"It's fine. Thank you."
"There are clean clothes in the closet. I had Mrs. Hogan bring some of her daughter's things that she left behind when she moved to Germany a few years back. They're probably a bit dated, but I think they'll fit."
"I'm sure they'll do fine, thank you. And thank Mrs. Hogan for me if you see her."
Nicola Hogan was one of the staff that lived in the stone houses situated along the narrow gravel lane that led through the grounds to the mansion. When they'd first arrived, the roughly fifty-something woman had seemed delighted at Constance's presence. Now she knew the absence of the woman's daughter was why.
Fintan hovered for just a moment, the silence between them uncomfortable.
"Anything yet?" she finally asked.
He shook his head, knowing what she meant. They had yet to receive word from Declan that he had landed safely and while it hadn't been said yet, they both were beginning to suspect the worst.
"Dinner will be served at seven-thirty in the main dining room directly opposite us and one floor down. I hope you'll join me," he said, as he turned to leave, his movements on the two forearm crutches clumsy.
Constance turned back to the lake as the last rays of the sun fell behind the trees beyond it.
"He'll be grand, you know? He's done this kind of thing before," Fintan said.
Constance turned back to him and forced a smile. "I want to know. I want you to tell me."
"Tell you what, love?"
"About Declan's past. All of it."
Fintan adjusted his crutches and turned back to face her. "I'm sorry to say that I wasn't privy to a lot of it. My role was far more brains than brawn, intelligence gathering and the like. But I'll tell you what I do know."
"Please. I need to understand this. I know a bit about the Troubles, the IRA, their Protestant counterparts. But there seems to be more to this, more to Declan, then the IRA story I'm familiar with."
"Well, love," Fintan said, searching for the correct words. "Things in Ireland during those times were convoluted to say the least. Unless you lived it, it's hard to understand the amount of treachery and double-dealing that was a part of daily life back then. But I suppose there is more to Declan's part than was usual." The words seemed to catch in his throat and she wondered immediately if what he had to say was so bad that it could alter her view of the man she loved. Suddenly she wasn't so sure she wanted to know. But it was too late; he'd already begun to speak.
"For lack of a better analogy, Declan and his mates were like the IRA's version of the Frankenstein monster, and my father, Eamon McGuire, was the mad scientist." Fintan moved back onto the balcony and took a seat on one of the concrete benches that flanked the doorway.
Constance lowered herself onto the balcony floor and sat cross-legged to listen.
"Declan sought out the 'Ra after his parents were killed near their home in Ballygowan by a corrupt constable who was linked to a band of UVF thugs. They'd tried to hide some weapons on his da's farm and had been thrown off. Declan's da' was also a politician deeply opposed to the Troubles and always looking for a way to form a power sharing government between the Catholics and the Protestants. The UVF thought of him as a traitor to his Protestant heritage and his throwing them off his land was the proverbial straw that broke the camel's back. They murdered him and his wife at a fake checkpoint one night.
"I suppose Declan was looking for revenge and a few years later he found it. He was eleven when his folks were murdered, and when he was barely fifteen years old he went looking for their killers. Over the course of the next two years he tracked them down and killed every one of them, with the help of an older boy named Torrance Sands that he'd met in an orphanage in County Down. By seventeen, Declan had taken out eight men that were at least twice his age, most of whom had been killing since the Troubles began in the late sixties."
Constance was in awe as she took in the information. At the age of seventeen she'd been attending governor's school in Savannah, Georgia, and hadn't even been aware that there was a conflict in Northern Ireland.
Fintan continued, "Of course, you don't take out eight paramilitaries and not attract some attention. The attention Declan attracted was that of my father, who took him in as a sort of protégé, if you will; Sands, too. Declan was too young to be an official member of the army, but then so were a lot of the others who were taking part in the conflict. Right away my da' picked him out as something special. He showed an uncanny talent for tactical assaults. He could look at a given situation and within seconds tell you the best avenue of attack and where to strike for the most damage. He could also think on his feet. If an operation went south, and that happened a lot, he reacted fast and adjusted as necessary—most of the time saving the operation and the lives of the men involved in it. For someone of his age and apparent inexperience, it turned some heads. He operated under Da's direction for another year. Then my da' sent him to the Soviets to train. In a lot of ways he was the perfect recruit. He had no living family that could recognize him or worry about him."
