Rider

by Merrigan, Peter J

  ‘What do you think?’ she asked.

  ‘That would be nice,’ he said.

  And she cried against his shoulder.

  * * *

  Dinner at Margaret’s. She said she wanted to be close to Kane, closer than before. She no longer had a son; for nearly four years Kane didn’t have a mother. Ryan got him through her last cancerous days, through the funeral, and through the desolate days and months that followed. Now Margaret and Kane were leaning on each other, offering support and receiving it in kind.

  David was distant during the meal. He and Margaret were having a whispered conversation when Kane arrived and as they ate they barely spoke to each other. Kane could only think it had something to do with the outcome of his London deal.

  Ryan was the topic of conversation for the most part. ‘Remember,’ Margaret began, ‘the time you saved his life?’ She looked at David, smiled wistfully.

  Kane had never heard this story. ‘When was that?’ he asked.

  David shook his head. ‘Years ago.’

  ‘He could have drowned if it wasn’t for David,’ Margaret told him. She drank from a glass of water. ‘Where were we? Algarve?’

  David nodded, chewed some food.

  Margaret continued. ‘It wasn’t long after we’d eaten, I think. We were sitting on the beach and it was so hot. I remember I made Ryan put on twice as much sun block as normal. He went for a swim. I told him not to go too far but you know what boys are like.’

  She paused. Kane waited, listening. It turned out he didn’t know Ryan at all.

  She sat her cutlery down, laced her fingers under her chin. ‘He got caught in the tide or something. If it hadn’t been for David’s keen eye…Well. He rescued him, anyway. Ran into the water, swam out to him, and dragged him back in, coughing and spluttering like he’d swallowed half the sea. It was months before he went swimming again.’

  Margaret took another drink and sat the glass down, daubing at the corners of her mouth with a peach-coloured napkin. She gave a tiny burst of laughter, but her eyes remained sad. Everything was just a memory now.

  David chewed on his food and stared at his plate.

  Kane could see the tension between them was hurting Margaret. He had to ask. ‘How are things with your London deal, David? Everything okay?’

  David snorted and Margaret took another drink.

  ‘Not good,’ he said. ‘The bas—’ He glanced at Margaret and stopped himself. ‘This guy in London has got it in his head that the deal won’t work. Says it’s just a feeling, but someone must’ve said something.’

  ‘Any idea who?’ Kane asked.

  ‘No, and that’s the thing. No one would want to jeopardise this for us. It’s a big deal. Our biggest.’

  So that was it, Kane thought. David was losing a deal and he and Margaret had argued about it.

  But David continued, ‘I’m going to have to go over there. Try to rescue the whole situation. I leave tonight.’ He shook his head in disgust. That revelation would have hurt Margaret even more than a lost deal. Not long after her son’s death and already her husband was talking about going out of the country.

  ‘Isn’t there anyone else that could go?’ Kane asked.

  ‘Apparently not,’ Margaret said.

  ‘Honey, I told you this already. There’s no one else we can trust. I thought you understood.’

  ‘What I understand is that you think your work is more important than everything else.’

  ‘That’s not fair. You know that’s not true. But this deal, it’s the biggest thing we’ve got. If we clinch it, we’re set.’

  Kane cleared his throat. He wasn’t sure if he should try to help them resolve this, or step back out of the way.

  ‘I buried my son yesterday,’ Margaret spat. She stood and stared at David. ‘You think that was easy for me? What I need right now is some support. I didn’t expect you to come home and tell me you’re jetting off to London on some businesslike holiday.’

  David simply stared back at her, his eyes narrow, one hand making a fist around his napkin. Calmly, he said, ‘It isn’t like that. I love you, Margaret, and I loved Ryan like he was my own, but you have to understand. This business is all we have. If I can’t make it work we’ll go under.’

  Margaret blinked, picked up her plate, and left the dining room for the kitchen.

  Kane put his hands on the seat of his chair to stand. ‘Should I…?’

  ‘Leave her,’ David said. Then he sighed. ‘I’ll go.’

