Blood Whispers Read online

  ‘Our first line of attack is the silence of money. That’s our main weapon.’

  Jay-Go didn’t know why, but he nodded again. He had no idea what the Holy Man was talking about, but he wanted to give the impression that, not only was he following the train of thought, but he might have some ideas of his own to throw into the mix.

  The Holy Man was still talking, ‘. . . drop our street prices below anything that Abazi is offering. Even if we have to give the shit away for free we are going to put an end to his business. It’ll only work if all the big players are on board, but so far we seem to have a cross-party agreement. And because of that, the value of your property has just halved. So I’m offering you fifteen for the first instalment and ten for the second. If you accept, we’ll shake hands now and you can give me your bank details. If you decline, you run the risk of Abazi finding out that you have his smack and all the grief that goes with that scenario. You won’t last a minute out there.’

  Jay-Go was starting to sweat again. His hands were trembling worse than ever and his brain was pounding on the inside of his skull. Fifteen thousand was far less than the heroin was worth, but Jay-Go had never had so much money in his entire life and the Holy Man was right: once it was off his hands the pressure was off as far as Abazi was concerned. If he’d known that’s who it belonged to he would have left the shit where he’d found it, but it was too late now.

  The Holy Man was speaking again.

  ‘Don’t take too long to think it over, wee man. As far as I can see your jacket’s on a wobbly nail. It’s less than you were hoping for, but once I shake your hand, you know I’m not going to fuck you over. It’s a cast-iron deal. Think of the money you’re losing as your contribution to the war effort.’

  Jay-Go was battling with the cocktail for control of his eyelids and so far the pinkie sling was winning. He needed something else to drink, and some class A to straighten him out.

  Suddenly he reached his right hand across the table and after a cursory shake the deal was done. ‘Puff tells me you brought a large sample with you, so we’ll keep that and you can go party with a few quid in your back pocket.’ The Holy Man shouted over to Happyslap, who was standing nearby.

  ‘Big man, get Jay-Go a thousand from petty cash as a gesture of goodwill, and order me a scampi and fries, would you?’ He was talking to Jay-Go again. ‘D’you want to know whose finger it was?’

  Jay-Go shook his head.

  ‘You should have had it with the orange juice. That way you don’t have to look at it. Now . . . tell me what you know about the hit on Keira Lynch.’

  ‘I was there when it happened.’

  Twenty-four

  ‘Armed guard! Seriously?’ Keira’s mother was walking along the clinical-blue corridor towards a firearms officer with an MP5 sub-machine gun clamped across his chest, who was standing sentry at the entrance to the acute trauma ward.

  ‘A precaution, Mrs Lynch,’ answered Detective Superintendent Gary Hammond as he walked alongside her. His broad face and angular jawline looked like they had been chiselled out of Scottish granite and set in the only expression left on the shelf. His colleagues at work called him Happy Hammond and had a tote running to see who would be the first to make him crack a smile. The pot for the year was running at over two hundred pounds, with no signs yet of a winner.

  ‘At some point they’re going to find out that she’s still alive,’ he continued, ‘and when that happens they may well try again.’

  ‘Who are “they”?’

  ‘Don’t really know for sure. We have a pretty good idea who’s behind it all, but we don’t know who pulled the trigger. Until we get a better picture of who exactly we’re dealing with it’s safer if people think Keira’s dead. Makes the bad guys behave differently, too . . .’ Gary tailed off as they approached the ward.

  The firearms officer stood to one side and held the door open for them.

  *

  Keira opened her eyes and stared vacantly at her mother as she crossed to her bedside. Gary Hammond closed the door gently and came in to stand behind. Keira tried to say hello, but her breathing was laboured and difficult, making it impossible to draw enough breath to manage even the faintest whisper. She was heavily sedated, but could still hear what was being said, although she struggled to make sense of the words. Despite the tubes in her nose she was also aware of the smells in the room. Every so often clean, disinfected scents wafted around her when the nurses changed her dressings or cleaned the entry and exit wounds where the bullets had ripped through her chest, shoulder and abdomen. Her eyes were leaden and slow: each time she opened them either Gary or her mum, or both, appeared to have shifted their position to a different part of the room until finally she opened them again and Gary Hammond had disappeared altogether, leaving just her mother sitting in a chair next to her bed.

