The Time Bubble Box Set 2, стр. 39

She switched on the engine, knowing he would soon have tocross the wide expanse of St Giles’. She had already disabled all of theexisting safety modes in the car, enabling it to avoid all collision detectionand speed limiting.

She had also disengaged all location and tracking devices, effectivelyrendering the car off the grid. This was something the average person didn’thave any control over but for someone of Vanessa’s technical abilities it was amatter of relative simplicity.

She was parked about 200 yards behind Henry’s position, nicelypoised for when he began to cross the road. As soon as he did so, she began tomove forward slowly, waiting until he had reached the central reservation. Helooked across to see her car trundling along a good hundred yards or more away,and took the decision he had plenty of time to get across.

As soon as he was committed to crossing, she floored it. Theacceleration was phenomenal, far beyond anything she had experienced the lasttime she had driven a car. The real beauty of it was that, even though she wasusing a petrol engine, modern technology had rendered it virtually silent.There was no squealing from the highly sophisticated smart tyres either.

Quite simply, he never heard her coming. The slick, black,sporty car accelerated to nearly 70mph in less than three seconds and hit Henrycleanly, right in the centre of the bonnet, sending his body tumbling up andover the car, as Vanessa instinctively ducked, but she managed to maintaincontrol.

Looking up, she felt enormous satisfaction at seeing hisshattered body rolling over and over in her rear-view mirror, broken arms andlegs splayed out at impossible angles as the waitress serving drinks at thecafé on the corner let out a scream.

“Goodnight, sweetheart,” she murmured, relishing the kill.As his body came to rest, he disappeared from her mirror and her life, as shesped on up the Woodstock Road safely away from the scene of the crime.

She thought about torching the car which even with all thetracking devices disabled would still contain old-fashioned evidence likefingerprints and DNA, but then she thought, why bother? She could use thetachyometer to come back and clean up anytime. For now, the best place to gowas into the past where her crime had not yet been committed.

She drove west to the village of Eynsham, about five mileswest of Oxford, and parked it on an affluent-looking street where it wouldn’tlook out of place. Then she transported herself, both mind and body, back intime by a week, and went to find accommodation for the night.

She was quite happy with a basic B&B she found on theHigh Street. It would be a good place to bed down and figure out her next move.

There was a rumbling in her stomach which reminded her shehadn’t eaten for hours, so she decided to wander out and see what the villagehad to offer.

She wound up at a traditional pub with a restaurant in theold part of the village, where she enjoyed the most delicious home-cooked food,as well as a few drinks and a chat with the locals. It was all nicely low-keyand relaxing after what had been a rather dramatic day.

Her newfound friends she met in the pub found her delightfuland charming, having no inkling whatsoever of the sort of person they weredrinking with. This amused Vanessa no end. To think she could wipe out the livesof any one of these people anytime she wanted.

Right now, she had the power of life and death over everysingle person on the planet. Earth was her plaything and, in her eyes, that wasgood enough to make her a god.

After the pub closed for the night she made her way back toher accommodation, where she lay awake for an hour or two, dreaming up all thedelicious ways in which she could erase her enemies from history.

When she wasn’t thinking about that she was focused on Joshand how she could manipulate time to change the way he felt about her.Eventually she slept, fitfully, with dreams in which she was a princess andJosh was her prince, and the two of them ruled over a medieval kingdom whereanyone who stood in their way had their heads chopped off with a good,old-fashioned axe.

It was a most satisfying dream, but it ended indisappointment when she woke up. It had been interrupted just as she and Joshwere about to consummate their passion in a large, four-poster bed in front ofa roaring fire in the heart of the castle from which they ruled over thepeasants.

The cheap double bed in the small room with the plastic trayfull of sachets of cheap coffee and tea bags was a serious comedown, but nomatter.

Soon she would rule the world just like in her dream, andJosh would be her consort.