Free A Rip in the Veil by Anna Belfrage Page A

could happen?”
    Hector levelled a dark look at him. “Diego didn’t fully believe me.” Hector sighed and turned away. “And now he’s fallen into somewhere else.”
    “And Alex?”
    Hector looked as if he couldn’t care less. “She’s obviously dropped through time as well.” He put a hand on John’s shoulder in a brief pat. “Don’t expect her to come back. They never do.”
    “Well,” Diane cut in, “first of all Mr Olivares, we don’t know what has happened to either Alex or Mr Sanderson, and secondly, I must say I find your theory entertaining but totally incredible. Time nodes – really!”
    Hector shifted his shoulders under his jumper; one moment he was a slight, somewhat effeminate man, the next he looked as dangerous as a starved tiger. Diane stood her ground.
    “And anyway, how on earth would you know one can fall through time? Unless you’ve done it yourself, of course.” She threw John a triumphant look, as if saying See? Got him .
    “Oh, I have,” Hector said. “Several times, as a matter of fact, flung from one time to the other.” Something dark settled over his face. “And all because of Mercedes Gutierrez Sanchez, time travelling witch that she is.”
    “Mercedes?” John took Diane’s hand in his; he didn’t like this, not at all. He tried to laugh, but somehow it got stuck halfway up. “That’s ridiculous!”
    “Is it? Is it really?” Hector shook his head. “What would you know?”
    Hector left shortly after, having wheedled a promise out of them to drive him out to the crossroads the day after, insisting he had to see the place where Diego had disappeared.
    “I’ll pay you of course,” he’d said, bowing with certain irony in Diane’s direction. “Just as we’ll pay for the work you did for Diego – assuming you’ve got something to deliver.”
    John sank down onto the sofa and stared at Diane. “Please tell me you still believe there’s a perfectly rational explanation to all this, please, please, tell me you’re laughing your head off at what that rather sinister man just told us.”
    “Of course I am,” she said, “but he was very matter-of-fact, wasn’t he?”
    “Yeah, he was. And what was all that crap about Mercedes flying through time?”
    “I wouldn’t put it past her,” she said with a teasing grin. “I’ve thought for years that there was something very strange about her. I suppose dropping through time nodes would have a disruptive impact on your sanity,” she said sarcastically.
    John gnawed at his lip. “She was pretty ageless, wasn’t she?”
    Diane shrugged. Good genes, she told John – and a skilled hairdresser.
    *
    The silence lay like a smothering blanket in the car as John drove it back towards the crossroads the next day. Hector sat in absolute stillness, hands folded over crossed legs, and studied them from his position in the backseat. Diane was keeping up a constant conversation with John, no doubt in an attempt to distract him, but as far as Hector could see it wasn’t working very well, John’s shoulders tense under the red wool of his sweater.
    He wondered how much of the previous night Diane had spent verifying his identity, and mentally he tipped his hat at her; Diane Wilson was thorough and not easily intimidated, and those were qualities he appreciated – particularly in people working for him. He met her eyes in the rear view mirror, sharpened his gaze until she looked away. Hector went back to regarding the speeding landscape. In the front seat Diane was saying something in a low, intense tone, and without turning his head he tuned in.
    “…so of course there must be some sort of explanation,” she said to John. “It’s just that we haven’t found one yet.”
    Good luck to them. He’d spent most of his extended life attempting to unravel the logic behind his own fate. He’d thought he’d found it when he met Diego, a divine compensation of sorts for all the previous fruitless years. He gnawed his lip.