Misspent Youth

30. WILL THE REAL JEFF BAKER PLEASE STAND UP

TEN TO THREE IN THE MORNING and Jeff had almost gone to sleep. He’d spent the whole evening reviewing data for the superconductor project. Not that he’d had any insights yet; he wasn’t expecting any. That would come later, when he had acquired a great more detail and information on state-of-the-art systems and theories. Possibly. That was his thing. Sometimes entire solutions would just rise out of a whole mass of seething raw data, utterly obvious with hindsight. Sometimes the routes to solutions would flare in his mind like little nova bursts of illumination. Ninety-nine percent of the time he just slogged along with the rest of the pack, making mistakes and floundering down dead ends. But he did possess that elusive ability. His mind could hold aloft the whole problem and look at it from new angles.

Call it genius. Or even intermittent genius. It had worked a few times in his life, though the world at large only knew of the one. The rest were dull stuff, inapplicable outside of esoteric physics laboratories, although they had cemented his status within the scientific community far more than the showbiz-style glamour of memory crystals, a status high enough for Brussels to spin their trillion-euro gamble on his head.

And somehow, throughout the whole ridiculous circus of faith that an entire continent had placed upon him, he didn’t feel pressured. Like everyone else, he too believed he might manage to produce results.

A neat trick if you can do it.

As the actress said to the bishop.

The security camera picked up the stretch limousine as it turned in to the drive. Jeff watched it blankly for a moment, his eyes still half registering the scrawl of data on the main display screens. Then he saw the time.

“Oh, bugger it. Click. Save, safe store duplicate, and switch the hell off. We’re through for the night.”

“I understand that, Jeff,” HAL9000’s melodiously menacing voice assured him.

The screens blanked out, and began to slide back into their recesses. He stretched elaborately. Empty teacups and his supper plates cluttered one half of the desk. He couldn’t be bothered to take them to the dishwasher.

Jeff stood at the top of the portico as the limousine braked to a sharp halt. The driver’s door flew open, and the furious chauffeur got out, flinging his cap onto his seat. He stormed off toward the back of the vehicle. The rear door opened before he reached it. Jeff heard the unmistakable sound of someone puking. He rolled his eyes toward the lazy silver stars glittering above. “Oh Christ,” he muttered.

Tim half fell out of the limo. He wasn’t wearing his jacket anymore; his bow tie was askew around his neck, both shirt-sleeve cuffs were undone, flapping about. One arm flopped down, patting the gravel. Then he tensed and heaved again.

“Get out of my fucking car!” the chauffeur yelled. He put his hands under Tim’s shoulder and started pulling.

“All right,” Jeff said loudly. “All right, I’ll take him from here.”

The chauffeur ignored him, and dropped Tim on the gravel. For one moment Jeff thought he was going to kick the semiconscious boy. Tim giggled in the gurgling way that only the truly drunk can manage, a sound guaranteed to infuriate the sober.

The chauffeur was glaring down at Tim, clenching his fists. Jeff stepped in front of him, hands held out to placate the man. “I’ve got him.”

“Oh, you’ve got him, have you? Where the hell were you when he was chucking up in the back of my car, man? Huh?”

“I’m sorry, I’ll see…”

“He threw up in my fucking car. Threw up! That is the most disrespect you can have for me, man. There isn’t another car like this left in the country.”

Jeff hardened his voice. “I said I’m sorry.”

“I’ve got a fucking passenger booked for tomorrow. What am I going to tell him? Just slide around till you find a clean piece of fucking seat? Is that what I say? That’s leather upholstery, man. Real antique leather.”

“Get it cleaned. Bill me. All right?”

“Get it cleaned?” The chauffeur waved his arms around. “Where the fuck am I going to get it cleaned in time for my next passenger? It’s three o’clock in the fucking morning.”

“Hi, Dad.”

“Shut up, Tim. I don’t know where you get it cleaned, and I don’t care. Just calm down and get the hell out of here. I told you, I will pay.”

Lieutenant Krober was coming down the portico steps behind Jeff. Tim’s bodyguard squad were climbing out of their BMW.

“Fuck you, man.” The chauffeur looked around at the approaching men. He pointed a rigid forefinger at Jeff, shaking it. “I got friends, man. Good friends. You fucked with the wrong person tonight, you understand? Friends.”

“You’re on an express elevator to hell. Going down. You should get off before it reaches the bottom.”

The chauffeur gawked at him.

Jeff held back on a sigh at the reaction. Doesn’t anyone watch the classics anymore? He beckoned a couple of the Europol team. “Get him inside, will you, please?” They bent over Tim and hauled him to his feet. The boy groaned, but didn’t throw up again.

Jeff ducked his head down and looked into the back of the limousine. The smell of vomit was appalling. Annabelle was sitting hunched up on a long sofa bench that ran along one side of the cavernous interior. He was pretty sure she’d been crying. “Come on,” he said softly, and held a hand out to her. “Let’s get you home, Cinders.”

WHILE TIM WAS CARRIED INTO THE MANOR, Annabelle and Jeff walked over to the garage at the side of the building. In the cool, quiet night air, her footsteps sounded incredibly loud on the gravel. That was all she focused on, the ridiculous crunching sound under her heels.

