‘Because violence always works, right? You shut up. It’s nothing to do with you.’ I turned back to Dad. I shouldn’t have come home, but I hadn’t wanted to be alone in my flat.
I should have stayed with Marcus. He would have looked after me. He would have understood. And maybe — it had never occurred to me before — he might not have wanted to be alone either, and we could have looked after one another.
‘That’s absolutely not what I’m saying. He never did anything of the sort. He only went up to the farm because he knew I’d have gone anyway, and he didn’t want me to go alone.’
‘He should have stopped you.’
‘Stopped me? He has no more right to order me about than you do. And anyway, I’m glad we went up. It was the right thing to do.’
‘He was off duty. The police got there soon enough, and you didn’t achieve anything by going.’
‘We don’t know that. If we hadn’t gone up, they might have been able to get those poor people away. Something terrible might have happened.’ Was it beyond belief that they might have killed them for their own protection, the way they’d planned to kill Marcus and me? ‘Those men might have got away.’
‘And by going up there, you nearly died.’
I shivered. The thick smoke. The growing heat. The frantic moment as Marcus had struggled to haul me up on to the roof. ‘I had to do the right thing. You know I do. Everybody should.’
Mum had been replacing everything, piece by piece, in her sewing box, listening and waiting for her moment to intervene. ‘Eilidh, go and get changed. I want to hang that frock up before it gets marked. Now, Bronte.’
I turned to her, my lips set. The look on her face showed me that I wouldn’t get the kind of sympathy I was hoping for. ‘What?’
‘I’m not going to blame Marcus for everything that happened to you. I’m afraid you bring it on yourself. Ever since you first started getting silly ideas about what’s right and what’s wrong—’
‘They aren’t silly ideas. They’re important. What am I supposed to do? Sit back and let people keep others enslaved? Seriously — slavery. It’s real. It’s happening all the time, right in front of us.’
‘No-one is forced to steal, and you don’t have to take responsibility for every no-hoper who’s simple enough to hide behind that excuse. You’re far too kind-hearted and far too gullible.’
I was almost speechless. ‘That’s not what—’
‘Nevertheless,’ she went on, as if I hadn’t spoken, ‘it seems to me that since you’ve been involved with this man—’
‘He has a name.’
‘—since you’ve been involved with him, you get into ever deeper trouble and ever more danger. I’m not suggesting you aren’t the architect of your own misfortune, Bronte, but he certainly isn’t a calming influence on you.’
‘Your mother and I are ultimately responsible for your welfare,’ Dad chipped in. Whatever my mother thought about Marcus, they’d talked it through and they were in agreement. She would play the good cop and he the bad.
There was only one cop I wanted in my life. ‘I’m twenty-six. I’m responsible for myself. I didn’t come crying to you. I’m just trying to be honest with you.’
‘And I’m being honest with you. You do enough damage on your own. With him, you get into even more trouble. I don’t want you to see him again.’
‘Amen to that!’ Eilidh couldn’t help herself.
‘I told you to go and change.’ Mum, reminded, shooed her out of the room.
I drew a deep breath. The flames of the gas fire licked up in a sudden alarming memory. I’d seen too much fire. ‘For God’s sake. I came here because I needed a break. I came home because I wanted some sympathy.’
‘We’re very sympathetic. We’re just suggesting ways in which you could make your life a little bit easier.’
‘Let me speak. Let me tell you something.’
They were silent, all of them. Even Eilidh, pausing in the doorway so as not to miss anything, forbore from any comment that might draw any more hostile attention to her.
‘I’m happy when I’m with Marcus. He’s a good man. When I’m with him, I’m always comfortable.’ I was mad not to have gone back with him, but maybe this scene was meant to happen, too.
‘It’s quite clear that you haven’t been yourself for weeks.’ Mum shifted to the sympathy I’d craved, but too late.
‘It’s not because of him. It’s since I changed my job. I keep getting flashbacks to what happened in the past, but that isn’t Marcus’s fault.’
