Falling Glass (3 page)

“Get dressed, do it now! Tell your sister.”

“What is it?”

“Don’t argue with me. Go!”

Rachel went to the freezer, took out the Heckler and Koch P30, flipped off the safeties. “Mum, Claire says I have to get dressed,” Sue whined.

“Do as your sister says! Do it! Get dressed and pack a bag,” Rachel ordered with cold authority. She took a deep breath and exited the trailer. She held the P30 two-handed in front of her, finger next to but not on the trigger. She couldn’t shoot a cop. It was twenty-five years minimum if you killed a peeler.

Her flip-flops were onomatopoeing so she kicked them off. She walked barefoot to Dave’s, looked in. Blinds down. TV dead. She tried the door. Locked. She crouched down and pushed open the dog flap. She peered inside but she couldn’t see anything.

“Dave?”

No answer, but most nights he slept with earplugs.

She walked round the back of the caravan. Here the clayey dirt became sand and the sand showed a russet-coloured blood trail that went off into the woods.

“Jesus,” she whispered.

She knelt down and touched it. Dry but not caked.

Swallowing hard she followed it into the trees.

“Thresher?” she tried quietly.

And then she thought of a worse scenario: “Dave?”

She looked back at her caravan. Everything
seemed
okay.

She stepped over a fallen tree and there, about fifteen yards into the big firs, was Thresher covered in ants with a puncture wound in his head.

She bent down. Cold to the touch. Died a few hours ago. He’d gone after whoever had come and they’d killed him.

“Good boy,” she whispered. “You did well. Good boy.”

She was surprised to see that the blood trail did not abruptly end at Thresher’s body but instead went deeper into the wood.

She followed it easily over the dense layer of pine needles on the forest floor. Even if she hadn’t been schooled by her scoutmaster da she still could have tracked this guy.

Heavy footprints, a couple of coins, blood, one leg dragging behind the other.

At one point he’d fallen and it had taken him a while to get back up again.

He was crawling now, not walking.

She found him barely a hundred yards from the caravan park.

Thresher had torn him up pretty well. He was about thirty-five, wearing a leather jacket, black jeans, white sneakers. He had two gold earrings, a pale pock-marked face, a thin moustache and a
Mafiya
teardrop under his left eye. Lovely.

He was covered in sweat and he’d contrived to break his leg.

In his left hand was a mobile phone, in the right a handgun.

He was definitely not an Irish cop nor Interpol nor Special Branch.

His eyes were closed but he looked up when she approached.

“
Spacaba
,” he said.

Rachel approached carefully. She stepped on his wrist, leaned down and took the gun out of his hand. She threw it into the forest.

“
Spacaba
,” the man repeated.

She stepped on his other wrist and picked up the mobile.

“Cigarette,” he said.

She scanned the recent calls. Four of them to London.

“Cigarette.”

“When are the others coming?” she asked.

“Cigarette, please.”

“Are they coming from London?”

“I don’t know.”

She pointed the P30 at his face. “London or Dublin or Belfast? Tell me!”

“London,” he said.

Keeping the gun on him she searched him and found car keys and a wallet. She took a step back.

“You tell your boss…You tell your boss…” she began. She didn’t want him to tell Richard anything. She threw away the keys and kept the wallet. She ran back to the caravan park and banged on Big Dave’s door until he appeared bleary eyed, confused.

“Rachel, what…what time is it? Jesus, what time is it? Thresher gets me at six, it must be nearly—”

“Dave, I need the Subaru, Richard’s found me. His goons are flying in from over the water.”

Dave was pushing sixty five and first thing in the morning he looked a lot older than that. His face was greyer than his hair and his eyes seemed far away.

“Dave,” she said, looking at him, squeezing his shoulder through his denim shirt.

“What? Oh. The Subaru?”

“Yeah.”

He nodded, went inside the caravan, brought the car keys and a roll of money.

“I don’t need it,” she said.

“Take it.”

“No.”

“For god’s sake, take it, get the girls something.”

She put the roll in her pocket. She kissed him on the cheek. “It wasn’t peelers, Dave, he sent muscle, bloody Russians or something, they killed Thresher,” she said.

Dave staggered a little, recovered, shook his head.

“Guy’s a nutcase.”

