Kirsten nods.
I push her across the deck, watching her slip and slide through the blood. At the same time I spin around and aim the Glock blindly into the night sky. Nothing happens when I pull the trigger.
Kirsten's body spins and she clutches her side. A fraction of a second later I hear the bullet. Blood flows over her fingers but she keeps moving.
The choice of two targets has distracted the shooter but I have to do something about the floodlight. It's made of brass and chrome and fixed to a pillar in the center of the deck.
I spin the Glock until I'm holding it like a hammer. Using Ray Murphy's body as a shield, I slide across the deck until I'm beneath the light. Reaching up I smash the glass. The bulb flares and dies.
A shadow passes in front of me, tripping over my feet and sprawling on the deck. Gerry Brandt scrambles to his feet and tries to reach the diamonds. Launching a kick at his groin, I send him in the opposite direction. A bullet detonates in the space he left behind. He yowls and gives me a murderous look. I save the arsehole's life and this is the thanks I get.
His face is a pale blankness of shock. A red dot appears in the center of his chest. Even without the spotlight the sniper can still see us. He must have an infrared scope.
Gerry looks at his chest and then at me. He's about to die.
He rolls and the deck splinters beneath him. Over and over, he tumbles, past the netting and the packages. He disappears off the stern but the splash is muffled by the sound of the engine revving at full throttle. I have visions of him falling directly onto the spinning propeller.
Kirsten is in the wheelhouse, opening the throttle. A mooring rope is still looped through a cleat on the stern. The boat dips and sways, going nowhere. The dual engines are pulling us under. Rolling across the deck, I reach up and uncoil the last loop of rope from the cleat, feeling it whip through my fingers. The boat pitches forward but instead of turning away from the bank we steer toward it, colliding heavily against the stonework.
For fuck's sake, what's she doing!
The boat collides with a sunken pylon or another boat, before spinning into open water. There's nobody at the wheel. Where's she gone?
The boat is going around in circles. The shooter is waiting to get another clean shot at me.
Half crawling and half dragging myself across the deck toward the wheelhouse, I brace my back against the outside wall. Reaching up, I hook my fingers over the edge of the porthole, pulling myself upward until my eyes reach the glass window.
There's nobody there. In that same instant a dark stain fills my vision, a spray of blood. My finger disappears along with my wedding ring. It's a neat, clean amputation by a high-velocity bullet. I slide backward, landing heavily on the deck.
The shooter is somewhere high up on a bridge or a building. Now he's aiming at the engines or the fuel tanks. The current is turning the rudder and we're drifting on the tide. Soon we'll be out of range.
I suck the stump of my missing finger. There's surprisingly little blood. Where's Mickey? Was she in the pipe? Is she down below? I can't leave her behind.
I hear another sound—a different engine. With my back against the wall, I lever myself upward again, peering through the shattered porthole. I can't see any navigation lights. Instead I make out the silhouette of a boat. There is someone standing on the bow holding a gun.
I can either stay here or take my chances in the river. It takes less than a fraction of a second to decide.
Then I see Kirsten lying under a tarpaulin against the bow. I don't see her face, just her outline as she tries to stand and falls. She tries again and rolls over the side. I hear the splash followed by the sound of men yelling and bullets hitting the water.
The boat is getting closer. I have one good leg and one leaking. Pushing off the wall, I take two stumbling steps and roll over the railing. The cold comes as a shock. I don't know why. I'm still wet from before.
Kicking with one good leg and whipping my arms across my body, I swim down into the darkness where I'm going to drown or bleed to death. I'll let the river decide.
28
Joe is holding on to me. I'm growing accustomed to his face. He lays my arm over his shoulders and braces his body against mine.
“C'mon, let's get you out of here.”
“I remembered.”
“Yes, you did.”
“What about Mickey?”
“She's not here. We'll find her.”
I climb out of the drain and we limp across the parking lot. A pair of teenagers, a boy and a girl, have parked their car away from the light. I wonder what they make of two middle-aged men arm in arm. Are we drunks or lovers? I'm way past caring.
I have remembered. I have waited and hoped for this to happen. I have feared it. What if I shot someone? What if I had Mickey in my arms and lost her to the river? I dreamed the nightmare because I didn't have the truth.
It's almost ten o'clock when we reach Primrose Hill. Yellow light paints the edges of the curtains and a coal fire warms the sitting room.
“You'll stay here tonight,” says Joe, opening the door.
I want to say no, but I'm too tired to argue. I can't go home or to Ali's parents' place. I'm like an infectious disease—poisoning those around me. I won't stay long. Just tonight.
I keep getting flashbacks of being under water, unable to breathe. I smell the foulness of the sewers and see the white-green water boiling at my feet. Each time it happens I take a ragged urgent breath. Joe looks at me. He thinks I'm having a heart attack.
“I should take you to the hospital. They could run some tests.”
“No. I need to talk.” I have to tell him what I remember in case I forget again.
Joe pours me a drink and then moves to sit down. He suddenly freezes. For a split second he looks like a statue, trapped between sitting and standing. Just as suddenly, he moves again as the signals reach his limbs. He smiles at me apologetically.
The mantelpiece is decorated with photographs of his family. The new baby has a moon face and a tangle of blond hair. She looks more like Joe than Julianne.
“Where is your lovely wife?”
“Tucked up in bed. She's an early riser.”
Joe rocks forward with his hands between his thighs. I tell him about being washed through the sewers and what happened on the boat. I remember Kirsten Fitzroy wiping vomit from my lips and feeling the dead weight of Ray Murphy slumped across me. His blood leaked down my neck, pooling in the depression beneath my Adam's apple. I remember the sound of high-velocity bullets and seeing Kirsten spinning across the deck, clutching her side.
Memories carry more memories—fleeting images captured before they fade. Gerry Brandt going over the stern, the silhouette of a gunman, my finger disappearing . . . These things have all become substance now and nothing else is real except what happened that night. Even as I try to explain this to Joe I have the horrors of hindsight and regret to contend with. If only I could change what happened. If only I could go back.
Ray Murphy worked for Thames Water. He knew his way through the storm-water drains and sewers because he used to be a flusher and a flood planner. He knew what water main to sabotage to create a flood. The explosion would be blamed on methane or a gas leak and nobody would bother investigating further.
Radio transmitters and satellite tracking devices are useless underground and nobody was likely to make such a journey. Ray Murphy would also have known about the underground river beneath Dolphin Mansions. He and Kirsten provided each other with an alibi on the morning Mickey disappeared. But where did Gerry Brandt come into the operation? Perhaps they needed a third person for the plan.
“You still can't be sure they kidnapped Mickey,” says Joe. “There's no direct evidence.” A sudden spastic movement of his arm flicks up at my face. “It could still be a hoax. Kirsten had access to Rachel's flat. She could have taken strands of Mickey's hair and counted the money in her money box. If they kidnapped her three years ago, why wait until now to send a ransom demand?”