Before: Sam Ireland Thriller Book 4 (Sam Ireland Thriller Series)

by Finn Óg

  “Which are what?” Min’s patience with her was exhausting. “What is it you’re suggesting?”

  Áine failed. She turned away. “Sorry, I don’t know. Nothing. Of course, nothing. Stupid, I’m sorry. Ignore me, I didn’t mean it.”

  Min knew she was crying but let her be. “Fran, how long would it take to get from Cork to Dublin?”

  “Three hours tops. Less in lockdown traffic.”

  “Ok, we need to think it out. He came back because of Sinead, yes? He must’ve, otherwise he wouldn’t be at that lock-up.”

  “Yeah,” Fran said in Áine’s silence.

  “So somehow he knows more than we know. And somehow he’s inside that building and that’s the only link we have to Sinead.”

  Áine gradually turned back towards Min, not even trying to mask her distress. “So do we tell all this to the Guards?”

  “Maybe,” Min said. “But we need to work out the timings – we need to understand how he got there before us. And we’re going to have to make a decision.”

  “On what?”

  “Whether one of us is going to read his last letter.”

  33

  “We need to eat,” Min broke a solid two minutes of silence. “Without food and rest, we will be at a disadvantage.”

  Áine stared at him. “Do you seriously just function like a machine?”

  Fran decided to get offside. “I am very happy to assist with the preparation of a meal,” he said, “if there are no objections?” But he was already making his way across the open living room towards the kitchen area.

  “The Guards will be calling soon.” Min looked out at the morning light shining off the Liffey.

  “I’ll not hold my breath,” Áine replied.

  Min was quiet for a while, facing the windows, mulling. Eventually he sighed and said, “I really don’t think we should tell them.”

  “Why?”

  “A, they don’t seem likely to do anything. B, worse still, that they do do something and make a complete balls of it.”

  “How?”

  “They’re called plods for a reason. But, honestly, Áine, there was something about the way he stood, looking towards me.”

  “Imaginary Sam, you mean?”

  “It was Sam, Áine. I think you know that. It fits. The whole thing fits – just about. And I’ve known that man nearly twenty years. It was him.”

  “Then he’s either a gangster who has somehow been playing us all along, or he’s … I dunno what he is.”

  “The stare, into the blackness, I think, might have been deliberate. He could just have waved me in to give him a hand.”

  “What – you think he knew you were there?”

  “Mebbe. Aye.”

  “So he could have brought you in to take over whatever’s going on in that lock-up?”

  “Aye, two’s better than one, and we’ve been against the odds before.”

  “Unless – and you won’t listen to me – he is somehow wrapped up in it all.”

  “You know that makes no sense.” Min turned towards her. “Don’t ye, like?”

  Áine lay back into her chair, her pain making her wince. “Yeah,” she said.

  “I think he deliberately came down with the other man to check the car alarms, that he somehow sensed someone was there.”

  “That’s ridiculous.”

  “He might have seen me – you never know.”

  “Sure, even if he had, in the black dark, you said it yourself – you and Sam could probably have taken on whoever was inside.”

  “Aye, but, what if, like, he was somehow working at it – getting the information he needs? He seems to know Sinead’s in trouble, right?”

  “Well, from emails, he’ll know at least that I’ve been attacked.”

  “But what I’m thinking is he knew before he left that there was a problem – before you emailed Sinead’s last letter. How could he know?”

  “Why do you think he knew?”

  “Cos he left in a hurry, intae a dangerous environment with his wee lassie. You heard the man,” Min nodded to Fran clattering about in the kitchen, “a cruise ship is no place for a kid in a pandemic.”

  “Ok …”

  “And he could have waited it out, instead of presumably stowing away on a liner.”

  “Yes.”

  “And he’s at the lock-up – I mean, that’s the bottom line here. He was there – before we were, so he obviously knows more than we know.”

