Holy Island Trilogy 03 - The Final Countdown

THE FINAL COUNTDOWN

Sheila Quigley

eBook published in 2013 by Burgess Books

Copyright © Sheila Quigley 2013

All rights reserved

The moral rights of the author have been asserted

ISBN-13:
9780956654687

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or any means without written permission from the copyright holder, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in connection with a review for insertion in a newspaper, magazine, website, or broadcast

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data:
A catalogue record for this book is available from
the British Library

Print book printed & bound in Great Britain
by MacKay’s of Chatham

Burgess Books

1 Cellar Hill Terrace

Houghton le Spring

Tyne and Wear

DH4 4EB

PROLOGUE

NORFOLK

60 AD

Fresh from the battle of Camulodunum, a woman strode into the crowd at dusk. She paused for a moment and looked around, before mounting the small hill so that she could be seen by all. The setting sun picked out the red strands in her waist-length brown hair as the wind whipped it around her face. She was a tall woman and wore a many coloured shawl around her shoulders, held together at the front with a large brooch. Around her neck there was a golden torc. Her bearing was regal, as suited a queen. Her name was Boudicca.

The Iceni tribe belonged in what is now Norfolk. They had just lost their king, Boudicca’s husband. Her daughters had been raped, and Boudicca’s body held the marks of the beatings she had endured. The land had reverted to the Romans on the death of the king. And the Iceni were in revolt.

They were now on their way to Londinium, but as she urged her countrymen on, Boudicca had a hidden agenda. She held a secret title, that of Keeper of the Book. A book that had been stolen from her, a book that held the names of an elite set of families. A book that she must take possession of at all costs.

A few hours later Boudicca lay down her sword. From her chariot she looked around. Four men had been sent out to search the four corners of Londinium. The dust of battle was settling but of the men there was no sign.

Anxiously she spun round full circle, then out of the dust they came. One of the men, the third that she checked out, was carrying something. The others were empty handed.

‘Could it be?’ she muttered, hope rising in her heart as she jumped down from her chariot.

The soldier reached her and handed over the parcel. It was wrapped and bound tightly in a blanket of woven horsehair. Slowly, with trembling hands, Boudicca unwrapped it.

A moment later she held it against her chest, and smiled as she said, ‘ Thank God… It is the book.’

The soldiers bowed their heads

‘One day, a man born here and yet to be a saint will come home from his journeys. Then he will set off once more and take the book to an Island in the North East of this land, where it will be safe, until it is needed. We are charged with the safe keeping of the book, but,’ she looked up from the book, ‘first give the order that Londinium is to be razed to the ground.’

Boudicca and her army went on to sack Verulamium. However, the Iceni were to be defeated by Suetonius in the battle of Watling Street. After fighting bravely for hours, and seeing what was about to happen, Boudicca called her four trusted guards.

‘We must go now, the book is too precious to be taken from us again. It must be saved so that our future generations do not live by the yoke.’

Together they left the battlefield.

Boudicca was never seen again.

PART ONE

NORTHUMBERLAND

Present Day

CHAPTER ONE

 ‘OK... That’s it, enough. I need rest, the whole world's gone fucking crazy today,’ Detective Kristina Clancy said to the blonde police driver, Susan Cleverly. Her own car was in the garage again, and she had to use Susan, whom she had come to like. She found the woman quite friendly, if a trifle nosy at times, but she put it down to wanting to know more about how detecting really worked.

‘You can say that again.’ Cleverly took her keys out of her pocket and jingled them, hoping that Kristina would get the hint.

‘You’ll be worn out as well.’

Cleverly nodded, and stifled a yawn.

‘Right. Seeing as there’s nothing more we can do here, time for home.’ Together they turned and headed for the police car.

And it had been a long day for them all, a day in which they had dealt with a gruesome double murder, where the victims, two young men, had been found near the river Tweed in the early hours by a couple on their way home from the local night club.

Kristina suspected that they weren’t really a couple as such, seeing as they hardly seemed to even know each other’s names, but were wondering down by the river for something much more than an early morning stroll.

They had both been let go after a few hours. Kristina was convinced they had nothing to do with the murders, they had just been the unlucky ones to find them. Basically they had been in the wrong place at the wrong time, and they had both been seriously traumatised by the state of the bodies. She’d also rejected the thought that the murders could have something to do with the Families, a group of people that Mike Yorke was out to prove ruled the world and had done for centuries, keeping the world and its people under a ruling class they did not even know existed.

 Kristina pictured the bodies and shuddered. Both of them had been horrifically tortured to death, their faces unrecognisable, and then their tongues had been cut out and placed on their chests -  probably while they were still alive, the pathologist had informed her. There was no apparent motive as yet, though Kristina had mulled over the thought that it seemed to be a warning of sorts, and one which the news sources would have a field day with, when-if- they found out.

But Kristina was trying her best to keep a tight lid on everything, telling her superiors that this was exactly what the murderer wanted, the warning out there.

But who he was warning was up for grabs.

She guessed that whoever the murderer was would be chafing at the bit wondering when it was going to be made public, and the longer they kept it quiet, the more chance there would be of the murderer going back to the spot to see if the bodies were still there.

 Then, if that hadn’t been enough, some utterly stupid boy racer, hyped up on drugs, had decided that speed - in more ways than one - was a great thing, even though the heavens had opened for hours at a time, causing flash flooding on most of the motorways in the north of England.

The idiot had thought that doing way over a hundred on the flooded A1 was the way to get his kicks, sending walls of spray up and over the roof of his car and many others. That was, until he crashed head on into a bus full of very unlucky old people, who had been out for a fateful day trip to the Northumberland coast.

