Inside, Michael Hill couldn't believe his eyes as he crouched low and looked through the window. Jack Delaney and his bitch of a girlfriend walking towards the door. How the hell had he tracked him down? The man had the detecting skills of a blind goose. So far everything had had to be laid out on a plate for him. He hefted Jessica Tam under one arm and lifted the tranquilliser gun, which he had reloaded, in the other. There was nowhere to go. He pointed the gun at the door and waited.
The doorbell rang. He stayed motionless. It rang again. He could hear Delaney move around the side of the house, peering in the windows, but he wasn't visible in the hall. The bell rang a third time. He held the nurse tighter to him, grateful that she was so small.
After another couple of minutes he heard footsteps moving away. Then a car engine starting up and the car pulling away. He let out the breath he had unconsciously been holding and propped his arm under Jessica Tam and around her waist. Walking her to the door as if she had had too much too drink.
He opened the door and manoeuvred her clumsily towards his vehicle. He was halfway there when Delaney stepped around from the side of the van and pointed a pistol at him.
'Your exhaust pipe is still hot.'
Michael Hill stiffened, holding the gun against the petite nurse's head.
'I'll kill her.'
Delaney looked at the man's curly brown wig. Could see the madness dancing in his dark eyes. He had no doubt at all that he meant what he said.
'You pull that trigger and you're a dead man.'
'Maybe I'm a dead man anyway. But we're not finished here yet. I'm a force of nature, Delaney.'
Delaney looked at him and wondered at his own hesitation. Earlier that day he had been unable to kill a man responsible for the death of his wife and the death of his unborn baby. Something in him had changed, that much was clear. A couple of months ago he wouldn't have hesitated. He'd have put a bullet in each of Mickey Ryan's kneecaps first and then put one in his head. He looked at the frail woman who had tried so hard to help him all those years ago. He was powerless. He looked at the expression in the man's eyes facing him. He took a step closer, saw the pupils grow wider as though the man had come to some kind of decision. He moved slowly towards the man, positioning the barrel of the gun in the centre of his forehead.
'Drop the gun, Michael.'
'Look into my eyes, Delaney. You know I'll do it.'
Delaney looked in his eyes and then pulled the trigger. Michael Hill's head snapped back in a way the spine wasn't designed for. His dark brown wig fell off and as he crashed to the floor with his arms held out, his head landed with a wet, slapping thud, jolting one of the brown contact lenses he was wearing loose. He now had one brown eye and one blue and looked, Delaney thought, with his blond hair and white face exactly as David Bowie might have looked if he had carried on with the heroin.
The nurse, Jessica Tam, had fallen from his lifeless arms and was now laid across his body in an unnaturally intimate manner.
Delaney barely registered the sound of car tyres as Kate pulled back into the driveway. He picked the nurse up in his arms and carried her over to the car. Kate opened the door for him to lay her on the back seat and then leaned over her to check her vital signs. She put a finger on her carotid artery and then bent over to listen to her breathing.
'She's got a strong, steady rhythm, Jack. She's going to be fine. Just drugged, that's all.' She looked over at dead figure of Michael Hill and shuddered. 'Are you okay?'
Delaney looked down at his hand, which was trembling now and nodded. 'I'm fine.'
He pulled out his phone, and turned his back to shield himself from the wind as he made a call.
