Plugged - Eoin Colfer [49]
So now I am Faber’s boy. He’s got the key to my heart rate. I spend a minute trying to think of some way to screw with him, but it’s a foolproof system, and so I settle down in my seat at the back of the New York bus and try to grab a little sleep. Maybe a low heart rate will fool Faber into thinking I’m dead.
I cross my ankles over the canvas bag at my feet. At least Faber’s plan involved me catching a bus, so I got to collect my weapons and drop off my cash after I had picked it up from the cruiser.
It takes most of the day to get out to Farmington from New York. First a train to New Haven from Manhattan, then a transit bus. It might speed things up a bit if the driver didn’t stop at every corner in Long Island on the way. Seems like everyone knows his name except me. I don’t know why I’m fuming; it’s not like I’m in any great hurry to get where I’m going. Plus the rocking motion should help me to digest the sack of Taco Bell I bought at Grand Central. I wolfed it down a little quick, my first proper meal in over twenty-four hours. When you’re having a crappy week, nothing comforts like Taco Bell.
I have to admit, standing there under Grand Central’s famous vaulted ceiling, I did think about nipping to the rest room, sticking my foot down a toilet and putting a few rounds into the bracelet.
How tough can this thing be? Ghost Zeb reasoned, eager to have me back on his own case.
While I was mulling this over, Faber gave me an almost psychic call on Macey Barrett’s cell, which I told him was my phone.
‘So here’s the thing, Dan,’ he said, and I could almost hear the air part as he jabbed a finger at his mouthpiece. ‘Sometimes distance makes people brave. They start thinking like it’s traditional warfare and they can run away. Before you give in to that impulse, I got some information a chivalrous guy like yourself should have.’
Chivalrous? Does everyone know my weak spot?
‘Yeah? What’s that, counsellor?’
‘Your lady friend. The cop on the trolley. If I don’t hear from you by nightfall, she goes in the freezer. We just wheel her right in there. And once in, she’s not coming out. I had a plate bolted over the safety latch. After that, I set my dogs on you. You shot the cops and my bodyguards shot you. Simple.’
Looks like chivalry might soon be dead along with Detective Deacon. The bodies just keep stacking up like sandbags.
I spend a futile moment wishing that things were normal again. If this were a normal week, I would be meeting Zeb for karaoke later. The little mensch loves the karaoke bar. Barry Manilow is his speciality, if you can believe that.
Oh Mandy, you came and I came, you were fakin’.
I think he might have screwed up the words a little.
Karaoke, says Ghost Zeb into his sleeve, the way he does when he’s in one of his moods. Not likely since you abandoned the search for me to save Princess Supercop. I’m as good as dead.
Don’t be like that. I haven’t abandoned you, but I’m on the clock with Deacon. They’re going to ice her, man.
That makes two of us, says Ghost Zeb. Why don’t you do something about my problem, since you’re just sitting there? Have you even thought of a plan yet?
I roll my eyes, which must look strange to the old lady in the seat opposite giving me the glare treatment.
I’m a little preoccupied at the moment.
Not so preoccupied that your brain doesn’t have a few spare cells to conjure me up.
Okay, okay. I have been thinking about this, as you perfectly well know. Let me make a call.
Make your call, Judas.
Hey, Judas wasn’t Irish.
Just make the call.
One call then I’m back on Deacon.
It takes me a minute to remember Corporal Tommy Fletcher’s number. I punch it in carefully, big fingers little buttons.
From what I hear, Irish Mike Madden has family in Ireland. Maybe Tommy can do a little recon, get us some leverage.
It’s a start, I suppose, says Zeb, unwilling to give up