The Killing Files

by Nikki Owen

‘Dr Carr said that you would be helping people, my dear, that you were so intelligent, so unique that only good could come out of what they were doing with you.’

  ‘For the greater good,’ I say now and, turning from her begin to rock as inside me a tsunami of emotions rages. ‘My handlers—did you help to arrange them? Father Reznik, my university professor, my hospital bosses? Did you know they were all working undercover for the Project? Was Balthus involved?’

  Mama angles her head back so her eyes look down on me. ‘I knew about your handlers,’ she says. ‘Balthus wasn’t involved.’ A small sigh slips out. ‘I helped arrange the handlers’ positions, of course, helped ensure they would have access to you. It was for your own good—’ She dabs her cheeks. ‘You needed to be monitored so they knew the tests and the conditioning they were carrying out on you were safe, controlled. And it helped—look how well you’ve done! You’re so sharp, so intelligent, my little angel.’

  ‘This is all fucked up.’ Ramon shakes his head. ‘This is all utterly fucked up.’

  Chapter 41

  Apartment buildings, Central Madrid.

  Present Day

  I stand by the fireplace now and rearrange the ornaments one way then the other, then the other, putting them in order, in a set pattern. Ramon stands near me, looking at Mama, her arms and legs arranged in the armchair in an elegant bag of bones.

  ‘You’ve called them, haven’t you?’ he says. ‘The Project.’

  She sighs. ‘They may be on their way, yes. The cancer is taking hold now, my dear. I need help.’

  Ramon paces three steps then stops. ‘You told Maria that it was me who had the room soundproofed—I heard you. But that paperwork Maria found—it was all you. Why?’ he says. ‘Why did you get all the work done?’

  She looks away over to the window and watches the curtain billow in and out. ‘I would … look after people sometimes for the Project.’

  ‘Subject numbers,’ I say, now, finding my voice, my heart racing. ‘There are numbers etched to the wall. I have seen them. The years correlate with your documentation in the bureau. They have your signature.’

  ‘Why did you install the padding and the reinforced walls?’ Ramon says.

  She shrugs. ‘They would be loud, the subjects sometimes before the Project collected them. For many, the drugs they were given didn’t quite work as planned. There were … complications. We had to keep them safe from themselves, you understand.’

  Ramon stares at her. ‘And you didn’t want anyone to hear. You didn’t want Papa to hear.’ He drops his head. ‘Oh my God.’

  She smiles. ‘What is it, dear?’

  ‘He found out, didn’t he?’

  I put the ornament in my hand down and listen. A fear, a dark, heavy fear begins to build in the base of my throat. It mixes with the pungent jasmine and orange blossom scent that seeps from Mama’s skin, and, as Ramon stares at Mama, I find myself slowly walking to her and, before I can fully understand what I am doing, I thrust the photograph of Isabella with me in front of her. ‘Who put this in the cellar?’

  She frowns, shakes her head, finally glancing to the picture. ‘I, I don’t know, my dear.’

  ‘Yes, you do,’ Ramon says. ‘Tell her.’

  ‘No, I don’t—’

  A huge surge of anger and loss and sheer overwhelming sadness engulfs me and before I can stop myself, before I really know what I am doing, I slam my hand forward and grip Mama’s throat. ‘I said. Tell. Me.’

  ‘Al … Alarico,’ she finally croaks. ‘Alarico put it there.’ I release her neck and she rubs it, eyes wide, pressing her back into the chair.

  I force myself to ask the next question, to make myself say it. ‘Why did Papa put this picture in the cellar all those years ago?’

  Ramon stands tall as we both look to our mother now, waiting. She shifts a little in her seat, tries to cough then stops, chest sinking backwards.

  ‘I put him in there,’ she says after a moment.

  ‘You did what?’ Ramon says.

  She looks up now, eyes narrow, a strange smile sliced into her mouth, as ahead, the glow of the lamps and the embers cast dark shadows across her face. ‘I put him there; he gave me no choice.’

  My mind fires, connections fuse. ‘You got the room soundproofed and you put him in there and he hid this photograph.’

  Ramon jerks his head. ‘Why did Papa hide the photo, Mama? Why did he feel he had to do that?’

  Mama coughs, levels my brother with a stare. ‘Ramon, my boy, you don’t understand.’