  “Well, that I can’t argue with.” Áine’s eyes remained closed, her fingers resting against her temple.

  “I think he knew someone was standing in the dark, and, more than that …”

  “What?” Áine’s eyes fluttered open.

  “I can’t help it, and I can’t say why, but I think he knew it was me.”

  Áine scoffed. “Unless you glow in the dark—”

  “Think about it, though. He very deliberately came to that door and stood guard in a specific way – facing the opposite direction to the car sirens. Anybody else would have expected trouble from the other side – towards the cars.”

  “I can’t picture what you’re describing.”

  “Well, that doesn’t matter, but it was weird – the way he stood, like he was … what’s the word? Sort of, like … willing me tae stay put.”

  “Imploring?”

  “Aye! Exactly that. Imploring me to no’ get involved.”

  “And you could tell all that without being able to see his face until he turned back into the doorway.”

  “Ahh, I sensed it, but I know how that sounds. It was a feeling more than anything.”

  “I reckon he was just standing there to protect the building in case anyone tried to sneak in the way you had planned, and you’re making excuses for leaving the place and coming back here.”

  Min stared at her.

  She sat upright and hung her head. “I’m a nasty wee bitch sometimes. I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean that.”

  “Part of ye did,” he replied, “otherwise it wouldn’t have been said.”

  “Min, you’ve been so good to me. I’m sorry.”

  She heard him move away, and she began to cry yet again.

  Áine listened to Fran and Min in the kitchen. The apartment was open plan but had enough separation for her to remain largely alone. Words between them were few. She knew Fran would have overheard all that had been said and she felt shame and guilt and pain and fear. She wracked her aching head for the words to begin to make amends.

  Eventually she rose and, adopting the only tactic she knew, went into the kitchen.

  “Min, will you read Sam’s letter? Please. I’m so terrified for her. I’m not able to be rational. I don’t mean what I’m saying. I’m just … I don’t know what to do or think.”

  Min looked at her, as if he was able to strip the layers back. For a moment she thought he was done with her.

  “Ye need tae understand this,” he began, “I don’t mind people saying what they’re thinkin’. I can manage that – even when they’re wrong, but don’t pull the soppy shit wi’ me. I know you spoke out o’ turn there, I know ye said ye were sorry, and once I’m calmed down that’ll be the end o’ it. But you need tae also understand that this is no’ ma first run round the block. You need tae listen tae what I’m tellin’ ye, and ye need tae eat, ye need tae sleep, and ye need to be at yer best – cos sure as hell you’re rapidly becoming no bloody use to anyone. De ye get that?”

  Suitably chastened, she nodded sheepishly, in a manner she was unaccustomed to.

  “Now, eat.” He pointed a knife at a third plate laid out by Fran, who had continued to eat silently, eyes down, wishing he’d just stayed in bed. “After, I’ll read the letter, and then we’ll see what’s what.”

  34

  Min opened the envelope and was not one bit surprised by the brevity of the typed message. Fran and Áine were sitting round the table trying to pretend they weren’t looking at Min every few seconds to see his re
action to what he read.

  “Wait a minute,” he paused and looked up at Fran. “How did this arrive?”

  Fran drew in a breath. “Well,” he began, embarrassed, “that one came in an email on an attachment that got sent to my junk, so it was binned for a few days before I realised it was there.”

  Áine choked out in incredulity, “You’re telling us this now?”

  Fran turned to her. “It’s only in the last few hours that we realised he’s in Ireland!”

  “Shut up,” Min quietened them both. “When did it actually arrive?”

  “I think it may have landed eight or nine days back.”

  “Bloody hell,” Áine said, her head shaking painfully.

  “Ok, ok,” said Min, keeping everyone calm. “So after Sinead disappeared?”

  “Seems so,” said Fran. “Reason I didn’t see it was it came from a weird email with dolphin watching in the address. Course I now know that’s this man in Dominica.”

