Serafina and the Virtual Man

CHAPTER Eleven



The Ewans took the appearance of the handsome if slightly cadaverous Blair very well. He inclined his head graciously on being introduced, even smiled at Petra, who was clearly not immune to his charms, and no one seemed to notice the fact that he never spoke.

“Same deal as before,” Dale said shortly as he strode across the wide entrance hall toward the glass front door. “I’ve locked and alarmed the out-of-bounds areas.”

“Silly question,” Jilly said suddenly. “Does the poltergeist stick to those rules?”

Dale paused, his fingers grasping the door handle as he frowned in thought. He and Petra exchanged glances. Then he said, “Actually, it seems to. So far. It’s never been near my testing area. I’d really like to keep it that way—Jesus, the damage it could cause in there…”

“Don’t you have the…work duplicated anywhere else?” Jilly asked.

Dale stared at her. “I don’t think that’s any of your business.”

Jilly shrugged. “Your funeral. Even school kids know to keep backups.”

“It’s okay,” Sera said hastily before Dale’s irritation could become incandescent, although, interestingly, he already seemed to be calming into thoughtfulness. “We’ll get rid of this thing tonight, give you peace to concentrate on business matters.”

“Let’s go,” Petra said with an impatient glance back into the house. “We’ll be home in the morning, but please keep us informed of any major events. If you discover any more bodies, for example.”

She stepped after her husband and closed the door with a very decisive clack.

“I think we’ve been told off,” Sera murmured. “Okay, Jilly, do you want to find your virtual man while we rake up the rubble for a keepsake?”

Sera wanted something of Adam’s to try to reach his spirit via what was, to her, more normal channels. Jilly hesitated. She distrusted the urgent yearning to see him again. But more than that, she needed evidence.

“I want to do a bit of raking myself,” she said, leading the way to the stairs. “By their own admission, the Ewans dumped stuff in there. I want to see what they took from Adam’s flat.”

“Good luck with that,” Sera said. “If they didn’t destroy it, the poltergeist will have.”

When Jilly tried to push open the door to the spare bedroom, it wouldn’t budge.

“Have they locked it?” Sera demanded. She looked at Blair, who shook his head. He stepped forward, and Jilly hastily got out of the way. Blair put his broad shoulder to the door and forced it open, pushing against whatever was in the way. When it was wide enough, they all edged through the gap.

“I know,” Sera agreed as if Blair had made some comment. “Well, he certainly rearranged the mess, but as far as I can tell, it doesn’t look much worse than last time. Blair, can you heave that mattress up against the wall? Well, the bits of it.”

As Blair moved it, the disturbed duvet stuffing got up Jilly’s nose and made her sneeze. It was everywhere. Some of the mattress springs had even been torn loose and all but straightened.

“I’d say this room must reek of Adam,” Jilly observed. “Judging by the fury this thing vented in here. Didn’t you feel him the first time?”

Sera shook her head, crouching down to rake through the mess of splintered wood and paper. “No. I just felt the poltergeist. Like an echo.” She shivered. “Come on, we’ll have to be quick here, or the damned thing will show up again.” She glanced at Blair and after a moment said, “Are you sure about that?”

Blair nodded.

Sera said, “Apparently the poltergeist won’t form anywhere near Blair.”

“Well, if you don’t get rid of the bastard tonight, Blair can just come and live with the Ewans. Shite, this is impossible, Sera, everything’s in bits. You can’t even tell what it was.”

“I should be able to pick up something from bits. I just have to touch the right bits.”

After a few minutes’ more sifting, Jilly finally uncovered a plastic bag. She dragged it free and discovered with some triumph that it was heavy, full of stuff. Broken stuff, as it turned out. A piece of glass poking out of the bag cut her finger.

“Ouch,” she said and quickly sucked the blood before it dripped onto her skirt. Over it, her gaze flew to Blair, who stopped lifting up the larger pieces of wood to watch her. His eyebrow twitched. He licked his lips.

“Blair, stop teasing her,” Sera commanded, and Blair winked before bending back to his work.

