Ken Follett - Code to Zero (2000)

'A rug,' Anthony said, breathing hard.

The man looked at him with the candid curiosity of small-town people. 'Someone give you a black eye? Or 'A little accident'

'Come inside, get a cup of coffee or something.' 'No, thanks. I'm okay.'

'Please yourself.' The driver ambled slowly into the terminal. :

Anthony got into his car and drove away.

.

1.30 A. M.

The first task of the radio transmitters is to provide signals enabling the satellite to be followed by tracking stations on Earth - to prove that it is in orbit.

The train pulled slowly out of Chattanooga. In the cramped roomette, Luke took off his jacket and hung it up, then perched on the edge of the lower bunk and unlaced his shoes. Billie sat cross-legged on the bunk, watching him. The lights of the station flickered then faded as the locomotive gathered speed, heading into the Southern night, bound for Jacksonville, Florida.

Luke undid his tie. Billie said: 'If this is a striptease, it doesn't have much oomph.'

Luke grinned ruefully. He was going slowly because he was undecided. They had been forced to share the roomette: only one was available. He was longing to take Billie in his arms. Everything he had learned about himself and his life told him that Billie was the woman he should be with. Yet, all the same, he hesitated. -

'What?' she said. 'What are you thinking?'

'That this is too quick,'

'Seventeen years is nothing?'

'To me it's been a couple of days, that's all I can remember.'

'It feels like forever.'

'I'm still married to Elspeth.'

Billie nodded solemnly. 'But she's been lying to you for years.'

'So I should jump out of her bed into yours?'

She looked offended. 'You should do what you want'

He tried to explain. 'I don't like the feeling that I'm seizing an excuse.' She said nothing in reply, so he added: 'You don't agree, do you?'

'Hell, no,' she said. 'I want to make love to you tonight -I remember what it was like, and I want k again, right now.' She glanced out of the window as the train flew-through a small town: ten seconds of streaking lights and they were in darkness again. 'But I know you' she went on. 'You've sever been on to five for the moment, even when we were kids. You need tune to think things through and convince yourself that you're doing the right thing,''

'Is that so bad?'

She smiled. 'No. I'm glad you're like that It makes you rock-solid reliable. If you weren't this way, I guess I wouldn't have ...' Her voice tailed off.

'What were you going to say?'

She looked him in the eye. 'I wouldn't have loved you this much, this long.' She was embarrassed, and covered up by saying something flip. 'Anyway, you need a shower.-

It was true. He had been wearing the same clothes since he had stolen them thirty-six hours ago. 'Every time I thought about changing, there was something more urgent to do,' he said. 'I have fresh clothes in my bag.'

'No matter. Why don't you climb up on top, and give me room to take off my shoes.'

Obediently, he climbed the little ladder and lay down on the top bunk. He turned on his side, elbow on the pillow, head resting on his hand. 'Losing your memory is like a new start in life,' he said. 'Like being born again. Every decision you ever made can be revisited.'

She kicked off her shoes and stood up. I'd hate that,' she said. With a swift movement she slipped off her black ski pants and stood there in her sweater and brief white panties. Catching his eye, she grinned and said: 'It's okay, you can watch.' She reached under her sweater at the back and unfastened her brassiere. Then she drew her left arm out of her sleeve, reached inside with her right hand to pull the strap off her shoulder, thrust her left arm back into the sleeve, and drew her bra out of her right sleeve with a conjurer's flourish.

'Bravo,' he said.

She gave him a thoughtful look. 'So, we're going to sleep now?'

'I guess.'

'Okay.' She stood on the edge of the lower bunk and raised herself to his level, tilting her face to be kissed. He leaned forward and touched her lips with his own. She closed her eyes. He felt the tip of her tongue flick over his lips, then she pulled away and her face disappeared.

He lay on his back, thinking about her lying a few inches below, with her round breasts inside the soft angora sweater her neat bare legs. In a few moments he was asleep.

He had an intensely erotic dream. He was Bottom in A Midsummer Night's Dream, with donkey's ears, and he was being kissed all over his hairy face by Titania's fairies, who were naked girls with slim legs and round breasts. Titania herself, the queen of the fairies, was unbuttoning his pants, while the wheels of the train drummed an insistent beat...

He woke up slowly, reluctant to leave fairyland and return to the world of railroads and rockets. His shirt was open and his pants were undone. Billie lay beside him, kissing him. 'Are you awake?' she murmured in his ear - a normal ear, not a donkey's. She giggled. 'I don't want to waste this on a guy who's asleep.'

He touched her, running his hand along her side. She still had on the sweater, but her panties had gone. 'I'm awake,' he said thickly.

She lifted herself on hands and knees so that she was over him, poised in the narrow space below the ceiling of the roomette. Looking into his eyes, she lowered her body onto his. He sighed with intense pleasure as he slid inside her. The train rocked from side to side, and the tracks sang to an erotic rhythm.

He reached inside her sweater to touch her breasts. Her skin was soft and warm. She whispered in his ear 'They missed you.'

He felt as if he were still half in the dream, as the train rocked and Billie kissed his face and America flew by the window, mile after mile. He wound his arms around her back and held her tightly, to convince himself that she was made of flesh and blood, not fairy gossamer. Just as he was thinking that he wanted this to go on forever, his body took control, and he clung to her as waves of pleasure broke over him.

As soon as it was over she said: 'Keep still. Hold me tight' He did not move. She buried her face in his neck, her breath hot on his skin. As he lay prone, still inside her, she seemed to twitch with an internal spasm, time and time again, until at last she sighed deeply and relaxed.

They lay still a few minutes longer, but Luke was not sleepy. Billie evidently felt the same, for she said: 'I have an idea. Let's wash.'

He laughed. 'Well, I sure need it.'

She rolled off him and climbed down, and he followed. In the corner of the roomette was a tiny washbasin with a cupboard over it. Billie found a hand towel and a little cake of soap in the cupboard. She filled the basin with hot water. I'll wash you, then you can wash me,' she said. She soaked the towel, rubbed soap on it, and began.

It was delightfully intimate and sexy. He closed his eyes. She soaped his belly, then kneeled to wash his legs. 'You missed a bit,' he said.

'Don't worry, I'm leaving the best part till last.' When she had finished, he did the same for her, which was even more arousing. Then they lay down again, this time on the lower bunk.

'Now,' she said, 'do you remember oral sex?' 'No,' he said. 'But I think I can figure it out'

*

PART 6

8.30 A. M.

To help track the satellite accurately, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory has developed a new radio technique called Microlock. The Microlock stations use a phased-lock loop tracking system which is able to lock on to a signal of only one-thousandth of a watt from as far as 20,000 miles away.

Anthony flew to Florida in a small plane that bumped and bucked with every gust of wind all the way across Alabama and Georgia. He was accompanied by a general and two colonels who would have shot him on sight if they had known the purpose of his trip.