True (31 page)

After a brief pause she stood up and held out the portable hard drive. 'Your laptop?'

He pointed to the desk in the corner. She walked over and attached the firewire cable. 'You're sure we've got until tomorrow to stop Ilium?'

Max checked his watch. 'Yes. My father and Klaus should be meeting with the target clients at any moment to extract their payment. The lethal permanent dose will be administered as the bridesmaids leave. But, I won't let that happen.'

She powered up the computer and opened the folder. 'Okay, I understand Ilium, but not Project Venus.'

'What?'

She pointed at a folder on the screen labelled 'Ilium/Venus'. 'You've never heard of it?'

'No.'

She double-clicked on the folder, revealing two separate ones, then highlighted Venus. 'It shares the same folder as Ilium, so I guess it's some kind of sister project. Perhaps it's the antidote.' She double-clicked and a list of files appeared. She opened the first.

It was a German text document, evidently a management summary of the project. The introductory paragraph made him gasp. He reached for the mouse. Helmut Kappel's project could never be called an antidote - unless you had the darkest sense of humour. As he scrolled down the screen he was appalled by his father's arrogance. And yet it all made a kind of sense. 'Shit,' he muttered.

What is it?' she said. 'Tell me.'

TWO HOURS LATER

'you asked to see me.' feliks lysenko was the third to be called into the small conference room near the atrium. Now that Isabella was dead diey would have to wait to extract payment from Hudsucker, but Helmut Kappel wasn't dissastisfied. Over the last couple of hours Giscard Corbasson and Christophe Nadolny had agreed terms, and there was no reason to suppose that the Russian would be any different. Venus hadn't even begun, but Helmut had never felt more poweful.

The masked ball wasn't due to start for a few hours but Lysenko wore immaculate evening dress and carried an elaborate mask. The Russian glanced at Klaus Kappel, who was sitting in the corner looking at a laptop. 'Where are your masks?' he asked, as excited as a child at Halloween.

We'll wear them when the party starts,' Helmut said.

Lysenko wagged a finger. 'Is this a business meeting? Shame on you! It is the eve of your wedding. You should have fun.'

'Have a seat, Feliks. Have you been enjoying yourself?'

Lysenko sat and a broad grin creased his face. 'I have never had such fun. The company has been perfect.'

Helmut smiled. 'Kathryn Walker is indeed exquisite -- and to be in love with a beautiful young woman who reciprocates your passion! Believe me, I know how that feels.'

Lysenko grinned, and Helmut had to turn away to conceal his contempt. He marvelled at how quickly love's alchemy had turned the Russian into a foolish boy.

'But, Feliks, you of all people understand that everything has a price. Since I invited you to my wedding, you haven't been able to stop thinking about Kathryn. Don't deny it, my friend - you've been in a kind of hell. Then you came here, met the object of your dreams and are now in heaven. Am I right?'

Lysenko said nothing.

'It would be unthinkable to return to hell now, Feliks, wouldn't it? I know I'd hate it if Phoebe no longer wanted me.'

Lysenko frowned.

'Let me be frank with you, Feliks. Although you're intending to move your accounts from Kappel Privatbank, we remain loyal to you. We still wish to serve you as our client. We want nothing more than to see you leave here with your new love, and live happily ever after.' He paused. 'But there's a problem.'

'What are you saying?'

'That Kathryn Walker's love for you will expire by the end of tomorrow. When you leave here, the two blissful days you spent with her will be only a memory that'll haunt you for the rest of your life. If you agree to certain conditions, however, we can guarantee that her love for you will last her lifetime.'

Lysenko's initial reaction was no different from that of the Frenchman and the Swiss. He was furious. 'Who the fuck do you think you are? You don't control my private life. How dare you? I will destroy you.' He strode to the door.

'Don't be foolish, Feliks. Look at the facts. Your passion for Kathryn began after we sent you an invitation to my wedding. When I introduced you to her, she immediately fell madly in love with you. Why? She doesn't need your money. You're her social inferior. And she certainly isn't after you for your youthful looks.'

