She clung onto him for a whole minute without saying anything until eventually, her breathing subsided and her body relaxed. He rubbed her back and felt the warmth of her flesh through the thin cotton. She loosened her grip around his neck and pulled back to look at him.
“What the feck are you doin’ here?”
“Nice to see you too.”
“How did you find me?”
“Coffee would be great thanks; it’s freezing out there.” He desperately wanted to kiss her, long and hard, and run his hands through her curly mop of hair but he was not going to risk destroying the moment. There’d be time for that later, if ever.
“I’ve only got tea.”
“Tea it is.”
She released him and turned away and he watched her go into the kitchen. A log fire burned fiercely in the grate, emitting a comforting warmth and filling the room with an orange glow. He heard the run of a tap and the click and clatter of objects in the kitchen and looked around the tiny space. The cottage appeared to have only one room plus kitchen, simply furnished with a sofa, one armchair, an oak sideboard and a wooden staircase set against the wall with a coatrack and shelves underneath. The stone floor was bare apart from a threadbare rug that lay in front of the fireplace. The absence of a TV made it look like something out of the fifties.
He felt a cold blast of air from the kitchen, the sound of activity stopped for a second and he felt a sudden surge of fear; fear that she’d run out the back door, get in the Focus and disappear. He leapt towards the doorway to the kitchen and met her as she reappeared, staggering, face twisted in pain, body writhing, man in black behind her gripping her by the hair, pushing her head forward, gun in his left hand. More noise behind him, more cold air, man in black stepping into the room, gun pointed at him.
She gasped in pain. “Get off me, jaffa scum!”
“Hello lover-boy,” said the older, stocky one behind him. He had a plaster over the bridge of his nose and a nasty bruise under one eye, courtesy of his collision with the Range Rover. The fingers of his right hand were strapped together with a white bandage. “I told you we’d be seein’ you again.” Siobhán had both hands behind her head trying to release the younger one’s grip but he yanked even harder in response. She dug her nails into the back of his hand, drawing blood.
“Fuckin’ bitch!” he shouted and pushed her roughly to the floor where she landed awkwardly on the fireside rug. Jack froze, racked with indecision, but with two guns, he was powerless. She glared at him on hands and knees; the accusation unspoken. The older one kicked the front door closed behind him.
“Now Caitlín darlin’, you know why we’re here and what we want to know. So just give us the information and we’ll be on our way and no one will get hurt.”
“You can away and feck yersel’. I’m tellin’ you nothin’.”
“Then my friend here will have to shoot you.”
She gave him a laugh of disdain. “And how’s that goin’ to help, gobshite? Kill me and it’s gone forever. I’m the only one who knows.”
“Then we’ll shoot lover-boy here.”
She laughed again and this time she sounded as evil as her tormentors. “On you go. He means nothin’ to me. For all I know you’re in this together.” Jack felt compelled to intervene at last.
“Whoa! Don’t lump me in with these punks.”
“Stay out of it, lover-boy.”
“You bunch of feckin’ amateurs!” She spat out words meant for them all.
“You will talk Caitlín, believe me. Mikey, how about we start pulling her fingernails out? What do you think?” The younger one grinned and leaned forward, grabbing her by the hair again in an attempt to lift her to her feet.
“Get off me!” she shouted. In a flash, she swung the iron poker in her right hand and struck him on the side of the head with all the force she could muster. He bellowed and fell backwards, his gun going off with a deafening crack. Jack ducked instinctively, feeling a rush of air as the bullet passed his face and slammed into the older thug just below the eye. He was thrown back against the front door and collapsed in a heap.
Siobhán was already on her feet wielding the poker like a machete, raining blows down on her assailant as he rolled and writhed on the floor trying to avoid them, holding his arms up in an attempt to protect his head. But she caught him again on the forehead and he went limp. She raised the poker high over her head, holding it in two hands ready to administer the coup de gras and Jack had to leap forward and grab her arms to stop her.
“Siobhán! Stop!”
“Let go. I’m gonna kill him!”
“Stop!” She pulled against him kicking out at the inert body while they both wrestled with the weapon but he was too strong and eventually she gave in and sagged in defeat. Then she took him completely by surprise and slapped him hard on the face.
“Trust me Siobhán? It’ll be okay?” She parodied his own words, glaring at him as he rubbed his cheek. She tried to slap him again, but he grabbed both arms to immobilise her.
“Stop, will you?” Her breath was coming in fits and starts again and her expression, homicidal. She wrestled herself free and swept her hair back.