  ‘Try me.’

  ‘He didn’t realise—’ she coughs ‘—he didn’t realise what he had stumbled onto,’ she says finally. Ramon and I go still. ‘Alarico,’ she continues, ‘he discovered some documents I had about your conditioning, Maria, about the tests I took you for. Well, as you can imagine, it was all highly confidential back then, very hush hush.’

  ‘Jesus Christ …’

  ‘And, well, one day he found some conditioning documents and, well the Project directors advised me to keep Alarico down there for a while until they could decide how to handle the information leak. We made it look like … like a robbery.’

  Ramon drops his head. ‘Except Papa knew it was you, didn’t he? He’d figured it out by then. That’s why he hid the photo there. He’d found out about it all, thought he could hide it, come back for it and expose it all.’

  ‘You have to understand, my dear, I loved him so much.’

  ‘But what did they do to him, Mama?’ Ramon says.

  ‘My boy …’

  He punches his fist into the wall. ‘Tell us!’

  ‘My children, please! I did it for you, you must understand that. I had no choice. I was ill, I am ill. They are not giving me the drugs any more until I give them to you, my dear Maria. I only have three months left to live without the medicine.’ Then she stops, sighs. ‘My dear, he loved you so much, your papa, Alarico.’

  ‘What did they do to him?’ I find myself saying, but it doesn’t feel like me, as if I am detached somehow from my own body.

  Mama pulls herself up to a stand, her whole body shaking, and takes two tiny steps forward.

  ‘What did they do to Papa?’ I say again.

  ‘They killed him,’ Ramon says.

  I turn to my brother, confused. ‘How do you know?’

  He glances to Mama then he gazes back to me. ‘Because I did it, M.’ He stops, smears his damp face with his sleeve. ‘I think I killed Papa.’

  I stare at my brother now, not understanding what he means. ‘You could not have killed Papa, he died in a car accident.’

  Ramon glances to Mama and back to me. ‘She asked me to do something to his car.’

  My head starts to spin. ‘Do what? Do what to his car?’

  ‘My dear boy,’ Mama says now, hobbling nearer, knuckles bulbous on the handle of her stick and I think of the witch in the Hansel and Gretel fable Papa used to read to me. ‘Please don’t …’

  But Ramon wipes his eyes and keeps his gaze on me. ‘It was in the morning. I … I remember it as if it were yesterday. Father Reznik had been teaching me how to fix up cars.’ He shakes his head and smears snot from his nose. ‘Father Reznik was your handler for this fucked-up Project, but I didn’t know, and there he was, teaching me how to fix a car, or so I thought.’ He spins round to Mama and steps back. She is closer now, so close Ramon can almost touch her.

  ‘Ramon, my dear, do not say any more.’

  ‘Why?’ he says, spit flying from his mouth. ‘Scared I’ll say something you don’t want anyone to hear?’

  She takes one more step forward. ‘Stop. Please, my son.’

  But Ramon just smiles and, gritting his teeth, leans in to mama so his face is almost touching hers. ‘Fuck. You.’

  Stepping back, he twists to face me. ‘The morning of Papa’s death, Mama asked me to fix something on his car.’

  Cogs begin to spin in my head, but I don’t want them to, don’t want to face the reality of wha
t Ramon is beginning to say …

  ‘She asked me if Father Reznik had taught me what she needed me to do on the car and he had, the week before. I was excited—I was getting to fix Papa’s Jaguar all by myself.’

  ‘Ramon. Son. Stop.’

  But he continues, fast. ‘I got the wrench … I …I remember now. I had to dislodge something underneath the car first, get all the way under it, then Mama showed me the bonnet and asked me to disconnect something. I … I remember at the time thinking it was odd, but it was Mama, and she was telling me to do something Father Reznik had taught me, a priest.’ He looks straight at Mama now. ‘Except he wasn’t a fucking priest was he?’

  ‘He was working with the Project,’ I say, to myself, in a bubble of shock.

  ‘Children,’ Mama says, eyes slicing us both, ‘I think you are getting too excitable, inventing stories that … that don’t exist.’

