Free Age of Heroes by James Lovegrove Page A

Ernesto M. Campos in Ushuaia was, so help me, a dead demigod.”

 

    SIX
     
     
    Airspace above the Coral Sea, South Pacific
     
    R OY Y OUNG WAS reading a Jake Killian novel on his Kindle Paperwhite as the Embraer Legacy 650 large-cabin jet banked on its ascent from Vanuatu’s Bauerfield International Airport, turning northward.
    It wasn’t a great book, in his opinion. Decent enough story, but the prose lacked finesse. Plenty of narrative oomph, but the author, Theo Stannard, could have crafted his sentences a little better. They were punchy, terse, too much in thrall to Chandler and Hammett, without their masterful, jazzy sense of rhythm. The style seemed intended to bludgeon readers into submission, rather than caress and cajole them along.
    The novel was absorbing, at least, and Killian was a compelling wish-fulfilment protagonist. A man with a dark past, trying to bring light. Roy needed distraction, and Killian’s Rage , the third in the series, was providing it.
    As the jet levelled out, Roy heard a seatbelt being unbuckled. From the front of the cabin, Holger Badenhorst headed aft to the toilet. “Got to drop the kids off at the pool,” he announced to everyone and no one. He emerged several minutes later, wafting a hand in front of his nose. “Phew! What a klankie ! I’d leave it a while if I were you. Damn islander food. Plays havoc with the guts.”
    Roy guessed, from the way he had said it, a momentary hesitation, that Badenhorst had substituted “islander” for a crude racial epithet. The Afrikaner was not what you would call politically correct, but he was making an effort to be, in deference to the sensibilities of the multicultural team he had assembled.
    As he made his way back up the aisle between the dual rows of plush seats, Badenhorst shared a word or two with his employees. “How’s it today? You okay? Travis, great work. Sean. We got him, nè ? Pulled it off nice and smooth. Hey, Serge. You’ll get a go soon enough, don’t worry. Onward and upward, eh?”
    Finally he came to Roy. He laid an arm on Roy’s headrest and leaned in.
    “What you doing there? Reading, huh?”
    “Yeah.”
    A fellow Englander might have picked up on Roy’s tone, and left him alone. Badenhorst was not English, and something of a stranger to subtlety.
    “What is it? Novel?”
    “Yeah. Sort of a crime story. Action-adventure.”
    “Who by?”
    “Bloke called Theo Stannard. Heard of him?”
    Badenhorst gave him a complicated look he couldn’t quite fathom. “Ha! Interesting. Why’d you choose that one?”
    “I like thrillers, and his stuff kept coming up on my Amazon recommendations. Some algorithm obviously decided he was my thing, so I thought I’d give him a shot.”
    “And...?”
    “I don’t feel qualified to comment yet. I haven’t got very far in, you see.”
    Again, the brisk summation carried a subtext: I’m really not interested in talking to you .
    “Well now,” said Badenhorst, oblivious. “Listen. I just wanted to say, you’ve been doing great so far.” The Afrikaner raised his voice so that everyone in the cabin, all fourteen of them, could hear. “You all have. You’re earning your paycheques, and no mistake. But you, Roy...” He dropped the volume back down to conversational level. “Hiding the axe in the reef beforehand – stroke of genius, my friend. I wish I’d thought of it myself. That stupid kont Merrison would never have seen it coming.”
    “Don’t call him a kont ,” said Roy. “If that means what I think it means.”
    “ Ach , why do you care what I call him? He wasn’t a person to you. Just a job.”
    “Still. Have some respect.”
    “Whatever.” Badenhorst flapped a hand. “I’m complimenting you. Take the praise. You played your socks off yesterday, just like you did in Argentina. Ja , Argentina. That was a hell of a thing, that was. Perfectly sprung trap. Target One thought you were his chommie . Trusted you. Went along all meek and mild. Lamb to