The Girlflesh Institute (Nexus) Read Free Page B

opposite the Tower and extended her watch late into the night and the early hours. She recorded the types of these anomalous vehicles, their usual routes and the times they came and went. It soon became evident that there was far too much traffic for a typical building of that size. Something strange was going on, but what?
    Then Shillers returned her CV with a polite letter saying they were not hiring staff at present. That left only one option. Somehow she would have to risk entering the building covertly. After careful thought and calling on some of the
Globe
’s more specialised contacts, Vanessa made her plans …
    Braydon Road was a narrow, featureless street formed by the backs of small industrial units and high service-yard walls, often used as a rat-run by goods vehicles. Before six in the morning, with the grey light of dawn flushing the sky, there was normally little private traffic. But as the box-sided lorry turned into the street, a car was revealed angled across the road with its bonnet raised. The driver, bent over the engine, signalled that he would only be a moment longer.
    The lorry pulled up while the motorist fiddled with the engine, got back into his car, started it successfully, jumped out again to close the bonnet, returned to his seat with a quick wave of thanks and drove off. The lorry continued on its way and turned towards Shiller Tower. In a couple of minutes it halted at the security gate guarding the entrance to the car park.
    Clinging on tightly to the lorry’s underframe, secured by snaplink cords attached to a climbing harness, Vanessa’s heart thudded. She heard a few casual words exchanged between the driver and the gate guard, then the barrier lifted and the lorry moved forwards into a world of echoing concrete and the harsh light of fluorescent tubes. The vehicle slowed again and there came the rattle of a mesh gate rolling aside to let it through. That was the inner gate dividing the car park. Her gamble had paid off. She was entering the Tower’s mysterious high-security zone. The lorry swung down a ramp to the lower level, came to a brief halt, backed a little way, then stopped.
    The engine cut and Vanessa heard the driver jump down from his cab. Footsteps sounded on the concrete, the rear doors of the lorry opened and a ramp was lowered.
    ‘All OK?’ the driver asked.
    ‘No problem,’ came a woman’s voice from within. ‘They slept most of the way.’
    ‘What was that hold-up about?’ a second male voice asked.
    Vanessa’s heart skipped a beat. Two people had been travelling in the back of the lorry.
    ‘Just a stalled car,’ the driver explained.
    Vanessa breathed again. It was sheer luck that they hadn’t heard her stowing away beneath them.
    ‘Right, let’s get them down below,’ the woman said.
    ‘Down below?’ Vanessa wondered. But they were already on the lowest level.
    ‘Want them to take the gear down with them?’ her companion asked.
    ‘No,’ the woman said. ‘Send up another chain for it later. This lot deserve a rest. They’ve had a busy night.’
    ‘Another chain?’ Again Vanessa wondered at the odd phrase.
    The other man chuckled. ‘Fair enough.’
    Vanessa heard a soft scuffing whisper of movement from within the lorry, accompanied by a metallic clinking. This odd procession of sound passed slowly down the ramp and off across the concrete floor. Then came the swish and whirr of lift doors opening.
    ‘I’ll go up and have a bite to eat,’ said the driver. ‘See you later …’
    As the echo of his footsteps receded, the shuffling and rattling sounds inside the lorry ceased. There was a soft clunk of closing doors, then the fading sound of the lift in motion.
    For the moment at least, Vanessa was alone.
    Taking a deep breath, she unclipped her securing lines and dropped into a crouch under the lorry. Still doubled over, she stripped off her harness and packed it away into the toolbox slung beside her, removing from it a blue peaked cap