Lynch (12 page)

‘From what I remember of him,’ Katherine said, ‘I doubt the prison wardens would have held you back. In fact, they’d probably have helped.’

Clark
smiled. ‘You’re probably right. And if I’d known I’d get suspended over it, maybe I would have punched him. Anyway, when Interpol found out I’d been to see him, they obviously weren’t very happy about it. They said I was “interfering with an ongoing investigation,” but it was my investigation to begin with. Mine and Wilson’s.
Dixon
’ll be out in five or six years tops, and if I know him at all, I know he’s a man to hold a grudge. I was trying my best to keep him off the streets.’

Katherine flattened her lips, spread her fingers on the table. ‘He named me, didn’t he? In his vendetta campaign.’

‘Yes,’ was all
Clark
could say.

‘And that’s why you’re here,’ Katherine said. ‘It’s not just because you got suspended and had nothing better to do with your time. It’s because of
Dixon
.’

‘
Dixon
’s an arsehole. He has more hot air than the sun and none of the warmth.’

‘But it got you worried enough to want to be here, to make sure we were okay.’

Clark
shrugged. ‘Okay, you got me. I’m a caring soul sometimes.’

‘Does he know where we live? What our new names are?’

‘No.’

‘How can you be certain?’

‘Because I met with him almost two weeks ago and you’re still alive.’

Katherine closed her eyes.
Clark
could almost see the resignation on her face.

‘If it comes to it,’
Clark
said, ‘you’ll get relocated, given new identities.’

‘I was just getting used to this identity.’

Clark
said, ‘It’s not going to happen. It’s just a standby precaution. Robert Mann’s a tough one. He’ll do everything he can to protect you both.’

‘What’s he like, this new boss of yours?’ Katherine asked.

‘Mann’s a cop first and foremost. He worked with my father in CID before shifting to Interpol. And before CID, he had more stripes on his uniform than one man should possibly be allowed. He doesn’t just do things by the book, he wrote the book.’

‘That’s why you were suspended,’ Katherine said.

Clark
nodded. ‘
Wilson
loved rules, but he knew when it was acceptable to bend them. If he was still in charge, he’d have slapped me on the wrist and sent me on my way. Mann’s only option was to suspend me pending investigation.’

‘You’re clearly not overjoyed,’ Katherine said. ‘But you don’t sound too despondent about it, either.’

Clark
shrugged, looked away from Katherine. ‘I’ve been in this game a long time,’ she said. ‘Maybe I want to take up basket-weaving instead.’

‘You’ll always be a cop,’ Katherine told her. ‘And they’ll have you back onboard before you know it.’

‘I’m not so sure,’
Clark
said.

Katherine put her cup on the table, folded the paper from her muffin into quarters. ‘You’re breaking rules even now, aren’t you? Just by being here with us.’

Clark
looked at her. ‘Yes,’ she said. And it was true. Witness protection was supposed to be total extraction, except in times of need and only by a serving member of the team.
Clark
had handed in her badge and if Robert Mann found out where she was, she’d be booted out permanently before her head could stop spinning.

But if
Dixon
was going to try anything, she wanted to be here just in case.

Chapter 15

He pulled up in the stolen Audi A5—sleek, steel grey, leather interior, and spotlessly clean when he had taken it from a car park in West London this afternoon—and cut the engine. He double-checked the address that Thomas Walter had given him and cursed silently. The single property was actually a large house, maybe two semis cut-and-shut, converted into four flats, two up, two down.

He couldn’t be sure which flat was Kane Rider’s and he wasn’t about to go knocking on doors pretending to be a pizza delivery prick. Instead, he drove back down the A61 towards
Leeds
and pulled into a secluded lay-by, hidden from the road by a row of overgrown shrubbery. He would wait until nightfall before returning.

He got out of the car and walked up to the burger van. The proprietor was standing outside, smoking a cigarette. Her hair was netted and she wore a blue, grease-stained apron over a once-white T-shirt and black leggings. Fernandez wondered if it would be blood or burger-juice that spilled from her jugular if he cut her throat. When she spoke, she sounded relatively middle class and that broke the image he had had of her.

Although he would still like to see her blood.

‘Afternoon, love,’ she said. ‘Excuse me and my filthy habit.’ She took a long pull from her cigarette and stubbed it out before stepping back inside the van and looking out at him. ‘What can I get you?’ she asked, washing her hands.