  There was a question she needed to ask: something important. But even though her senses were starting to return, her mind was still playing catch-up, as though part of the healing process was to keep her wits locked down until she was in better shape physically. No matter how hard she tried, the question wouldn’t come to her. The more she concentrated on it the deeper it sank into the pool of random thoughts and disconnected images that fogged her mind.

  ‘You keep slipping in and out of consciousness, sweetheart; are you okay? Are you in a lot of pain?’ Her mother was trying to keep the look of concern from her face.

  It took a few moments for her brain to untangle the words before she managed a slight movement of her lips to whisper, ‘I’m fine.’

  There was a burning sensation in her side and a similar pain near the top of her left lung.

  The next time she opened her eyes her mother had shifted position again: sitting halfway along the bed now, holding her hand.

  Three hours had passed. ‘I have to go home now, darling, and get a change of clothes, but I’ll only be gone a little while then I’ll come straight back, okay? You’re doing good.’

  Keira wanted her to stay.

  She heard a thin, distant voice say, ‘Wait! I need to ask you something,’ but when she opened her eyes the room was empty and she wondered if she had spoken the words out loud or just imagined saying them.

  *

  It was light outside when Keira next came to. Her mother turned from the window when she heard the movement behind her.

  ‘Good morning.’

  Keira’s difficulty in breathing had eased slightly and the fog seemed to have lifted a little: enough for her to be able to respond this time.

  ‘Morning?’ she whispered. ‘I’m not sure about good.’

  She wanted to sit up, but no other part of her body was responding to the signals. ‘Am I paralysed?’ she asked weakly.

  Her mother shook her head. ‘No. But it was close.’

  ‘What happened?’ Keira suddenly winced as a sharp stabbing pain shot through her chest, causing every muscle in her body to tense.

  ‘Are you okay?’ Her mother moved to the side of the bed.

  Keira nodded slowly, and felt her body relax as the spasm gradually subsided.

  ‘What happened?’ she repeated.

  ‘That’s what everyone’s waiting to ask you. Gary Hammond’s been here every day hoping to talk to you.’

  ‘Every day? How long have I been in here?’

  ‘They brought you in on Sunday night.’

  ‘What day is it now?’

  ‘Friday.’

  The end of the week: that was significant, but she couldn’t think why. The question was nagging at her again, but still skulking somewhere in the morphine-swamped shadows.

  ‘You were in a medically induced coma for three of those days,’ continued her mother. ‘One of the bullets grazed your spine. They were keeping you immobile until they knew for certain there was no permanent damage.’

  ‘Sounds like my kind of party. Do they know for certain now?’

  ‘You’re going to be fine.’

  There was a kno
ck and Gary Hammond’s large, square face appeared round the edge of the door. ‘Mind if I join you?’

  Keira tried to sit up again, but the stabbing pains in her chest made her give up immediately.

  ‘Rescued this from the evidence room.’

  Gary placed Keira’s flight bag by her bed. ‘Nurses told me you seemed very keen to have it . . . kept asking for it.’

  The box of throwing knives Father Anthony had given her was in the flight case. She remembered having to check it in at Belfast International, which had meant a further delay when she arrived at Glasgow airport, but she had no recollection of asking any of the nurses for it. She’d put the knives inside the case and kept the slim package with her on the plane. Inside was an old jotter and some loose photographs. The pictures were mostly of her grandmother as a young woman, standing behind two young boys or resting them on her knee; posed, but natural and unaffected. One was a wedding photograph, a rare image of the grandfather she’d never met. There were also a few faded colour photographs of the boys as teenagers with feathered haircuts and three-button high-waisted trousers, wearing platform shoes and tight Simon shirts. She had recognized her uncle Danny straight away, but it was the photograph of Sean, his brother, that had made the biggest impact. She recalled the burst of adrenaline when she’d realized the striking resemblance between herself and the man she believed to be her father. They had similar shaped faces and shared the same cool intensity of stare behind the same black eyes. She’d briefly flicked through the jotter, but had been too distracted to pay it the attention it deserved.