"I thought the IRA only used training camps in Libya and such."
"That's mostly true. But Da' had a contact in the Russian special forces, The Spetsnaz. A Colonel, some man named Novikov or some such thing. He was in charge of a supposedly top secret unit at the time known as Vympel. To the best of my knowledge it was a counter-terrorism unit designed to help the Russian's win their war in Afghanistan, only it didn't operate like a typical counter-terrorism unit. It operated more like the terrorists themselves; bombings, kidnappings, assassinations. Their mission was to significantly destabilize the government of their enemy by attacking its foundation and hopefully causing a collapse from within."
"Why would the Soviets agree to train a foreigner in a top secret unit?"
"Well, you have to remember, by this time it was 1988 and the Soviet Union wasn't in a good way. The collapse had already begun in many parts of the country and there were a lot of military and police units left with absolutely no money or provisions for their soldiers, yet they were expected to carry on in Afghanistan. On top of that, corruption has always been a problem in Russia. I'm told it's even worse now than it used to be. I don't know what Da' paid this Colonel, but I know it was quite a lot. As I'm sure you've noticed, money is one thing my family has in good supply. Da' thought their training would be particularly advantageous in the 'Ra's war with the Brits. He sent twelve men. Only nine returned."
"So Declan fought in Afghanistan for the Russians?"
"I don't know exactly where they trained him for sure. Whatever happened, he came back an entirely different person. Disillusioned, I suppose. By that time there was a full blown power struggle going on in the IRA. Sinn Fein was trying to consolidate power in Belfast and had appointed its incompetent puppets to run the Army units around the North. Da' and several of the other council members didn't like it and were still committed to complete independence from Britain. He used Declan and the other eight to start what he called the Black Shuck Unit."
"Black Shuck?"
"Aye, it's a legend in southern England about some sort of demon dog that signifies death to any that see it. Da' thought it was funny, a team of Irish freedom fighters dealing out death to their British enemies under a name taken from British folk stories."
Constance nodded her understanding. She'd heard a similar story from Declan about a ghostly dog that was said to guard churches and graveyards in Ireland. The Kirkgrim he'd called it. "So how did all of this end?"
"It ended in 1993 when a member of the unit, Torrance Sands, betrayed my father and his allies to the politicians in Belfast. They subsequently hired Sands to murder the entire Black Shuck Unit. He did, in the basement of this very house nearly twenty years ago. Only Declan, a fellow named Shane O'Reilly, and myself survived."
"That's why you have trouble walking, isn't it?"
"Lower spine was shattered by a bullet from Sands' gun. I spent nearly a year in hospital in Dublin, didn't return h
ere for years until after the peace accords were signed in 2000."
"And Sands, he was a friend of Declan's? You said he'd helped him as a teenager."
Fintan nodded. "Aye, but Sands was never really a friend to anyone other than himself. He was a stone cold killer from the word go. He used my da' to get the training and experience he wanted and then he left."
"What happened to him?"
Fintan shook his head. "Nobody really knows what happened to him. He just disappeared after that night."
"And Declan made his way to America?"
"Aye, Declan went to America and the other survivor, Shane, to England where he continued in a role my father put him in, working as an informer for MI5 to bring down the traitorous bastards in Belfast."
Constance took a deep breath. The holes in the story were almost filled. All except for a few details that she didn't think she wanted to know. She'd heard stories of the Russian atrocities in Afghanistan. At times they'd wiped out entire villages in search of one Mujahideen.
She stood up. "Thank you for telling me. I know it wasn't easy."
