team had already departed and Howard was waiting to hear from one of the Fire Department’s investigators who was walking through the wreckage. They’d recovered the second body, a badly burnt man, when they had the fire under control. The corpse was charred and smouldering and Howard would never forget the smell. He’d covered his mouth with his hand as he’d put his head close to the blistered and blackened flesh. He found what he was looking for. Two bullet holes in the chest. Dunning had called Baltimore County Police and arranged for the medical examiner and a crime lab tech team before he’d taken his men and gone back to the city. He seemed to resent the fact that there had been no-one for his SWAT team to take down.
Howard heard shouts of warning and a large blackened beam fell to the ground, not far from where the investigator was standing. He turned and waved, signalling that he was okay. Two of the fire fighters walked over to him, axes in their hands. The investigator, a black guy in his late fifties called George Whitmore, knelt down and touched something on the ground before lifting his gloved fingers to his nose. Whitmore stood up and spoke to the fire fighters with axes. They nodded and began to chop away at something while Whitmore watched. The thwacks of the axes were replaced by the sound of tearing wood and then the three men disappeared. Howard frowned. One minute the fire fighters were standing together, the next they’d vanished as if the ground had swallowed them up. Behind him, another fire engine drove off, its work done.
Howard walked towards the smoking ruins, running his hand across his stubbled chin. The walls around the kitchen, and the floor above it, had been totally destroyed, and all that remained of that side of the house were smoking timbers and blackened appliances. As he got closer he saw that the fire fighters had opened up a stairway leading to a basement. A white helmet appeared, followed by the bulky shoulders of George Whitmore. He pulled a face at the FBI agent. “Another one down there for the ME,” he said. He took off his helmet and tucked it under his arm, reaching inside his waterproofs and coming out with a pack of cigarettes and a Zippo lighter. “Want one?” he asked Howard, who shook his head. Howard looked around the remains of the kitchen as the investigator lit up. Everything above the kitchen area had been gutted and what remained of the ground floor was covered in a thick layer of ash. Despite the devastation, there were still signs of domesticity — the dishwasher door had popped open and inside were plates and cups, a floor mop stood by the refrigerator, its head melted but its handle surprisingly untouched, and a kettle stood on the stove.
“Can I look?” Howard asked.
“Better if you don’t,” said Whitmore. “There’s still a lot of smoke down there, and the stairs are in a bad way. Wait till the guys have made it safe.” He took a long pull at his cigarette and exhaled deeply, blowing the smoke into the air with a look of contentment on his face.
“Okay,” said Howard. “What can you tell me about the body?”
“Woman, late twenties maybe. Hard to tell ‘cos her face is all mashed up.”
“Shot? Smoke?”
“Not shot, that’s for sure. Smoke? I don’t think so, I think she was dead before the fire, but you’ll have to wait for the ME to take her apart in the chop-shop before we know for sure.” He drew deeply on the cigarette again. “Sure is some weird shit down there, though.”
“What do you mean?”
“Knives, a pair of shears, all of them covered in blood. Bits of chain on the floor.”
“You think she was tortured?”
The big man shrugged. “Maybe. There’s a man’s wallet down there. I didn’t touch it, thought the crime lab technicians might want to take a look first.” A timber crashed somewhere at the other side of the house and he put his helmet back on. “You’d better move back, Agent Howard, this isn’t exactly safe right now.”
Howard nodded and walked away from the smouldering wreckage. In the distance he heard an ambulance siren, heading towards the house. He wondered why they were bothering with the siren.
Mary picked Bailey’s glass off the floor and went over to her suitcase. She opened it and took out a bottle of malt whisky, keeping an eye on him as she unscrewed the cap and poured out a double measure. “Here, drink this,” she said, holding out the glass.
Bailey took it and swallowed it in three gulps. “I’m sorry,” he said.
“That’s all right,” she said. “We’re all a little apprehensive.”
“This isn’t Ireland, Mary,” he said. “They electrocute k-k-killers here.” He looked up at her and she saw that his left eyelid was flickering. “I’ve got a bad feeling about this.”