Jilly, unconvinced it was all teasing, opened the plastic bag with more care. Her breath caught. It was full of photographs. Some of the glass and wood from the frames had been broken, and some of the photographs were either pierced or scrunched, but it was the closest to intact they’d so far seen in this room.

Jilly pushed a heap of rubble to one side and began to ease out the photographs, one at a time. Four young lads in a bedroom, sprawled around a computer, grinning at the camera. Adam was there, his hand on the mouse, smiling over his shoulder while someone aimed a pillow at his head—Dale. Student days, Jilly guessed from the institutional look of the room, like a university hall of residence. Both Adam and Dale certainly looked several years younger. Dale’s hair was longer, and he looked less smart, more carefree. But Adam didn’t seem to have changed a great deal. His black hair was just as uncut and unruly, and he had the beginnings of a beard on his jaw.

Something contracted in Jilly’s chest. She wished she’d known him then. She wished—

Hastily, she moved on to the next photo. Adam wasn’t in all of them. Neither was Dale. There were several of Roxy, some with Adam, some not, a few of her on stage with her band, a couple of other women Jilly had never met. There was even one of Dale, Adam, and Petra, arm in arm in Trafalgar Square, London. Jilly looked at that one quite closely. Petra, in the centre, had linked arms with both men. Smiling, her face was half-turned toward Adam.

It was only when she found the tiny picture of the raven-haired toddler that she was sure. He was on a battered-looking tricycle in front of a block of council flats, and a young, equally dark woman in tight jeans bent over him, holding on to the tiny handlebars while she smiled up at the camera. The little boy was smiling too, with great glee, as if this was a rare treat he was enjoying to his utmost.

Genesis Adam, with the woman who’d named him.

Jilly swallowed. “Eureka,” she said. She passed it to Sera, who’d crawled over to see what she was looking at. “I’ll bet you anything these came from Adam’s flat. Dale must have removed them to make it look as if Adam took his personal stuff with him to Australia, and just dumped them in here.”

“Maybe. Or he could have kept them as a keepsake of his old friend. Jilly, if Dale did him in and was responsible for this whole charade, he wouldn’t be stupid enough to keep anything that’d incriminate him.”

“Suppose not,” Jilly said reluctantly. “But he’d have gone through them, wouldn’t he? Why would he keep a picture of Adam and his mum from long before they ever met?”

“I don’t know,” Sera admitted, picking up the tiny, battered picture. “But I should be able to use this. All of them, in fact, if they were in Adam’s home and meant something to him.”

Sera sat back in a cleared space, her back against the wall, holding the photograph and what was left of its frame between her hands. She closed her eyes. Blair and Jilly looked at each other, then at Sera. Her expression didn’t change from calm concentration for several moments.

Then she opened her eyes. “Nothing,” she said in a frustrated voice. “But then, this isn’t the best place to try. It’s too full of our friend the poltergeist. And Jilly? This is the man who killed Killearn. Remember that.”

“Maybe,” Jilly said, feeling ridiculously mutinous.

Sera didn’t answer. She was looking at the other photos. “Hot, though,” she observed, before casting a quick, half-annoyed glance up at Jilly. “For a geek. All right, let’s take the photos and find the virtual man himself.”

****



Jilly’s heart rate increased rapidly as they piled into Dale’s office. What if he’d gone? What if he wouldn’t talk to Sera? What if the whole thing was proved to be a figment of her sick imagination? How would he greet her? Would he even remember the kiss from the game? Shite, did she want him to?

Squashing the surge of ridiculous questions, she concentrated on opening the inner door.

“Doesn’t Ewan ever review the camera recordings?” Sera said. “Won’t he see you opening his precious door?”

“I think Adam wipes them.”

“Do you have any idea how bizarre that sounds?”

“Do you ever listen to yourself?” Jilly retorted, and pressed the final four numbers that caused the door to slide silently open. “Okay. When you step beyond the first computer there, it triggers the VR machine. It scans you with a bright green light, and then you’re in the virtual world. I’ll go first.”

She stepped into the room and glanced back at Sera. “It’ll scan you for longer because you’re not in its database yet.”

“Fab,” Sera said faintly. She actually took Blair’s hand, as if this scared her more than the poltergeist.