“I know. I better go. I’m sorry about Thresh. He was a good dog.”

She kissed him again and ran back to her caravan.

“Girls, are you ready?” Rachel called as she vaulted the cinder block steps.

“Sue won’t get dressed,” Claire said.

Rachel looked in.

Claire was ready. Standing there with a stuffed suitcase, wearing three shirts and two jackets. Sue was naked.

“Jesus Christ, Sue, you’re not even dressed!” Rachel said..

The goon’s mobile rang in her hand. She pressed the green button.

“Misha, we’re here, where are you?” a voice said in a cockney accent.

She put her finger to her lips so the girls wouldn’t speak.

“Misha, where are you? We made it, we’re here.”

She hung up and looked outside. At the bottom of the dirt road behind the Toyota there was now a black Range Rover. Two men inside, maybe more in the rear.

“Claire, go to Dave’s car, get in the back, put your seatbelt on,” Rachel said, fighting the panic.

“What’s wrong with our car?”

“They might know our car. We’re just going to try and drive past them.”

“Mum they’ll see us.”

“Do as I say, Claire, get in Dave’s car and put your seatbelt on,” Rachel said calmly. It wasn’t hard for Claire to see the fear in her mother’s eyes. There was only one way in and out of the caravan park and unless they made a desperate run through the woods they were going to have to risk it. Rachel gave her the emergency bag which was always packed with underwear, money, Snickers bars and the laptop, Richard’s laptop – the only insurance they had.

“Go!” Rachel said.

Claire ran out and Rachel wiped the tears so Sue wouldn’t freak out.

Sue wasn’t paying attention anyway, standing there sucking her thumb looking at
Dora the Explorer
on the TV set.

Rachel knew there was no time to do the usual minefield walk with her. She went to the bathroom, grabbed a beach towel and wrapped Sue
in it. “Come on, honey,” she said. “You can get changed into some of your sister’s clothes.”

“Wait a minute, where are we going?” Sue asked.

“Don’t worry about it.”

“I don’t want to go!” Sue insisted.

“Honey, it’ll be fun, now come on,” Rachel said.

“I’ve got no clothes on!”

“You can wear your sister’s.”

“I don’t want to wear
her
clothes, they won’t fit me!” Sue said, wriggling from her mother’s grip and falling to the floor.

Rachel could feel a scream welling up inside her. She ran to the door jam. The men had parked and were coming up the dirt path on foot. Two of them, both in T-shirts and aviator sunglasses which definitely meant private muscle not coppers.

Sue had picked up the TV flipper and put on
SpongeBob
.

Rachel grabbed the beach towel from the floor and wrapped it tight around her.

“No!” Sue yelled.

Rachel picked her up and ran outside.

“Mum! Stop it! This is a good one!”

Sue didn’t weigh much but she fought all the way, wriggling, scratching, biting.

Rachel opened the rear door of Dave’s Subaru Outback and threw her inside.

“Get Sue’s seat belt on,” she ordered Claire.

Sue was screaming “Noooo!” at the top of her voice.

“Would you just shut up!” Rachel said.

“You better get moving,” Dave said. He had pulled on a dressing gown and he was carrying a long-barrelled shotgun.

She nodded, got in the car, put the key in the ignition.

Stick shift, Jesus, Richard had always bought automatics, how did these things work again? Clutch and brake. She turned the key, stalled the car.

Ahead the men coming up the path identified her.

They pulled something out of their pockets and began running.

“I see them,” Dave said.

She turned the key, let the clutch out
easy
. Sue leaned over, grabbed a chunk of her hair and tugged hard. Rachel screamed and the car stalled again.

“Stop it!” Rachel shouted. “Claire, hold her down!”

The two men were close, twenty yards, less. They were wearing medallions round their necks and the black T-shirts said “Licenced Bounty Hunter” in yellow letters across their chests – which of course counted for absolutely nothing in Northern Ireland.

“I don’t want to go!” Sue yelled.

“Mum, I’m scared,” Claire said.

“Come on girl,” Rachel told herself. She turned the key. “Clutch out slow, petrol in slow,” she muttered. The engine caught. She drove forward. The men were here. Big white guys, moustaches, salt and pepper hair on the first, the second younger, meaner.

