 'origins'?" Turnbull said. "He's a gangster from Camden town."

"That's perhaps what he told you. His true background is a bit more extraordinary, is it not, Mr. 'Smith?'"

Vin shrugged. "You tell me. You're the one with the file."

"Very well. Wamsley-Foote is aware you're an extra-terrestrial—"

Turnbull guffawed, but Pender ignored him.

"—and that you have been amassing large sums of money through criminal enterprise, in preparation of an unknown project. Specifically, you have been selling, or offering to sell a ruby bracelet worth several million pounds, and either swindling the buyers or stealing the bracelet back after the transaction, as you did with the British Museum several years ago."

The scream of a grinder cutting steel drowned out all other noise. When it died down, Turnbull said: "He's got your M.O., Vinnie. But this bit about being a space alien? Pender, if I'd known you were a nutter, I would've never agreed to a meeting."

"Let him finish," Vin said.

"Thank you." Pender shuffled a paper out of the file, scrutinized it. "In the past year you've been speaking to a Belgian particle physicist, an expert on Celtic archeology, and several known eccentrics in the field of mathematical theory. This presumably has something to do with your project."

"Let's back up a moment," Vin said. "How did you come to the conclusion I'm an extraterrestrial?"

Turnbull erupted into laughter again.

"The manner of your, ah, arrival caught the attention of several Cold War agencies, monitoring for nuclear explosions. You've been under varying degrees of surveillance ever since. I might add, your decision to enter popular culture as a science fiction writer was less than discrete."

Vin glanced at Turnbull to quiet him. "Let's assume, hypothetically, that you're correct. Why should I answer any of your questions?"

"In a word: money."

"How much money?"

"That would depend on the information disclosed. Wamsley-Foote represents several large corporations, whose interests include military technology and related applications. Your very presence here suggests you come from an advanced civilization. That bracelet you wear is nothing compared to the potential revenue several new patents could generate. Provided, of course, you have the appropriate legal backing."

Vin fought to keep from grinning. He had trouble using a computer, let alone understanding all the mechanical and electronic components that made his C leg work. But he'd play along. If nothing else, he had to get his hands on that file. Years of detailed surveillance information could answer all the questions he had about his time on Earth.

Pender tented his fingers. "Let's get back to your mysterious project. Clearly, some ground-breaking technology is involved. What if I was able to secure several legitimate backers? You wouldn't have to depend on criminal activity for your budget."

"Intriguing. What would your 'backers' want?"

"First patent rights, of course. Doubtless, a lot of new products could be spun off from the project. Whatever it is." Pender fished a checkbook out of his suit pocket. "I'm prepared to offer a substantial retainer, here and now, for a short prospectus detailing—"

The ruby bracelet throbbed two urgent pulses. Vin looked past Pender's shoulder at a pair of approaching construction workers. Their expressions were carefully blank. The leadmost was holding something behind his back. His partner had already drawn a Glock, and was raising the pistol in a two-handed shooter's grip.

"Trap!" Vin shouted. He flipped the plywood table over and dove behind it.

Turnbull cursed. Pender's shrill voice proclaimed he hadn't set anyone up, but a staccato burst of automatic fire cut him off. Pender folded over the table's edge. The top of his head was gone. A metallic-smelling sludge of gray and red dripped down next to Vin's feet.

Turnbull had his automatic out and blazing. Two holes stitched across his raincoat, just above the hip. He doubled over, but kept firing. Vin drew the Beretta and poked his head around the table's edge. The first worker was leveling a submachine gun. Vin ducked back just as a hail of slugs burst through the plywood inches above his prone form. He hugged the concrete floor, wishing he could somehow sink down inside it.

The bracelet tingled and sent splinters of urgency up through his arm.
Now.

He rolled from cover, chambering the automatic by brushing its ridged top against his chin. The robotic hand wouldn't have been fast enough. He sighted at the submachine gunner, who was busy sliding in a fresh clip. His finger tensed three times. Two rounds slammed into center mass, while the third found the gunman's forehead. He flailed backwards and tripped over a sawhorse.

But the second gunman was now swiveling in Vin's direction, angling the Glock down to fire.

Turnbull's pistol roared. The gunman shuddered and turned sidewise, a ragged hole appearing in his neck. He dropped and Turnbull put a final round through the side of his head.

Eyes stinging from the cordite haze, Vin wobbled to his feet. Pender's file lay strewn across the concrete. Several of the scattered pages were soaked in blood and brain matter. Vin began snatching them up.