Lysenko's head was a red beacon of rage. But he hovered by the door.

Helmut marvelled again at how love's power could turn even the most ruthless, hard-headed man into a malleable fool. 'Don't be offended, Feliks. Look at Phoebe and me. How do you think I snared her? I don't fool myself that she'd be marrying me without a little help. You must have known it was too good to be true. You went from desperation to having your dream come true. But dreams cost money. Fortunately you have plenty of that.'

Lysenko reached for the door handle. But his feet didn't move. 'How much?' he said eventually.

'Well, here is the problem. There are other interested parties. Kathryn Walker is a very desirable woman. But we want you to have her. You've been a client for a long time and I hope you'll stay one for even longer.'

'How much do you want?' Lysenko said.

'How much do you want her?'

'A million?'

Helmut laughed, and turned to Klaus. 'How much can our good friend afford?'

'At least a thousand times more than that.'

'This is the deal, Feliks. If you want us to guarantee you Kathryn Walker's love for the rest of her life, you'll transfer a billion euros into an escrow account. We'll ensure that the payments are staggered so they don't look too obvious.'

'A billion? That's ridiculous. It would virtually bankrupt me.'

'You have an hour to decide. After that the price increases by a hundred million euros an hour. Once you leave here tomorrow the deal is off. Of course, if you can live without her then what I'm suggesting is ludicrous. If, however, you truly love her, it's the bargain of a lifetime. Why search for true love when you can buy it? Happiness is the best investment you'll ever make.'

Helmut lit a cigarette and relished the hit. 'You have an hour,' he repeated. 'Once you decide what you want to do, contact Klaus and he'll arrange everything.' He stood up and extended his hand. 'Enjoy the party, Feliks, and cherish your time with Kathryn. Don't be angry with us. We're not forcing you to do anything. We're merely offering you the chance to secure true love, which until now your money has been unable to buy.'

After Lysenko had left, Joachim entered the room with a tray of four small shot glasses moulded in ice. Each bore embossed images of Helmut and Phoebe's faces.

'Ah, thank you, Joachim.'

T like the glasses.' Klaus took one.

Helmut smiled. 'They were designed for tonight's toast. I thought we'd sample them to celebrate the success of Project Ilium.'

'Where's Max?' Klaus asked.

Helmut smiled. 'I haven't seen him or Stein since Max reported back from his trip with Isabella Bacci. Let him be. I suspect he's resting after his exertions.'

'She's no longer an issue?' Klaus added.

Helmut turned to Joachim, who had paled. 'I think we can safely say she's out of the equation.' He raised his glass. 'To the power of love.'

'To love,' the other men echoed, and drank.

ISABELLA SIPPED HER SCOTCH AS SHE LOOKED AT THE COMPUTER screen and her scribbled notes. She had always hated whisky, but as she struggled to make sense of the madness of Venus, its fiery taste soothed her jangling nerves and calmed her. For the last two hours she and Max had sat at the laptop, translating Joachim's scientific notes. She tried to ignore the confused and intense emotions Max brought out in her. On the lake she had been convinced he was going to kill her. And the shock, when he had turned the gun on Stein and told her he loved her, had been almost too much to bear. She still couldn't decide whether he was her tormentor or saviour. She believed him when he said he had tried to save her father, but doubted she could ever forgive him for his part in deceiving her and her friends with Ilium -- regardless of what he might do now to put it right.

What added to her confusion was that this time the drug hadn't worked on her or Max. Assuming it had been administered correctly, there was only one reason for this: the Zero Substitution Effect she had read about in her father's notes. But she didn't want to think about that. Not yet anyway.

Instead she focused on what she had learned about Venus and what she could do to stop it.

'Tell me what we've got so far,' Max said. He looked as tired as she felt.

She glanced down at her notes. 'Venus is an earlier version of the NiL drug inserted into one of Comvec's smart vectors. Your half-brother selected one of my father's prototypes and combined it with his Tag Vector.'

'Joachim could never get the authorities to approve his Tag Vector.'

'Probably for the same reasons that your father wanted to use it. It's virtually impossible to contain.'