Fernandez read the menu board above her head, imagined it was written in her blood rather than chalk. ‘Cheeseburger.’

‘And a drink?’ she asked, writing his order on her pad as though she’d forget it.

‘Coffee,’ Fernandez said. He visualised throwing the steaming-hot coffee in her face. He reached into his pocket and withdrew some British money that María Herrera had given him before he left
Spain
. He had memorised the size and the colours of each note so as not to appear like an imbecilic foreigner.

She dropped a burger on the griddle. ‘Three pounds sixty, please, love. Driving anywhere nice?’

Fernandez handed her a green note. Five pounds. He would check the change diligently. ‘Hell,’ he said.

The woman said, ‘I’ve never been.’ She flipped the burger. ‘I’ve been to Scunthorpe,’ she said, ‘but never
Hull
.’

He took a mental note to work on his accent. ‘
Hull
,’ he said, sounding it out.

‘You want to go to Bridlington,’ she said, layering some cheese on top of the burger meat. A few seconds later, she scooped it up and dropped it in a bun with some crisp lettuce and a chunky slice of tomato. She reached for the ketchup without even asking him and he had to stop her. He never used ketchup—his life’s work was blood; he didn’t want to eat something resembling it.

The countertop of the mobile van had to be around five feet high and he used one hand as an aid while he jumped and grabbed her hair with his other hand. As he dropped back to the ground, he brought her head down with him, smacking it into the wooden counter and stunning her. Her yelp was short-lived but satisfactory.

He calmly walked around the van to the rear entrance and stepped inside. She was scrabbling around on the floor, trying to turn over, and he brought the sole of his shoe down on her face. He stooped and dragged her to her feet. His gun was tucked into the waistband at the back of his jeans but sometimes he hated using it. A gun was so impersonal.

He picked up a broom from the corner of the van and smacked her across the back of the head with it. As he pushed her face into the molten fat of the fryer with the bristle end of the broom, he said, ‘I’d rather not have ketchup, thank you very much.’ When her body stopped convulsing, he let her drop to the floor. Her face and neck was boiled and red and peeling and her hair had come away from her scalp. The sunken sockets of her eyes were sightless. He sighed, dragged her by the feet out of the van, bouncing her body down the two steps to the roadside, and dumped her in the bushes. He returned to the van and looked with disgust at the mess of grease and fat on the floor.

Fernandez dropped the window hatch into place, effectively closing up shop, emptied the till of notes, and picked up the burger she had prepared for him. He wrapped it in some greaseproof paper and returned to his car.

He had driven a mile down the road before he realised she had failed to make his coffee.

Scott had an hour to kill after work and before meeting up with John so he decided to spend some time with Lea. He had already mucked out her stable earlier and was now grooming her, long sweeping strokes with the soft brush, talking gently to her and calling her a beautiful girl. She was a stunning animal.

When Ryan spoke to him, he guessed he was losing his mind. But he didn’t care. Scott knew it wasn’t really a ghost, but the mental projection was real and exact.

‘Jeez, it stinks in here.’

Scott looked up and smiled. ‘You never did like horses.’

‘You weren’t any good with them, either. You’re a regular little Lester Piggott now,’ Ryan said. He was standing in the corner with his arms folded and his nose crinkled. He looked exactly as Scott remembered him.

‘What’re you doing here?’ he asked.

‘I could ask you the same thing,’ the memory of Ryan said. ‘Come on, Kane, talk to me.’

Scott frowned. ‘I’ve missed you.’

‘I know.’ There was a heavy weight in his words. ‘But it’s been a year and a half.’

Scott sat on the bench in the corner of the stable and Ryan sat down next to him. They didn’t face each other. It was too hard to look at him.

‘But I love you,’ Scott said. ‘Still.’

‘Damn right you do,’ Ryan said. ‘And I won’t ever let you forget it. But, Kane, stop holding yourself back.’

‘You’re talking about Jesse,’ Scott said.

‘Unless you’ve got some other stud tucked away somewhere that I don’t know about.’

Scott looked at him finally. Ryan was smiling. He’d never forget that smile.

‘Do yourself a favour, Kane. Let go of me.’

‘I don’t want to.’

‘You have to. It’s time. Jesse’s a good guy.’

‘He is.’

Ryan laughed. ‘He’ll never be as good as me in bed, mind.’

‘He’ll never be as good as you in many ways, Ryan.’

Ryan stood. ‘Damn it, Kane. Get a check on yourself. Let go of me before you go insane.’

