the shiny metal.
Hennessy grabbed his hair and wrenched his head back. “So, are you ready to tell me why you were following Bailey?” she hissed.
Joker swallowed. What could he tell her? That he was tracking Bailey to find her. And why was he looking for her? To kill her. Joker didn’t want to think what she’d do to him if he told her that. “Orders,” he said.
Hennessy let go of his hair and tapped the blades of the shears against her cheek. “When did you leave the SAS, Cramer?” she asked.
“Three years ago,” he said.
Hennessy nodded. “Why?”
Joker closed his eyes. “Medical discharge,” he said.
Hennessy waited until he opened his eyes again. “Because of that?” She nodded at the scar on his stomach and groin.
“Yes,” said Joker.
“So now whose orders are you acting on?” she asked.
“They brought me back,” he said, each word grating on his tongue.
“Why you?” she said.
Joker closed his eyes again. It didn’t hurt quite as much in the dark, as if the fluorescent lights were keeping the nerves to his brain on constant overload. In the darkness he could concentrate on the pain in his wrists and chest and try to will it away.
“Don’t pass out on me again,” said Hennessy softly. Joker felt the tip of the shears press against his left breast, circling. He opened his eyes. She held a paper cup of water to his lips. He tested it with the tip of his tongue and to his surprise it wasn’t salty. He drank, deeply, but after the third swallow she took it away. Joker licked his lips, not wanting to waste a drop.
“Why did they bring you back?” she asked.
Joker shook his head. “I don’t know,” he said.
Hennessy narrowed her eyes as realisation dawned. “It was me, wasn’t it? You were after me?” She threw the paper cup away, her eyes blazing. She placed her left hand against his breast and stroked the nipple with her thumb. It stiffened involuntarily as she circled it, rubbing it slowly. Joker tried to back away, his feet shuffling along the floor, tangled in his jeans and boxer shorts, but she gripped his nipple between her thumb and first finger, a look of contempt in her eyes. “Don’t,” he said, hating himself for begging and knowing that it wouldn’t do any good. She slipped the blades of the shears either side of the nipple and grunted as she forced the handles together. Joker felt the blades bite through his flesh and click together somewhere deep inside the muscle behind the breast and then the pain lanced through his chest as if he’d been impaled on a metal spike. Joker screamed and he felt himself start to black out. He grabbed for the oblivion, welcoming it because it would put an end to the pain, but it was elusive, and the more he tried to pass out the clearer his thoughts became. Hennessy knew exactly what she was doing and she stood by his side, waiting for his breathing to steady so that she could continue.
Mary walked into the kitchen and closed the door to the basement behind her. Carlos and Bailey were sitting at the table, drinking tea and talking in low voices. They both looked up as she walked over to the fridge and took out a can of Diet Coke.
“Did he say anything?” asked Carlos. His hand was buried in a bag of chocolate chip cookies and he put one in his mouth, whole.
Mary smiled thinly. “He’s talking,” she said, popping the tab on the can. She sipped it. Bailey was looking at her with horror in his eyes and she realised there was blood on the front of her shirt, a thin dribble of red that ran down her left breast. “He’s unconscious now. I’ll leave him for a while. It’s always more effective if they have a chance to think about their options.”
She pulled out a chair and sat down at the pine table. “He says he followed you from the airfield, Matthew. And he says he heard about the airfield in New York.”
Bailey nodded, his hands tight around a white mug. “That’s what Pat Farrell said,” agreed Bailey. “Did he admit to killing the two guys?”
“We haven’t got to that yet,” said Mary.
“Who sent him here?” asked Carlos, tossing another cookie into his mouth. He chewed noisily and with relish.
“He says the SAS, and I believe him,” answered Mary. “His ID looks genuine, which means that it’s Government sanctioned.”
The two men nodded. “Where’s everyone else?” asked Mary.
Carlos gestured upwards. “Stripping their rifles,” he said.
“Do you think we should stay here?” Bailey said.
Mary shrugged. “I don’t see why not. He seems to be acting alone.”
Carlos frowned. “You think the British Government would send one man?”
“It’s possible,” replied Mary. “And this man is unusual. He left the SAS some time ago, and I think a large part of that is because of what I did to him in Ireland three years ago. I killed a friend of his, and I nearly killed him.”
Carlos nodded. “So you think it’s a personal vendetta?”
“I think there’s a strong possibility,” she answered.
“I think we should m-m-move,” stammered Bailey. “Now.”
“I think you’re over-reacting,” said Mary. “Let me have another few hours with him. I should know everything when I’ve finished.”
“But if he’s not alone, we c-c-could have the SAS swarming all over the house by then,” said Bailey. His stutter had returned, Mary noticed.
“Matthew, if the SAS were here, we wouldn’t be having this conversation,” she said. He nodded, but Mary could see that he wasn’t convinced. “Look, first things first. He saw you out at the airfield, so I think we should move the plane. Could you fly it over to Bay Bridge airfield?”
“Now? Sure, no p-p-problem,” replied Bailey. He was clearly still worried.
“It’s going to be all right,” Mary said reassuringly. “It’ll all be over soon. We’ll be in Florida and then Cuba and we’ll have done something they’ll talk about in Ireland for ever more. We’ll be heroes, you and I.”
Bailey sighed and ran a hand through his red hair. “I’m f-f-frightened that it’s all going to f-f-fall apart,” he admitted.
Mary narrowed her eyes. It wasn’t the operation that was in danger of falling apart, she realised. It was him.
“He’s just one man,” she said. “And soon he won’t even be much of a man.” She reached up behind her hair and set it loose, shaking it from side to side. She’d undone the top three buttons of her shirt because of the stifling heat down in the basement and she could feel Bailey’s eyes on her breasts. “I’m going to take a shower,” she said. “Then I’ll get back to work on Cramer.”
She went out of the kitchen, and was halfway up the stairs when she realised that Carlos had followed her into the hall. He obviously had something on his mind. “What is it?” she asked.
“This Armstrong woman. Are you sure we can trust her?”
Mary sat down on the stairs and looked down at Carlos. “Her father was Irish,” she said.
“But she’s an FBI agent,” said Carlos. “How do we know she’s not setting you up?”
Mary smiled. “In the first place, there’s no need. It’s not as if the FBI need to gather evidence against either of us, is it?” She brushed a strand of blonde hair from her face and eased it behind her ear.
“But why are you so willing to trust her?” pressed Carlos.
“Her father was in the IRA,” she said quietly.
Carlos was stunned. “Oh come on,” he said. “Are you telling me that the FBI recruited a woman whose father was a terrorist? Even the Americans aren’t that stupid.”
“Colm O’Malley was her natural father. Her mother was American and they divorced when Kelly was only a few years old. The woman moved back to the States and remarried. As far as the FBI are concerned, Kelly Armstrong is the original all-American girl.”
“And this O’Malley, this Colm O’Malley, what happened to him?”
Mary studied Carlos thoughtfully. “He was killed,” she said quietly. Carlos said nothing, waiting for her to