'But why use one of the earlier NiL prototypes?'

'Because NiL Forty-two has no gender boundaries.'

'What?'

'No sexual chemistry. Let's say I imprinted my facial genetic code on Venus and injected it into a heterosexual woman or a homosexual man. They wouldn't want to have to sex with me, but they'd still adore me. What's more, any love they felt for anyone else -children, friends, family - would be neutrali2ed by their passion for me. It's far stronger than NiL Sixty-nine or Seventy-two. This was the version that made my father almost scrap the project. In his notes he called it an anti-love drug.'

She remembered sitting in her father's attic, reading his letters to her dead mother. 'Anyone I injected with the drug would worship me. They'd be compelled to gaze at my face, or a likeness of it. If they couldn't get their fix, they'd be beset by an almost intolerable anxiety. I'd become the centre of their existence -- a kind of god.

'But that's not all. By using the Tag Vector Joachim has added a new dimension. Let's say the patient, the victim, is a woman. As with NiL Sixty-nine or Seventy-two, her brain is reprogrammed while she sleeps, and love is triggered when she next sees the genetic facial imprint encoded in the drug. But after that Venus is different from both NiL Sixty-nine and Seventy-two.

'How?'

'First, it works across genders, as I said, and it's a liquid that has to be drunk rather than the powder that's injected. Second, as soon as the subject's love is triggered the airborne influenza component of the Tag 'Vector kicks in and she becomes an unwitting, infectious carrier, who can spread her devotion with just a cough, perpetuating the cycle.'

MAX'S HEAD ACHED. 'AND IT'S MY FATHER'S FACIAL GENETIC imprint on the drug.' 'Of course.'

His father had always been obsessed with duty and destiny, Max knew, and this fulfilled his ultimate fantasy. Venus would cure the world of every conflicting, confusing, weak aspect of love, and in its place leave just one pure strain: single-minded devotion to him. Helmut had probably convinced himself that he was doing the world a great service in purging it of love. He was helping it find a new sense of direction, unity and duty. He would become the ultimate patriarch, and the entire human species would become his devoted and obedient family.

He got up and paced the room. 'And, of course, this explains why he wanted this circus of a wedding. It fits perfectly with his plans. While the guests are here in a controlled environment he can watch them and choose his moment. He must be loving this.'

'According to Joachim's files, they plan to administer the drug some time today or tonight so it becomes live tomorrow.'

'Perfect,' groaned Max. 'Tomorrow the guests will be primed and all eyes will be on the happy couple in the ice chapel. As soon as they see my father their devotion will be triggered. When they return home they'll infect everyone they come into contact with. And because of the global media feeding frenzy that's going to follow this wedding, his face will be everywhere.' Max could barely get his mind round the enormity of his father's mad ambition.

'He'll be bigger than Christ,' she said. "Within days, Joachim's Tag Vector will have spread the NiL Forty-two genes around the world. Studies have shown that, with modern air travel, a flu-like virus can travel the globe in less than a week. In a matter of days most of the world will be obsessed with your father and feel no love for anyone else.'

Project Ilium had been intended to protect the financial future of his father's bank and punish a few disloyal key clients -- but it was a sideshow, Max realized now, a distraction from the main event. 'Are Klaus and Joachim in on this too?' he asked aloud. 'Joachim must be.'

'After the wedding it won't matter who was in on it. Once you're infected, you'll worship him too. But why do you think your half-brother helped him?'

Max could guess what had happened. From the first meeting, when Bacci had told them about his disastrous NiL #042 experiment, the seed would have been planted in his father's mind. It wouldn't have taken him long to come up with the combination of Bacci's drug and Joachim's Tag Vector. He would have flattered Joachim by asking him to make up a permanent version of the NiL #042 drug, which contained his facial imprint. And delighted, Joachim would have obliged, having no idea that his father intended to use it on him. Once Joachim was in his father's thrall, Helmut would have told him to combine it with the Tag Vector. The irony was that Joachim had always worshipped their father and would probably have done whatever he wanted anyway. His younger brother hadn't stood a chance.