She was a nightmare without AEON, especially because she couldn’t get up the stairs to Ana and wasn’t allowed near her server. The only laptop that came close to being what she needed belonged to Owain and had also been taken in as evidence. She was getting rather good at Patience.
It was the first day of summer when Bryn finally knocked on their door. Jason buzzed him up and Amy looked like all her Christmases had come at once when he set down the boxes containing AEON.
Jason wanted to sit down with a cup of tea and hear all about the investigation, but Amy was too absorbed in directing him hither and thither to put her beloved computer back in working order.
“They weren’t impressed when they found it was empty,” Bryn said, amused at her fervour. “Though I think the tech boys kept it an extra week just to ogle your setup.”
“No, the other USB port. That one!” Amy jabbed at the air between her and Jason, as he tried to guess exactly what she was pointing at.
“You could label them,” he mumbled.
“I didn’t exactly foresee her being dismantled, did I?” Amy leaned forward to get a closer look and winced. Jason abandoned AEON to fetch more tea and painkillers.
Bryn slurped his tea and gestured at the designer anklet peeking out from beneath the hem of Jason’s jeans. “I’m also here about that. Good news or bad news?”
“Good.”
“Bad.” Amy scowled at Jason and prodded him in the side. “Always bad first.”
“Anyway,” Bryn said, “they’re dropping the murder charge. And escape from lawful custody, though that one took a bit of persuasion. Damage’s sky storage thing proved it in the end.”
Jason felt a huge weight fall from his shoulders. “Thank fuck,” he muttered.
“You’ve still got to go up the Crown Court and have it all officially said and done, but one of the boys will be by later to remove the tether.”
“What about Owain?” Jason asked.
“Could go either way,” Bryn said. “With Cerys’s and Amy’s statements, he has a good chance, but the courts are holding off until he’s fit to plead.”
Jason turned to Amy. “What statements?”
Amy waved her hand dismissively. “Oh, I told the special investigator I sent you and Cerys out for cocaine samples as part of the Colombian case. You protected me by saying you acted alone in Canton.”
Jason was flabbergasted. “Amy, that’s—”
“The truth. I signed my name to it.” She stared him down, silently daring him to call her a liar in front of an officer of the law.
“Stuart Williams confirmed he sold the cocaine to Cerys and was vague on the dates,” Bryn said. “I’m confident we can get Owain through this.”
Amy squeezed Jason’s arm. “That was the good news. I specifically said—”
“Madhouse Mickey walks. So does Stuart Williams.”
Jason gritted his teeth. “How the fuck can they get away with that? What about Damage? What about that fuck-tonne of drugs?”
Bryn held up his hands. “They fingered Bas—sorry, I mean Zook—as the mastermind. They were prepared to give details in exchange for immunity. And Madhouse Mickey sold his enforcer up the river for the murders of the Colombians, Damage and Rich Porter.”
“And he’s just going to let that shit fall on him?” Jason was incredulous.
“Perks of the job.” Bryn suddenly looked old, worn thin around the edges. He looked weary. “Once Bas threw himself on the pyre, all hope of finding the truth vanished. We’re left with liars and backstabbers.”
“I can find out,” Amy said suddenly. “I have AEON back. I can look at the evidence—”
“You have to stay away from this,” Bryn said, his voice sharp as a daggers. “You narrowly escaped a charge for perverting the course of justice, and that was only because the CPS couldn’t decide if lying to Rawlings constituted a crime.”
Amy subsided, muttering into her tea. “Well, I could.”
“But you won’t.” Bryn scrubbed a hand over his face. “All of us are going to let this one lie. There’s a man banged up for Damage’s death and the drugs are gone—for now. And none of us are going to prison. I can live with that.”
Jason looked over at Amy, that fragile body held together with coffee and a huge plaster cast. If Mickey and Stuart thought she was on to them...
“So can we,” Jason said.
* * *
With AEON at her fingertips, she was flying.
Amy basked in the sweet flow of the data, her computer and her server back under her command. At Bryn’s insistence, she had quarantined the files associated with the Colombians and Damage’s murder, locking them away in the bowels of the server. They both silently agreed to pretend she wouldn’t look at them again.
She immersed herself in catching up with old friends, secure forums, places she would only dare to explore under AEON’s secure cloak—once she had swept her machine for police-issue Trojans and mechanical spyware.
When she looked up, it was dark. The curtains were closed and the full mug of tea by her elbow was stone cold.
“Jason?” she called tentatively.
“Oh good, you’re back.”
He came up behind her, hand resting against her shoulder. She would never tire of that feeling, the easy intimacy, the warmth. It almost made this entire emotional roller coaster worth it.
“I’ve been thinking,” he said.
“Those words have never preceded anything good in the course of human history,” Amy said solemnly. “Except perhaps ‘eureka!’”
“Diazepam. Is it a bit like truth serum?”
Amy froze. “No. Why?”
“Because you said some things in the car—”
“You said it yourself—I was high.”
“So you do remember what you said?”
Shit. “Bits and pieces.”
“So, when you were talking about Lizzie—”
“Do we have to talk about Lizzie?” Amy had almost forgiven her sister for calling her assistant a murderer, and calling their parents for a chat, but she couldn’t shake the lingering feeling that she had been looking strangely at Jason. Amy couldn’t wait until Lizzie flew back to Australia and the cushion of twelve hours and ten thousand miles lay between them.
Except it seemed that Jason didn’t know when to stop and leave well enough alone. “You said that she said that you liked me and—”
“Of course I like you!”
She felt Jason’s hand tense on her shoulder.
She counted to five.
“I like you,” she said quietly. “You’re my friend, you’re my best friend.” And that is all it is.
Right?
Jason laughed. “Well, then, I guess I like you too.”
Amy laughed, relief rattling around her chest. Things were the way they should be again. The way she wanted to keep them, at all costs. Even if it meant lying to herself a smidge, telling Jason one little white lie.
“Tea?” he asked.
“I’ll make it,” she said.
* * * * *
See how Amy and Jason’s story began
with Binary Witness, available now!
Binary Witness
Book one of The Amy Lane Mysteries
Police detectives rely on Amy Lane to track the digital debris of their most elusive criminals—when she’s not in the throes of a panic attack. After two students disappear in Cardiff, Amy uncovers photographic evidence that they’ve been murdered. From the safety of her computer, she looks through the city’s digital eyes to trace the steps of a killer.
Amy’s investigation requires footwork, however, and the agoraphobic genius can’t hack it alone. She turns to her newly hired cleaner, ex-con Jason Carr. Jason is fascinated
by both Amy and the work, and can’t refuse even when she sends him into situations that risk returning him to prison.
The killer strikes again and again, and Amy and Jason are the only investigators closing in on him. But Amy’s psyche is cracking under the strain, and Jason’s past is catching up with him. To stop the next murder, they must hold their unconventional partnership together at any cost.
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About the Author
Rosie Claverton grew up in Devon, daughter to a Sri Lankan father and a Norfolk mother, surrounded by folk mythology and surly sheep. She moved to Cardiff to study medicine and adopted Wales as her home. Her short film “Dragon Chasers” aired on BBC Wales in autumn 2012. Currently exiled to London, she lives with her journalist husband and their pet hedgehog.
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ISBN-13: 9781426899089
Code Runner
Copyright © 2014 by Rosie Claverton
Edited by Deborah Nemeth
All rights reserved. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.
All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.
This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
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Code Runner (Amy Lane Mysteries Book 2) Page 30