“It doesn’t hurt,” Jilly assured her and walked forward. Behind her, she was aware of Sera’s gasp when the scan began, and then she was in, and Adam stood a foot away, looking at her.

His face was quiet, closed. Her heart turned over. His arms had felt so strong, so good around her, his mouth caressing hers a revelation she longed to repeat with her whole body and soul. She wanted those hands, hanging so loosely at his side, on her body, on her naked flesh. She wanted to see him, touch him…

It’s just lust. I am human after all.

She drew in her breath, trying to focus. There were so many things she wanted, needed to ask him. And yet what came out in a rush was, “Did you kill James Killearn?” Are you James Killearn?

“Yes.”

That’s good, she told herself desperately. If he was James Killearn or any part of him, he surely wouldn’t have confessed so calmly to killing himself, not the fury that had destroyed the Ewans’ spare bedroom because Adam had slept in it.

But there was no time for more. Sera stepped out of the green light, looking bemused. She gazed in fascination at Adam. “F*ck,” she said.

“All things are possible with VR,” he said sardonically and spread his arms. “Be my guest.”

Sera’s eyes narrowed. “Mr. Literal,” she observed.

“This is Sera,” Jilly said hastily.

“I know.” Adam held out his hand.

Surprise, or perhaps curiosity, must have overcome Sera’s suspicion, for she reached out and shook his hand. Her eyes widened, no doubt at the solidity of the contact, and then Adam released her and strode to the nearest computer, his fingers flying over the keys.

“Something’s wrong,” he said urgently. “Your friend won’t scan. Get him out of there.”

“Blair!” Sera cried, rushing back the way she’d come.

“Christ, how did that happen?” Adam straightened, dragging his hand through his hair. “It was working perfectly when you two came through. Is he all right?”

“He’ll be fine,” Jilly said confidently. “He just has different—physiology. I doubt your program can recognise him.” She hadn’t thought of it before, but it made perfect sense that Blair wouldn’t be able to use the VR machine like humans could. Everything about him would be wrong, from his bodily organs to his brain waves. After all, the guy was dead.

“Different?” Adam frowned at her. “In what way? Shit, he doesn’t have a pacemaker, does he?”

“No,” Jilly said cautiously. “I’m not sure his heart beats at all, to be honest. Blair is—Shite, there’s no easy way to say this. Believe it or not, he’s a vampire.”

“A vampire,” Adam repeated. “How would you feel about ‘not’?”

Jilly shrugged. “Doesn’t bother me. I didn’t believe it either when we first met him. Doesn’t change what he is, though.”

Adam’s gaze bored into her. After a moment, his breath seemed to catch on what might have been a silent laugh. His lips curved. “You’re amazing, do you know that?”

Warm blood suffused her cheeks. Some of it was embarrassment; the rest felt terribly like pleasure. Perhaps fortunately, Sera walked back through the green light.

“He’s fine,” she said briskly. “But the machine doesn’t seem to like him. He’ll wait for us. So,” she moved hastily on, “you’re Genesis Adam who created all this?”

He inclined his head. “Well, me and a few engineers who built the hardware. And the developers who helped make the games.”

“Modest, aren’t you?”

He shrugged, faintly amused. “Just truthful. Mainly.”

“Mainly?” she pounced. “Why did you kill James Killearn?”

“He was trying to kill me.”

“Why?”

Adam hesitated, then sat down on the nearest chair. “Good question.”

“Did you owe him money?” Sera asked.

“No, I’d never seen him before in my life. He just dived at me from behind the curtain in Dale’s sitting room, wielding a knife as long as your arm.”

“Did he cut you?”

“A bit,” Adam replied, raising his forearm involuntarily.

“Show me,” Sera invited.

His smile was twisted. “There’s nothing to see. My program was in the database long before I was cut.”

“So there’s no sign of where he shot you either? Convenient.”

“He didn’t shoot me. He died before I was shot. Are you a cop in the hours of daylight?”

“I’m thinking of applying,” Sera said. She glanced at Jilly, then back to him. “Would you humour me? Just walk with Jilly and me to the door.”

“You’re not very trusting for a psychic,” he observed.