“Now what, lover-boy?” She was still in shock and to some extent so was he, but Jack had already worked it out.
“Get your stuff.”
“What?”
“Get your stuff! Anything you want to take with you. We’re getting out of here.”
“What? And let that feckin’ jaffa chase me down again? I don’t think so.”
“What do you want to do Siobhán…?”
“Caitlín.”
“… Caitlín. Shoot him and bury them both in the back garden? They’ll be found before too long and then you’ll be the prime suspect and you’ll have the coppers after you as well as their pals.”
She put her hands on her hips. “What do you suggest, Sherlock?”
“We can call the police, but you’ll have a lot of explaining to do.”
“No way!”
“Then leave Mikey boy here to clear up the mess. Assuming you haven’t killed him already, there’s no way he’s going to call the police. Once he wakes up, he’ll call his pals and they’ll come and tidy up. There’s no way you can stay here. This place is blown.”
“Thanks to you!”
He ignored the jibe. “So get your stuff, now!”
“What stuff?”
“Clothes, belongings, pack a bag. We’re going right now.”
She looked ready to slap him again, but instead ran up the stairs and was back in two minutes with a soft bag. She reached under the staircase and put on some light boots, pulling her outdoor jacket and scarf off her peg. A small leather handbag hung on another hook and she foraged around inside checking the contents, pulling out a set of keys.
“You don’t need those, I’ve got transport.”
“I’ll drive myself!”
“No way. I’m not letting you out of my sight.” For a moment she looked confused, then bent down over the prone gunman who was still unconscious but breathing and picked up his gun. “Are you crazy? Leave it!”
“Why not?”
“What are you going to do with a gun? You can get arrested just for having one. Leave it.”
“Alright!” She screamed at him in rage, tossing it on the sofa.
“Let’s go.” He grabbed her arm, but she shook him loose, her anger quickly returning.
The older guy by the door was dead. He’d taken a bullet in the face and it had come out the other side splattering blood and hair on the stone wall. Jack heaved him out of the way and opened the door. The wind had got up and an icy blast blew into the cottage causing the flames to dance even higher. She ran back and put the guard up.
“Don’t want the place burnin’ down now, do we?” she said, heavy with sarcasm. He waited by the door, but she brushed past him, stomping down the path and through the garden gate. He overtook her and marched up the slope to where the Range Rover was parked, a black BMW sitting behind it. He briefly contemplated letting the tyres down or smashing the lights so they couldn’t be followed but thought again. Better that Mikey had a way to move his pal’s body out of the cottage and get away himself.
He got in beside her and drove down the hill, did a three-point turn and gunned the engine. The car roared into life, sped up the slope and over the brow of the hill. He hit the main road in two minutes and turned left towards Inveraray.
“Where are we goin?” she said without any real interest.
He had no idea. “We’re just going to put some space between us and the bad guys for now. I admit I didn’t come prepared for this.”
“Me neither.”
“What do I call you?”
She shrugged. “Whatever you like.” Her truculence was wearing but understandable. He thought he’d been alert to any threat, but ultimately, he hadn’t taken enough care.
“Siobhán, Sineád or Caitlín?”
She made him wait before she eventually answered. “Caitlín. Caitlín McConnell.”
“Jack Fleming. What’s with all the names?”
There was only a moment’s respite in her simmering rage before she exploded. “You brought them two feckin’ jaffas to my door!” She was still mad and with good reason. “You went to all that trouble to find me and made the whole feckin’ mess even worse! If you’d stayed out of it and left me alone, I’d still be in that wee cottage warmin’ my feet against the fire, so I would. So what are you doin’ here?” She was right to be annoyed. He’d interfered in someone else’s business for reasons known only to him and screwed up. Or worse, as far as she was concerned, it could be one elaborate scam to get whatever information the bad guys wanted. If she was the only one who knew what they wanted, then she was right, they couldn’t harm her. Why not stage the whole thing, use dummy bullets, let “lover-boy” rescue her and then soften her up? The tough approach hadn’t worked so far.
“I told you. I thought you were in trouble.”
“Why would you think that?”
He jerked a thumb over his shoulder. “You don’t call that trouble?”
“Aye that’s trouble alright. Trouble you brought with you. I was safe before and now I’m not!”
“I told you. I promised you’ll be okay.” It sounded limp and hollow, and she laughed cruelly at him.
“And I told you not to make promises you can’t keep. You broke the first one within two feckin’ minutes!”
“Okay, okay. I hear you. But if those guys were able to track you down on the Isle of bloody Wight, they were going to do it again eventually, with or without me.”
