by Eoghan Egan
‘You’ll come off the motorway in a minute,’ Hugh said. ‘There’s no way he’d risk going through the town with a kidnapped person. What if he got caught in traffic and—?’
‘What if she’s unconscious?’ Ruth said. ‘Maybe in the car boot, and he doesn’t give a damn—’
‘But at any stage, she could scream, or kick … If we’re on the right track, I reckon he’ll take the ring-road. Follow the signs for Birr. There’ll be gardaí and a squad car in Kilcormac.’
The car careened by the IDA Business Park, got stuck behind a bus that tilted on its left axle, and proceeded at a glacial pace towards the N52 junction. The bus jerked to a halt at a traffic signal, blocking two lanes. Air brakes hissed, and it bounced on broken suspension springs. Puffs of noxious gases belched from exhaust pipes, like smoke from bellows.
Sixty slow seconds slipped past.
The lights changed to green. The bus crawled a few metres. Stalled. Ruth squeezed the Corsa alongside. The light sequence changed to red again.
Ruth braked.
Hugh fumed.
Ruth kept the Opel in gear and the rev count high, staring at the traffic lights, moved her foot from brake to accelerator before the filter arrow turned green. She spun right onto the N52 and the car hydroplaned on the icy surface. Hugh braced, anticipating a spin-out. Ruth changed gear, mashed the accelerator, worked through the controlled skid and forced the Corsa into obeying her touch. ‘Phew.’
The outside temperature gauge read minus six degrees. They passed the fifty-kilometre speed sign, and Ruth accelerated again. A wobble forced her to slow … slightly. A hazy red neon sign glowed in the distance, looking like an alien spacecraft hovering in the frosty air.
Hugh pointed. ‘If that petrol station’s open …’
Closed.
They barrelled past Blueball service station.
Ruth chewed her lip, downshifted, powered around an Insignia and eased by a Land Rover. The full beams picked out taillights. ‘Ahoy, captain,’ she said. ‘Car ahead.’
‘We’re nearly in Kilcormac, Ruth. I hope we’ve made the correct guess. If not, we’re—’
‘Beemer. 530d,’ Ruth said. ‘What’s that reg number again?’
‘Two, two—’
‘Three-two-five?’ Ruth finished.
Hugh leaned forward. ‘Yes. That’s it.’ He touched Ruth’s arm. ‘Pull back.’
Ruth slackened off. The BMW gained a hundred metres and drove into Kilcormac.
‘The station is …’ Hugh pointed. ‘Jesus. I don’t believe it. The bloody cop station’s closed.’
‘Cutbacks,’ Ruth said.
Hugh glanced out the passenger window. ‘The Kinnitty road’s here on the left.’
The BMW maintained its steady speed and stayed on the N52.
‘Shit, we’re following the wrong car.’
‘I’m not sure, Hugh. It’s too much of a coincidence to have the make and model, along with half the reg number in your head … Anyway, he’s not likely to bring a body home. We’ll go another bit. See what happens.’
‘Give him space so.’
‘Try the phone again.’
Hugh did. ‘Still no signal.’
They listened to the wheels whish, eyes glued on the car in front. Hugh shifted in the seat, impatient. ‘Where the hell’s he going? We’re way beyond Kilcormac.’
Ruth didn’t answer.
A white van overtook, and the trio travelled in convoy. After a kilometre, white van man swung off the main road.
A forest outline loomed in the moonlight.
Six kilometres.
Past Fivealley.
On their right, an LED streetlight lit up a church in its ghost-grey beam. Hugh fidgeted. ‘We’ll be in Birr soon. Should we overtake? Make him stop?’
‘And then what? It might be an innocent person out for a drive. Or, if it is the kidnapper, we don’t want him to know we’re following him. What if he’s got a gun? Birr’s only a few kilometres away. We’ll let the gardaí there—’
The BMW indicated left.
‘We can’t follow off the main road, Ruth. When he turns, pull over.’
Ruth skidded to a halt.
Hugh shuffled back to the side road, more a laneway, a boreen. He watched the BMW’s taillights bounce a few hundred metres ahead. Brake lights glowed, and the car vanished.
Hugh limped back to Ruth, darts of pain slicing his foot. ‘We’re here. Wherever that is.’
Ruth peered out at him. ‘Now what?’
‘I’ll check where he’s gone. If there’s a house, I’ll—’
‘You’ll what? Ask him to come out and play? Forget it. Let’s go to Birr.’