  ‘Bullshit!’ Ramon snaps. ‘I did what I did to Papa’s car and that morning, on the way to work, he crashed. The car—the car that I altered, that you told me to fix—veered off the road and he died.’ Ramon sniffs. ‘Papa died. And you made me do it, for what?’ He searches her eyes. ‘Because he found something out that uncovered it all—your drugs, your illegal payments, didn’t he?’ Ramon laughs now, head nodding. ‘He found out what you were doing with my sister and he confronted you.’

  ‘Ramon, you will stop this at once and—’

  ‘Don’t you dare!’ His hands swing in two fists by his side. ‘Don’t you dare tell me to stop. I have seen you—manipulating, plotting. But I loved you, made excuses for you, protected you because that’s what families are supposed to do, except you don’t, do you?’

  The door to the side swings back a little, half closing. Mama shuffles forward.

  ‘Son, calm down. We can work this out.’ She reaches out a frail hand. Ramon smacks it away.

  ‘You lied about me to Maria,’ he says, tears flowing down his cheeks. ‘You implied it was all my idea to put her down there. I am your son! Your own son, and yet you would do that to me, despite everything—everything—I have done for you, for what? Power? Money?’

  Exhaustion washes over me, confusion, fear—every emotion I feel courses through my bloodstream. But there is something in my mind, something clear, present. Dangerous. ‘Ramon—the Project. When you contacted them, when did they say they would arrive?’

  He turns to me. ‘Oh God.’

  ‘When, Ramon?’

  He stops, checks his watch. ‘Shit, in about an hour now, maybe even less.’

  I swallow, slapping back the panic. ‘We have to go.’

  ‘No.’ Mama has picked up her cane and has locked it across the frame of the door. ‘You cannot go—and anyway, I have contacted them, too. They need you, Maria, my dear. You are one of them now—the Project is good for you.’

  ‘Rubbish,’ Ramon says. ‘You just want your drugs so you can rule the fucking world in parliament. It’s nothing to do with what’s good for Maria, and everything to do with what’s good for you. That’s all politics ever fucking is—everyone in it for themselves. You even got me, your own son—a child—to rig a car so your own husband would be killed. What wouldn’t you do, Mother, hmm, to get what you want? Where the fuck is it all going to stop? The whole world is not about you!’

  The cane still blocks the door. ‘You cannot keep us here,’ I say. ‘We are going to leave.’

  Mama holds out her weak arm, frail fingers gripping the cane still in front of the door. ‘I can’t, my dear. I cannot let you go. I am so ill.’

  Ramon lunges at Mother. He does it so quick, slips his fingers round Mama’s bone china throat so fast, that I don’t have time to stop him, to shout for him to step back.

  ‘Be ill, you bitch,’ he spits. ‘And when we get out, I’m going to tell everyone about this. I’m going to go to the press, to the government, to your precious cronies on the political circuit and tell them what a lying, selfish, conniving old bitch you really are.’

  He drops his hand and Mama gasps for breath, cane clattering to the floor, her hands rubbing her neck.

  Ramon turns to me. ‘You ready to go?’

  I glance once to Mama, a coldness forming inside me as I look at her, as I feel the vast enormity of what she has done to me, to my brother, to Balthus. To Papa. ‘I am ready,’ I say, and rush to the door, when there is a crack, a loud snap that vibrates in my head that sends shock waves down my entire body.

  ‘Ramon?’ My eyes go wide as, ahead of me, Ramon slumps against the wall, hands clutching his chest. Between his fingers, blood oozes, pumping out at an alarming speed.

  ‘No!’

  I run to him, dropping to my knees, desperately trying to stem the blood loss, but there is so much of it, I can’t see his chest properly.

  ‘Step away from Ramon, Maria, dear.’

  I twist my head round. Mama stands holding a gun. And it is pointed at me.

  ‘Why did you shoot him?’ Frantic, I fly my head to my brother as he goes into shock, his body convulsing, his eyes wide. I press down on his wound with the heels of my hands, take his pulse, but nothing makes any difference. His body is going cold, his heart rate is slowing fast.

  ‘Maria, dear, I said come away from your brother.’ The gun is pointed at me. I glance to the door; it is open. I see Ramon’s eyes fall to it, too, his body weak now, heart failing, and then, silently, his fingers find mine, squeezing them. I look at him now, my brother. I thought he was with the Project, assumed he was lying to me just like everyone else, but it was him that was being lied to. He was just doing what he thought would help me because he loves me.

