Powerstone (4 page)

Irene obeyed.

‘I’ll ask you that question once
more. Are you disappointed?’

The scalding coffee shocked Irene
into speaking the truth. ‘Let’s see. I was on the verge of being offered
probably the best job in the world, being trained to take charge of one of the
biggest corporate businesses anywhere, with a virtually unlimited salary and
unparalleled power. But I lost. And you ask me if I am disappointed.’ She
swallowed another mouthful of coffee, not caring that her voice was rising as
quickly as her temper. ‘Of course I am disappointed! What sort of damn fool
question is that to ask? Do you want me to spell it out? I put everything I had
into winning that show, and I lost. I failed, and I hate failure. So now, Peter
Madrid, once you have finished your coffee, could you please stop gloating and
leave my apartment? I have a life to rebuild and you are wasting my time.’

Peter shook his head. ‘It seems
that I am not.’ He sipped delicately at his cup. ‘Nice coffee; decaf? How would
you like to rebuild your life within the Manning Corporation?’

Irene shook her head. ‘Working for
Kendrick? I would not even consider it. Either I’m at the top, or I’m out
completely.’

‘Good.’ Peter nodded. ‘That is the
answer that Ms Manning hoped you would give. There is a limousine waiting on
the street outside. It will leave at ten o’ clock, either with you or without
you.’ He stood up and handed her the empty coffee cup. ‘Ms Manning does not
send limousines for losers.’ He looked pointedly at the broken television set.
‘Nor does she give people a second chance.’

Irene frowned. ‘Is that an
ultimatum?’

‘It is a fact of life,’ Peter
said. He glanced at the clock that hung on the wall, its green digital figures
counting away the seconds of the day. ‘I will see myself out.’

For a minute Irene pondered what she
should do. Would she be better to swallow her pride and enter the limousine,
placing herself in the hands of the woman who had so publicly rejected her, or
strike out alone from nothing? The clock clicked again as another figure slid
into place. Irene looked up and flinched. 09:50. She had five minutes in which
to decide, and then five minutes to reach the street. 09:51. There really was
no decision to make; she knew that she would enter the limousine.

Rapidly changing into a neat dark
business suit and low sling back shoes, Irene tore a hunk of bread from a
slightly stale loaf and threw open the door just as the figures changed to
09:57.

‘Irene? Who were you talking with?
Where are you going?’ Patrick appeared in the doorway of the bedroom, his body
unclothed and his eyes still half closed.

‘No time to explain,’ Irene told
him. ‘I’ll be in touch.’

‘But my coffee?’

‘You know where the kitchen is.’
Irene crossed the corridor and madly pressed the button to summon the elevator.

‘Where are you going?’ Patrick
padded after her.

The elevator seemed to take
forever as it dropped the eight floors to street level, stopping once to let an
elderly Jewish couple on, and again to allow them to leave. The foyer was quiet
and the uniformed commissionaire smiled as he came toward her.

‘Miss Armstrong! I saw you on the
television last night. You looked good.’ He hesitated for a second. ‘I really
think that you should have won, though.’

‘Thank you, Mark,’ Irene spared him
the briefest of smiles, ‘but I’m afraid that I am in a hurry.’

‘Of course,’ Mark opened the heavy
glass doors and saluted as Irene bustled past. ‘You businesswomen! Always
rushing away to some meeting or other!’

The street was busy, with yellow
cabs blaring their horns and commercial vehicles thundering past. Long and dark
green, the limousine was parked exactly in front of the door, with a uniformed
driver at the wheel. Even as Irene approached, the driver started its engine,
the soft purr spurring her forward.

‘Wait!’ She heard the crack in her
voice as she pulled open the door.

The driver turned around. ‘Miss
Irene Armstrong?’ He was about forty, broad faced but not fat, with narrow
eyes.

‘That’s right.’

‘Please put your seat belt on,
Miss Armstrong.’

‘Irene!’ Avoiding a despairing
clutch by the commissionaire, a naked Patrick lunged toward the limousine.
‘Where are you going?’

‘I don’t know!’ Irene held the
door open for a moment. ‘Go and put some clothes on, Patrick, and I’ll let you
know as soon as I find out myself. Go on now.’

‘It’s
ten o’clock
, Miss Armstrong,’ the chauffeur said. ‘I must leave.’

‘Drive,’ Irene agreed. ‘He’ll
keep.’

‘Wait!’ Patrick pressed against
the window, but the driver eased into the traffic and rolled smoothly away.
Unlike any other vehicle in which Irene had travelled, the limousine seemed to
be able to split traffic like Moses parting the
Red Sea
. Signals altered to green at its approach, even the
yellow cabs gave way and the road through the city was clearer than she had
ever known.

Irene tapped on the glass
partition that separated her from the driver. ‘Where are we going?’

‘LaGuardia,’ the driver said,
quietly, turning into
Grand
Central Parkway East
.
‘Sit back and enjoy the ride, Miss Armstrong. We should arrive in about twenty
minutes.’

 ‘LaGuardia?’ Irene sat up
straight. ‘I thought you were taking me to meet Ms Manning.’

‘I am following my instructions,’
the driver said enigmatically.

It was an eight-mile journey, but
the driver barely halted until he steered into a reserved slot in the parking
garage for the Central Terminal. A man in the pressed grey trousers and green
blazer of the Manning Corporation was waiting for their arrival, and gently
ushered Irene through Terminal Building A, past the security guards and onto
the tarmac.

‘Onto the aircraft, ma’am,’ he
said, indicating the Cessna Citation Bravo that purred a few yards away. The
tail carried the familiar Manning logo.

‘Where am I going?’ Irene asked, but
the blazered man proved as politely unforthcoming as the chauffeur.

