Buying the Virgin novel Chapter 110

MICHAEL

James looks up from the map, glancing around the room, then stands up straight, turning, looking wild. “Where’s Charlotte?”

“Bathroom?” I ask, and rap smartly on the door. “Charlotte? You in there?”

No reply. I push the door open, checking inside. Nothing.

“The lift!” mutters Ross, dashing through to the hall, followed by me and James.

The turbo-lift is already way below us, twenty stories down.

“The service elevator?”

“She’s sent that down too.”

James all but bangs on the intercom, yelling at the answering concierge. “Lock the doors down there. Stop anyone coming in or out of the building until I or Richard Haswell instruct otherwise.”

But I am watching the indicator. “She’s not stopping at the ground floor.”

“The car park?” mutters James. “In that case, she’s about to discover that her car pass has been blocked.” He picks up his phone, tapping briefly. “Francis. Is Richard there? Will you tell him please, that Charlotte’s trying to leave the building. Can you make sure everything’s locked down while we get her back. Yes, that’s right. Thanks.” As he hangs up he says, “Richard’s on his way up.”

“Or he will be, when there’s an elevator to bring him,” I say, nodding at the indicator. It stops at the parking level, then a moment later starts rising again. The service lift, much slower, is still descending.

James’ phone rings. “Yes? Oh, hello Francis…. What! How?” His eyes roll upwards. “I see… Thanks.”

He darts a look at me. “She’s out. Security says her car just exited the parking lot using my pass….”

He stabs at his phone, pacing the room, mobile pressed to his ear. “Pick up the phone Charlotte…. Pick up your fucking phone.”

Then he pauses, glancing up at me. “Answer-phone…. Charlotte…” he says, visibly hanging on to his self-control. “Listen, please come back at once. We’re coming after you, but please, call me back….” He glances sideways at me. “Or.… call Michael if you’re not comfortable calling me. Please. I don’t know what you think you have in mind, but you’re not safe out there and you must come back. Now, please call us back.”

The lift pings and Richard steps out, his face like thunder.

“What happened? Are you seriously telling me that three grown men can’t keep one little girl locked up?” He swings on Ross. “And where the hell were you? You were supposed to be standing guard over the elevator.”

Ross, pasty-faced, starts to stutter. “It wasn’t Ross’ fault.” interrupts James. “Charlotte diverted us all rather neatly.”

I cast my eyes back over the map, considering…. “You know, she did divert us, but there’s an awful lot of work gone into that map for a diversion….” I am interrupted.

My phone pings. Simultaneously, so do James’ and Richard’s.

We have all received an identical message, from Charlotte.

“Check your e-mails”.

“What the hell?” mutters James. “Fucking wilful, infuriating, stupid woman….”

I interrupt him. “Wilful she may be. Infuriating she certainly is, but stupid she’s not. She’s obviously planned this, so perhaps we should start working around whatever it is she’s up to. Let’s do what she said, and check our e-mails.”

Ruefully,” You’re right.…”

“Richard. Can I get online somewhere?” I ask.

“Let’s all go down to my office. We can see things more easily there.”

As we enter Reception, Francis flags us. “I’ve just had a message from Charlotte…”

“You and we all,” shouts Richard back at her as he sweeps by to his office. Get hold of a laptop for Michael to use.”

James darts through to his office, returning with his computer. And Francis is already heading out of the office, returning moments later with her own machine.

James taps furiously away, then pauses. He glances up. “Just downloading now…. Ahh.…” He taps again. Then he frowns…. “It’s a password; ‘Charlotte-01’, and several links to…. to what?”

Simultaneously, I log onto my own e-mail. “Yup. There’s something here from her, sent to me and James, and Richard and Francis. Looks like she was definitely going for belts and braces to get her message out.…”

James taps and waits, then leans forward, peering at the screen. “The links she’s sent are all to tracking sites of one kind or another. Fuck! She’s set up tracers and she’s using herself up as bait… The first one is a find-your-phone site for her mobile.”

“There’s no guarantee that she’ll get to keep her phone,” says Richard. “The first thing they did was get Elizabeth’s off her.”

“We’ll still be able to see where it gets dumped,” I reply. “And it’s not the only link.”

“The next link is to a different tracker site,” says James. “Another provider. A different device.”

“The third one too,” I say.