‘Gimme a minute. I’ll find out if we’re right.’
‘What happens if we are right?’
‘Then we’ll drive to Birr.’
‘Let’s go there now.’
‘We’ve no proof of anything. I’ll go check.’
Ruth shivered. ‘I’m not thrilled with this idea.’
‘If I’m not back in ten minutes, drive to Birr. Garda station’s on the Square.’
‘Five,’ Ruth said. ‘I’ll give you five minutes.’
Wispy clouds clothed the moon.
Hugh shuffled along the lane, struggling to walk in the tyre track groove. Above him, a canopy of sagging tree branches arched and joined. The timber creaked and groaned under the weight of snow and ice. Slivers of moonbeams filtered between the gaps, giving faint shape to objects. Underfoot, frozen snow and rough ice crunched like crisp cornflakes. Hugh craned his neck, forcing his eyes to adjust. Except for the distant growl of a Harley with its modified pipes and kamikaze rider puttering along the main road, the night was still. The cold penetrated his bones. He shuddered. What had seemed bright from the comfort and warmth of Ruth’s car, now became dingy and menacing.
Something rustled in a hedge.
A fox howled. An owl hooted a rejoinder. Icicles dripped from naked branches, their plops, eerie whispers. The hair on Hugh’s head bristled with tension, as mangled nerves and stress ramped up his heartbeats. Eyes wide open, searching the tree-line, a snow pellet dripped on his face, making him jump. He didn’t see the pothole. Ice splintered, a gunshot in the stillness. His left ankle twisted and bolts of pain rippled up his leg. The runner acted as a sponge, soaking in weeks of slush.
Hugh shuffled on, each step producing a paroxysm of agony. He’d lost all feeling in his toes. To his right, through the trees, he made out the shape of a large structure. On the left, a machine sat hunched in a gateway. The invasive, cloying stench of silage hung in the air. It clung to clothes and stuck in his throat. The tree-line ended. A two-story house materialised out of the gloom, a grim and cheerless dark silhouette. The muted glow of an artificial light shone from the rear of the building and bounced off the tyre tracks.
Every fibre in Hugh’s body hummed with fear. His heart rattled against ribs, thumping trip-hammer fast, and nerves jangled, screaming at him to turn and run. The thin light beam hindered rather than helped lessen the intimidating atmosphere. He crouched and crab-walked to the house, inched around the gable end, and sensed movement behind him. He straightened, spun, and raised his arms for protection. A faint buzz. The side of Hugh’s neck burned and he got hurled backwards by an invisible force. His skull drummed against the concrete wall. A ball of white pain flashed. Then, like a blown fuse, everything faded to black.
Hugh had no idea how long he’d been unconscious.
He blinked.
A light appeared, disappeared and reappeared in a wavy haze.
He blinked again.
The light got brighter, triggering an intense migrainous pain that made his head feel big as an inflated ball one second, and as if a compactor had crushed it the next. Dazed and disorientated, slumped on a chair in a small room, legs numb, arms locked at his wrists, his brain worked in slow motion. Through blurred vision, he saw Sharona’s outline lying on the floor. A man towered above her, growling. ‘… i
n blood, bitch. You’ll pay in blood.’
Hugh wrestled with the plastic restraint, trying to force slack. Pulled muscle agony shot up his arms. He tugged harder. The yellow tie dug into his wrists.
His vision cleared.
Sharona was gagged with duct tape, ankles crossed and tied, arms twisted behind her back. Tears trickled, but she stared at her nemesis, defying him.
‘You’ve. Ruined me. You, the Polish bitch, and that interfering northern cunt. You’ve no idea the sacrifices, the years of … My achievements. My business. You’ve destroyed my life. Court cases. Compensation. MY COMPANY. You’ll pay. You toyed with me at the ball last Saturday, you and this … hop-along Fallon. Forget about anyone coming to your rescue. The stress you’ve brought on me. The anxiety you’ve caused. You’ll pay in blood, both of you, after I find his transport. To the victor comes the spoils.’ The man pressed a mobile unit to Sharona’s neck. A surge of current flowed across the top of the device and her body jerked. The hair on the side of her neck singed. The coppery, charcoal odour of fried flesh fused with the stench of sulphur and filled the room with its repulsive reek. Her body slumped, skin turning greyish-white.
Hugh realised he could move his legs, but chronic pins and needles made both feet heavy as cement blocks.
