Money Run

by Jack Heath

  “Thank you,” one of the others said as he handed over her bag.

  “No problem,” Ash replied.

  The main lobby was cleaner than most hospitals. Granite sparkled underfoot, wood panelling glowed under the reception counter, and mirrored glass walls reflected Ash’s surprise back at her. She’d expected it to look classy, but for most office buildings classy just meant clean and sparse. This was more like walking into the reception area of a five-star hotel. It smelled of money.

  The lifts were depositing a steady trickle of people into the lobby. They drifted past her towards the exit. Ash glanced at her watch – 4.20 p.m. Pretty soon everyone would be gone.

  A receptionist with long, silver-painted nails looked up at her as she approached. “Hi,” she said. “Can I help you?”

  “My name’s Ashley Arthur,” Ash said. “I’m here to see Mr. Buckland.”

  The receptionist was already typing in her name by the time Ash had finished speaking. “The top floor, the twenty-fifth,” she said, pointing into the alcove with the lifts. “You’re a little early, so you might have to wait a while.” She caught a name tag as a printer spat it out. “Wear this at all times. Security will hassle you otherwise.”

  “Sure,” Ashley said, putting it around her neck. “Thanks.”

  The receptionist had already turned back to her computer.

  Ash’s wedges clacked against the granite. The many lift doors gleamed invitingly. She felt like everyone in the foyer was staring at her, like they could tell she didn’t belong. She risked a glance. They weren’t. Just nerves, she supposed. It was the most important day of her life, so she was entitled to be a little on edge. She pushed the button beside the lift, and watched the numbers scroll down on one of the indicators.

  A woman with blood-red curls appeared beside her and pushed the down button. On her way to the basement car park, maybe. There was a ping, and the doors to a lift going up opened. Ash walked in and pushed the button for the twenty-fifth floor. It wasn’t the top button; there was one for the roof as well. Ash wondered if someone went up to polish the yellow cube each day.

  The doors slid shut. The interior of the lift looked like a miniature version of the lobby – granite floor, mirrored walls and wood panelling around the ceiling. It was so roomy Ash could have done a cartwheel.

  As the lift began to ascend, the floor numbers blinked on a screen above her. At floor 6, the lift stopped. A guy with a silk suit and blue-framed glasses entered. He glanced at Ash’s name tag but didn’t speak to her. At floor 12, a man and two women joined them, muttering among themselves. Floor 13 brought a woman with a handbag designed to look like a slice of watermelon, and on floor 19 a man walked in who smelled faintly bitter, like old sweat, or a coin held in the hand for too long.

  At floor 23 they all got out, and Ash travelled the last two floors alone. The lift was smooth and silent.

  The doors slid open, and she stepped out of the lift. A redwood-panelled corridor stretched away to either side. There were small paintings hanging on the walls, one every few metres along. Prints, not originals – there for the sake of atmosphere rather than art. Green mountains, vivid fruit bowls, faded lilies.

  Ashley had studied a plan of the building, and knew that there were only conference rooms and bathrooms to her left. She turned right, and started walking.

  She stared at her hands to check if they were shaking. They weren’t. She was about to meet one of the world’s wealthiest, smartest businesspeople. But she was still in absolute control.

  A curly-haired man was sitting behind a marble counter up ahead. He looked up from his computer, and stood as she approached. “Hi,” he said, sticking out his hand. “I’m Adam. Lovely to meet you, Miss Arthur.”

  He was in his mid-twenties, but was only a few centimetres taller than her. She thought she detected a trace of Welsh in his accent. His dark curls bobbed around a noble face. His sleeve slid up his outstretched arm, revealing that his watch-tan was slightly larger than his watch, like he’d bought a new one recently. His name tag read ADAM KEIGHLEY.

  “Call me Ash,” she said, shaking Keighley’s hand. “Sorry I’m early.”

  “No problem. We have some very comfy chairs, and I want to give you some background on Mr. Buckland and HBS before you go in anyway. Come with me.”