  “Whales,” Áine said.

  “What?”

  “Whales. Not dolphins.”

  “Really.”

  “It’s whales,” she repeated testily.

  “Ok!” Min said again.

  “What does the letter say?” Áine held her hands open.

  “Gimme a minute.” Min finished scanning to decide whether or not it was too private to share, then began reading aloud.

  “This is important. More on the other stuff later, I promise, but you need to take this very seriously. Daniel got a call an hour ago from a number we now think might be in Europe. I’ve got a friend working on that, but he was told by the caller that they know where ‘the phone’ is, and that if they don’t get it back, they’re going to do you harm. That’s what they said. I know they mean you because they said they would come to the convent and they would hurt you. So I need you to tell Min. I need you to tell him straightaway. I know he has been helping you. I need you to tell Min, and to do whatever he says. WHATEVER he says. You need to stay away from the convent, and you need to stay away from the apartment. And you need to throw away the bloody phone you called Daniel from. And if anything happens, just tell them where it is. Just tell them. No bullshitting around – don’t let that other one persuade you otherwise and don’t let your conscience kick in. Just tell them, because this is not an idle threat. Just give them what they want and leave the rest to me. You let me worry about everything else.

  “This is not a joke and I do not want to scare you but there is no choice here. You must know how important you are to me – to us, so please just do what I ask. Please. I am not going to go through this again. Please, just do what I say. Get out, don’t go to work and speak to Min.”

  Min looked up.

  “That’s it?” Áine said.

  “That’s it.”

  She looked to the window. “That bloody text I sent. It started all of this.”

  “What?” Min asked.

  “When I dumped the madam’s phone in the bin in the park and then immediately used my phone to text Sinead. They just joined the dots.”

  “I don’t know—” Min wavered.

  “They’ll have used location.” She found herself keen to convince the men of her guilt. “I texted Daniel from the madam’s phone, beside the bin in the park, then I dumped it. Then I texted Sinead, and that must have connected Daniel in Dominica, to me, to Sinead, in a triangle.”

  “No,” Min said. “That would mean they knew where the madam’s phone had been. They’d have looked in the park.”

  Áine was not for having her act of contrition challenged. Her head fell a little. “It’s the only way. They’d have had a window – a short one – to see where the phone last was. They had no reason to search the bin – they’d have assumed their phone left with mine. Its location beacon would have failed with the battery.”

  “However they did it is besides the point. I think we can agree now that Sam knew before we did that Sinead was in danger.”

  Áine’s face was buried in her hands. Fran flitted his worried stare between the two, but decided to pose a question, quietly, to break the distress.

  “That doesn’t explain how he knew where to go, though, does it? How he ended up in that lock-up?”

  Áine lifted her head again. “No,” she nodded, “and who’s the friend he mentioned he had working on it?”

  “I’ve an idea who that might be.”

  “Why didn’t he ask you to do it?” Áine snapped her head to Min. “He’s asked you for that sort of thing before – and you’d be well placed for it?”

  “That, I can’t answer,” he said. “But at least we know now how he knows. He’s one step ahead of us, and he’s done bloody well to get in there, however the hell he’s done it.”

  The three looked at one another around the table.

  “Question is, what do we do now?”

  “Trust him, I reckon,” Min said. “And I need to make a call.”

  Min sat in Áine’s bucket seat and debated for a long time whether to dial the number. There were huge potential problems with opening up such a front, yet not doing so would leave Sam on his own – completely isolated – in handling whatever it was he was handling.

  The bottom line, he told himself, is there’s a missing woman at the hands of dreadful people. She was the sister of someone he very much wanted to help, and she mattered to a man he wouldn’t, and couldn’t, let down.

  There are a small number of occasions, he told himself, when consequences need to be dealt with later – when his own rules about prior planning ways out of problems need to be ignored. This was one. He needed to get the job done, then he would work out how to clean up the mess.

