Bleed For Me (joseph o'loughlin)

by Michael Robotham

  Afterwards I intercept Ronnie Cray as she walks towards the parking area.

  ‘I want to apologise for my conduct the other day.’

  She doesn’t answer. Her eyes are stained by the wind.

  ‘I feel as though I’ve let you down,’ I add.

  Still she doesn’t speak.

  ‘I guess this is a bad time.’

  She sighs. ‘You’re one of the good guys, Professor, but you’re heading for a serious fall. I can’t afford to be associated with someone like you.’

  ‘I understand.’ I feel like I’ve swallowed a bubble of air. ‘Can I just ask you one question - is there a link between Novak Brennan and Ray Hegarty?’

  Her eyes narrow. ‘Are you suggesting Ray was bent?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why ask the question?’

  ‘I saw Lance Hegarty outside the Crown Court. He was with Brennan’s supporters.’

  ‘I guess the lad is entitled to have his opinions,’ she replies. ‘Is that all you want to ask me?’

  ‘Gordon Ellis went to university with Novak Brennan.’

  ‘That’s a statement not a question.’

  ‘Ellis got into trouble with a bookmaker. Owed him a lot of money. The bookmaker sent someone to remind Gordon of his responsibilities. The messenger spent three months in hospital and now talks through a hole in his throat.’

  ‘Gordon Ellis beat him up?’

  ‘No, but I’ve seen the man who did. He’s been looking after Rita Brennan during the trial.’

  ‘The sister?’

  ‘Yes.’

  I describe the tattoos on his cheeks, like black tears. Cray seems to be sucking on the information like it’s one of Ruiz’s sweets.

  ‘Is that it?’

  ‘I think it’s worth investigating.’

  ‘First you were trying to convince me that Sienna was the intended victim. Now you’re telling me that Novak Brennan organised a hit on Ray Hegarty. Why would he do that?’

  ‘I just want you to keep an open mind.’

  ‘Oh, I know all about keeping an open mind, Professor. Yours is so open that all your ideas fall out. I’ve just got to be careful not to step in them.’

  The funeral is over. Mourners are blown back to their cars by the wind. No wake has been planned. Ronnie Cray and her colleagues will no doubt retire to a watering hole and raise a glass to Ray Hegarty - swapping anecdotes about him and contemplating their own mortality.

  Sienna is being allowed home for a few hours. Her chaperone is a mental health nurse with gelled hair, stovepipe jeans and a skinny black tie. His name is Jay Muller and his handshake - a brief pressure and release - tells me nothing.

  ‘Call me Jay,’ he says. ‘You’re a psychologist?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You’re doing the report on Sienna?

  ‘That’s right.’

  Jay claps his hands together as though he’s won a guessing game. I ask him how Sienna has been coping.

  He leans closer, about to share his professional opinion. ‘Sleep is the problem. False awakenings. She dreams of waking up only she can’t move or make a sound. She describes being trapped in her body, unable to call out or press the emergency bell. Then there’s the “screaming” in her head.’

  ‘Screaming?’

  ‘It’s more like a rushing sound, she says, but it’s deafening.’

  ‘Has she mentioned her father?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Can I see her today?’

  Jay has a habit of picking at the corners of his lips as though scraping away food encrusted there. ‘I got no problem with that, as long as Mrs Hegarty agrees. I’m taking Sienna back to Oakham House at six.’

  On the far side of the parking area, Lance Hegarty leans against the side of a black limousine, smoking a cigarette. Sienna is somewhere inside behind tinted glass while Helen and Zoe are outside the chapel saying goodbye to the Deputy Chief Constable.

  Walking up the slope towards Sienna, I prepare to confront Lance. The last time I saw him he was hurling abuse outside the Crown Court.

  ‘You’ve got some damn nerve, coming here,’ he says, stepping in front of me and pushing his face into mine. His eyes are flecked with tiny red veins. ‘You’re working for the police.’

  ‘Wrong.’

  ‘You got her locked up.’

  ‘I’m trying to get her out.’

  Lance spits a gob of phlegm near my shoe.