  Kane watched him go through into the kitchen and stared at the door as it swung closed. Their voices were muffled, angry, and then gradually their tone softened and he thought he heard Margaret tell David she loved him. ‘Of course I’ll come with you,’ she said.

  When they came back into the dining room he was standing by the CD rack at the far wall holding a copy of an Ella Fitzgerald album. Ryan was a fan. Kane turned as they entered. ‘Do you mind?’ he asked, holding the CD up.

  ‘Not at all,’ Margaret said, her eyes hooded and sad. She came and stood by him as he slotted the CD in, and she read the track listing on the back of the cover.

  Ella’s profound and sultry voice filled the room as she crooned her happy rendition of Basin Street Blues. Margaret swayed to the rhythm, the CD cover clutched to her chest.

  ‘Ryan couldn’t get enough of the oldies,’ Kane said. Margaret smiled.

  Kane turned as David approached, handing them each a brandy. Ella finished her song and the room lapsed into silence for a few seconds until she picked up the beat with Lover Come Back to Me.

  David put his arm around Margaret, kissed her and suggested they retire to the living room before Kane went back to his flat. Margaret had offered to let him stay another night, but he refused. He felt he had overstayed his welcome already. If he was going to step foot back into his life, he needed to do it soon.

  * * *

  Kane drove aimlessly, going nowhere. He knew he needed to reconnect the threads of reality again, but he hated the idea of walking back into his empty flat.

  He drove by the cemetery but could not enter. He drove by Ryan’s workplace but did not stop. He even drove up the 20mph road outside their old secondary school but he kept his eyes straight ahead, refusing to look at the building, at the playing field, at the grassy spot in the corner where they used to sit at lunchtimes, planning their weekends and their future.

  When the last cold rays of sunlight gave up breathing life into the streets of Belfast and the evening became oppressive, he turned the car for home. As he drove, he thought about the possibility of moving house. The flat wouldn’t seem the same any more, an empty container with nothing to fill it. He knew all his memories were there, but he could easily pack them up with the furniture and take them with him. A house was just a building. It was love that made a building a home.

  There was a mild chill in the air when he stepped out of the car and triggered the central locking system. He walked through the empty parking lot and into the building, picking up the small amount of junk mail from his box.

  When he slotted his key in the door and opened it, he was struck by how dark it was. Across the room, the clouds were banking up outside the window. He flipped the light switch and dropped the post on the table. Then there was an immediate and audible oomph and a searing pain at the back of his head.

  He fell.

  Someone was on top of him. He tried to turn around but was hit on the head again. His right ear rang from the collision. He didn’t know what the object was but he was sure it wasn’t a hand or a fist.

  He tried to shout for help.

  ‘Shut up!’ a muffled voice ordered.

  Two pairs of hands grappled with his body and roughly turned him onto his back. He could feel a knee on his stomach, just below his breastbone, then a pair of hands around his neck.

  His mind was strangely alert as he could feel his lungs labouring for air. The men’s faces were hidden in balaclavas. The man on top of Kane, the only one he
could see clearly, was wearing a dark green hoodie.

  For seconds—minutes even—he struggled against his assailants, and for a moment he thought of Ryan. What would he look like in Heaven?

  And just before he blacked out, the room went crimson and purple.

  Chapter 6

  It was pitch black. Even before he opened his eyes he could tell he was in a vast, open space, like a warehouse or something similar. His shallow breathing echoed back across the room. He could feel his hands between his back and the cold floor he was lying on, the rope or twine that held them together cutting deep into his wrists.

  It took him a minute to remember what had happened. There had been someone in his apartment, someone strangling him. He swallowed saliva and coughed.

  He wondered what time it was. Something told him it was night, something beyond the darkness around him. As he let his eyes adjust to the lack of light, he twisted a kink from his neck and tried to position himself so that his hands weren’t pressing into his back so much. Overhead, some fifteen foot above, he could just about make out a corrugated ceiling.

  There was a distinct smell of wet and rotting wood that clung to the stale air around him. His stomach churned and, without realising the consequences, his cracked and hoarse voice shouted for help, the words grating in his throat. He lay his head back down and breathed through his nose. There was a soft scuttling noise not far away. A rat, he thought.