  ‘Move now, my dear,’ Mama says. ‘You can’t help him.’

  I glance to the door and Ramon squeezes my fingers one more time then lets go, hands falling like feathers to the floor.

  Slowly, I rise, eyes on the door the entire time as, behind me, Mama still points the gun.

  ‘That’s it,’ she says. ‘Good girl. You know it’s the right thing to do, to stay. It’s who you are. You can’t run from that.’

  I breathe in, get ready and, glancing one more time to Ramon, to my brother dying on the floor, I bolt for the exit.

  Chapter 42

  Apartment buildings, Central Madrid.

  Present Day

  A gunshot rings out now as I sprint down through the hallway, past the vast line of gilded mirrors and art deco paintings. The entrance hall is up ahead, the main door, the exit. I hear Mama scream as, more shots sounding, she moves, faster than I expected her to, out of the drawing room.

  I dash through the door to my left, to the lounge, hoping to find a new route out, but the windows are locked and there is no additional exit. My heart slams against my rib cage as I dart out, back into the hallway then stop dead. My mother is standing at the foot of the stairs, hair clumped to her head in wisps, gun pointed, arms shaking.

  ‘You can’t leave, Maria dear.’

  I look down the barrel then back to Mama. ‘You killed Ramon, you made him do something to Papa’s car.’

  ‘I didn’t know what would happen.’

  ‘I don’t believe you.’

  She sighs. ‘My darling, I can understand that. I can. But right now, I don’t have time for this conversation, because I need you to go into that room and stay there until the Project come. What will everyone think if you keep making this racket, hmmm? So, please,’ she says, levelling the gun at me, a slip of a smile on her lips, ‘be a dear and pop in the lounge, hmmm?’

  ‘No.’

  Her smile drops. She angles the gun towards my leg. ‘I don’t want to kill you, my dear—naturally. But I will shoot you so you cannot run. So, please, co-operate for Mama, yes? I’m really very tired.’

  I stay still, not a muscle moving, every nerve ending in my body on fire. ‘You are not my mama.’

  There is a knock on the front door.

  We both freeze. Mama frowns, tilts her head. I twist, whip my eyes to the frosted pane of glass th
at is cut into the wooden frame. Shadows, three shadows loom large.

  ‘The Project,’ Mama says. She waves the gun at me. ‘Well, what are you waiting for, my dearest? Open it.’

  The weapon is directed right at me and, no matter what trajectory calculations I do in my head, no matter how many times I try to formulate a fresh plan, nothing really sticks, because I am trapped. The Project is here, Ramon is dead and Mama has a gun to my head.

  The knock sounds again, louder this time. I take one step, two, sweat waterboarding down my back, my body spent and beat, mind washed away. I reach the front door and rest my palm on the handle. Mama waves the gun, mouths, ‘Open it,’ and I turn. Drawing in a large breath, I pull back the lock and swing open the heavy, black door.

  ‘Doc! Thank God you are okay.’

  My mouth hangs open as I peer at the people in front of me now, shocked, relieved, desperate, because they are not the Project or MI5.

  Balthus, Chris and Patricia are here.

  ‘Oh, Maria!’ Balthus says, ‘thank goodness you are okay! And Ines—I was worried.’ He falters. ‘W–what is—?’

  Mama points the weapon at him. ‘All of you, in the lounge. Now.’

  ‘What? Ines?’

  Patricia looks at me, eyes wide.

  Mama moves towards us, looks to Patricia and Chris, ‘And whoever you two are, go into the lounge. Now.’

  We enter the lounge, Mama behind us as she shuts the door, switches on a ceiling chandelier and the room rotates in a twinkling kaleidoscope of light. I glance to Balthus and feel the bile return to my throat.

  We halt by the empty fireplace. ‘Mama is with the Project,’ I say.

  ‘Ines?’ Balthus says, mouth dropping open, ‘what on earth?”

  Mama shuts the door, leans her back on her chair and smiles. ‘Balthus, dear, you of all people should not be surprised that someone has had to do what was necessary to survive.’

  Balthus frowns. ‘Ines, I … I don’t know what you mean.’

  She laughs, the gun still suspended mid-air. ‘Maria knows.’

  ‘I don’t understand what you mean.’

  I glance to Patricia, to Chris. They lower their eyes, shaking slightly