“I con for my living, Mr. Adam. I don’t trust anything. Take his hand, Jilly.”

Jilly was about to object. She already knew what would happen, and Sera was wasting time. Then she felt the shock of Adam’s touch, his warm fingers closing round hers, and she realised this was all about touch. Sera’s touch. She wanted to say something, to tell him about this gift of Sera’s, in case he believed her comment about scamming. She did scam, of course, from time to time, but that didn’t detract from the rest.

Jilly felt like an automaton, walking the few paces toward the trigger point.

“Are you really Genesis Adam? Is he really in there?” Sera reached up with her free hand and tapped his forehead.

“All that’s left of him.” Adam put one foot in front of the other, and it disappeared. He brought it back whole while Sera watched, apparently fascinated. “I can’t leave here,” he added. “And if you go beyond this point, you won’t see me anymore. I only exist in the VR program.”

“But you’re more than that,” Sera argued. “You know what happened to you after your program was made, after you died…or is this part of a game? Did you program that too?”

His lips twisted. “God, no. Even I couldn’t have come up with anything that sick.”

Sera dropped his hand and glanced at Jilly. “I can’t feel anything of Killearn in him or anywhere in here. Find out anything you can and call me or Blair. I’m going to wrestle poltergeist.”

Sera walked over the trigger point and vanished. Watching her go, Jilly tried to squash the rising panic. She had to remind herself that she wasn’t frightened of anyone.

Adam didn’t let go of her hand. Instead, he tugged her backward, away from the edge of their virtual world, and shifted around to face her, looking down into her eyes with a crease between his serious brows.

“Is that what you thought? That I’m really the spirit of Killearn, your poltergeist, playing tricks? Is that why you brought her here?”

“Yes,” Jilly said miserably. “I mean no, only sort of. And I brought her here just to see. She thinks she’s looking after me.”

“She is,” Adam said, twisting his fingers through hers. “I’ve seen her in action. Do you look after her too?”

“I try, but I can’t keep her away from the vampire.” Jilly drew in her breath, hated the faint shudder she heard in it. “Look, she needs everything she can get about Killearn’s death to help her disperse the poltergeist. Is there anything else you can tell me?”

“Nothing, except he was strong and vicious and wouldn’t give up.”

Jilly nodded. “Yes, that sounds like what he’s left behind. How did you get the upper hand?”

“I suppose I don’t give up either. Not when it came to our lives or his. And I’m stronger than I look.”

“You look pretty strong to me,” she said, eyeing his biceps. “Or did you program those as extra?”

His dark eyes lit with amusement. “This was me in nerd mode, right down to the old T-shirt and comfy jeans. All you see is all you get. I run when I remember, and I have a wee gym in my flat.”

“I know,” she said without thinking.

His brows lifted. “You do?”

She flushed, tried to draw her hand free of his and yet wasn’t sorry when he held firmly on to her fingers. She lifted her chin. “I went there. To find out what I could about you.”

“And what did you learn?”

“That you took nothing with you to Australia, not even your portrait of Roxy.”

He frowned. “I don’t understand the Australia thing.”

She drew in her breath. “Well, I have a theory about that. In fact, I have a few theories I need you to listen to, and you’re not going to like any of them.”

He nodded thoughtfully. “Okay. Let’s go somewhere more comfortable, and you can hit me with them.”

“Adam, we haven’t got time to play games!”

“We’re already talking faster than we could in real time. Why not do it with a little luxury thrown in? Sera doesn’t need you, does she?”

She tried to laugh. “With Blair around? Are you kidding?”

“Then let’s go.” He released her hand, strode to the nearest computer, and did a lot of clicking, followed by a bit of keying and a bit more clicking. She watched him, acknowledged the ache of pity and longing in her. Along with a more down-to-earth appreciation of the neat, tantalizing shape of his denim-clad bum.

He shouldn’t be dead. He just shouldn’t be dead.

Still bent over the computer, he looked back at her across his shoulder. A smile played around his expressive lips. His eyes were warm, sending butterflies scattering from her stomach throughout her whole body. “JK? I liked kissing you. I liked it a lot.”