Heart Stopper Page 20

  She maneuvered her way around to face out the back of the trailer, inch by inch, holding in her breath as though the smallest dimension would make a difference. When she was positioned right, she nudged the edge of the tarpaulin and saw that the dusk that she needed was moving in. There were no car headlights in view.

  They were reaching the area where Reyna had turned right onto a narrower road through the bog. Priya moved closer to the edge of the trailer praying that Powli would turn right as well, but he passed the turn and she hesitated for a second and then launched herself off the back of the low trailer aiming for the grass verge and ditch beside it. She landed with the upper half of her body on the grass and her legs scraping the tarmac. She felt the pain and heat through her trousers, but stopped the cry that tried to escape. She rolled into the ditch and lay quiet, listening through her gasps. The sound of the van’s engine lessened as it continued on its way, without a pause.

  Her legs hurt, but she needed to get off this road and onto the one through the bog, the road that led to Catherine’s house. She staggered up the gravel track that led up a hill. At the top, she could see the stretch of the way ahead. The curve around the hill hid the road on which she had come. The track was edged by fields of bog, part dug up, part intact. She stumbled on the stones, the clicking of her shoes loud in the boggy silence.

  She was halfway down the track when she heard the noise. She looked back, but saw nothing. Then she saw two diffuse shafts of light winking between the hills. She ran.

  She knew would be an easy target in the open and she searched the fields on either side for somewhere to hide. She made her decision and scrambled off the track and into the darkness of the bog.

  The earth was torn like a dog’s chewed up plaything. She was lying in the earth cut of bog, bricks of turf lying chunky and black beside her.

  She quietened her breathing and listened. Her head lay against the base of the tunnel, the days’ sun-baked heat still retained to seep out into her skin. The dense earthy smell crept into her nostrils. She felt the quiver of her pulse in her cheek and then the tremble of weight on the stone-chipped track. The clicking of wheels on gravel cut through the night air.

  Priya felt tears trickle down from her eyes and drop to the black earth silent as pebbles in a raging current. The car had stopped, the thunk of its door shutting preceded the light footfall, shifting weight on an uneven stony ground.

  As the footsteps grew closer Priya realized with horror that the moonlight was bouncing off her white shirt, glowing like a firefly in the deep blue night. She was possibly more visible to the occupants of the car than if it had been broad daylight. She tried to shrink further into the ground. Then the anger that had been building in her from the moment she saw Michael lying on the floor struck her hard. She felt around, her hands grasping and releasing crumbling turf, until her fingers gripped something that didn’t disintegrate. She felt the edges of a solid object, it was shaped like an axe head, it was blunt, but it was something, something solid.

  The footsteps had stopped at her hole in the ground and she raised her head and then her torso. She gripped the axe head feeling the blunt edges dig into her palm.

  The tall shadow figure was silhouetted by the lights of the car behind. Priya used her arms to launch herself off the ground and towards the legs. Her shoulder connected with a sharp knee and she heard the exclamation of pain, a surprisingly high-pitched sound that at first she thought might have come from her own crazed mouth. The axe head had fallen loose into the dark soil so she scrabbled for the throat of her pursuer and closed her hands around soft skin and a slim neck.

  “Priya?” The accented voice was a woman’s struggling to break free, to breathe. A voice Priya recognized. Her hands loosened and she felt strong hands grasp her own and hold them away. Priya rolled off from on top of Reyna and huddled against the sharp edged stacks of turf lining the pit.

  Reyna sat up rubbing her throat. Her face was in shadow still cast into a sharp silhouette. The engine of the car whined and then sputtered out, the lights dimming in a faint flicker of movement. The breeze was quiet and couldn’t conceal the sound of their breathing. Priya could see in a haze Reyna moving towards her like a zookeeper approaching a wounded lion. She felt the edges of shock nudging her towards nothingness and she battled to keep her mind present, adrenaline leaving its bitter taste in her blood as it ebbed.

  She felt Reyna beside her, and then arms around her shoulders gentle, but firm, guiding her into a circle that cut off the cold of the evening air. Her trembling lengthened into a shaking, jerking, gasping string of words that made no sense to her.

  When her words ran out, she felt the grip around her tighten and she sank further, emptied and silent. She didn’t know how long they sat there; it felt like hours huddled against the rough edges of hardened earth.

  ∞

  Priya felt Reyna whisper in her ear as the circle of warmth loosened. She felt the cold leak back into her arms and chest as Reyna got up. She acquiesced as Reyna stood her up, as fingers wiped away some of the tears, as she was led to the car that sat quiet its light cutting a weak path through the lightening night.

  Reyna helped her into the front seat and Priya felt lost in the seconds it took for Reyna to walk around to the driver’s side. The cold feeling of loss continued to numb her; she paid no attention to the route, staring silent out of the window unseeing. The occasional grinding of the automatic transmission punctuated the long drive, the road twisting and rising before settling into a level path darkened by trees bunched at its side.