  ‘I saw you yesterday,’ I tell him. ‘You were outside the Crown Court. I didn’t have you pegged as a neo-Nazi thug.’

  ‘I’m a patriot.’

  ‘The last refuge of the scoundrel.’

  Lance doesn’t understand the reference. ‘You know nothing about me.’

  ‘That’s where you’re wrong. You left school at sixteen and signed to play football for Burnleigh, but a knee injury ended your career. Two years ago you were arrested and deported from Croatia after a World Cup qualifier. Seven months ago you bashed a Pakistani student because you saw him kissing a white girl. You’re a thug, Lance. And you’re a racist. I know you’re angry. You’re pissed off that you couldn’t protect your sisters from your father. You’re angry at yourself because you didn’t stand up to him, the bully, the abuser. But what frightens you most, Lance, is the nagging little voice in your ear that keeps saying you’re just like him.’

  Blood rises. Fingers close into fists.

  ‘I’m nothing like my father.’

  For a moment I think he’s going to hit me, but the car window glides down. Sienna’s eyes have a strangely androgynous cast. White headphones are plugged into her ears, leaking a tinny hiss.

  ‘We need to talk,’ I say.

  She nods her head to the beat of the music. ‘I’m sick of talking.’

  ‘I still have questions.’

  ‘Nothing matters any more.’ Her voice is flat, almost devoid of emotion.

  The window is gliding up. Unless I say something now, I’ll lose the opportunity.

  ‘I have a message from Charlie.’

  The window stops. Sienna pulls the earphones from her ears. ‘Is she OK?’

  ‘She misses you.’

  ‘I miss her too.’ Her tongue flicks out and withdraws, moistening her bottom lip. ‘Tell her I’m sorry.’

  ‘You could tell her yourself.’

  Sienna pushes the earbuds back into place, flooding her mind with music. The window glides to a close.

  Helen Hegarty has finished saying her goodbyes. The compassion and sympathy have worn her down and I can almost see her mask slipping as she pushes Zoe’s wheelchair towards the car. She wants this day to finish.

  ‘I was hoping I might drop round to the house . . . to talk to Sienna.’

  ‘She’s only home for a few hours.’

  ‘I know.’

  Helen glances at the limousine and sighs, ‘She won’t talk to me. Maybe she’ll talk to you.’

  I help Zoe into the car, lifting her easily. She puts her arms around my neck, holding me tightly, making it easier for me to carry her. She sits alongside Sienna, taking her hand. Sienna doesn’t react.

  Having folded the wheelchair and placed it in the boot, I watch the limousine being driven away, stunned by how much misfortune can befall one family. A crippled daughter. A slain father. A racist son. A child charged with murder. There is no truth in the cliché that luck evens itself out. Maybe in games of chance, but not in real life.

  An arm slips through mine, hooking around my elbow. It is such a familiar touch that I expect to see Julianne.

  ‘I’m so sorry about last night,’ says Annie Robinson. ‘I shouldn’t have turned up like that. I don’t know what I was thinking.’

  ‘It’s not your fault.’

  ‘You didn’t call me.’

  ‘I didn’t call a lot of people.’

  ‘You’re angry.’

  ‘It’s been a difficult few days.’

  She brushes her cheek against mine. ‘Come and see me. I’ll sho
w you the photograph of Gordon and Novak Bennan.’

  36

  Helen Hegarty unlatches the front door and I follow her through to a kitchen that smells of sugar and citrus peel. She is making jam. Saucepans bubble on the stove and sterilised jars rest upside down on dishcloths on the table.

  The steam has straightened strands of her hair, which are plastered to her forehead. She wipes her hands and glances at the ceiling. ‘Sienna is upstairs. She’s packing some things.’

  ‘You’re on your own?’

  ‘Zoe and Lance have gone into town.’

  I climb the stairs and tap gently on Sienna’s bedroom door.

  ‘Don’t come in,’ she says, sounding startled.

  ‘It’s me.’

  ‘Can you come back later?’

  ‘No. I’ll wait.’

  Pressing my ear to the door panel, I hear drawers being closed and a window opening.

  ‘I really don’t want to talk to you today.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I’m not feeling well.’