The man pivoted.
Adam Styne.
A bulging-eyed madman, face suffused with rage, had replaced the suave businessman. Flecks of froth foamed at the sides of Styne’s mouth. His piercing blue eyes blazed with malice, teeth bared in a feral snarl.
Hugh moved a fraction in the chair, struggling to generate feeling. His heart galloped, body awash with adrenalin, shoulder muscles knotted, on fire with the battle to free his arms.
Styne stepped towards him.
Sharona groaned.
Styne twisted his head.
Hugh tugged at the ties again. Thunderbolts of pulsing pain drilled into his skull.
I’m dead, he thought. We’re both goners. There’s no way I can save us.
Ferdia’s voice swam in his consciousness:
“If you’re ever in trouble, forget the fancy stuff. Kick the other person’s knee. Hard. It’ll give you a chance to run like hell.”
Styne bent …
Five.
… transferred the stun gun to his left hand …
Four.
… tested the tie around Sharona’s ankles. Hugh clinched and unclenched his toes, squeezing circulation back into his legs, forcing blood into trapped nerves. He breathed deep, filling his lungs. Styne’s malign energy seemed to suck oxygen from the room.
Three.
Styne turned Sharona on her side, checked the wrist binds. Hugh tensed calf muscles, and the agony reduced to a cold burn.
Two.
Sharona coughed, choked on the gag. Styne caught a corner of the grey duct tape and ripped it free. ‘Breathe, bitch. I don’t want you to die. Yet.’ Gulps of air rattled in Sharona’s throat, rushing into starved lungs.
One.
Styne stood.
Go.
Adrenaline levels spiking, Hugh exploded from the chair like a gusher. Pain surged when his feet rammed against the floor. He powered across the room, eyes riveted on Styne’s right leg, his mind streaking from Alzheimer’s and redundancy, to rows and relationship break-ups. He channelled every ounce of rage, frustration and anger he’d stomached over the last week, into this front leg kick.
The right heel caught Adam Styne flush on the kneecap. The audible crack as Styne’s patella broke and relocated, sounded like a twig breaking. Pads of cartilage snapped and shifted. Muscles and tendons controlling leg motion were torn asunder. Styne’s leg twisted inwards, the kneecap shattered, forced out of its groove. His arms thrashed, the mobile fell and he face-planted the floor. Hugh whipped his foot forward and smashed the runner into Styne’s jaw. The psychopath’s condyle fractured, and the impact snapped the temporal crest.
Face muscles tight with pain, breath sawing his lungs, Hugh’s eyes searched for something sharp to cut the ties. Each step blasted lightning rods of agony around his body.
‘Hu … Hugh.’ Sharona coughed.
He whirled. ‘Sharona. Hang on. I’ll get a knife. One second.’ Hugh checked Adam Styne, unconscious, marinated in a pool of blood. ‘You’re safe,’ he said to Sharona. ‘Styne can’t hurt you now.’
Sharona gaze focused over Hugh’s shoulder. Her eyes widened, an unspoken warning. In his peripheral vision, Hugh spotted movement in the doorway, and he spun to face this new threat.
‘When you get to the part where you call the nurse, she’s here,’ Ruth said, holding a tyre iron, chest high.
‘Can you find anything to cut these ties, Ruth?’
Ruth produced nail scissors from a coat pocket. ‘Girl Scouts,’ she said. ‘Always be prepared.’ She cut Hugh’s ties, moved to Sharona and sniffed. ‘Get me water, Hugh.’
‘He knocked us out with that.’ Hugh pointed at the stun gun and rubbed his neck.
‘Hugh, get me water. Now.’
‘Okay.’ Ruth’s face swam out of focus.
Someone shook him and screamed. ‘HUGH!’
It cleared the fuzziness. ‘Water. Right. I’ll get water.’
Hugh lurched through the hallway, spotted a green push-button landline telephone on a Victorian-style chaise longue. His stomach cramped, tightened and stretched. He gagged, swallowed the bile and dry-heaved, hunting for a toilet. Sweat beads clung in patches to his skin. He changed direction, made the kitchen sink and retched.
When his breath steadied, he filled glasses with water.
‘I knew you’d find me, Hugh.’ Sharona’s voice was a croaky whisper. ‘You’re caked in blood.’
Hugh rubbed his dishevelled hair. ‘So much for that good night’s sleep.’ He wiped sticky palms on a trouser leg. ‘There’s a landline here. I’ll call 112.’