  ‘You’re looking a bit better today,’ said Gary Hammond, breaking into her thoughts. ‘Getting some colour back in your cheeks.’

  ‘Is the colour brown?’ mumbled Keira.

  ‘Brown?’

  ‘I feel like shit.’

  If Keira had known about the tote she could have staked her claim on the two hundred-pound prize. DSI Hammond’s lips cracked a thin smile. It was over quickly, but it would still have counted.

  As she looked over at Gary a coldness spread over her like a cloud passing in front of the sun. For some reason his presence troubled her. She remembered something. She had left a message for him to meet her at the apartment. ‘You weren’t there,’ she said in a slow whisper.

  It wasn’t an accusation, but a statement of fact.

  ‘I was delayed. I did get there, but too late, I’m sorry.’

  ‘You saved my life.’

  Keira caught the look on his face.

  ‘They told me . . .’ started Keira, every few words punctuated with a short gasp for air, ‘. . . a doctor said . . . if the ambulance hadn’t been called when it was, I wouldn’t have made it.’ She closed her eyes and paused for a second until the burning sensation at the top of her chest subsided enough for her to continue. ‘My “golden hour” was down to the last few seconds.’

  Hammond looked surprised.

  ‘I didn’t phone the ambulance.’

  ‘Who did, then?’ For a brief moment there was a glimmer of hope in her eyes. ‘Was it David?’

  Gary didn’t need to say anything. Keira could tell from the expression on his face what his response was going to be. ‘Did the girl survive? Kaltrina, where is she?’

  He gave a slight shake of his head. His normal self-assuredness left him momentarily and he found himself staring at the floor. ‘The only person who made it out alive was you . . . The call for an ambulance did come from your apartment, but we’ve got no idea who made it . . . It wasn’t me.’

  Keira was no longer listening.

  She could feel the burn at the back of her eyes. She wanted to cry, but her feelings were numb. Kaltrina Dervishi was dead. David, her pal and work colleague, was dead too. But there was something else: another question. It involved her mother and Thursday and something else . . . nothing to do with Gary Hammond or Kaltrina Dervishi or David . . . then suddenly it reached the surface.

  ‘Her funeral,’ she managed to say as she gasped for air.

  ‘They have to finish the girl’s autopsy first,’ began Hammond.

  ‘No!’ Keira was shaking her head.

  She could see her mother’s ashen face staring back at her. ‘The funeral?’ she repeated.

  ‘David was buried yesterday.’

  ‘No!’ Keira’s voice was hoarse.

  Her mother knew exactly what Keira was asking, but couldn’t bring herself to tell her: not just yet. ‘Don’t be worrying yourself about that now.’

  ‘Ma?’ said Keira, pleading with her.

  In a voice so low it was almost impossible to hear, her mother eventually replied, ‘I didn’t know what to do.’

  ‘No . . . Ma, please tell me I didn’t miss it . . . please.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Keira . . .’

  ‘In Newry?’

  ‘In Scaur: Roucan Loch cemetery.’

  ‘It’s not what she wanted.’ Keira’s tone was flat as she repeated, ‘It’s not what she wanted.’

  ‘I didn’t know what to do, Keira.’

  ‘Who was there?’

  ‘Please, darling,’ answered her mother. ‘Get yourself better, then we’ll have this conversation.’

  ‘Who was there, Ma?’

  ‘Father Anthony flew over; I didn’t want anyone else, it didn’t seem right. When you’re better he’s going to hold a memorial service back in Northern Ireland.’

  Keira’s back suddenly arched in the air. The pain in her side was intense. But her throat and lungs were so constricted that when she tried to scream no sound came.