‘I’m talking to a dead guy,’ Scott said. ‘I think I’m already insane.’

‘Move on,’ Ryan insisted. ‘You have my blessing.’

Scott shook his head. ‘I don’t want your blessing.’ He was crying.

‘Man up,’ Ryan said. ‘You’ve got a memory box. Put me in there and keep me at the back of the wardrobe.’ He crouched down in front of Scott and smiled. ‘I’ve been inside your dreams, Kane. I know what you’re thinking. You’re doing yourself a disservice by believing that you’re betraying me. I’m just a memory now. A great memory, I know, but just a memory. You need to live. Don’t be dead like me. Live.’

Scott sighed and looked up. Lea chuffed and stomped a foot.

And Ryan was gone.

He stood, picked up the grooming brush, and put his arms around Lea’s neck. ‘Don’t you dare start talking to me, too,’ he told her. She nudged his arm for a treat.

‘I wish he was still alive,’ John said.

Scott’s smile was tight-lipped and perfunctory. No one could wish it more than he did.

He had called John after work as he promised and they were now sitting in a small back-street bar in
Leeds
drinking Coke and sharing a bowl of peanuts. When he arrived, before John turned up, he called Jesse to ask how his day off had been.

‘Absolutely lazy,’ Jesse had said.

‘What time do you start tomorrow?’

‘Ten. Do you maybe want to come round for a night cap?’

Scott had smiled to himself; he had actually missed Jesse at work today. It felt as though it was ages ago since he had seen him but it had only been this morning before he slipped off to meet John. It felt like cheating, and Scott wished he could tell Jesse the truth about who he was, but for Jesse’s safety, he couldn’t. ‘Give me a couple of hours,’ Scott told him on the phone, looking at his watch. It was seven o’clock. ‘Should I bring anything?’

‘I don’t run a bring-your-own-bottle gaff,’ Jesse laughed. ‘Just come as you are. See you soon.’

Now, sipping from his pint glass of Coke, Scott said, ‘You’re not the only one.’

‘More to the point,’ John said, ‘I wish I’d been around to kneecap David when the truth came out. You know I know some people.’

‘How many drag queens are in the IRA?’ Scott joked.

‘You’d be surprised.’

‘Besides, David got what he deserved. I’ve been trying to put it all behind me, but it hasn’t been easy.’

‘I bet.’ John scooped a handful of peanuts. ‘I remember the first time I met Ryan.’

Scott closed his eyes. His own memories of Ryan were painful at best; he wasn’t sure he could listen to someone else’s.

‘It was in that Indian on
Donegall Street
at two in the morning. I’d just finished a set in the Kremlin.’

‘I remember that night,’ Scott said. He and Ryan had been to the Kremlin but Scott didn’t remember seeing Daphne on stage. Ryan went for food while he went off to stand in the queue for a taxi.

John laughed. ‘I’d caught my heel in the doorway and spilled the entire contents of my purse all over the floor. Everyone in the takeaway laughed at this six foot drag queen blushing like a banshee, except Ryan. He helped me pick my things up from the floor and he put his arm around me and told the others to stop their yammering. I must admit, I fell a little bit in love with him there and then. You were a lucky man.’

Scott smiled. ‘The luckiest.’ Ryan was loved by everyone who met him.

‘Anyway,’ John said, ‘I thought that would be the last I saw of this rescuing knight, but there you guys were the following week.’

‘Ryan greeted you like you were old friends. It was hard to believe you’d only met the week before.’

‘You know he was going to propose to you,’ John said.

Scott closed his eyes again. He hadn’t known. They had discussed it as a future prospect, and Scott had made his own plans to propose, but he hadn’t known Ryan would have been on the cusp of asking.

‘He didn’t get round to buying the rings,’ John continued. ‘But he showed me a picture of them. Kane, they were gorgeous. I wish you’d seen them.’

Scott kept his eyes closed, saw the vision of Ryan in the stables. He knew he wasn’t losing his mind, knew that Ryan had been a projection of his own mixed up emotions, but he had seemed so real, so desperately real.

It was time to let go. If a stereophonic reproduction of his dead lover from his own imagination was telling him to move on, then he should.

He opened his eyes, looked at John. ‘I won’t forget him,’ he said.

‘You can’t forget him.’

‘I don’t want to forget him. But I can’t bring him back.’

‘No, you can’t.’

Scott smiled wistfully. And let go.