diamond courier sitting propped on the dirty toilet with the gaping wound in his throat, robbed of his dignity along with his life. And of the fear captured immobile on Tess’s face as she lay dead in the hotel bathtub. The driver might or might not survive his injuries, but he was a casualty of battle. The others had been little more than executions.
I stopped briefly alongside the man with the broken elbow. He looked up at me with a dull hatred in his eyes that only served to fan my anger.
“Tell Eamonn this ends here,” I said, my voice cold. “But if he wants to take it further we
The man paused, not wanting to give me an inch. Then his gaze flicked round the faces of the others, all silently intent on him, and the precariousness of his position seemed to dawn on him. He nodded, not meeting my eyes. I leaned in close. He struggled with himself not to lean away from me.
“And if you should think about changing your mind later,” I added quietly, “I swear I’ll come back and break your other arm.”
Twenty-eight
By the time we’d got Jamie back to the bottom of the embankment – Sean and I retrieving our helmets as we went – a small crowd had gathered on the road above us. A couple of the braver onlookers ventured down the steep slope and made for the van and the men lying around it. Their sideways glances as they passed made it clear that they knew we were to blame for what had happened, but nobody quite wanted to call us on it, even so.
Jamie was mobile enough to climb back up unaided, though he was still pale and unsteady when we reached the top. The rest of the crowd parted silently and let us pass. Anyone who was thinking of mounting a challenge took one look at our set faces and quickly changed their mind. We hurried through them back to the bikes.
The Devil’s Bridge Club had left their machines scattered across the hard shoulder near where Sean and I had stopped. Now we all jumped back on board, Jamie climbing on behind William, who handed him his helmet.
We took the couple of seconds required to plug our radio headsets back in before we all jammed our lids on and fired up the motors. As we pulled away I looked back over my shoulder, down towards the Merc van.
The flames had died back and mostly gone out as the petrol exhausted itself. The paint was blackened around the front end and had largely burned away from the glass where Daz had scored his direct hit on the windscreen.
The bystanders who’d gone to help were clustered around the driver but their movements seemed uncertain, as though they’d very little idea of what to do for him. He was going to need years of plastic surgery – if he survived. And we’d done that to him.
I tried to feel sorry, but it wasn’t something that came easy.
“So, what do we do now?” It was Daz who voiced the question over the radio and I realised that we hadn’t talked about what happened after we intercepted the van. All our efforts had been focused on getting Jamie back.
“We head for the next ferry,” Sean said, pulling out smoothly to overtake a farm tractor, getting back into a rhythm. “Any ideas, William?”
“We’ve missed the Belfast to Heysham boat, but there should be one coming in to Larne in less than an hour,” William said after a moment’s consideration. “I know the guys on board and they should be able to squeeze us onto it. That’ll take us across to Troon.”
“Good enough,” Sean said. “Anywhere away from here will do.”
Compared to our earlier pace, we rode almost sedately round the outskirts of Belfast and headed up the A2 for Larne. I was bringing up the rear of the group and all the way I had one eye on my mirrors, watching for signs of pursuit. None came.
By the time we dropped down into the harbour at Larne and saw the reassuring bulk of the ferry waiting there, I couldn’t help a small sigh of relief. As William had predicted, he was a known face to the ticketing staff at the gate. He negotiated our way on board without any real fuss and the bikes were slotted in to one side of the car deck
“Might be a rough crossing today,” one of the crew told us. “We’ll make sure they’re well strapped down for you.”
We clattered our way up the metal staircase to the passenger deck and William led the way towards the First Class lounge at the stern, charming his way in with a friendly greeting to the smartly-uniformed woman in charge.
“You’re lucky – we’re so quiet today I think you’ll have the place to yourselves, William,” she said. “I think everybody’s heard the weather forecast and decided to give it a miss.”
“Thanks, Jo,” William said gratefully, dumping his helmet onto the nearest table. “I think we could do with some peace.”
“Busy trip, huh?” she said brightly.
“Yeah,” he said, giving her a tired smile, “you could say that.”
I pulled out my mobile, only then noticing I’d missed three calls during the mad ride up from the south. When I checked, all of them were from Jacob. I tried calling him back but his answering machine cut in. I left him a brief message to say Jamie was safe and we were on our way back.
After the adrenaline rush of action that had pumped up our systems ever since we’d gone chasing away from Mondello Park, the climb down left all of us slow and lethargic. I was aware of a creeping headache starting up from the back of my neck and I rolled my shoulders, trying to relieve the pressure.
Only Sean still looked wired, keeping an eye on the door and reacting minutely every time it opened and the cabin crew bustled about their pre-sailing tasks. It wasn’t until the bow doors had shut and the vibrations through the deck picked up to signal we were moving off that he seemed to relax a fraction.
“Is that it?” Paxo demanded softly, glancing at him. “Is it over?”
