In the Country of Shadows (Exit Unicorns Series Book 4)

by Cindy Brandner

  He sat, the morning sun high enough that he could feel the warmth of it on his back. It was going to be another fine day. He watched Pamela as she moved about the kitchen, cracking eggs and putting a rasher of bacon on to fry, cutting bread to toast, putting oats on to cook and setting the kettle to boil.

  The sun was touching her too, outlining her in pale gold, and making, he was disconcerted to see, her nightgown rather transparent. He looked away, feeling like someone had hit him in the solar plexus. Desire prickled along his skin, and he had to focus to take a breath and resume his mask of cordiality. He understood only too well what that flicker of fire had been in Noah’s eyes.

  She put a bowl of oatmeal on the table in front of him, along with a pitcher of cream and a jar of honey. They ate in companionable silence, Pamela getting up now and again to bring the eggs from the warmer and refill the toast plate.

  He watched her drizzle honey, thick and amber, over her porridge. She looked tired still with dark smudges beneath her eyes and her skin so pale that he could see the delicate blue of her veins and the pulse of blood that flowed through them.

  She looked up suddenly, her eyes the dark bottle green they were when she was troubled. “What is it, Jamie? I can feel words sitting on your tongue, just go ahead and say them.”

  “Just this—be careful.”

  As she so often did, she understood the words he had not said and answered to those rather than the ones he had said.

  “He’s an acquaintance, Jamie, we have an understanding. It’s no more than that.”

  He opened his mouth to protest but just then Conor awoke and made his way over to them, rubbing his eyes and yawning. “Mama, I’m hungry,” he said.

  Conor came and sat beside Jamie, while his mother got up to fix him breakfast. He leaned into Jamie’s side, still half-asleep, the weight of him warm and comforting. He put his arm around the boy and felt some of his tension subside, though his worry did not abate in the least.

  Pamela believed what she needed to believe at this point, and he knew from long experience that she didn’t always understand her effect on men. But he did and he knew what he had seen in Noah Murray’s face when the man had looked at Pamela out there in the yard, with the morning light touching her like smoke. It was a man who wanted possession of a woman, pure and simple. And he wondered, as he watched her move about the kitchen, warming milk for Isabelle, and fixing oatmeal and toast for Conor, just how far the man was willing to go to secure that possession.

  Chapter Thirty-seven

  From Dawn ’Til Dark, From Dark ’Til Dawn

  November 1976

  PAMELA KNEW that the first anniversary of Casey’s disappearance was going to be very difficult and that no amount of putting her head down and working her way through the day was going to change that. So she had taken the day off, driven the children to Gert’s and then gone to the one spot where she thought she might find some relief. She and Casey had stumbled across it one day during a long country ramble, nearly two years ago.

  The shrine was an ancient one; it had been there as long as the memory of the land. It lay deep in a small mossy wood and had the feel of a secret well kept. There were three well-worn stone stairs that led down into the dark hollow. The well was at the end of a shallow cave, and the walls of the cave were thick with letters and appeals to Saint Bridget—that she might heal the sick, find the lost and soften the grief of those left alive to survive without their loved one. Pamela had brought a set of beautiful beads today, made from Baltic amber, ones her father had given her long ago, to offer up to the Saint along with her prayers.

  She knelt and felt the damp seep into her trousers right away. The cave smelled of candle wax and smoke, incense and living water bubbling from deep beneath the earth. It was the scent of respite from pain.

  She placed the beads carefully around the statue of the Saint. It was an old statue, the face barely discernible beneath moss and the wear of time. She breathed out, some of the tension she always carried with her pricking along her skin and then releasing into the quiet. It was peaceful here.

  Bridget was one of the three patron saints of Ireland, and the only female. Pamela felt her prayers were better addressed to one who had the heart and mind of a woman. She began with the prayer, knowing the words would give breath to her own thoughts, would coalesce some of the pain in her heart and body and allow her to put it into words, and perhaps in the wake of an official and oft-repeated prayer her own words would not seem so small and naked.

  Brigid of the Mantle, encompass us,

  Lady of the Lambs, protect us,

  Keeper of the Hearth, kindle us.

  Beneath your mantle, gather us,

  And restore us to memory.

  Mothers of our mother, Foremothers strong.

  Guide our hands in yours,

  Remind us how to kindle the hearth.

  To keep it bright, to preserve the flame.

  Your hands upon ours, Our hands within yours,

  To kindle the light, Both day and night.

  The Mantle of Brigid about us,

  The Memory of Brigid within us,

  The Protection of Brigid keeping us

  From harm, from ignorance, from heartlessness.

  This day and night,

  From dawn till dark, From dark till dawn.

  The words, spoken quietly, were a meditation. She felt the anxiety she carried everywhere with her abate a little, enough that she could breathe with ease. She sat silent for a long moment, not waiting for anything other than the time when it would seem right for a more personal prayer, a plea really. The words came simply because they were always in her heart, and the silence and peace of the cave gave them form so that she could speak them.

