Elena’s nerves didn’t start settling back until three hours into the flight.
Dinner had been cleared away an hour and a half ago and most of the cabin shutters were down, the lights subdued. ‘End of Days’ was playing on three pop-down screens above the centre-aisle, with a choice of German, English or Flemish dialogue through her headphones. But she paid the film little attention, her headphones were tucked into the seat-back ahead, her eyes flickering lazily in the semi-dark as she willed on sleep. She felt exhausted, completely burnt out by the Niagara-rush of nervous energy she’d outpoured over the past hours. But still some residual nervousness, turning over in her mind things that could still go wrong, kept her from slipping completely under.
Lorena was beside her in the window seat and had decided to watch the movie, only to doze off halfway through. Elena had gently removed her headphones and tucked them into the seat-back. She looked so serene and untroubled sleeping: no hint of concern that she was probably by now on police wires across half of Europe.
Elena returned the prim smile of a passing stewardess, then leant her head back, trying to let the last of her tension slip away. Gordon’s plan at least seemed to be working so far: dumping the car at Lille so that she wasn’t on the road too long, then the train to Brussels to catch the second leg of a Frankfurt-Brussels-Toronto-Edmonton flight. She’d booked to board at Frankfurt to hopefully foil any early ticket searches at Brussels, and originally they were ticketed to go all the way to Edmonton. But they’d changed at the last second to Toronto and would catch the train up to Montreal. Even if they were finally traced as catching the flight, the police would hopefully start searching in and around Edmonton. Gordon had carefully planned out every move, and revelled in it. Seeing his ‘cat’s got the cream’ grin as he put the final embellishments to her route, she’d ribbed him that he’d missed his vocation: he should have gone into the secret service, not banking.
She’d planned to tell Lorena the other reason why they were travelling so far as soon as they were airborne — but the first good opportunity had been when dinner was cleared away. ‘…I’m also hoping to see someone I haven’t seen for quite some time.’
‘Who’s that?’
‘My son… we got split up some time ago, so I haven’t seen him much you see.’ She swallowed back the lump in her throat; she was unable to bring herself to say that she hadn’t seen him at all. Lorena’s expression was quizzical. ‘Why did you get split up? What happened?’
‘Well, it’s a long story… it goes all the way back to when my father was alive and…’ Elena suddenly stopped herself. She couldn’t go into the horrors of the story with Lorena; and, regardless of the reasons, this girl whose life had been so scarred by abandonment since infancy would never understand how anyone could possibly abandon their own child. Especially not someone like her who Lorena no doubt looked up to as a saviour of abandoned children. One light of hope amongst the gloom and confusion: Lorena had seen enough dreams and illusions torn down by Ryall to have to shoulder any more. She smiled with that indulging re-assurance grown-ups often give children when they suddenly realize they’re not old enough to know something. ‘As I say… it’s a long story. Maybe if I do finally catch up with him, I can tell you it all then.’
Now, she couldn’t resist another smile to herself at the irony. She should be as excited as Lorena by this adventure: she might soon meet the son she hadn’t seen since birth! It wasn’t enough that she probably by now had an army of police tracking her down to take the edge off of that — now she’d also be playing shell-games with her constant companion. But having lied to Gordon and everyone else for half her life, that part at least should be easy: now all she had to do was deceive a ten-year old child.
She shut her eyes fully, shut out the last remnants of faint flickering light from the changing screen images, and willed on welcome sleep to envelope her nervous exhaustion. But her mind kept churning: what if they did track their tickets while they were in flight? What would they do: radio ahead to the pilot, or simply have a police welcoming committee with handcuffs for when she alighted?
Her eyes flicked suddenly open again, watching keenly the movements of the stewardesses, trying to judge if they were glancing her way at all anxiously or guardedly. She might as well forget it: sleep was impossible.
Georges was still gasping for breath minutes after the cloth had been put on; not just because it was tight around his head and face, but from the exertion of the struggle as he was bundled in and tied up. And his breath was hot: it felt as if his head was boiling, his pulse pounding like a jackhammer at his temples.
‘What the fffuck… isss this?…’ Two tremulous, breathless bursts. ‘What’s this about?’ Though in his rapidly sinking heart, he knew exactly what it was about; he’d worried about little else for days.
No answer.
As he regained more breath, he ventured: ‘This is about Roman, isn’t it?’
Still no answer. Only the drone of the van and its vibrations against his side as it sped through the city. He was laid flat in a half coiled position, found it difficult to sit up with his hands tied behind his back and his legs also tied.
Georges honed in closer on the city sounds beyond the fall of his own breathing, trying to work out where they were headed. Two turns already, a left then a right. Or had it been a right then a left? He was so filled with panic that he’d hardly paid attention. He felt them slowing and finally halting: a junction or traffic lights. Indicator ticking for ten or twelve seconds, then they swung left.
A long stretch this time: their speed picked up more than before and seemed to be staying constant. The rush of other traffic close by was also stronger, as if on occasion they were being passed. After a few moments, a voice finally from the front.
‘So, what did you tell the RCs when you were in with them?’
‘Nothing… I didn’t tell them anything.’
‘You were in there quite some time. Whadya do? Talk about the weather, conditions on the ski slopes?’
‘No, they put me in a holding cell for a while to cool my heels because meanwhile they were tracking some guy called Venegas, and they…’ Georges found it hard to talk with the hood tight on his face. He spoke in bursts between fractured breaths, raising his voice because of its muffling effect, and could instantly feel the strain to his throat. It made it sound all the more like a desperate plea. ‘…They were worried that if they let me out straight away I might warn Roman and spoil their operation.’
‘Yeah, sure.’ Heavy doubt in the voice. ‘And nothing else?’
‘No… that was it.’
The thought made him feel suddenly queazy. He wished now he hadn’t drunk so much: his thoughts were spinning frantically with fear-induced adrenalin, but he couldn’t focus clearly on what to say that might save his neck. It felt as if two sets of nerves were at play in his stomach: one clutching so tight he could feel the ache, the other set skittering wildly around the edges — and with the van’s swaying and bobbling, he started to feel sick.
‘I don’t think he’s going to say anything.’
‘Nah. Doesn’t look like it.’ The driver speaking for the first time.
‘So… where are we going to do this?’
‘There’s a multi-storey a few blocks beyond the bus terminal. I thought there’d be good.’
‘What’s the drop?’
‘Six floors… but it’ll be enough. He won’t survive it.’
George nerves hit fever pitch. His whole body was racked by cold-sweat trembling, his pulse a pounding ache at his temples as he felt himself spinning close to black-out. Raw bile swirled up without warning and he let out a couple of weak liquid belches before swallowing back, tasting the sourness as he fought for even breaths and some control. Almost surreal, as if it wasn’t actually happening to him, their conversation now mirroring the tape — but he was sure now from the tease in their voices that it was purposeful: they
Was that why Simone hadn’t phoned? But even if she did know about whatever happened in the two hours he’d lost at Viana’s place, he could imagine her angry and beating his chest with her fists or not wanting to speak to him for weeks, maybe months or never — but what he couldn’t picture was her just simply turning away while her father said that he’d have to ‘take care of it now’, or whatever tame euphemisms he used when he had to order someone’s death.