The ball was supposed to be a fabulous extravaganza, one they would all remember for years. This was the marker for the future, her future, the standard she was going to live to. Then Tim had done what Tim always did.

And to top it all, now she had to go home. Back to the small dark house in its worn-down estate. Back to the cheap shabby interior. Back to her father and his baffled pity. It was as if home only existed to emphasize how her hopes had been broken again.

“I don’t want to go home,” she said mournfully. “There’s nothing there.”

Jeff put his arm around her shoulder and gave her a quick squeeze before breaking contact. It was the most platonic and endearing gesture he’d ever shown her. “Come on, it’s not that bad.”

You have no idea, she thought.

SHE WAS SILENT for most of the drive back to Uppingham. They drove together in the Merc, with a thoroughly pissed-off bodyguard squad following behind.

“He always does it,” she said as they slid along the road through the Chater valley. She had to say something, to explain how awful the evening had been for her. She was sure nobody understood. “Always.”

“I’m sorry. Really. I wanted you both to have a lovely night.”

She gave him a long look. His generation’s Sir Mitch. “Did you?”

“Yes, believe it or not. I did. I was as envious as hell of Tim when the two of you set off tonight. You were the perfect couple. You deserved better than the way it turned out.”

Annabelle let her head fall back into the leather seat cover, and closed her eyes. The Merc’s suspension provided an incredibly smooth ride, almost as if they weren’t moving at all. It gave her an odd feeling of isolation. “I was stupid, you know, letting me and Tim ever happen.”

“You were good for him. In fact you’re probably the best thing that’s ever happened to him.”

“I shouldn’t have done it. I was overreacting to everything going on in my life, and it was wrong. I want things that were never going to happen with Tim, I see that now.”

“I’m sorry.”

“You don’t have to be.”

He didn’t respond.

Annabelle smiled into the darkness. Now all that was left was to wait. Her heart was racing away inside her chest. That shouldn’t be happening to someone who was supposed to be calm and in charge, but there was so much pressure concentrated on this moment. Like Stephanie going for game point.

The Merc drew up outside Annabelle’s house. At this time of the morning, even the local bad boys had slunk away home. Jeff turned the power off.

“Here we are,” he said. “Home sweet home.”

“I just live here, it’s not my home.” Her eyes were still closed.

Jeff looked at her. Weak streetlight shimmered through the Merc’s windows, showing him her profile in a dry sodium-orange drizzle. He took his time, unrepentant, enjoying the way the gown’s bodice clung to her, showing off the shape and size of her breasts. Several skirt panels had slipped aside, revealing long athletic legs.

Seventy-eight years of a good life lived well should have produced an unmatched sophistication and refinement. There ought to have been clever words and wicked lies he could use, rivaling history’s great seducers. All Jeff said was: “I want to fuck you.”

Annabelle opened her eyes, looking around at the familiar street, the BMW parked behind. “Don’t let them see. Not this.”

He found the dial that controlled the opacity of the Merc’s windows, and turned it up full. The streetlights faded away to tiny dim stars. There was just enough light left for him to see her reach around and undo the gown’s neck clasp. She pulled the bodice down. His hand clamped down hard on one of her breasts, squeezing to discover the weight, the firmness.

“Let me just…” he said, and used his free hand to turn her chair release lever. The back hinged down until it was almost horizontal.

There was no real room to move. Annabelle couldn’t cry out for fear of who might hear and be drawn to the car. Her skirt panels were clawed aside. His weight pressed her down, shoving her spine into the cushioning of a seat that was now bent awkwardly, making it uncomfortable to the verge of painful. Hands switched between breasts and thighs, fiercer than Derek had ever been. Her feet banged into the dashboard. Fingers curled around her panties and tugged until the cotton ripped.

There was nothing she could do but lie there while he thrust into her again and again. It was demeaning and disgraceful. Bodies locked together in cramped darkness, his a deplorable sixty years older than hers. Gown fabric constricting, scrunched too tight against her limbs. Car seat preventing her from moving, escaping. Illicit and depraved. Leather squeaking and sticking, rubbing abrasively against sweating flesh. His strength. The heat. Her boyfriend’s father’s cock rooting round inside her. Breath panting over her face. All of it at once as her orgasm built, taking over.

In the end she did cry out. It didn’t matter who heard, not now. It was a victory cry, pure animal.

He lay on top of her, limp and shaking, while she tried to get her breathing back to normal. Then she heard a slight chuckle, and he gingerly raised himself up onto his elbows. His face hung centimeters above hers.

“You okay?” he asked, concern in the voice.

“Yes.” She was smiling unseen in the darkness. Sex, with Jeff, in a car, in front of her own house, was far more exciting than it had ever been creeping off to see Derek. I knew it would be.

“Bloody hell,” he grunted. “Doing it in a car at my age.”

Annabelle wriggled an arm down between them. Her hand curled round his cock, and moved the way she knew men couldn’t resist. “More,” she whispered. The urgency was like confessing every sin she’d ever committed.