  ‘I’m sorry to hear that. Let’s talk about it.’

  ‘I’m getting changed. Won’t be a minute.’

  The door eventually opens and Sienna spins away from me, crawling on to her bed and sitting against the wall, drawing up her knees and tugging her dark skirt tight over them. The room is tidier than I remember. The bloodstained rug has gone and the floorboards have been scrubbed clean.

  Walking to the window, I glance outside, wondering if someone might have been with her. The garden is below. Sienna used to brag to Charlie about climbing out the window and shimmying down the rainwater pipe while her parents thought she was studying upstairs. A gnarled cherry tree has been cut back so its branches don’t scrape against the wall.

  ‘It must have been tough today.’

  Her shoulders rise and fall.

  ‘You thought he might come, didn’t you?’

  She doesn’t answer.

  ‘Mr Ellis was never going to come, Sienna. He says you made it all up.’

  No answer.

  ‘Now he’s complained to the school that you’ve been harassing him. He wants you suspended.’

  Sienna tilts her face and glares at me. ‘I don’t believe you.’

  Behind her head I notice a torn strip of wallpaper curling like a roll of parchment. Beneath is an older layer with nursery rhyme characters. Little Bo Peep is visibly searching for her lost flock.

  ‘I don’t want to fight with you, Sienna. I just want to understand. ’

  ‘You can’t. You’re too old. You don’t know what it’s like to . . . to . . .’

  ‘Be in love?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I know you believe your feelings, Sienna. You believe he loved you. Tell me how it started.’

  ‘And then you’ll leave me alone?’

  ‘If you help me understand.’

  ‘Remember I told you how I got the scar on my leg?’ she whispers. ‘Malcolm Hogbin dared me to climb a tree and I fell out.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Mr Ellis was the first teacher to reach me. He carried me to the infirmary and got me a blanket and called the ambulance. Then he sat talking to me and told me really lame jokes until it arrived. “Don’t laugh or it’ll hurt more,” he said, and he wouldn’t let me look at my leg because the bone was sticking out. I remember wondering if he saw me fall. My dress flew up which meant he probably saw more of me than he should have, but having Mr Ellis see my underwear didn’t creep me out like I thought it might.

  ‘They had to put metal pins in my leg and I was in plaster for three months. Mr Ellis signed my cast. He drew a bird and signed his name.

  ‘“Why a bird?” I asked him.

  ‘“Because birds can fly, which you obviously can’t.”

  ‘I remember looking at his long fingers as he signed his name. He had such nice hands. And when he talked he had this deep round voice that rolled out of his mouth and burst in my ears. He said I could call him Gordon, but only when we were alone.’

  ‘You started to babysit Billy?’

  She nods and smooths her skirt over her knees. Her bruised-looking eyes now look sleepy.

  ‘I missed six weeks of school, but Gordon helped me catch up. I know you think he’s done something wrong, but it wasn’t like that. He made me feel lovely. Grown up. Special.’

  ‘How old were you when he made you feel grown up?’

  ‘We were just sitting in his car and he put his finger beneath my chin. Suddenly his lips were right there, pushing against mine.’

  She won’t look at me. Her forehead is resting on her knees.

  ‘I knew about sex. Lance kept magazines in his room and I once saw him and Margo Langdon going at it like nobody’s business in Simpson’s barn. Margo was on her back and Lance had his pants down and his backside was going up and down on top of her. I remember because Lance started whimpering and shaking and that’s when Margo turned her head and she looked straight at me.’

  ‘How old were you when you had sex with Gordon?’

  ‘Thirteen.’

  ‘That’s against the law.’

  ‘Juliet was only thirteen when she fell in love with Romeo. Gordon told me that.’

  ‘Romeo wasn’t forty.’

  ‘That doesn’t matter. True love doesn’t wait.’

  She says it defiantly, parroting the words that I’m sure Gordon whispered in her ear when he took her.

  ‘I wish you could understand,’ she explains. ‘You don’t know how wonderful he makes me feel. He could have had any girl he wanted, but he chose me.’

  ‘He’s married.’

  ‘He was going to leave Natasha when I finished school. He doesn’t love her. He loves me!’