  One solitary light cut through the darkness, brighter than the lights of the car, bright in the darkness of forest that cleared to surround the house on three sides, the fourth side, at the back of the building was pale, no trees blocking the dawning sky. The car bumped up from a pothole and her head tapped off the side glass window. She sat up as Reyna brought the car to a stop at the back of the farmhouse, its white walls glowing pale the windowsills chipped dark where they appeared through the flowerboxes that rested in sleeping colors of red and blue and deep almost black violet.

  Reyna got out and walked around the car to open Priya’s door. Priya took the outstretched hand and the help to get out of the car. The back door of the house was unlocked and the warmth of the empty kitchen felt like a blanket on her face. The light went on, she was seated at a worn solid pine kitchen table and she heard Reyna opening a few cupboards. Reyna placed two tablets in her palm and helped Priya with the glass of water before finding a bottle of brandy from which she poured out a glass and the smell hit Priya with a memory of Michael and his neatly placed dishtowel. She rushed to the sink and retched, but the old thick Belfast sink remained white and clean and mocking her efforts.

  Priya leant against the solid ceramic, eyes shut tight against the tears. She felt Reyna hug her gently from behind and then lead her out of the kitchen and through a draughty hallway. They passed an open door that held the remnant smell and heat of a turf fire and then entered the small room with the bed covered in its knobbly white bedspread. Reyna pulled back the covers and Priya crawled into the space beneath closing her eyes and letting the cloth swaddle her as the covers were laid back over her.

  Priya heard the scraping of a chair being pulled up and the creak as Reyna settled into it. She felt the light weight of a hand resting on the fabric covering her shoulder and then the blackness swept in and she felt nothing.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  Sunday, July 24, 2011

  Did it matter that it was a woman he would be killing? Did it matter whether she was attractive, charismatic, kind?

  The diplomat swam laps of the pool, his arms pumping the questions into the water. There were a multitude of women like her in his country who would suffer as much as dying, as would the men, and the children.

  He hoped the man was in control. He had 4 days before the device arrived. He couldn’t practice with the real thing. That was one of the risks he would take. That it would all
work out on the day.

  They had 8 days.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Sunday, July 24, 2011

  In her dream, she was sitting on the boulder by the river watching the water flow at her feet and the traffic overhead. She turned and Kathy was beside her, sitting on the rock. They watched the bodies float by, nameless, smooth movement then jagged as they bumped off the tree trunks resting on the riverbed. Kathy got up; she pushed Priya’s hand away and walked into the river until she disappeared. Priya was in the bog pit, lying face up to the midnight blue sky. She was aware of lying on something, something warm. She felt under her with her hand, but she knew even before she touched the arms and chests and legs. She was screaming as she woke, flailing at the covers, clawing at the edge of the pit, seeing even as she climbed out of the dream, the faces beneath her.

  She was still struggling as Reyna pulled back the cover, freeing Priya’s arms. Reyna was saying her name. She heard Catherine too. She opened her eyes and the daylight hurt. She closed them again, squeezed tight, kept them closed. She curled up into a fetal position. Her mouth felt thick and dry.

  “Here, take some of this.” Priya heard Catherine say. She felt Reyna take her hand. She felt the cold of glass pressed against her other hand. She opened her eyes. Reyna was sitting on the bed beside her. She looked ragged, the sharp lines of her face softened with fatigue. Catherine was standing beside the bed holding a glass of cherry colored liquid to Priya’s hand.

  “Go on, my dear, I put in a mixture of things that are good for shock.” Catherine said.

  Priya grasped the glass and took a swallow; it tasted of cherries with a startling aftertaste of bitter. She grimaced, but drank all of it.

  Catherine sank into the chair beside the bed. Priya closed her eyes again and the three women stayed in silence for a few minutes. Then, Catherine got up.

  Priya said, “I’m sorry I came here. Now I’ve put you both at risk.”

  “You did the right thing. I tried ringing the Cop station last night after you’d gone to sleep, but I couldn’t even get through,” Reyna said.

  “Well, I for one am glad you didn’t get through,” Catherine said, “Not after what’s been on the news.”

  Priya looked from one to the other. Reyna was silent. Catherine smoothed back a strand of hair that fell across Priya’s forehead.

  “Come in to the kitchen when you’re ready.” Catherine gestured at Reyna to follow her then turned and left the room.

  Reyna squeezed and released Priya’s hand. She got up and smiled at Priya before leaving the room.

  ∞

  Priya washed her face. She was unable to look at it in the mirror. She rinsed her mouth out with the mouthwash but the bitter taste remained. Someone had left clothes neatly folded on a chair in the bathroom. They must have been Catherine’s jeans, they fit her loosely and she didn’t have to roll up the legs. The navy sweatshirt had California Berkeley emblazoned across the chest, the memory of another college sweatshirt swamped her, and she sank onto the floor clutching it to her. She muffled the sobs in the folds of fabric as she lay on the cold tiles. She heard a knock and a quiet voice asking if she was okay and Priya said she was fine as she dragged herself up the sink. She washed her face again and left the bathroom a few minutes later.

  Catherine and Reyna were sitting at the table when Priya joined them in the kitchen. She gratefully accepted the cup as she sat down at the table, the aroma of coffee strong in the air, diluted by the waft of breeze through the open patio door. The radio was on and the voices squabbled over the evils of the European troika that had taken over the running of Ireland.