  “I know you can’t bring him home, I know people plead with you a thousand times a day for those kind of miracles and it’s not always possible. I won’t ask for that, I won’t ask for you to bring him home safely, I will only ask you this—if you can’t bring him home, if you can’t let him come back to me, please make it hurt a bit less. Just a little less every week.” She leaned her head against the smoke-smudged wall, unheeding of the press of the beads and letters and pleas against her flesh. “I don’t want it to ever go away entirely, and I know it won’t, but if you could ease it a little, I would be so very thankful. Because I don’t think I can survive if it keeps on this way.”

  She understood now why people often said that someone had died of a broken heart, rather than whatever the medical cause was determined to be, because you could die from a pain this profound, this heavy. If it wasn’t for their children, she wasn’t sure how she would manage. Conor and Isabelle’s dependence on her remaining strong enough to get through the daily routines and to love them, was the one thing that kept her going.

  She got up off her knees and took a breath. It was a deep one, full of damp and incense and the scent of a thousand hopes and prayers and fears. It filled her lungs, and when she let it go, she could have sworn some of the pain, just a little, went with it, like one needle leaving a stack.

  She turned back on the top stair and felt the sigh of the small cave, as if it breathed out around her. The letters, the pleas and the pain were encompassed in that narrow passing breeze. She was merely one voice amongst an enormous choir in this country, but she felt a shiver of hope in her chest nevertheless. She put her hand to the silver cross around her neck and spoke to the woman in whom so many hopes and prayers resided. Her voice was small, but steady.

  “But if you have a spare miracle then please, please let him come home to me.”

  Chapter Thirty-eight

  Silence and Dignity

  THE FIRST FROST ARRIVED in late November and by early afternoon of the next day the thatch on the house still glimmered with it. The cobwebs, strung fine and delicate, were embroidered silver and the breath of both humans and animals was visible in small rising clouds. Winter had settled in on its hoary old bones and was breathing out across the land, w
ithering berries, stripping branches and turning the ground to iron.

  Pamela was seeing to the last of the winterizing. Patrick had come by a few days before and put the storm windows up and the byre was filled to the rafters with a season’s worth of hay. There were always the small things to attend to like taking up the last of the frost-bitten stalks, and covering the flowers that required protection from the cold. She used to love small tasks like these because it allowed her time to think and plan for the next spring, or just let her thoughts drift fancy-ward. Now she dreaded time alone because her thoughts wandered into very dark territory which had nothing of the fanciful about it.

  Pamela had been on edge ever since the letter and the incident of the doll. She had a hard time relaxing even in her own home, though she tried not to show that to her children. Conor was far too attuned to her moods as it was and she didn’t want him to be frightened. If there was one gift she could bestow upon her children, it was that they should feel secure and that their home should always be a sanctuary for them.

  She paused for a moment and looked about. The yard lay peaceful, the sun low and insubstantial as it was this time of year and the scent of peat smoke both sharp and comforting on the air. She drew in a breath of it and stood quietly. It was the thin time of the year, a time she usually loved because it seemed to her that ghosts lingered in the chill and smoky air, making it seem possible to cross the divide between the material world and the one that lay just beyond, out of reach. Dreams came thickly when the nights were long; laying their touch upon the dreamer so that it seemed the divide was crossed, even if it was only for a few moments in the depths of a November night.

  She had dreamed about Casey last night, so vividly that she had smelled his skin and felt the rough warmth of his hands as he reached out to touch her. She had awakened with tears on her face and her hands still reaching back for him. The fine webbing of the dream had clung to her senses all day, making her feel rather melancholy.

  She glanced into the house through the kitchen window, a flash of red having caught her eye. Conor had dashed in to make a sandwich. She had left the cheese and bread cut for him so that he wouldn’t need anything more lethal than a butter knife to put together his own snack. He was an independent little soul, and liked to do things on his own as much as was possible at three and one half years of age. The sandwich would not be a thing of beauty, but it would be roughly edible once he was done.

  The crunch of car tires turning into the top of her drive distracted her from Conor’s depredations in the kitchen and she turned, frowning, a small spurt of adrenaline coursing through her as it always did when a stranger entered her yard. Every now and again it struck her just how alone they were here. There were two men in the car and a woman in the back seat. She froze to the spot, her mind frantically trying to ascertain where the nearest weapon was. There was a spade leaning up against the house, so she grabbed it, the haft slippery against her gloved hands.

  As soon as the first man emerged from the car, his chilly grey gaze fixing her like a slap of snow to her face, the small spurt of adrenaline turned into a flood. It was Constable Blackwood.

  She stepped forward warily, the spade still clutched in her hand. She didn’t want to give them an excuse to shoot her, but if this was a kill squad, she wasn’t going without a fight. She didn’t think they would arrive in broad daylight in uniform, in truth, though, she had no way of knowing for certain. She would have to fight as long as she could to give her children a chance of survival. She’d had a talk with Conor about it last week, a talk that had been like walking a high wire between trying not to frighten him but also making certain he understood what to do if something should happen to her. She’d had to acknowledge that even though her son was not yet four years old, there were realities to living in this country that required a different kind of knowledge for him. Conor was a quick study fortunately, and had mastered the dialing of the numbers he needed to know some time back. He knew where the bolt for the door was, and he knew who to call—Gert as she was very near and almost always home and then the list moved to Lewis, Uncle Pat and Jamie.