Ruth examined Hugh’s head. ‘Use the church as a landmark. Both of you look as if you’re auditioning as extras in a vampire film. And you might have a concussion, Hugh. That cut needs stitching. This is Mr Styne, I presume.’
They studied the back of Adam Styne’s head and neck, matted with blood and perspiration. Hugh gripped his shoulder and flipped him face up. A mottled, swollen bruise, the shape of Australia, had formed across Styne’s forehead; his face ballooned up to twice its size. Rivulets of mucus and blood oozed from a broken nose and blended with sweat, the mix branching out resembling tributaries across his pain-lined face. His right leg flopped. Clouds of doubt flitted across Styne’s eyes as realisation set in. The mask of invincibility now shattered, his confidence leached away with the gore that soaked the cement floor. An acrid oniony stink emanated from him; the smell of fear. Styne used elbows and left leg in a bid to back crawl. Shoes slipped on the bloody floor. He coughed, spat out a tooth, and bubbles of blood popped when he gurgled words: ‘Mphffff.’
‘Shush,’ Ruth said. She picked up the Taser and pressed it to Styne’s neck. ‘Go to sleep.’
Chapter 9
Tuesday, 15 January
12:01 a.m.
Sirens heralded the arrival of a squad car.
An ambulance crew followed and moved Sharona to Tullamore General. A guard patrolled the external house perimeter, preserving the scene. Two more supervised the interior. Another separated Hugh and Ruth and questioned them.
A second ambulance pulled in. A male nurse sedated Styne, started an IV line and swaddled his head, face and leg in bandages. Hugh overheard him whisper to a detective that “they should get this man on the operating table while the wounds were fresh.”
Someone draped a blanket around Hugh. The nurse examined his wrenched, swollen left ankle, and said the big toe on his right foot was fractured. He cleaned and daubed antiseptic on the facial lacerations and head wound, and gave him an anti-tetanus injection before accompanying the stretchered Adam Styne out. The ambulance departed, siren screaming.
In contrast to the squad car’s flashy entrance, two vans crunc
hed quietly into the driveway. Men from the first vehicle erected half-a-dozen dazzling solar light towers, and three people from the second van stepped into white Tyvek hooded overalls, boot covers and face masks. The forensic team had arrived.
Still woozy, Hugh watched the Technical Bureau squad and the forensic crew work side by side, a well-oiled machine, putting chains of evidence together. The tech guys dropped aluminium stepping plates throughout the room and hall, creating pathways and concentrated on mapping and photography. One used dark cloths as backdrops, drew diagrams, took notes and captured observations on tape. His colleague circled items with yellow chalk and placed toothpicks with flags on objects of interest.
The forensic team used kit from their murder bags to collect material evidence, sealing fibres in Ziplocs and paint samples in screw-capped plastic containers. A woman used a Spectrum 9000 light source to search for trace evidence under skirting boards and in corners. Another swabbed Hugh’s footwear. Gardaí came, went, and revisited the scene again.
‘Hugh, is it?’ The speaker looked around Hugh’s age. Muscular, with just-out-of-bed tousled crew cut hair, a hawkish nose and a ruddy weather-beaten appearance. His eyes projected an air of alertness, and the authoritative voice sounded accustomed to giving orders and getting results.
‘Yes.’
‘Detective Mulryan. Call me Marcus.’
‘Hi.’
‘We’ll move you out of here and let Dusty get working on fingerprints. Only step on the treadplates. We’ll take you for an x-ray soon. May I borrow your phone?’
It wasn’t a polite request.
Marcus passed the confiscated mobile to a colleague and then took Hugh through his version of events. The detective maintained eye contact while he jotted down information, and also kept track on the forensic team. When he’d finished, he reverted to earlier questions, seeking further clarification. Once satisfied, Marcus disappeared to quiz Ruth. Another Garda sat beside Hugh, and the interrogation began again.
Hours passed. Pre-dawn crept in like a silent assassin. A Garda returned the phone and assisted Hugh to a patrol car. Even with illuminated brilliant white lights, the house appeared bleak. Ruth drove behind them and assisted Hugh into Tullamore hospital. The Garda presence meant normal A&E protocol got scrapped. Hugh was whisked past people in a far worse condition and propelled to the top of the triage train. The radio repeater on the guard’s shoulder squawked. He listened, gave a ‘sorry-gotta-go’ shrug, and left.