  He held his own phone in his hand and stared at it. His hand hovered over the contact, wavered, and reached for the IP phone. Nightmare had already established that Áine couldn’t be easily detected – even by experts, but Nightmare and his team were not GCHQ. Min knew well that there was always some agency out there with greater power, know-how – and in the case of British intelligence, determination to get what they want. So he set the IP phone down as well, pushed back the bucket chair and opened the control room door.

  “Fran,” he called.

  Fran turned from stacking the dishwasher. Min caught sight of the hem of patterned pyjamas sticking out of his waistband as he stood upright. “Yes, brother?”

  “Would you mind if I used your phone?”

  “Not a bit.”

  “You should know that it’s to make a call to someone who might be on the radar.”

  “Whose radar?” Fran inquired, but with a glint in his eye.

  “British intelligence. It’s only a maybe, like, but …”

  “Is it important?”

  “That I call him? I think so, yeah.”

  “Then imperial intelligence be damned, my friend. Make the call.”

  Min looked at Fran with a degree of wonder, smiled at his gleeful roguery, and accepted the proffered phone. He looked at his own as he tapped in the number and returned to his seat. It began to ring.

  “Leave a message,” a female robotic voice commanded. Min wasn’t surprised. This man wasn’t going to commit his voice to a line. He did as she directed. “You’ll know who this is. Gies a wee call back on this number, please. Urgent, like.” Min hung up.

  He returned to the kitchen where Áine looked up at him expectantly. “Had tae leave a message. If he’s involved in helping Sam, like I suspect he is, then I’m not completely sure he’ll return the call.”

  “Why not? Who is he?”

  “He’s a man Sam and I worked with way back. I canny say a whole lot about that, but he’s the Scouser I mentioned before. Good guy, Rob. He stayed in the unit we were seconded to after we left. Could be fifteen years ago now. He’s solid. But him and Sam were kinda reunited not so long ago, and I know they were in touch. Anyway, he got stroked by the folks he was working for—”

  “Military?”

  “That kind of thing, aye
. It’s very very complicated, and Sam was in the middle of it. The upshot is, this man will have no love for the powers that be, and if I’m right, I’m guessing that’s maybe part of the reason Sam went to him for a hand.”

  “Part of the reason?” Fran asked.

  “He’s got top-end surveillance experience. The latest – the very latest know-how. He’s been using kit we could only dream of. He’s the type of boy would be snapped up by private security or tech firms now he’s out of the job.”

  “Oh? So who does he work for now?” Áine’s interest was piqued.

  “Haven’t a clue. He’s literally just out, and I mean a few months, that’s all, so he’s probably no’ working for anyone just yet. Except maybe Sam.”

  The phone in Min’s hand began to buzz. Number withheld. “Fran, I’m gonnie take this, ok?”

  “No problem.”

  Min walked back into Áine’s control room and hit the green circle.

  “Hello?”

  “A’right, mate?” The voice was pure Liverpool.

  Min smiled, remembering how Rob had often been referred to as Ringo.

  “Thanks for coming back to me so quick. How you gettin’ on?”

  “Eh, mate … whose phone are you calling from? I’m running the number now but it’s taking a while cos it’s out of jurisdiction.”

  “An acquaintance of our friend. I’m amazed there are so many people who like him.”

  “You’re not wrong there, mate, for a bloke who does nothing but cause trouble. So you reckon it’s safe enough? I’m ok this end, like.”

  “I think so. He’s well removed from it all, this bloke.”

  “Well, can you use the, eh … the channel?”

  “I think so. Why don’t you let me try. If you approve this unit, I’ll see if I can pick you up. If not, I’ll buzz you back here and we’ll find another way, aye?”

  “Do well, mate, ta-ta.”

  The line went dead and Min made his way back into the kitchen.

  “Fran, I need you to install a new app store on your phone, but first I need to know who pays the bills and who this unit is registered to?”