‘Then,’ said my father, as if the answer was the simplest one possible, ‘you must give up your job.’
I looked at them. Dad, with his transport and storage business. Eilidh, a butterfly in marketing. Liam and Finlay, working occasional shifts in a bar to pay for drink and travelling to football matches while they studied. Mum, at home, devoted to all our welfare. Not one of them did anything for the less fortunate, unless it was the painless, conscience-soothing writing of an annual cheque for the local church’s overseas mission.
‘Just because something’s difficult, it doesn’t mean it isn’t worth it. I’m glad I’m doing that job. It’s hard, but it’s rewarding. I couldn’t do it if I didn’t have Marcus to help me through it. So, don’t ever think I’m going to give him up. You’ll have to learn to live with it.’
Dad sat there for a while with narrowed eyes, while everyone waited for his response. But there was a smile lurking in his eyes. He liked spirit. ‘No promises, Bella,’ he said, after a while. ‘But maybe — just maybe — I’m going to have to meet this man of yours.’
Chapter 39
Because Andy was still avoiding me at work, it was Mariam who told me he’d made sure he was kept well up-to-date on the details of everything that happened in Perthshire. None of the details came back to me, either from Andy or from Nick Riley, and though Marcus would tell me everything he knew, I wasn’t yet ready to give him the chance.
Tempering his understanding of my problems with his usual demand for sacrifice, Andy nevertheless kept me working on the social media coverage for the Kowalski case until well after I was supposed to be finished on the Tuesday. I’d written a blog post on the evils of society and its indifference to other people’s vulnerability, and drafted a statement for Andy to issue to the press, condemning modern day slavery in general and a failure of the police to take it seriously in particular. In my imagination, Marcus raised his eyebrows at that.
‘You did a good job, Bronte.’ Inevitably, Andy’s path and mine eventually crossed, and we found ourselves leaving the office together. ‘I’ll say one thing for you. You work hellish hard. The weekend must have been difficult for you.’
That was an understatement. Loneliness never bothered me until I met Marcus and imposed it upon myself, but the weekend had lit the touch paper of another series of nightmares for me. If I’d been disposed to seek out Marcus’s company, he’d surely have been too tied into police business by Nick Riley’s officiousness to spend his time with me. ‘It wasn’t great.’
‘No. But at least we’ve been able to get involved in helping the survivors. That’s a good thing you’ve done. They’re being properly looked after.’
I waited at the bus stop where Celina had stood to watch me, expecting him to head on, but he didn’t and when the bus appeared, a few minutes later, he got on it and sat beside me.
‘Is there any update today?’ I asked, when he offered me no information.
‘Yes, the social services phoned me. Janosik looked after them reasonably well, it seems, though that doesn’t in any way diminish what he did. But all four of them are very scared, and will take a hell of a lot of reassuring that they aren’t in any trouble.’
‘They won’t be, will they?’ As Marcus would point out to me, crimes had been committed, but surely any justice would be tempered with mercy.
‘They’ll have Planet People to answer to, if they try.’ His brow darkened into a frown. ‘We’ll
get one of your social media campaigns going. I don’t know what kind of impression you have on Nick Riley, but when you’re in full injustice mode, you scare the hell out of me.’
Typical Andy. He’d tell anyone a lie if it advanced his cause, but it worked. I smiled. ‘Thanks. Will they stay here, do you think?’
‘The young woman will. Celina. She says she’s got nothing to go back for. The others are taking some time to think about it. Either way, we’ll be doing everything we can to support them and make sure they feel welcome here.’
I thought yet again of Celina, her blue eyes almost surprised at her own courage as she’d appealed to me for help. Maybe I’d see her again. Whatever happened to her, she’d come through it, whether she had to spend the next few years waiting for her boyfriend to come out of prison or whether she’d find someone else. I might have felt sorry for Casimir Janosik, if he hadn’t abandoned Marcus and me to die in a storm.