‘I am following instructions, Miss
Armstrong,’ he said quietly, ‘but I would not worry, Ms Manning takes care of
her own.’

Irene had dreamed of being inside
an executive jet, but the reality exceeded her expectations. The interior was
the expected green-and-gold, but where the aircraft had originally been fitted
for seven passengers in club class, the Manning Corporation had reduced the
number of seats to four, ensuring more space for the lap-top computers and an
even more relaxing flight.

‘Please take a seat, Miss
Armstrong, and fasten your seat belt.’ The green blazered man had accompanied
Irene on board. ‘We will be airborne directly.’

‘You don’t allow me much time for
contemplation, do you?’ Irene did as she was ordered, only now aware that her
headache was returning and she was beginning to feel the first pangs of hunger.
Save for one mouthful of bread, she had not eaten since before the show
yesterday evening, and the effects of the morning’s coffee were beginning to
wear off.

‘Ms Manning likes efficiency,’ the
blazered man told her.

The Cessna taxied very briefly,
and then took off in what seemed a nearly vertical climb that had Irene
swallowing hard. A look out of the window showed her the vast spread of
New York
visibly diminishing beneath her,
with the tall buildings of
Manhattan
already assuming Lilliputian proportions and the
Hudson River
a streak of blue.

After a few minutes the intercom
hummed and a calm voice sounded. ‘We are now flying at
7,620 metres
and heading in a westerly direction. There is a gentle
headwind but not enough to impede our speed or progress. We are approaching our
cruising speed of 400 knots, or about
465 miles
an hour, so sit back and enjoy the flight, Miss
Armstrong. The steward will attend to any requests,’

There was fresh orange juice and a
light meal of newly baked bread and cheese, followed by strong coffee, but
Irene’s repeated demands for further information from the blazered man were met
only with a polite smile.

‘I am only the steward, Miss
Armstrong. I do what I am told.’

‘Well, let me speak with the pilot
then.’

The steward shook his head
regretfully. ‘I am truly sorry, Miss Armstrong, but Ms Manning’s safety
protocols are very strict. The cockpit is fully secured and separate from us.
We cannot approach the pilot when we are airborne.’

America
seemed to crawl below them as the
Cessna powered westward and Irene drank a never-ending succession of cups of
coffee. She forced herself to sit quietly, either staring at the clouds that
wafted below them or perusing the magazines that had been provided.

Leafing through the in-house
magazine for the Manning Corporation, Irene refreshed herself with the sheer
scale of the company. She read how Ms Manning had pushed herself through
college and had begun in electronics in a very small scale. By sheer hard work
and brilliance, she had steered her own company to be one of the main players
in
America
, and then had branched out into
other fields. Now the Manning Corporation was involved in real estate and
hospitality, clothing and drink, transport and pharmaceuticals, as well as the
original electronics.

Irene shook her head. The
corporation was so vast it was astonishing that one woman could keep her finger
on everything. Ms Manning truly was an impressive woman.

After the first couple of hours
Irene had given up attempting to judge where they were and tried to sleep, but
her active mind forced her awake, to think about the forthcoming interview. It
was early afternoon before the Cessna touched down, and the steward was smiling
as he approached.

‘We have reached our destination,
Miss Armstrong. On behalf of Ms Manning, I would like to thank you for your
patience and hope that you have had a pleasant flight.’

Irene stretched her legs and
straightened her back as she stepped outside. However luxurious the cabin had
been, the headroom had been less than generous to a woman of her height. She
looked around, shivering in a wind that hissed straight from the
Arctic
. The aerodrome seemed to consist
of a single long strip of tarmac beside a building of compact concrete, from
whose squat tower rose a mass of complex communications equipment. A bleak,
green-and-grey plain stretched to low hills that struggled above the distant
horizon. ‘Where are we?’

‘Our destination,’ the steward
repeated. ‘Within the continental
United States
, but I am afraid that I am not at liberty to divulge any
more than that.’

‘Why the hell not?’ Irene
demanded, but the steward merely smiled and ushered her toward another vehicle.
The Ford Expedition King Ranch waited with its engine throbbing and the
expected Manning logo shining on its doors.

‘The driver will take you further.
It may be a bit wild out here, Miss Armstrong, but Ms Manning will ensure that
you can rough it in comfort.’

Irene sighed, hoping that whatever
Ms Manning wanted, it had better be worth all this trouble. She slid inside the
air-conditioned interior and did not trouble the driver with questions.
Stretching out on the comfortable leather seat, Irene nursed her head that
still retained the memory of a hangover and wondered where she would be today
if she had won
The
Neophyte
competition. Probably already hard at
work in some Manning Corporation office, she told herself.

The driver negotiated the rough
track that led north and west toward the hills, saying nothing, but on one
occasion pointing to a herd of buffalo that moved slowly to their right. Irene
looked without curiosity; wildlife did not interest her as much as her future
career.

Twice Irene saw smaller
four-by-four vehicles driving alongside them but at a discreet distance, and
once a Ford pickup crossed their track, with the unmistakable form of armed men
sitting in the rear. Her driver drove straight on, unheeding, into a vast space
beneath a sky that extended into infinity.

After an hour, Irene realised that
they were heading toward a high, white building. Perched on a smooth knoll,
castellated round towers protruded above tall, windowless walls of whitewashed
stone. Irene shook her head; this building belonged to
Europe
, or at least
Hollywood
, rather than the reality of the
United States
. She half expected to see the
Sheriff of Nottingham ride out on a prancing charger.

‘What the hell is that place?’

The driver did not turn around. He
stopped a hundred yards from the arched doorway that seemed the only entrance
and spoke a few words into a radio. After a few minutes the iron-studded door
opened, and he manoeuvred through the entrance and into another world.