  Catherine said in a gentle voice, “It was on the morning bulletin on Galway Bay FM. They found the body yesterday evening and named him as Michael Walsh.” She paused as Priya flinched then continued, “Priya, they have released your name as a person of interest. They are saying that witnesses saw you running from the building.”

  “Did they say anything about the men?”

  “No.”

  “How would anyone know who I was?”

  And then she remembered,

  “My jacket, I didn’t have it when I ran. They must have found it.”

  She jerked her head up,

  “Are they looking for me because they think I killed him?”

  Reyna said, “They haven’t come out and said it. The news report was vague, but they said the police were searching for you for questioning. We first heard it on the 10 o’clock bulletin. Catherine has set up the TV, but it is difficult to get any channels up here, and she hasn’t got cable. Just the Irish language station coming through. You don’t speak Irish by any chance, do you?”

  Priya shook her head. “The few words I have wouldn’t get me anywhere.”

  Reyna said, “We’re going to watch it anyway and see if anything comes up on the lunchtime news. And we’ll see if the noon bulletin on the radio has any more information.” She looked at her watch and got up to turn up the volume on the radio. “It’s almost noon.”

  Priya felt a wave of panic. The voices on the radio were now arguing about mortgage debt forgiveness. Her heart jumped when the familiar jingle played to announce the start of the news bulletin. And sank as the newsreader spat out the juicy details of a murder in Galway and the search for an Irish woman of Indian origin who had been a friend of the murdered man and had also worked with the recently deceased American doctor who had brought investment, jobs, and prestige to Galway through his cutting-edge involvement in the medical devices industry. The woman bemoaned the lack of detail in this breaking news story, but hinted at more to come from unnamed sources. She ended the piece by mentioning that Dr. Priya Joseph had recently lost her mother and was known to the Gardai prior to this murder.

  “They’re making it sound like I’m some crazy woman who the Gardai have known about for a while!”

  Catherine was looking worried. She nodded and sighed. “It’s believable. If I hadn’t met you, I would probably have thought… With all that has happened to you in the last few years. It’s just going to get worse when they find out about the other things. And they’re going to find out, they’re going to dig and what they find is going to add to the picture of a woman unbalanced by grief.”

  “You two don’t think I killed Michael, do you?” Priya’s voice was rising with an edge of panic.

  “Of course not. And we all know now this isn’t a coincidence nor was Daniel’s death an accident.” Reyna’s voice was firm. Catherine nodded.

  Priya said, her voice barely audible, “Why did they not just kill me? Why Michael?”

  Reyna said, “I don’t know.” She paused, her forehead crinkling. “But if the police are looking for you and you’re on the run, then you’re not trying to dig up any more on Daniel’s death.” She sat back and rubbed her forehead. “It would never pass as a coincidence if you died so soon after Daniel. But, if you were pushed over the edge and…” She broke off and paused for a moment.

  Reyna continued, “No one would have been suspicious about Daniel’s death because it seemed like a natural death. When I got his text, I would have just gone back to Catherine’s and then contacted him the next day. If we hadn’t ended up back at his place that night, I would have found him on the Saturday probably. I wouldn’t have thought there was anything more to it than a heart attack. It was the fact that we went there that night, that I left you there and I thought you and he had been together, that made me suspicious. Even after that, when we got the package he sent. The things we found out since, it all comes back to him dying of a heart attack, which is throwing us off.”

  Catherine asked, “We’re saying again that someone killed him and made it look like a heart attack? Is that even possible?”

  Reyna smacked her palm on the table. “I know it sounds crazy.”

  The sound jolted Priya. She clenched her fists. “And meanwhile those bastards get away with it?”

  Reyna asked Catherine, “Does anyone know that you live her
e?”

  “No. I don’t think so. Daniel never said it to anyone as far as I know, he probably just mentioned Connemara in general, I’d say.”

  Reyna turned to Priya. “Ok, I would say they don’t know where you are at the moment. Neither the police nor the men who killed Michael. I don’t know how long it will take them to work it out. We can’t sit around while they do that.”

  Priya said, “You are both going to be in trouble, and in danger. They are going to work it out. The bus driver would remember me; the guy at the pub will definitely remember me. They’ll put it together, that Catherine, and you, live in Connemara.”

  Catherine shook her head. “They’ll look for Catherine Fairer if they do go down that line. The house will still be under the name Leo Turner.”

  Reyna cut in. “We need to be fast. We have to work out why somebody would be willing to kill two people and destroy another. What in all the things we looked through? We need to finish going through the stuff. We’re just not seeing something.”

  The female voice on the radio was now droning out the death notices for the Galway area. Would they add Michael’s name? Reyna got up from the table and snapped off the radio.

  Priya felt the guilt punch in her solar plexus. What had she missed? And then she remembered something else and slumped further down in the chair.

  “I left the papers in my car. All the stuff Daniel sent and the notes I made. And the Excel sheets from my PhD.”

  “Where is your car?” Reyna’s voice was patient.