‘Andy, this kind of thing is happening all the time. This wasn’t an isolated incident, or even on a particularly large scale. We have to do something to stop it.’
‘We’ll never stop it, but we can have a damn good try. I’m thinking of proposing a joint campaign, between us and the police. Publicise the kinds of things people should look for. They can go to the police, or if they feel they might be treated too harshly, they can come to us. We can set up a helpline for people to call. Do you reckon you could manage to organise something like that? It’s concrete, it raises our visibility.’
‘I’m sure I could, if you think so.’ The bus jolted down the hill towards my stop. I got up. Normally I’d have walked, but I was getting lazy now that I was working full time. ‘This is my stop. I’ll see you tomorrow.’
He heaved himself to his feet. ‘I’ll get off here, too. I’ve got a bit further to go, but I’m early. A bad habit. The walk will do me good.’
‘Where are you off to?’
‘A public meeting. Integration of different religious groups. It’s the first one — it’s bound to be a bit tetchy. Everyone has their prejudices. But they’ll get over it.’ We walked a few steps in silence. ‘Fancy coming along? I can see a bigger role for you in Planet People than just social media. You have organisational skills, and it would be a waste of your talents not to use them.’
If I went to the meeting with him, he’d become impassioned and fired up, and I would remember all the other times and all the other people, and how everybody else’s prejudices and everybody else’s unwillingness to understand a different viewpoint had nearly cost me my life. Sacrifices? I’d made enough for the moment. ‘If you don’t mind, I’d rather not.’
‘It would be a step for you,’ he said, understanding, ‘in learning to trust. As we discussed.’
‘I’m sorry, Andy.’ Already I was experiencing the first flutter of the heart that presaged a panic attack, the first flickering at the back of my mind that would give way to fear and, later, nightmares. ‘It’s too soon.’
‘I understand. These things take time. Trauma hurts. But never be afraid to show your scars. The people who matter will respect you for it.’ He stopped at the traffic lights. ‘I’m heading up here. I’ll see you tomorrow then.
‘Bye, Andy.’
I stood in the street outside my flat and breathed deeply, too scared even to go in alone. That wasn’t fear. That was stupidity. And there was only one person in the world I could rely on to make me feel better.
I got out my phone and called Marcus.
Chapter 40
On his way out of work on the Tuesday, Marcus finally allowed his impatience to get the better of him, executed a sudden U-turn in the middle of the corridor, and headed up to Nerissa’s office. ‘Are you busy?’
She raised a good-humoured eyebrow. ‘As you see. A pile of paperwork up to my eyes, and I’ll end up taking it home. But I think I can guess why you called in.’
‘I’m assuming that Nick Riley isn’t returning my calls because he thinks I’m a time-waster. But I did wonder whether he might have decided it was wise to keep you informed.’
She laughed at him. ‘He hasn’t got back to you because he’s come up with some completely specious excuse about compromising the progress of the investigation if he does so. But apart from that, you’re right. I had to try a couple of times, but I did manage to get five minutes of his precious time this afternoon.’
‘So, what’s happened?’
She looked down at her note pad. This time there were fewer exclamation marks and her doodles were more serene. ‘More or less as we expected. Fair play to Nick — he may have made a balls-up of the investigation, but he’s shutting the stable door firmly enough. The investigation from here on will be rigorous. He’s a master of detail when he wants to be.’
‘I can imagine that.’
‘He’ll have to be, for reasons I’ll explain later.’ She consulted her notes again. ‘You were correct in your deductions. I expected no less. The man you and Bronte both saw is Casimir Janosik. He sang like the proverbial canary and, in fairness to him, he did express some form of remorse. In association with a man named Douglas Henderson, his business partner — dominant business partner, I might add — he found a more lucrative line of business than honest hard work. Henderson, by the way, wasn’t so keen to cooperate.’
‘Janosik was in financial difficulties? I wondered about that. The farm’s pretty run down and there was no stock.’
‘Yes. He’s recently had to finance an expensive divorce, and Henderson bailed him out, to a significant degree.’