"Ancient history, love," Fintan said, shrugging off the notion that the story was an emotional one for him. But she could tell he was lying. It was nothing if not a painful memory, a lot of painful memories, actually. She kissed him on the cheek as he stood from the bench.
"I'll get ready for dinner. I'm sure Mrs. Hogan prepares a wonderful meal."
Fintan nodded and said, "Aye, and she'd be most disappointed if you didn't come and enjoy it."
"Then I will."
He nodded again and made his way out of the large room, closing the heavy door behind him.
She stepped inside and closed the balcony door. After locking both doors she stripped from head to toe and turned on the shower in the adjacent bathroom. As steam filled the ornately tiled room and fogged the mirrored surfaces, she thought about Declan. How he'd spent so much of his life completely alone with no one to understand what he'd been through. The thought of him out there alone now dealing with the same type of treachery scared her and brought tears to her eyes. She didn't care about what he'd done in the past. She loved him and that was all that mattered. As she stepped into the streaming water, she hoped she'd see him again, that he'd survive and would return to her so they could get on with their lives.
Chapter Fifty-Three
6:32 a.m. Local Time – Friday
Gay Lane
Marloes, Pembrokeshire – Wales
Declan awoke to the sound of raised voices. Or was it the wind playing tricks with the clay shingled roof? He couldn't be sure. Maybe he'd even been dreaming. Slowly his vision focused on the low ceiling of the Sawyer's guest cottage. He heard the sound of a man yell, and this time he was sure of it. He swung his legs around and off the edge of the bed, bringing himself to a sitting position. He rubbed his face with his hands trying to clear the clinging extremities of sleep.
How long have I been asleep?
He looked out of the small window near the door. It's still dark.
He listened for the sound of the wind and heard none, nor the beating of the rain that had been falling earlier. The storm's passed, he thought, as he stood and pulled on the clothes that were draped across the bed's footboard. Thinking quickly through the events of the previous night, he realized that he hadn't used the satellite phone to contact Fintan when he'd landed. Constance had to be worried sick and probably thinking the worst. In his injured state and with his harried attempt to find shelter, he'd forgotten all about the satphone. Hopefully everything had gone smoothly with the landing at Waterford Airport and Fintan had been able to get Constance past the police. Declan scanned the floor for his duffel bag, but couldn't find it. He was certain he'd had it when the Sawyer's had shown him to the cottage. Something was wrong. Images of fully armored police officers surrounding the cottage with their rifles aimed streamed through his imagination. Had the Sawyer's recognized him from television reports? He hadn't noticed a television in the house, but he hadn't seen every room. His recklessness became obvious to him all at once, but he shook it off and forced himself to focus. What's done is done. There's no going back now.
Slowly, he turned the doorknob. The wooden door creaked as it opened and he stepped out onto the gravel pathway that led to the main house. The air was damp with lingering moisture from the rain. Overhead the sky was cloudless, the stars bright. He saw no movement along the stone wall that enclosed the backyard and relaxed slightly as he moved to the stone patio. There were no lights on in the house. He gripped the doorknob and turned it, expecting it to be locked. To his surprise it wasn't. He pushed the door inwards, revealing the darkened kitchen and the living area beyond, illuminated only by the faint light from a dying fire. He stepped inside and waited for his eyes to adjust before closing the door behind him.
Sitting alone on the leather sofa, Hannah Sawyer sniffed away tears as he approached. "I'm sorry," she mouthed.
He felt something cold touch the small of his back. He raised his hands slowly, knowing it was the barrel of a gun.
"So do paragliders always carry suppressed weapons?" Rhys Sawyer snapped, as he continued to poke Declan in the back, pushing him forward. "Why don't you try telling me the truth, Mr. Flynn, if that's your real name?"
Declan walked slowly forward and turned to face the old man. Rhys was holding the Glock pistol from the duffel bag in his right hand with the suppressor attached. "I don't mean either of you any harm. I'm one of the good guys. You have to believe that."