“Aye well, you were a great help.” She was angry but so was he. Seething with anger both at his own stupidity and her vitriol. He hadn’t seen this side of her before because he had never really got to know her. But the circumstances were extreme, and passions were running high; she was a fiery, potty-mouthed, take-no-prisoners redhead and she had a major problem on her hands.
“I’m sorry.”
***
Mikey McGee groaned, rolled over and dragged himself onto the sofa. The fire was still burning but he was cold; cold from being hit over the head twice with an iron rod and the trauma of blood loss. The fuckin’ bitch would pay for that. He turned his aching head to see Declan Doyle lying on the floor in a crumpled heap, dead as a doornail. Jesus I killed him, so I did. What a fuckin’ mess. He fished in his inside pocket for his phone, relieved to see it was intact and selected his contact. He closed his eyes at the throbbing pain in his head and in anticipation of what was to come
***
It was still rush hour when they hit the Glasgow ring road but the traffic kept moving and the M74 was clear going south so he was able to speed up. Caitlín had long since finished her diatribe and they’d remained silent for a while. There was a lot on his mind, so many questions he wanted to ask, more than ever before but he didn’t dare in case it set her off again. He decided she’d calm down in her own time.
“How did you find me?” She sounded subdued and at last, she was calm.
“Your phone. I found your phone in a wheelie bin.”
“You went lookin’ in wheelie-bins in case you found a phone and got lucky?” She sounded sceptical and instantly suspicious.
“Mr and Mrs Angry…”
“Who?”
“The folk who owned the house gave me your number and I rang it. I heard it ringing in their wheelie-bin.”
“No way! It was switched off.”
“No, it wasn’t.”
“I swear to God I switched it off!”
“You may have done but the tracker virus powered it back up again.”
“Virus? Jesus, I knew there was somethin’ goin’ on. But that doesn’t explain how you ended up here.”
“I found you through the car rental agreement. There was an email.”
“No you didn’t! I wiped everythin’ off it. Deleted everythin’ and reset it to zero.”
“Afraid not.”
“I feckin’ did!”
“Listen. When you delete something, it doesn’t actually go up in a puff of smoke. It may be invisible to you, but it stays where it is until it’s overwritten by something else and until that happens, it can always be retrieved using specialist software. It’s the same with any data storage device.”
“Jesus.”
“Just as well I found it and not the…er, jaffas.”
“You’re right there.”
“What’s a jaffa?”
She looked at him as if he were thick and laughed. Strangely, he was pleased to be laughed at; it was better than shouting. “Orangemen. UVF.”
“What? Ulster Volunteer Force?”
“Aye.”
“Jesus.”
“Now you’re surprised.”
“I just took them for a couple of thugs. I met them on the Isle of Wight.”
“What? You already met them?” She was incredulous as well as disturbed. She’d turned in her seat and was staring at him.
“They were the ones tracking your phone, but I didn’t know that at the time. They thought you were with me.”
“So they just walked away?”
“No, we had an argument and I had to use a bit of force. If I’d known they were UVF I might have thought twice. I didn’t even know they still existed.”
“Och they’re not as crazy as they once were. There’s a few diehards but these days most of them are just bog-standard villains. Organised crime is their thing, not defendin’ the six counties from papists. It’s the same with the rest of them feckin’ lunatics; IRA, INLA, UDA, UFF they’re all still there in one form or another, squarin’ up to each other, struttin’ around thinkin’ they run the place.”
“But they were armed this time.”
“Aye. Mainly for show.”
“You’re very casual about it.”
“I remember when it was all for real.”
“One of them’s dead.”
“Well, you shouldn’t give boys dangerous toys.”
He spotted a sign for motorway services. He needed fuel and a rest stop. He filled the tank and went inside to pay. He was back in the driver’s seat within five minutes.
“I suggest we stay here tonight. They’ve got a hotel on each side. If we park the car here and walk over the bridge then we can stay on the northbound side. Makes it a little more difficult for Mikey if he happens to be in hot pursuit.” He tried to make light of it but when she didn’t respond he looked across to find her staring through the windscreen. All the colour had drained from her face and a single tear ran down her cheek. She was full of surprises. “I’m sorry. Did I say something?” She wiped the tear with the back of her hand and took a breath.
“I turned on the radio and heard the six o’clock news. Someone was shot dead in Derry last night. Someone I know.”
“Oh God. A friend of yours?”
“Not really. She was a journalist. Louise Harrison.”