‘Was it all Henderson’s idea?’
‘It seems to have been. He’s a deeply unpleasant character with a conviction for manslaughter in a pub brawl. Ten years. As far as I can tell, he’s a man motivated by greed and anger, so it’s no wonder Janosik was afraid of him.’
It must have been that red-hot fury in defeat that had motivated Henderson to set fire to the bunkhouse when he’d failed to take Marcus out on the A9 — a desire to take other people down with him when he fell. ‘I see that.’
‘The only thing I think we can be grateful for is that the operation was on such a small scale. Janosik is a fluent Polish speaker, of course. He was the man in charge of the day-to-day operation. Henderson cased the joint and took the gang out to steal. It was a smart operation — never the same combination of them, always one of them on the watch. He prepared thoroughly. His gang were instructed to make it look like an opportunistic break in, but in every case, he targeted a few high-value items.’ She shook her head. ‘I’m not sure which of them had the criminal mind, but at least Janosik seems to have something that passes for a conscience.’
He must do. Marcus cast his mind back again, to the man rushing into the flames where he hadn’t dared, saving a life that he himself had not been prepared to risk a sacrifice for. A tinge of guilt irritated his own conscience, but he knew he’d do it again. If he’d gone in, Bronte would have gone with him. There was nothing, in the end, to regret. ‘Are Janosik and Celina both all right?’
‘Yes. He’s in hospital — he’s sustained a lot of smoke damage to his lungs, though he’ll be out and off to prison very soon. I don’t imagine he’ll get bail. And Celina is astonishingly resilient.’
‘From what you said about the kind of life she’s had, I’m not surprised.’
‘Yes. She’s devastated about her brother, of course, but I sense she’ll get over that, too.’
‘I don’t imagine she expects much from life. What’s another knock back?’
‘Don’t sound so bitter.’
‘I know he saved her life,’ Marcus said, thinking again of Celina’s vulnerability, ‘but I don’t think I’d be able to forgive him for the way he exploited her. And the others.’
‘I know exactly what you mean.’ She sighed, fretfully. ‘From what Nick says, she seemed genuinely fond of him. But I don’t know what option she had but to persuade herself that it was in her best interests.’
‘He’s old enough to be
her father.’
‘Age gaps like that do work, in some cases, of course. But not this one. I can only hope she gets over him very quickly. She strikes me as pretty tough, so I’ll guess that she will.’
Marcus thought of what little he knew of Celina — the flinty blue eyes, the still expression on her thin face. That other, much younger man had crept out of hiding and slid an arm around her to comfort her, and she’d leaned her head against his shoulder in acceptance. She would be all right. Life might not have been kind to her, but it had made her into a survivor. ‘What about the others? Similar story?’
‘Yes. Henderson and Janosik targeted the most vulnerable of the workers on the farm, and played on their fears in the most cynical and brutal manner. They’re all very scared and none of them in top physical form, but they’ll all recover very quickly. But the social services are on the case, and I believe Andy Watt and his charity are getting involved, too.’
Marcus allowed himself a wry smile at finding himself on the same side as Andy. ‘They do publicity very well. I can’t say I’m surprised. And maybe we need people to bring these things to the public attention more immediately than we do.’
‘Yes. One other thing. Nick has placed himself under investigation, citing a conflict of interest. He owes Janosik money. Not much, but enough to persuade him to look for a solution that didn’t make his own life difficult. I understand he genuinely didn’t believe the man was involved, but he wasn’t motivated to look.’
‘That explains a lot.’
‘It does. He’s properly repentant and working his backside off to make amends.’ Nerissa flicked her computer off. ‘Obviously you’ve suffered no ill-effects. How’s Bronte?’
‘She’ll be all right.’
She looked at him with some sympathy. He told her very little about his private life, but she was an incisive judge of character and it was difficult to hide anything from her. ‘It’s not surprising she takes time to learn to trust.’
Storm Child (Dangerous Friends Book 3) Page 25