  She reached out in desperation toward her mother.

  *

  Keira was standing in her kitchen again. She heard the hiss of air behind, felt the impact of the bullets forcing her to the floor. Her chest was aching and her lungs burned as though she was breathing in a huge ball of fire.

  In the confusion, just as the room started to fade from view, she could hear someone screaming, ‘Help her, she needs help.’

  Keira thrust into the darkness, her arms outstretched, reaching for something, or someone who wasn’t there. In the silence that followed she could hear the faint echo of uillean pipes.

  *

  Keira woke up drenched in sweat. She had no idea where she was or how long she had been asleep. She tried to sit up, but stopped when she heard a voice from somewhere near the end of the bed, ‘Just you stay where you are.’

  ‘Ma?’

  ‘Your mum’s gone home. She’ll be back in the morning, but you need to rest.’

  Keira lifted her head off the pillow and saw a nurse replacing a clipboard on a hook at the bottom of the bed.

  ‘I’ve given you something to help you sleep, but no more visitors for another few days. Too much excitement. It’s not good for you.’

  ‘My grandmother’s funeral,’ said Keira as she started to drift off. ‘I’ve missed it.’

  ‘Don’t worry about that just now. It was nearly your own a few days ago.’

  Twenty-five

  ‘Are you ready to talk?’

  ‘I’m ready to scream.’

  ‘How you feeling?’

  ‘Like I’ve been shot.’

  ‘If it’s any consolation, we’re pretty sure you weren’t the target. Word from the steamie is Abazi’s brought in a hired hand to do his dirty work. But the picture’s still a wee bit blurry: complicated, you know?’

  ‘I told Patrick Sellar before all this happened that they were going to hit Kaltrina Dervishi. I know I wasn’t the target.’

  ‘Who told you?’

  ‘I heard a rumour.’

  Keira was propped up in bed with a sheet pulled up to her chin. She was still hooked up to various machines via tubes and cables, but the fact that she was sitting up at all showed she was on the mend. The medical team must have thought so too, because DSI Hammond had finally been allowed back in to ask her some questions.

  ‘Why did Patrick Sellar release Kaltrina from custody?’

  Gary shrugged hi
s shoulders, ‘Who knows?’ then said, ‘He made a statement a few days after the shooting saying that, based on a conversation he’d had with you, jail didn’t seem like the right place for the girl.’

  ‘I did say that, it’s true, but I sent him the tape of her parents being threatened. He knew she was at risk.’

  ‘He mentioned that.’

  ‘He mentioned he’d watched the tape?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So what the hell was he thinking, letting her out? When her life was under threat.’

  ‘He said he didn’t receive the tape until after the event and in any case it was the parents’ lives that were being threatened, not the girl’s.’

  ‘Jesus Christ!’ exclaimed Keira, shaking her head.

  The Advocate Depute Patrick Sellar was just one of the many lines that didn’t run straight by Keira’s way of thinking, but until she had more information, she’d let it go for the moment.

  ‘Kaltrina knew something that Abazi didn’t want out in the open and that’s why they wanted her dead.’

  ‘Do you know what that something is? Did she tell you anything we should know?’

  ‘No. She’d only just started to open up, to trust me, but . . . I never, at any time, got the impression she was carrying some great secret around. Obviously, she must have known about Abazi’s criminal activities and that in itself would have been enough to get her killed, but there has to be more to it.’

  ‘Did she see the video?’

  Keira nodded.

  ‘How did she react?’

  ‘She was upset, but it was a strangely benign reaction. She reckoned the Clan would have killed the parents afterwards anyway.’

  ‘It could have had something to do with the child?’

  Keira wondered how Gary could possibly have known about the boy. It was supposed to be a secret. ‘Who told you about that?’

  ‘It’s in the autopsy report. Two murder charges and the death of an unborn child,’ he continued.

  ‘Jesus! Kaltrina was pregnant?’

  ‘That’s what I’m saying. Could be why she decided to run now. Not a year ago . . . or two years ago. You know what I’m saying?’