  I produce a photograph from my pocket, holding it between my thumb and forefinger.

  ‘Remember I told you that Gordon had been married before? Her name is Carolinda Regan. Everyone called her Caro. She’s Billy’s proper mother. Nobody has seen her in three years.’

  ‘What about Natasha?’

  ‘Gordon met her at school - just like he met you. She was about your age.’

  Sienna chews at her bottom lip leaving a carmine mark that slowly fades. Hugging her knees more tightly, she grimaces as though in pain. Her bare feet are tucked beneath the bedspread.

  ‘You told me that Gordon took you away for a weekend. Where?’

  ‘I don’t know exactly. It was during the summer. Natasha was in Scotland visiting her folks.’

  ‘Where was Billy?’

  ‘He came with us. We took him for a trip to the seaside. Gordon has a caravan. I told Mum that I was spending the night with Charlie.’

  ‘This caravan - is it near the beach?’

  ‘I think so. I can’t remember much of anything. The whole weekend is a blur. I know we left on Friday afternoon and I can remember coming home. Gordon said I slept most of the time. He said it was food poisoning.’

  ‘Is that the only time you went away?’

  She nods. He eyelids are half closed. She forces them open.

  ‘Did anyone ever see you with Gordon outside of school?’

  ‘I don’t think so. Mostly we stayed in the car or went somewhere private. Sometimes I slept over when I was babysitting. I stayed in the spare room, which is next to where Billy sleeps. Gordon would sneak in and spend a few hours with me.’

  ‘What about Natasha?’

  ‘She was sleeping. I was scared she might wake up, but Gordon said that wouldn’t happen.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘He mentioned something about sleeping pills.’

  Sienna’s skin has grown ashen and beads of sweat prickle on her upper lip.

  ‘Did you ever tell anyone about Gordon?’

  ‘He made me promise.’

  ‘Did anyone suspect - someone at school, a friend?’

  Her head rocks from side to side and then stops. ‘Miss Robinson asked me.’

  ‘What did she ask you?’

&nbs
p; ‘If I was spending time with Gordon outside of school.’

  ‘When was this?’

  ‘Late last year.’

  ‘You’re sure?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Tell me where you went on that Tuesday - after Danny dropped you in town.’

  Sienna shrugs. ‘It doesn’t matter any more.’

  ‘Did you meet up with Gordon? Did he take you somewhere?’

  Sienna’s line of vision sweeps past me as though watching something terrible approaching. Something she has to escape from. She wants to run but I need her here. Gently gripping her shoulders, I make her meet my gaze.

  ‘You don’t have to be frightened, Sienna. I’m going to protect you.’

  ‘I didn’t kill Daddy.’

  ‘Show me. Prove it to me. Where were you?’

  Tears hover at the edges of her eyelids.

  ‘With Gordon,’ she whispers.

  ‘Gordon says he wasn’t with you. He’s given a statement to the police. He has an alibi. Natasha has backed him up.’

  ‘They’re lying.’

  ‘He’s letting you take the blame, Sienna. Just tell me where you went after Danny dropped you off.’

  ‘Gordon wanted me to do something for him.’

  ‘What was that?’

  Her mouth opens, but she can’t bring herself to tell me. I wait and she tries again. The words come slowly and then in a rush as though she wants them gone, forgotten, buried.

  ‘Gordon said he was in trouble, but I could help him. I just had to do this one thing for him and everything would be OK. I’d prove myself. He’d know I was the one. Then we could be together.’

  ‘What sort of trouble?’

  ‘He didn’t say.’

  ‘What did he want?’

  She shakes her head, embarrassed, ashamed.

  ‘I had to visit someone and do what he asked.’

  She puts the heel of her hand against her forehead. There are patches of colour on her throat as if someone has wrapped an invisible rope around her neck.

  ‘What did you have to do?’

  ‘I had to sleep with him,’ she whispers.

  There is a tingling in my chest like a heated wire is being pressed against my heart.

  ‘Who was he?’

  ‘I don’t know his name - some old guy who lived in a big house.’ Her voice starts to break. ‘I was dropped off and picked up later.’