“I agree. We have to find a way to appeal to his sense of right and wrong.”
“He works in politics, Ludo.”
“Yes, but he’s not a bad person. Not deep inside.”
Sunny was bouncing on his feet. I grabbed his hand and held the tips of his fingers in mine, trying to calm him, trying to calm myself. I studied the pebble-dash of freckles that decorated the back of his hand and remembered that hand working its way around my body, how good it felt to have it on me, how much I wanted it on me now. All the excitement, the adrenaline, was making me feel reckless. I wanted to kiss him.
“You know him better than anyone,” Sunny said. “How do we seduce him to our side?”
“I don’t think either of us has the boobies required for that,” I said.
Sunny froze, his eyes wide.
“Ludo, you’re a genius!” I finally got my kiss. It was long, passionate, illicit, and probably being live-streamed to VladPop’s dirt file server.
* * *
Sunny’s plan was an old-fashioned tabloid honeytrap, and I wasn’t happy about it. However, I didn’t have any other ideas, so I went along with it on the condition that the person on whose boobies the plan depended did so with her eyes wide open and her consent freely given.
That evening, Sunny and I sat tucked up on the summer house bed, outlining the plan to Leaf, Karma, and their daughter, Summer. The plan was for Summer to get close to Torsten during his weekend’s retreat and get him to talk. The redoubtable duo had been jolly keen to do their bit, but what really mattered was what Summer had to say.
“I’m in,” she said without hesitation when Sunny finished explaining the plan. Was I suddenly out of touch with feminism? “Anything I can do to stop a nuclear power plant on our doorstep, I’ll do it. I have just one condition.”
“What is it?” Sunny asked.
“If the story of how you got this information ever comes out, I don’t want to be called a ‘Derbyshire honeytrap,’ or anything like that, on the front page of theBulletin.” The look on Summer’s face was intense. “Or I’ll hunt you down and seriously misalign your chakras, mate. You got that?”
“Loud and clear.”
“How would you like us to refer to you, if we ever need to refer to you at all?” I asked.
“How about… environmental justice warrior.”
“We have a deal,” Sunny said. It was the promise of a tabloid journalist. The kind that had earned reporters everywhere our reputation for being untrustworthy. Sunny had absolutely no power to make a promise like that. When our call ended, I took him to task over it.
“We’ll just have to make sure no one ever learns about Summer’s involvement,” he said.
Chapter50
Sunny
The weekend was tense while we waited for news from Summer, Leaf, and Karma. On Saturday afternoon, almost twenty-fours into Operation Atomic Kitten (a name Ludo point-blank refused to use but I thought was five-stars-very-clever), we finally got a text.
Karma:All mostly going to plan. Not really a hiccup, just a surprise. T & S seem to have a deep and genuine spiritual connection.
Well, yes, I thought. Put single naked He-Man and single vegan She-Ra in a confined space for a weekend and give them nothing but fluffy white towels and essential oils to play with, and some kind of deep connection does seem like the logical outcome.
Karma:S says T’s an old soul who feels things very deeply. He’s holding on to a lot of trauma from past lives. She’s determined to help him discover a new inner peace.
Imagine hanging on to trauma from past lives. It was bad enough dealing with the crap that happened to us in this one. Like dealing with a father who bought a one-way bus ticket to fuck-knows-wheresville before I was even born, or being the queer ginger smart-arse in a community where being just one of those things is enough to get you lamped on a daily basis.
Sunny:Any news on the Newton Bardon plant?
It was only a slightly impatient message.
Karma:Nothing specific. But T’s soul is clearly troubled about it.
Twenty-four hours later, Karma messaged again.