  The second man emerged from the car. He had white hair and a red face, neck bulging above his tight, starched collar. He, too, was in uniform and clearly of a higher rank than the constable. Neither man appeared to be armed, but she clutched the spade a little tighter just in case. It was the white-haired man who walked toward her.

  “I’ll ask ye to put the spade to the side,” he said.

  “Why are you here?” she asked, wary but polite, she couldn’t afford to antagonize them, not with two small children to protect.

  “We need ye to come in for questionin’,” he said, blue eyes officious but not unkind.

  She put the spade aside. She took the gloves off and wiped her hands on the front of her jeans, a cold stillness coming over her.

  “Questioning about what?”

  “The murder of Philip Kirkpatrick.”

  She turned cold all over and she thought for one dreadful moment that she might faint as her blood plunged down into the vicinity of her toes.

  “Murder?”

  “Aye, murder.” This last was said by Constable Blackwood with a bit of relish. He had come to stand by the other police officer, a look of smugness on his face.

  “Mama?”

  Conor was standing in the doorway of the house, his cheese sandwich clutched in one hand, Finbar in front of him, teeth bared.

  “Finbar, enough,” she said sharply. She didn’t want the dog to be shot because he was trying to protect them. The dog gave her a baleful glance, sighed and sat down so that he was still shielding Conor.

  “He was shot in the head at point blank range before his body was burned to a crisp along with the distillery.”

  “Mama?” Conor’s voice was rising in panic. He’d walked out to stand behind her and she turned to take him in her arms and give him the comfort of her embrace. He put his arms around her neck, and she felt the cheese sandwich squish against her shoulder.

  “It’s all right, baby,” she said, even though it wasn’t.

  Constable Blackwood stepped toward her and Conor turned to glare at him, as if daring the man to come any closer to his mother. She turned away so that Conor wasn’t looking at the men anymore. She put him down and gave him a gentle push toward the door. “Go in the house, sweetheart. Remember what mama said to you about calling Gert.”

  Conor backed up in to the house, his hand on Finbar’s furry back. He looked from her to the policemen, and the WPC who having exited the car, stood further off, her hands folded in front of her, her face completely blank.

  “You can’t expect me to leave little children here alone. Please, just let me call someone to come and stay with them.”

  “They will have the WPC to take care of them until further arrangements can be made.”

  Those three words ‘until further arrangements’ stuck a sliver of fear in her heart. She had to hold it together and make it seem like she wasn’t frightened and that it was nothing terribly untoward to be questioned about a murder, a murder that she was only too aware certain police would be happy to pin on her.

  She glanced back at her son. He was near tears, his small face terribly white. She was incredibly grateful that Isabelle was sleeping through this. She had to do something to reassure him, to shore him up until an adult who loved him was here to look after him.

  “Conor, call Gert now. Remember everything that mama told you to do. And please check on your sister.”

  He nodded, small fists clenched. She gave him a look intended to stiffen his spine. He drew himself up to his tallest and she saw the strange reserve come over him, his wee face losing all expression, the way his father’s did when he didn’t want anyone to know his thoughts or to suspect his feelings. Conor had already learned the hard lesson of this land, and that was to give no one your vulnerability. She hated that someone so small already knew this, even if it was only subconscious. Or maybe it
was only part of his genetics, the Riordans after all, had never been friends with the police.

  She thought it was not a coincidence that the police had chosen this time, being that Jamie was away in the States. They had waited for their opportunity and then seized it. It would explain why they had not asked her to come in for questioning, as had been the case in the past.

  She said nothing on the ride to the station, merely sat with her hands clenched in her lap, and prayed with a desperate fervor that Gert would be home when Conor called. She could well imagine the Valkyrian fury that the WPC was going to have to deal with when Gert arrived.

  She did quail a little when she realized they weren’t taking her to her local station, but into Belfast. It was, however, more likely she would know some of the police there, which might help mitigate her terror. Not that any of them could help her, but it would be nice to see a face that wasn’t hostile.

  They took her to the Tennent Street station, which increased the flood of ice-water in her intestines since it was in the heart of Loyalist territory. Once there, they escorted her into an interrogation room with a shabby tiled floor and four uncomfortable chairs seated around an equally shabby table, which was bolted to the floor. She sat down and clutched her hands together, to still their trembling.

  She was dressed in old clothes, her skin smelling strongly of cold earth and clean straw. She could still feel the dirt in the lines of her palms and the sweat that was gathering around the particles despite the chill deep set in her flesh. She was wearing an old sweater of Casey’s, for the day was cool, and she had been cold working out in the yard. Wearing his clothes gave her a sense of holding him close, as if something of him—his scent, his aura, his strength—remained there in the weft of the threads. She pretended for a moment that he was here, the strength of his big hand curled around her cold one, telling her she could manage this without breaking down. For a fleeting second she thought she could feel it, the heat of his skin, the calluses that made the palm of his hand hard.