Mary held the bottle of whisky between her hands, gripping it tightly. “No-one is going to catch us. A couple of Sass-men have got close, that’s all. And they’ve been taken care of. You’ve dealt with the SAS before. You’ve gone up against them and you’ve always come out on top. And you know why that is? It’s because you’re fighting for something you believe in and they’re doing it for money. They don’t believe that the British Government is right, they do it because they pay their wages. They’re hired guns, and we’re freedom fighters. That’s why we’ll win in the end.” She put the whisky bottle on the dressing table next to a Gideon’s Bible and sat down on the bed opposite Bailey. “A few more hours and it’ll all be over.”
“Let’s just go home, Mary,” he said. “We c-c-can try again some other time.”
“We’ll never have another opportunity like this. Everything’s in place; we can’t fail. All we have to do is stay calm and do our jobs and they’ll talk about this for years to come.”
Bailey began to shiver like a wet dog and Mary shook her head sadly. “Matthew, you’re better than this,” she said soothingly. “Pull yourself together. It’s going to be all right.” She stood up and stroked his cheek and he tried to kiss her palm. She let him, trying not to show the distaste she felt. He licked her thumb and then sucked it like a baby feeding. With her other hand she stroked the back of his head as she watched herself in the mirror over the dressing table. Bailey had a vital part to play in the following day’s operation, and he had to be kept under control, for twelve hours at least. After that, it no longer mattered. “Stand up,” she said.
He did as he was told, his head bowed. She took off his spectacles, dropped them on the bed behind her, and put her arms around his neck. “You’re one of the IRA’s best, you know that,” she said. She waited for him to kiss her, knowing that he would, knowing that it was necessary, but dreading it nonetheless. She could smell his breath, a bitter, fishy odour, and his lips were dry and crusty. She closed her eyes and waited. His lips pressed against hers and his tongue forced itself between her teeth. She gagged but forced herself to respond. His hands went clumsily to her breasts, groping rather than caressing, and his erection stabbed against her groin. His kisses became harder, more aggressive, and his hands moved behind her, grabbing her backside as if he was scooping up handfuls of sand. He buried his face in her neck and began murmuring her name over and over again.
His hands went down to her shorts and he pushed them down roughly around her knees, then did the same with her underwear. Before she could move, his hand was between her legs, fumbling and probing, and he kissed her again. He was slobbering like a wild animal. He shoved her back onto the bed, almost on top of his spectacles, and then he began grunting as he ripped off her shorts, throwing them into a corner and unzipping his trousers.
“Mary, I’ve always wanted you,” he panted, falling on top of her. Mary opened her legs, closed her eyes, and filled her mind with images of Sean Morrison.
Joker awoke in confusion, unsure where he was or if he was still in danger. Before his eyes opened, his hands flew up in front of his face as if fighting off invisible demons. His first thought was that he was back in the basement but then he realised that the ceiling was a series of square polystyrene tiles and that the walls were white. His wrists had been bandaged, and professionally by the look of it, and his body felt numb as if he was floating on a cloud. Painkillers, he realised. He was in a hospital. There were smears of black ink on his fingertips. Someone had taken his fingerprints while he was unconscious. He tried to lift his head up but a bolt of pain ripped through his back. A low dose of painkiller, he realised. He lay back and gathered his thoughts. The last thing he remembered was the fire, and clambering out of the burning building. And the stranger, the man from MI5. The man he’d killed.
Something moved at the foot of his bed and Joker realised he wasn’t alone. He raised his head again, more slowly this time, and saw a uniformed policeman getting out of a chair. “Water,” Joker gasped.
The cop scowled. “What do I look like, a fucking nurse?” he said.
Joker lay back and closed his eyes. Something was digging into his hips and he felt around with his hands. There was a chain around his waist, and when he pulled it something rattled under the bed. “The doctors said not to handcuff you because of the damage to your wrists,” said the cop. Joker opened his eyes to see the man looking down at him. “But if you try any tricks with the chain, the cuffs go straight on. Understand?”
“Understand,” croaked Joker. “Where am I?”
