Embedded by Dan Abnett

Versailles is good," he admitted.
      "See? I'm not fucking about. Just a little careful groundwork. I didn't cross any line. I am trusting you."
      He nodded, but he could see it in her eyes. No matter how careful she'd been, how discreet, she'd got a whiff of the interest from Versailles, and from others, no doubt. A whiff of their hunger, a whiff of the money. She wanted that payday fast now it was in sight. A week was an eternity. She wanted the payday of the cash, the celebrity, the sudden ballistic ascent of her rep.
      A week was an eternity. She was going to get sloppy, cut corners to shorten that time. She was going to do anything necessary to punt the story into the back of the net. The thought, the very idea, that someone else might beat her to the punch, hurt like a physical injury. She could not allow it.
      "A week," he said quietly. "Just a week, and this will be better than you can possibly imagine."
      "Do you promise, Lex Falk?"
      His celf chimed. He turned away from the girl to take the call. It was Cleesh, blunt and unemotional, saying she might need to talk to him later. She cut off quickly. He looked around to see where Noma had gone.
      The problem with giving someone a nickname based on an item of clothing was that it became less and less appropriate the better you got to know them. Her name was already starting to eclipse his tag for her.
      He realised he could never really think of her as green hiker girl again now that he'd seen her naked.
     
    It was an inducement. It was her way of keeping him onside. He woke up in the middle of the night still riding the tail-end of the endorphin wave, but he was already getting head-spin sick from too much fizz and Scotcheffect. The buzz would soon wear off completely, and he'd be left more aware than ever before of his aches and deficiencies. What would abide would not be a memory of her pliant, stripped enthusiasm, but rather the look in her eyes. Pity, same as Underwood's. She'd been good at minimising it, but she hadn't been able to hide it altogether. He was a means to an end, just as others had been the means to his ends in the past. It probably wasn't for the first time, but it was the first time he'd known about it.
      She was asleep. Unsteady, he got up and caught his reflection in the window. A guy like the one standing in the city lights did not get a girl like the one lying on the bed without there being something in it for the girl.
      He found his glass and drank some Scotch-effect to try to restore his postcoital high, but it was far too late. This is a moment, he thought, this is one of those moments of self-realisation that you get four, maybe five times in a lifetime, that changes your world view, and shows you that you're not the person you used to be, and proves that you never can be again, and leaves you broken in a ditch beside the highway.
      He was washed-up and no kind of catch. He was a long way past being the good-looking guy who could charm the pants off anyone, and his way into any story. The idea that he was still using those moves, making himself look like a total asshole, made him feel nauseous.
      His celf rang.
      He realised it must have rung already. That was what had woken him. He went into the bathroom so he wouldn't disturb her. Some bleary-eyed, haggard old fucker looked back at him out of the bathroom mirror.
      "What?"
      "Lex, it's Cleesh."
      "What time is it?"
      "It doesn't matter."
      "What?"
      "It doesn't matter, Falk. It's got to be now. You've got to come now."
      "Fuck that," he replied. His hip throbbed. He was fairly sure he was going to hurl. "Call me in the morning. We'll set up a time to–"
      "It's got to be now, Falk. Things are moving too fast. If you want to be part of this, get here now."
     
 

TEN
     
 
    "Here" was a suite on the thirty-eighth floor of the Hyatt Shaverton.
      "Why not the GEO mast?" Falk asked Apfel when he came to meet him at the