is closed and padlocked.
Someone holding a torch is walking toward me. The beam swings from side to side, blinding me momentarily. I edge away from the trailer. Darkness feathers around me.
“You’re not supposed to be down here,” says a voice.
At that same moment a hand snakes around my face, cupping my mouth. Smothering all sound away.
I can’t breathe. My feet are off the ground. His fingers are digging into my cheek, tearing at my gums. His other forearm wraps around my neck, searching for my windpipe. I brace my hands against it and kick backward, trying to find his instep or his knee. The blow barely touches him.
He lifts me higher. My toes scrabble at the floor, unable to get leverage. I can hear blood pulsing in my ears. I need to breathe.
Karate training taught me about pressure points. There is one in the soft flesh between the thumb and forefinger, above the webbing. I find the spot. He grunts in pain, releasing his grip on my mouth and nose. I still can’t breathe. My windpipe is being crushed. I keep driving my thumb into his flesh.
A knee snaps into my kidneys. The pain is like a blast of heat. I don’t let go of his right hand but at the same time I can’t see his left fist cocking. The punch is like a punctuation mark. Darkness sweeps away the pain and the memories. I am free of the ferry and the incessant noise of the engines. Free of Cate and Samira. Free of the unborn twins. Free at last.
Slowly the world becomes wider. Lighter. I am suspended for a moment a few inches above my body, staring down at a strange scene My hands are bound with electrical tape behind my back. Another piece of tape covers my mouth, wrapped around my head like a mask, pulling at my split and swollen lip.
There is a weak light from a torch, lying on the floor near my feet. My head is on Samira’s lap. She leans forward and whispers something in my ear. She wants me to lie still. Light catches her pupils. Her fingers are like ice.
My head is pressed to her womb. I feel her babies moving. I can hear the sough and gurgle of the fluid, the melody of their heartbeats. Blood slides back and forth beneath her skin, squeezing into smaller and smaller channels, circulating oxygen.
I wonder if twins are aware of each other’s existence. Do they hear the other’s heartbeat? Do they hold each other or communicate by touch?
Bit by bit the confusion and darkness work their way into some semblance of order. If I stay relaxed, I can breathe through the tape.
Samira’s body suddenly spasms and jackknifes from the waist, squeezing my head against her thighs. Regaining control, she leans back and breathes deeply. I try to lift my head. She wants me to lie still.
I can’t talk with the gag. She hooks her fingers beneath the plastic tape and lifts it away from my lips just enough for me to speak.
“Where are we?”
“In a truck.”
Our whispers are magnified by the hollowness.
“Are you all right?”
She shakes her head. Tears form at the edge of her eyes. Her body convulses again. She’s in labor.
“Who brought me here?”
“Yanus.”
He and Pearl must be working together.
“You have to untie me.”
Her eyes sweep to the closed rear doors and she shakes her head.
“Please.”
“They will kill you.”
“Help me to sit up.”
She lifts my head and shoulders until I’m leaning with my back against a wall. My inner gyroscope is totally messed up. I may have ruptured an eardrum.
The trailer appears to be full of pallets and crates. Through a square narrow opening I see a crawl space with a mattress and three plastic bottles. Someone has built a false wall to create a secret compartment in the trailer. Customs officers wouldn’t notice the difference unless they measured the outside and inside of the truck.
“When did the contractions start?”
She looks at me helplessly. She has no way of judging time.
“How far are they apart?”
“A minute.”
How long was I unconscious? Raoul will have gone to the ferry’s captain by now. They will telephone Forbes and come looking for me. Forbes will tell them to be careful.
“Undo my hands.”
Samira shakes her head.
Letting go of the tape, she tugs a blanket around my shoulders. She is more worried about me than herself.
“You should not have come.”
I can’t reply. Another contraction contorts her face. Her entire body seems to lock up.
The rear doors swing open. I feel the draft and hear the intake of Samira’s breath.
“I told you not to touch her,” says Yanus, springing into the trailer. He seizes her, smearing his hands over her face as if covering her with filth. Then he peels back her lips, forcing her jaw open and spits into her mouth. She gags and tries to turn away.
Then he confronts me, ripping off the gag. It feels like half my face is torn off with it.
“Who knows you’re here?”
My voice is slurred: “The captain. The crew…they’re radioing ahead.”
“Liar!”
Another figure is standing in the open end of the trailer. Brendan Pearl. He can’t have been there for more than a few seconds yet I have the sensation that he’s been watching me for a long time.
The light behind him washes out his features, but I can see how he’s changed his appearance since I saw him last. His hair is shorter and he’s wearing glasses. The walking stick is a nice touch. He’s holding it upside down. Why? It’s not a walking stick. It has a curved hook like a fishing gaff or a marlin spike. I remember what Ruiz called him—the Shankhill Fisherman.
Yanus kicks me in the stomach. I roll once and he places a shoe on my neck, forcing it down, concentrating his weight on the point where my spine joins my skull. Surely it must snap.
Samira cries out, her body wracked by another contraction. Pearl says something and Yanus lifts his foot. I can breathe. He circles the empty trailer and returns, putting his heel on my neck again.
I force my arms out, pointing toward Samira. She is staring at her hands in horror. Liquid stains her skirt and pools beneath her knees.
Pearl pushes Yanus aside.
“Her water has broken.” Desperately, I choke the words out.
“She pissed herself,” sneers Yanus.
“No. She’s having the babies.”
“Make them stop,” says Pearl.
“I can’t. She needs a doctor.”
Another contraction arrives, stronger than before. Her scream echoes from the metal walls. Pearl loops the barbed hook around her neck. “She makes another sound like that and I’ll take out her throat.”
Samira shakes her head, covering her mouth with her hands.
Pearl pulls me into a sitting position and cuts the electrical tape away from my wrists. He pauses for a moment, chewing at his cheek like a cud.
“She don’t look so healthy does she?” he says, in an Irish lilt.
“She needs a doctor.”
“Can’t have no doctors.”