Unable to control the car, he’d crossed the road and hit the bus full on, killing the bus driver and five passengers and injuring most of the others. The catalogue of broken bones was immense. It had taken hours to sort out, and because of staff shortages due to government cuts, Kristina had personally visited all the families of the dead. The colossal fool of a car driver had got off with a few cuts and bruises, and was now cooling his heels in one of the cells. If Kristina had her way, the prick would never get out. Remorse was something the dickhead had never heard of, Kristina had thought, as she’d slammed the cell door behind him.

To finish the day nicely, a domestic in Berwick had threatened to get out of hand, with the woman swearing she would throw herself out of the bedroom window of a fourth-floor flat. Thankfully, after an hour or so, she’d been talked down by the negotiator, a middle aged man by the name of Melvin Kingstone, who Kristina had never met before. Annoyingly, he kept asking her where the hell Mike Yorke was, frustrating Kristina even more.

 In the end, things ended amicably enough. Until the next time, Kristina thought, looking at the highly-strung young woman as she got into the car and told Cleverly to head for home.

Most never jump. It's attention that they want, and now that she’s had it once, I can guarantee it’ll happen again. Shaking her head as they drove past the unneeded ambulance, she gave Stan, one of the drivers, a wave. Smiling at her, he blew her a kiss.

Now, finally arriving home, and just as she was about to put her feet up and watch a bit of telly to take her mind off the missing Mike Yorke, there was a sudden loud knocking on the door.

‘Shit,’ Kristina moaned, as she used the TV remote to shut Keith Lemon up. ‘What the hell now?’

She opened the door to find Mr Brodzinski standing there. Oh no, Kristina thought. I can’t be dealing with this now.

Mr Brodzinski, a chess-playing friend of Detective Jason Cox, had a missing grand-daughter who had been held in the monastery near Holy Island with many others, against their will. The teenagers had been plied with drugs to keep them compliant, as well as working them to death in the drug sheds. They had been treated as slaves and used any way he wanted. The culprit, who was now on the run, was known simply as The Leader. Mr Brodzinski’s grand-daughter Annya was now presumed dead.

‘How did you…?’

‘I followed you home.’

Inwardly Kristina sighed as she said, ‘Mr Brodzinski, I’m sorry for your loss, but it’s against the law to follow a police officer home. And Sergeant Rafferty is actually in charge of your case.’

She felt lousy being so short with the old man, but there were lines that shouldn’t be crossed, and following and visiting a detective at home was definitely one of them. Especially after the fucking day she’d just had!

‘Don’t like her.’ He shuffled his feet for a moment. ‘And really, dear, frankly I do not trust the woman. There is something that is not quite right about her.’

Hmm, not keen on her myself, Kristina was thinking. Never liked her from day one. Arrogant isn’t the word for her. But she said, ‘There really isn’t a lot I can do, Mr Brodzinski, as I said befor…’

‘My grand-daughter is most definitely not dead, Detective,’ Mr Brodzinski interrupted her. ‘I feel her.’ He patted his chest. ‘In here… She is not dead. I know.’

‘But--’

He shook his head, as he went on insistently. ’There are no buts, Detective, no buts at all. My Annya is not dead.’

Kristina sighed. ‘You have spoken with Detective Cox, haven’t you, Mr Brodzinski? I thought you and he were friends.’

‘We have spoken, yes, but he is of the same mind as you and says it is up to the other one if the case remains open. Though he did say he would try and talk to her about it, and he has.’

‘And what did Sergeant Rafferty say to him?’

‘She has closed the case. So now I have come to you.’

‘Oh. Well.’ Kristina did feel sorry for him, but with resources stretched as tight as they were, and with government cuts starting to bite deep, and Mike Yorke missing, she needed Rafferty on the double murder case.

She hesitated for a moment, trying to think of a way to let him down gently. Unable to come up with anything as the old man was staring intently at her, she said, ‘Tell you what, Mr Brodzinski. I’ll have a word with Sergeant Rafferty myself, and see if I can get her to take another look at things, perhaps question some of the other kids who were in the monastery at the same time as your grand-daughter. You never know, one of them might come up with something… Perhaps.’

Rafferty can spare an hour or two, surely, Kristina thought, as she smiled at Mr Brodzinski.

‘Thank you.’ He bowed his head. ‘That is all that I ask, that my Annya is not forgotten.’ He went to turn away, then, looking back at Kristina, he again touched his chest. ‘She is in here. Alive. I know.’

Kristina nodded and watched silently as he walked away, head down and shoulders hunched. She’d seen parents, grandparents and other family members in denial before, but something about this man touched her. Thoughtfully she closed the door and went into the kitchen. A cup of tea, then she would give Rafferty a ring. It wouldn’t hurt her to give the case another look over, for God’s sake. She glanced at her watch. Would she be home now?

She had no idea if the other woman had any social life at all, or even if she had any hobbies. In fact, she suddenly realised just how little she did know about Sergeant Rafferty. The woman had simply appeared in the office one morning, supposedly on exchange from the Dublin Garda, her superior assuring her that she had been informed of Rafferty’s coming over a week beforehand, and that the email must have been lost.

 ‘Hmm,’ she muttered, thinking of ways to put that right. First thing in the morning, she would get Cox onto it. Any missing emails, she was sure he’d be able to find them.

But for now a cuppa, then a quick chat with Rafferty. After all, it was part of the main case, which was still very ongoing. Even though they’d been told from above to drop a few things, which she and Cox had both found very puzzling. Plus there was no body. Really, there was nothing to prove that the kid was dead, which made Rafferty way out of order. Annya Brodzinski should be listed as missing.