  Ash followed him down a corridor behind the counter. Looking back at the screen of the computer he’d been working on, she saw an open game of Minesweeper. Apparently it was there for the appearance of professionalism rather than for actual work. His work started now – talking to her.

  “First time here?” Keighley asked.

  Ash nodded.

  “Lots of people have been before and don’t realize it,” Keighley said. “This building used to be a hotel. Mr. Buckland bought it, put the HBS cube on the roof, and now people forget it wasn’t always our headquarters.”

  “Wouldn’t it have been cheaper to buy an actual office building?” Ash asked.

  “Offices usually rent out individual floors instead of selling the whole building. And Mr. Buckland wanted a certain image for the company: classy and unusual. Prestigious. This way, although employees are paid the same as they would be anywhere else, everyone wants a job here. We always hook the best applicants and, because our employees know their jobs are in high demand, they’re more satisfied and they work harder.”

  “How many others are there?”

  “Other what?”

  “HBS buildings like this one.”

  Keighley smiled. “None. It’s a global organization, but this is the only infrastructure.”

  “How long have you been working here?” Ash asked.

  Keighley chuckled. “Is it that obvious?”

  “That you’re new?” Ash said. “Yeah. You still sound like a tour guide rather than an employee.”

  “Sorry. I’ve only been here a few weeks, and I studied hard for the job. Maybe too hard.”

  “No, it’s fine.” Ash stuck her hands in her pockets. “Give me the whole speech.”

  “Really?”

  “Sure.”

  “Okay.” Keighley clapped his hands together. “Hammond Buckland’s first invention was the disposable wall. He knew that restaurants and schools were spending lots of money to fix the vandalism of their toilets, so he started selling thin sheets of clear plastic to stick to the exposed surfaces that could be removed at the end of the day or week.”

  Ash nodded. The toilet cubicles at her school were always shielded by them.

  “The success of the disposable wall allowed Mr. Buckland to explore some other ideas. The collapsible subwoofer, the flash drive implant, the vacuum welcome mat. He hit the big time when he discovered a use for brewery protein – congealed protein that forms at the bottom of the vats during fermentation of beer. Every brewery in the world was just throwing it away, but Mr. Buckland reasoned that it must be either good for rats, or bad for rats, so if it was good he’d make food pellets, if it was bad he’d make rat poison.”

  “So which is it?”

  Keighley grinned, showing small teeth. “Good, as it turns out. Rats can eat almost anything. Pet food is a good industry to be in, because the customer isn’t the consumer, so the taste doesn’t matter.”

  “Was that when he started AU?”

  Keighley raised his eyebrows. “You’ve been studying too, I see.”

  Ash nodded. “I’m a customer, so I already know that bit of the speech.” AU was a digital banking service which connected to an existing bank account, and added interest in exchange for use of the money while it was in the account. “Although I have one question.”

  Keighley nodded. “Go ahead.”

  “What does AU stand for?”

  Keighley laughed. “It doesn’t. It’s the chemical symbol for gold.”

  Duh, thought Ash. I should have remembered that from school.

  “Pretty soon Mr. Buckland decided to start a bricks-and-mortar bank,” Keighley was saying. “HBS National. I
t cost more to run than AU, so it couldn’t offer as high an interest rate, and a string of high-profile robberies of other banks forced us to increase security expenditure soon after it was formed. But it held out, and now flourishes in conjunction with AU.”

  Ash nodded. Her AU account was attached to her HBS National account, so she knew all about that too. But she hadn’t wanted to interrupt Keighley again.

  “And now Hammond Buckland Solutions is one of the world’s biggest and most successful multinational corporations,” Keighley concluded. “It has more than one million employees worldwide and an estimated worth of $4 billion.”

  “How much money does Mr. Buckland have?” Ash asked.

  Keighley sighed. “Why did I know you were going to ask that?”

  “You get that question a lot?”

