He raised the Walther and inched forward, his breathing slow, listening, as the followers stayed close behind him. Two steps took him to the top of the stairway, another three to the door beyond. He pressed his ear against it. Nothing but dripping water. The doorknob was slippery in the bloody fingers of his left hand. Weakened and clumsy, they struggled to grip the brass. He turned it, pushed hard, and raised the Walther.
The door swung back on its hinges to collide with the wall. Dislodged tiles splintered on the floor. Fegan winced at the noise. The room held an old scroll-top bathtub, a toilet and a washbasin. Water pooled on the linoleum-covered floor, and a deep, dank smell climbed into Fegan’s nose and mouth.
No McGinty.
He looked to the other door. A noise, the faintest of rustlings, came from beyond it. Fegan took slow, soft steps towards the room. The rustling stopped. He reached out to the doorknob, his pistol ready, his breath held firm in his chest.
Fegan moved fast, turning the handle, pushing, dropping to his knees, aiming. The door frame exploded in a shower of rotting wood and he fell back, landing on his wounded shoulder. He pushed the pain away, and scrambled to a crouch. The room was in darkness. He’d barely seen the muzzle flash from inside.
The woman and the butcher stepped forward. They both looked at Fegan and stabbed their fingers towards the room. McGinty was in there, hiding in the thick shadows.
“He’s got no ammunition left,” Fegan said.
The woman smiled and nodded as she rocked her baby.
Fegan stood upright and advanced slowly to the door. His eyes searched the darkness but he found only shades of grey and black. He raised the Walther in his right hand, and tried to bring his left up to steady it, but it was too heavy. His left shoulder throbbed with a spiteful heat, and he felt warmth spread down his side.
The dark shapes solidified as Fegan’s eyes attuned to the shadows. Old furniture was piled in here, tables, chairs, cupboards, dressing tables. McGinty could be hiding in or under anything. Fegan eased over the threshold, floorboards creaking under his feet. Dust crept into his nostrils and he fought the urge to sneeze. It snagged the back of his throat and he wanted to—
A thunderbolt struck Fegan’s head and the room spun away from him. He careened into the wall, the Walther slipping from his fingers to skitter across the floorboards into the shadows. McGinty screamed as he brought the revolver down again, but Fegan got his forearm up in time to deflect the blow. He pushed back and McGinty stumbled away, crashing into an upturned table. Fegan dived at him, but McGinty threw himself to the side, leaving Fegan to fall against the upended table legs. He cried out as the wooden feet gouged his stomach and ribs.
McGinty tried again to slam the side of the pistol into Fegan’s temple, and he came close, but Fegan pulled his head back, leaving McGinty punching uselessly at empty air. Fegan turned as McGinty’s balance deserted him and he drove his fist into the politician’s temple.
McGinty went down hard, his chin cracking on the floorboards, and Fegan was on his back before he could recover. Fegan wrapped his right arm around McGinty’s neck, the crook of his elbow beneath the other’s jaw, and squeezed. McGinty bucked and writhed, and Fegan put his weight on the other’s back, but still he struggled. He clawed at Fegan’s hand, scratching, but Fegan only increased the pressure on his neck.
Fegan tried to find his pocket with his left hand, to get Quigley’s .22, but his dull, stupid fingers only fumbled at the fabric while McGinty threw his weight from side to side. Fegan put the last of his strength into his good arm and squeezed harder.
McGinty’s thrashing became more desperate and he reached up, searching for Fegan’s face. Fegan ignored the scratching and grabbing, feeling McGinty’s body slowly soften.
“Everybody pays, Paul,” he said through gritted teeth. “Sooner or later. That’s what she said to me.”
McGinty’s thrashing began to fade, and his hands fell away. Fegan kept the pressure on the man’s neck as his body twitched, fighting to live.
“Everybody pays,” Fegan said again. “Everybody. Even you.”
McGinty shuddered once as his life slipped away. Fegan lay there, across his back, for what seemed like centuries, feeling the stillness of McGinty’s body as his own screamed with adrenalin and pain. When his heart came under control, Fegan looked up to the shadows of the room. He released McGinty’s neck and gently lowered the dead man’s head to rest on the floor.
Fegan climbed to his feet, feeling the steady throb from his shoulder joined by new shades of pain. He turned in a circle, alone, all alone, nobody here but—
The woman stepped out of the shadows, her face slack, her hands outstretched. She looked down at her fingers, her arms, so empty now with no infant to carry. Her mouth was open and her eyes were bright circles. She held her hands out for Fegan to see how empty they were.
Empty.
So empty.
Fegan shook his head. “I don’t understand.”
Her face hardened. She stepped closer, forming her right hand into the shape of a gun. Her fierce eyes on Fegan’s, she reached up and placed her fingertips against his forehead. They were cold on his skin as she executed him.
ONE
60
“No,” Fegan said.
She pressed her fingertips against his forehead, harder. Her lips made a silent plosive as she pulled the trigger, and her eyes burned into his.
Fegan took a step back. “No, I did what you wanted.”
She followed, her finger-pistol trained on his head.
“I did it,” he said. “I killed them all. I did them all for you, so you could go. I did what you wanted. Please. Let me go.”
His legs rippled with spent energy and he had to steady himself against the wall. He turned and walked to the door. She came behind him. He could almost feel the bullets strike the back of his head.
“Please,” he said.
The woman walked in step with him, her fingertips against his temple now. He staggered to the bathroom, his feet splashing in the water pooling on the floor. A fractured mirror hung above the washbasin. He looked at the hollows of his face, the darkness under his eyes.
“All I wanted was some peace,” he said. “I just wanted to sleep. That’s all.”
Fegan saw her in the mirror, the finger-pistol locked on him, her eyes clinging to the reflection of his own. “Why didn’t you just take me? Why all this?”
The sound of groaning pipes roamed through the old house as he turned a tap. Spurts of brown water soaked his hands and he rinsed the blood away. When the water cleared he splashed a handful of it on his face, feeling the coarse stubble. He took another handful and brought it to his mouth, swallowing the copper taste.
“Oh, God.” He shut off the tap and wiped his eyes.
He shuffled over to the bathtub and lowered himself to its edge. His body felt so heavy he couldn’t hold it any more. There was a pressure at the small of his back: Campbell’s Glock.
“Please.” He looked up to the woman. “I can have a life.”