The younger one jumped on the bonnet, smashed the driver’s side window, leaned in through the broken glass and sprayed her with Mace.

Her retinas burned.

“Aaaahhh!” she yelled.

She slammed down hard on the accelerator. The Subaru leapt forward.

She heard the shotgun tear the air.

She couldn’t see.

Thumping on the windscreen.

The kids yelling.

She tried to open her eyes but they were flooded with tears.

She heard Dave shouting.

She grabbed the steering wheel.

It was a straight drive, except, she remembered, for the big Toyota.

“Claire, tell me when to turn so I don’t hit the truck!” Rachel yelled.

“Mum there’s a man on the windscreen!”

“Tell me when to turn!”

“Now! Now!”

The car went into a pothole, shuddered. She felt Claire’s hand on her neck.

“I think he’s got a gun!” Claire cried.

Pain from her burnt pupils. She blinked open her eyes, swerved to avoid a caravan, closed her eyes again, grabbed the bottle of water in the cup holder, opened the bottle with one hand and threw it in her face.

Rachel let go of the wheel for a second and rubbed the Mace out of her eyes as best she could. If she squinted she could see a little but what she saw wasn’t good. The bounty hunter/private detective was desperately holding onto the windscreen wiper with his right hand and trying to point a Taser at her with his left.

They were at the entrance to the caravan park now near Stu’s cabin.

“Give it up bitch!” the man yelled, finally getting a good grip on his Tazer and pointing it through the broken window.

The shotgun blast had brought Stu and Stacey out. Stu was standing there naked, covered in tattoos, holding a hurley stick. She’d never been fond of Stu but when he took a side he took a side and he went all in – especially for his customers.

“Pull over!” the bounty hunter yelled again.

She shook her head.

“I’m authorised to use—” he began before Stu clubbed him in the back.

He bumped off the car and Stu kept hitting him in the rearview.

“Thank you, Stuart,” she said and headed east for the crossroads.

They drove to Coleraine, stopped at a petrol station and filled the tank.

A little further along they found a McDonald’s.

She wondered how long Big Dave would hold the men before having to let them go. How many hours did she have? It couldn’t be too long or he’d be looking at a kidnapping charge.

The girls ate their food. She couldn’t touch hers.

It grew cold in the booth by the window. Heavy rain clouds had rolled
in from Donegal and lightning was stabbing at ships lost in the immensity of the Atlantic.

The rain turned to hail.

Sue played with the Powerpuff toy from her Happy Meal while Claire, concealing her worry, affected sang-froid and asked: “Mummy, where exactly are we going?”

Not too far with a broken driver’s side window.

Rachel stared at the grey water and black clouds and shook her head.

“I really don’t know,” she said.

chapter 2
back in the life

S
OMEONE MUST HAVE BEEN TELLING LIES ABOUT THE
S
PECIAL
K. H
E
wasn’t an expert on breakfast cereals, but this stuff, advertised as Kellogg’s, was an ersatz concoction of toasted corn shavings injected with flavourings and high fructose corn syrup, and moulded into quarter-sized wedges. He poured half and half into the plastic room-service bowl and ate. A chemical buzz on the roof of his mouth. Shooting pains near his heart.

It actually tasted rather good. He sipped the thin coffee. That didn’t.

Killian picked up his luggage, had a final look in the mirror and left a twenty-dollar bill on the dresser. He’d wanted to leave a five but after shepherding it all day he’d foolishly put it into the vending machine last night to get a Kit Kat; now it was either twenty or change.

He walked across the quad of the Union Theological Seminary and skidded to a halt in front of the chapel. A friendly sign said “All Faiths Welcome”. The wooden door was locked. The keyhole was iron. He had it open in forty seconds. He took a pew at the back and sat and tried to feel something. This went on for a dispiriting couple of minutes before he finally slipped away.

He left his guest room key with a dozing security guard and stepped out onto Broadway. A shiv attack wind from the Hudson. An empty
drinks can blowing along the pavement like a demented xylophone. The sky had a jet-lagged, early-morning-ferry-terminal aspect to it that he didn’t like at all. He saw a taxi and hailed it with a fading “Taaaa…” but it cruised on by. Two more did the same and finally a gypsy cab stopped. He got in, heaving his bag into the back seat next to him.