  “Kids always ask.” He shrugged. “I don’t know his net worth any more than he knows yours – it’s private information. But Business Review Weekly estimated his personal fortune at $2.2 billion last year. Good enough?”

  Ash smiled. “Excellent speech. Thank you.”

  “And here we are.”

  They were facing two large doors, panelled with what looked like oak. The handles were gold plated, but the doors didn’t look glamorous – they had a sparse, vault-like simplicity.

  There were two security guards, one on either side of the door. Their uniforms were a sharp grey, with a yellow square on the right shoulder of each – the HBS logo. Their faces were as expressionless as those of the Buckingham Palace guards.

  Keighley glanced at his watch. “We’ve still got a couple of minutes to spare,” he said. “Take a seat.”

  Ash sank into one of the giant black couches lining the walls. A clock on the wall read 4.28 p.m. Keighley sat behind a desk, identical to the one she’d seen him at before. He turned to the computer and brought up a half-finished game of Minesweeper – Ash wondered if it was the same game he’d been playing on the other screen.

  She slipped her phone out of her pocket and hit SEND. The phone silently dialled Benjamin’s modem, and connected. She switched the keypad to LOCK and pocketed the phone. Now Benjamin would be able to hear everything Hammond Buckland said when she was in his office.

  The phone on Keighley’s desk rang; two beeps and a chirp. Keighley poked it.

  “Send Miss Arthur in,” the speakerphone said. The voice was flat and distracted. Ashley recognized it from an interview she’d watched on TV – it was Buckland.

  Keighley minimized Minesweeper and tapped out a combination on the keyboard. The huge doors emitted a muffled clank.

  Keighley nodded to her. “Whenever you’re ready.”

  Ash stood up, and smoothed her blouse down at the front. She tilted her head from side to side, cracking her neck, like a tennis player preparing to serve. She walked to the doors, took a deep breath, and pushed.

  The Interview

  I hate government jobs, Michael Peachey thought.

  He was waiting outside HBS in the white Ford sedan that had been provided for him. Through the tinted windows he watched pedestrians bustling back and forth, other drivers drumming their fingers on their steering wheels. A window washer finished wiping the first pane of the top floor, lowered his platform a level, and started on the one below. The HBS logo shone high above, a surrogate sun for the overcast day.

  He checked his pocket watch. Ten past four. Damn government, he thought.

  When a gang hired him, a tattooed thug would give him a cash advance in a darkened back alley. That was fine. When it was a corporation, he would usually get a call on a secure line, or an encrypted email. That was okay. But when the government wanted his services, it got so complicated. They demanded disguises, intermediaries, false names, code words, foreign accounts. They wanted control over everything.

  They had forbidden Peachey to enter the building before 4.15.

  Peachey was wearing a dark grey suit. Not expensive, not cheap. His hair was cropped short, and had a touch of wax. His five o’clock shadow was only visible close up. His tinted glasses were small. He looked average in every way. Anyone who noticed him would forget him before he left their field of vision.

  He was supposed to wait for the girl to arrive before going in. She was Buckland’s last official appointment of the day, so if she didn’t turn up, Buckland might actually leave his office before Peachey could reach him. He had told the government agent that this wouldn’t be an issue. He was good at improvising. But she had insisted. “We will accept no departure from the plan,” she said. “Deviation will incur penalties.”

  When Peachey had met the agent, he wasn’t supposed to know who she was. But he did. Her white gold watch had the letters TW engraved on the face. There were nineteen government employees in this state with those initials. Only eight of those were women, only three of those were high up enough to be assigned to him, and only one of those had Korean ancestry.

  All of this was on the public record. Thanks to the Freedom of Information Act, the government wasn’t allowed to conceal the identities of its employees. Peachey could have walked right in to the federal police building and asked for a list.

  Her name was Tania Walker, and until recently she’d been an operative for Terrorism Risk Assessment. She’d left active duty in TRA to become a “consultant”. Peachey knew what that meant. She was in charge of off-the-books jobs, operations that the government couldn’t afford to be linked to.

  Jobs like this one.