"The bloody hell you are. I know your kind, your whole lot in Ulster. You've been trying to restart that damned war for over ten years now," Rhys hissed. "Didn't you waste enough lives last time? How many have to die just so you all can have your damn island all to yourselves?"
Declan considered his options. He wasn't sure what the extent of the old man's experience was, but he knew that Rhys had been trained in the use of firearms just by the way he held the Glock. Declan was reasonably sure he could disarm the old man without much trouble, but if he was able to get off a shot, Hannah could be hurt or worse in the brief struggle. He decided to take Rhys up on the invitation to tell the truth. Maybe it would make a difference, but he had his doubts. The old man's voice had carried a heavy tone of bias and his words had revealed that he was no supporter of the reunification of Ireland.
"My name's Declan McIver and you're right, Mr. Sawyer. I am from Ulster, and I was involved with the conflict there. But that was a long time ago and it has nothing to do with what's happening now." He watched as a flicker of recognition crossed the old man's face.
"You're the one the Yanks are looking for, the one that killed that Jew and those other guys. Police of some sort, weren't they?"
"I didn't kill Dr. Kafni. He was a friend of mine. The others weren't police, at least not anymore. They killed Kafni's assistant and they tried to kill me. I've been set up. You need to believe me. I don't want to hurt anyone, but there are some very dangerous people who are planning something terrible if I don't stop them."
"Hannah, come here now," Rhys ordered. Declan could tell he didn't believe a word of it. Hannah stood up and moved cautiously behind her father, her eyes narrowing as she looked over his shoulder towards Declan. Finally her father had been right about bringing home strays.
"I watched your lot kill too many innocent people. I was in Oman. I served my country and had a lot of good mates there. My time was up, but many of them weren't so favored. They came home from foreign soil only to end up in Belfast getting their arses shot off by their own citizens."
Declan had no interest in arguing the finer points of British expansionism, but he saw it as an opportunity. Rhys had revealed his feelings about the Troubles and Declan thought that if he could use the obviously sore subject to make the old man angry, maybe he'd make a mistake and provide an opening to disarm him without anyone getting hurt.
"The British Government treated Northern Ireland like it was a foreign country, opening fire
on civil rights protests and holding entire neighborhoods hostage for nearly three decades, just because they were Catholic instead of Protestant."
"And what were they supposed to do when those neighborhoods openly supported becoming part of another country completely?" Rhys snapped. "There are words for that. At the very least it was sedition, but more likely it was treason."
Declan could see that his words were having the desired effect. Already Rhys had lowered the pistol several inches and now held it at waist level. Declan flashed a purposely smug smile. "So what do you propose we do? Shall we stand here arguing politics all night?"
"I'll be damned before I let another one of you Fenian bastards cross my land in order to get to London and set off more bombs, killing more innocent people! I stood by once before and the letter bombs the bastards mailed cost my brother his sight!"
Declan saw his opportunity as the pistol was lowered even further and he stepped forward suddenly. Rhys quickly brought the gun up to eye level and Declan knocked it aside with a strike to the wrist. Rhys fired two shots from the weapon, but hit only the wall of his house. Throwing his fist forward, Declan caught the old man in the nerve center just above the stomach. As Rhys bent forward in pain, Declan finished his attack with a chop to his neck, compressing his carotid artery and knocking him unconscious. He wrenched the Glock from the old man's hand and slowly lowered him to the tiled floor.
Hannah screamed and stood against the wall near the door, seemingly afraid to move.
Bending down, Declan felt for the old man's pulse.
"Don't touch him!" Hannah screamed, beginning to cry.
"He'll be fine in a while," Declan said, standing up and placing the Glock in the waistband of his jeans. He walked over to where she stood against the wall and looked at her. He wanted to be comforting but he knew nothing he could say would make a difference. The best thing he could do was leave. He bent down and picked up the duffel bag that was beside the back door, unzipping it to make sure the items Lynch had packed were still inside.
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