  Soon he heard a key turn in a lock and a door swing open. The blinding beam of a flashlight fell on his face. He could see nothing, but over the sound of the blood pounding in his ears he could hear footsteps coming towards him. He squinted against the light, the glare hurting his head.

  A sharp pain exploded in his hip when someone kicked him. ‘Get up,’ a rough and surly voice ordered.

  Kane tried to move. ‘I can’t,’ he breathed.

  The man kicked him again. ‘Get up!’

  ‘P-please, I…’

  He crouched and gripped Kane’s hair. The pain in his scalp was agonising. ‘We’ve got company,’ he said evenly. ‘I want you on your best behaviour. Now get up.’ He pulled on Kane’s hair and forced him into a sitting position, then let him go.

  Kane’s head span. He coughed and twisted his legs around so that he could get some leverage to rise. The man stepped back and watched. Using his hands behind his back, Kane pushed downwards against the sweaty concrete and forced his body up, but he had only risen an inch or two before his arms gave way and he was back on the ground.

  The man laughed. ‘You faggots are all the same. It’s so much fun being tied up, isn’t it?’ He leaned down and helped Kane this time.

  When he was finally standing, weak legged and stomach sore, the man ran the beam of the flashlight up and down Kane’s body. The light that splashed back on him revealed his appraising face, harsh angles, narrow eyes. ‘You look like you slept on the floor all night,’ he said.

  He flicked the beam towards the doorway, indicating that Kane should walk. ‘Slowly,’ he said. ‘If you fall again I won’t be picking you up this time.’

  ‘What do you want from me?’ Kane asked. The man smacked the flashlight into the side of Kane’s head and he stumbled.

  ‘Shut up. No talking. Move.’

  Kane shuffled across to the door and was pushed through it, out into a blindingly bright room. He could hear the buzz of the overhead lights.

  ‘He’s on his way,’ a second voice said.

  It took Kane a few seconds to adjust to the new lighting. When he could see again, he noticed two men in the room. One of them wore a green hoodie.

  This one, the man from his flat, came up to him, right in his face, and said, ‘Not a word. You’re going to sit down over here and shut up.’ He pulled up his hoodie and showed a gun tucked into the waist of his jeans. ‘Any questions?’

  Kane lowered his eyes from him and turned his head away. The man took his arm and guided him to a chair where he was told to wait. It still wasn’t clear to Kane what was going on. His arms were beginning to ache behind his back, his legs feeling numb and his head hurting.

  A short time later, someone’s phone rang. The man in the hoodie stepped out of the room to take the call. When he returned, he pulled his gun out and said, ‘On your feet.’

  The outer door opened and another man walked in. He was well into his fifties with silvering hair and a pale grey suit.

  Without a word, he approached Kane. His smile was cold and sinister.

  ‘Mr Rider,’ he said at last, ‘glad you could join us.’

  Kane kept his eyes trained over the man’s shoulder, unable to look at him.

  ‘My name’s Lucas Dawson,’ he said. ‘I told you I’d be in contact.’

  * * *

  ‘I’m going to ask you once,’ Lucas Dawson said. ‘Then I’m going to kill you.’ He motioned to one of the men, who handed him a gun. When he flipped the safety off and pressed the barrel against Kane’s forehead he almost fainted. ‘Where is it?’

  ‘What?’ Kane said. He clenched his eyes. ‘Oh God. Oh God, please…’

  Dawson pressed harder against Kane’s forehead. ‘I don’t think you heard me, Mr Rider. Did he hear me? I don’t think he did. I’m a man of my word, but I’m going to pretend you didn’t hear me the first time. Do you know where my package is?’

  ‘I don’t—’

  Dawson cut him off. His hand gripped Kane’s jaw, pressing his cheeks to force his mouth open. When he shoved the barrel of the gun in beyond Kane’s teeth, against his tongue, the metallic taste made him retch. He could feel Dawson’s breath on his eyes.

  Kane whimpered.

  There was silence. Or at least he didn’t hear anything. With his hand on the back of Kane’s head, holding him upright, Dawson withdrew the gun. Kane’s legs gave way and he slumped out of the chair, a bawling wreck of sobs and tears on the cold, unforgiving floor.