  Peachey had watched the girl talk on her phone for more than five minutes before going in. This was already a deviation from the plan. She was supposed to walk right in and keep Buckland there.

  Maybe she would get caught in the crossfire later. He smiled at the thought.

  When the glass doors slid shut behind her, Peachey climbed out of the Futura. For once, he didn’t bother wiping his fingerprints off the interior surfaces. One of the benefits of working for the government, he thought, is that they short-circuit any investigation afterwards. Sometimes they even find a scapegoat. They protect you from the police. They have to, in order to protect themselves.

  He strolled in through the glass doors. Like he worked there. Like he belonged there. That was his gift. He could blend in anywhere.

  He had no bag to put through the X-ray machine. The metal detector didn’t pick up the gun in the holster under his arm. It was a Glock 7, German made, high-density ceramic rather than metal. Expensive and undetectable. The explosive residue sniffer didn’t pick it up either – it had never been fired. The holster was a complex tangle of leather and plastic, customized to the gun and his ribs so there was no visible bulge under his suit. Good for a quick draw, too, although the straps made reholstering it a little clumsy.

  When he was inside the lobby, the silver-nailed receptionist greeted him and accepted his cover story with a minimum of fuss. Yes, Mr. Buckland was expecting him. Yes, he could go straight on up. Peachey kept his hands mobile: smoothing his lapels, silently clicking his fingers, roaming slowly across the desk. This was a habit of his, designed to draw her gaze away from his face. The receptionist printed out his name tag and told him that Buckland’s office was on the twenty-fifth floor. He thanked her and headed for the lifts.

  My name is Michael Peachey, he narrated in his head. I’m a hit man.

  Peachey stepped into the lift and pushed the button. Keeping his head low and his arms by his sides, he gave the mirror his best sociopathic stare. Lips slightly parted, showing teeth. Head bowed, eyes steely.

  Perfect. Exactly how an assassin should look. Peachey continued talking to his imaginary audience as the doors slid closed.

  I put the same three shots into every victim. Torso left, torso right, head. In the decade I’ve been doing that, I’ve never missed. There’s an index of the world’s top fifty assassins, judged on experience, success rate and skill with their chosen weapon. Known as The List, it’s on a server in a basement in Beijing, but you can access it from anywhere in the world if you have
the contacts, the money and a password. Last time I checked, I was number three. Number two was Jeremy Quay, number one was Alex de Totth – and I happen to know that Quay is dead.

  Someday Peachey planned to write an autobiography. He had enough money to buy a new identity and vanish – it wouldn’t be hard, given that few people knew his name and even fewer knew his face. He’d move to another country, and send the book to a publisher. They’d print it, because it would be well-researched, his writing rich with details. Plus he wouldn’t ask for royalties. How could he, without compromising his new identity? But then someone would buy the film rights, and he’d show up at the audition. Just a no-name actor from somewhere in South America. And he’d get the part, because who could play Michael Peachey better than Michael Peachey?

  This dream was unlikely to come true, of course. Most days it all just felt like idle fantasy. But today it seemed close. He had a good feeling about this job.

  I know Quay’s dead because I killed him, he recited. It wasn’t out of rivalry – it was just business. Someone hired him to kill a very rich woman. She found out, hired me, and I killed Quay before he could get to her.

  Shame. He was a nice guy, for a contract killer.

  As for de Totth, well, she took a big job about six months ago. No word from her since, and I figure the government tried to hire her to kill Buckland before contacting me. They have access to The List, and they can afford the best.

  This is a risky business. You don’t hear from someone in six months, chances are you’re never going to again. Given that the government didn’t hire her for this job, I suspect I’m now the number one.

  Peachey hummed along with the soundtrack to this part of his imagined movie – a crunching, echoing beat, and a growling synth to build up tension.

  A few other people entered the lift on the eighth floor. A young man, chatting on his mobile phone. A dark-suited woman, tapping immaculate nails against the wall. A middle-aged guy wearing huge glasses.