  ‘Put him back inside,’ Dawson said, and he turned and left.

  Kane was lifted roughly from the floor and hurled back through the door into the darkness. ‘Sleep tight,’ someone said, and the door closed behind him.

  * * *

  The side of his face was numb from where it had been pressing against the concrete floor for the last half hour or more. He worked himself into a more comfortable position against a wall and breathed.

  Do you know where my package is?

  Dawson’s words echoed in the emptiness of Kane’s head. He didn’t know what he was talking about. He thought—and then immediately discarded the idea—that Dawson had the wrong man. But it was Ryan—he was the reason Kane was tied up in a warehouse with endless possibilities of torture and death. He knew it even before he had seen Dawson. He knew it even as he was being strangled in his flat. He knew it all along.

  What had Ryan done? It was bad enough thinking he had been murdered because of drugs, but what else could he have been involved in?

  Kane thought back over the last couple of months, searching for any behaviour that placed Ryan at odds with normality.

  His mind flashed on the night he died, his limp body in Kane’s arms, the apology he breathed before death took him.

  Do you know—

  Kane rolled down onto his side, Ryan Cassidy shooting hoops with his emotions. He was dead and yet, somehow, he was more alive in Kane’s head than ever before.

  —where my package is?

  He pulled his knees up to his chest. Ryan had stolen something from Dawson. That much was obvious. But why?

  Do you know where my package is?

  The pain in his heart outweighed the physical pain he was feeling, his wrists torn and bleeding behind his back. No one would miss him.

  If it was still night, the night after Ryan’s funeral, Margaret Bernhard would be out of the country with David. There was no one else to care about him, no one else to even remember he existed. Ryan’s friends were exactly that: Ryan’s friends. He was the outgoing one. He was the sociable one. Kane knew some of them, sure, b
ut he wouldn’t consider any of them friends. And none of them would come looking for him.

  The sound of the men’s voices in the next room was loud, their laughter defiant. For some time Kane listened to what they were saying, unable to make it out or take it in.

  And just before he drifted off into a fitful sleep, a mouse scurried across the floor in front of him and he didn’t even care.

  * * *

  He flinched against the light that spilled across his face as the door opened. A silhouette stood in the doorway, a broad man, a cigarette burning in one hand. Dawson. He took a step inside and was immediately followed by his two cronies, guns drawn and at the ready. Kane didn’t move.

  Dawson turned and flicked a switch on the wall. Rank after rank of overhead lights buzzed on. Kane saw a mouse scurry into a dark corner and disappear. As he had already suspected, the warehouse was practically empty, except for a stack of old wooden pallets along the far wall. It was perfect killing ground, he thought. God only knew how far from the rest of the world they actually were.

  The ground he was lying on was uneven and green with mould in patches. He tried to sit up. Pea-sized rodent droppings were inches from his head.

  ‘No need to get up on my account,’ Dawson said.

  Kane stayed where he was, his back arched inward, his chin on his chest. ‘I don’t know anything,’ he said, his voice fractured, throat dry.

  Dawson nodded and sucked from his cigarette. He came and crouched beside him, his men remaining by the door, eyes ever vigilant, alert to possible threats. It was unnecessary—Kane was completely at their mercy and they all knew it.

  Kane blinked.

  ‘Ryan Cassidy,’ Dawson began. ‘You loved him?’

  Kane looked away from him.

  ‘He was a good man, yes?’ he continued. ‘Very resourceful. Except he didn’t know when to quit. So I made him quit. I have this…special power, you see. People tend to do the things I tell them to.’

  Kane turned back to him and glared straight in his eyes. ‘He can’t do anything now.’

  Dawson shrugged. ‘An unfortunate turn of events for you, I’d imagine. But, you see, I’m not concerned with the smaller things in life.’ He paused. Kane looked away again. Dawson inhaled deeply from his cigarette and flicked some ash on the concrete floor. He breathed the smoke out through his nose before he spoke again. ‘I asked you a question a short time ago. Will you give me an answer now?’