He hears her gasp of surprise. Then shock. And the long sigh as she falls to the floor, a final breath before her skull strikes the marble with the sickening force of a dead weight. A crack like a rifle shot. And he cannot prevent the cry of anguish that tears itself from his throat.
His hand falls to his side, fingers losing their grasp of the Glock. It too hits the floor like a gunshot. Barely aware of the pungent stink of nitroglycerine that suffuses all the air around him, he covers the ground towards her in three paces and drops to his knees, immediately aware of her blood soaking through his trousers. It seems almost black as it pools on the marble. Red lost in darkness. Though there is light enough for him to see her face, eyes open, disbelief in their sightless gaze.
He draws her into his arms, exhorting her not to leave. This woman who carries his child and all his hopes for the future. But his words fall on dead ears, and in a sudden flood of light he sees the vivid red of her blood as it spreads across the cold tiles. He inclines his head to look back over his shoulder. A young policewoman, arms extended, points her pistol directly at him. He sees how pale she is, all colour drained from a face like a ghost. He sees how her hands tremble as they struggle to hold her gun steady.
‘Don’t move!’ she shouts at him and he thinks, how absurd! Move? Where would he go? And why? What point would there be now? In anything. Angela is dead. And a sudden anger fills all the empty spaces inside him.
‘You killed her!’ He hears his own voice as if it belongs to someone else. Words shouted in English. In torment. Is it really him? Surely to God none of this is actually happening. Then a second wave of fury consumes him and he screams again at this scrap of a woman who points her gun at him. ‘You fucking killed her!’
Cristina trembles from head to foot, fighting to keep control. She shakes her head in denial. ‘You did it!’ Words in Spanish. ‘You shot her.’ And just like the man on his knees at her feet, she feels as though someone else has spoken.
Her focus is momentarily distracted by Matías hobbling into the hall behind her, pistol pointed unsteadily towards them. An eternity too late.
Now the man is speaking in Spanish, his voice filled no longer simply with pain and anger, but with hatred. ‘You made me do it. You killed her. You!’
CHAPTER ONE
Mackenzie felt the pressure of being late. He hated being late. He built his life around never being late. To the extent that he would set all of his clocks, even his watch, five minutes fast. Despite knowing that his world was five minutes ahead of time, it placed a psychological pressure on him. To go faster. To ensure punctuality.
Although it pained him to admit it, the habit was borrowed – or, perhaps, inherited – from his uncle, who also set every timepiece five minutes in advance of real time, and would punish lateness with a stick. Actually, a cane. An old-fashioned walking cane with a curved onyx handle and knuckles on its shaft at six-inch intervals. Mr Kane, he had called it, emphasizing the K. His idea of a joke, a play on words. It hurt like hell.
Today Mackenzie had been delayed by Thursday traffic. Roadworks on the A4020. Circumstances beyond his control, and although his watch told him he was twenty minutes late, for once he was relieved to know it was just fifteen.
An overactive imagination conjured a picture of Alex waiting at the school gate, a few stragglers pushing past him on to Oaklands Road. Long gone the parental SUVs and people carriers and four-by-fours which ten minutes ago would have choked this narrow street.
Turning off Boston Road, beyond the Hanwell Royal Mail delivery office, he accelerated past rows of terraced houses with mean little front gardens. Already he could see the forlorn figure of his son standing outside the gates of the red-and-yellow-brick Edwardian-era primary school. His blazer was too big for him. Susan’s idea of economy. If it was too big for him this year, it would fit him next. And if he didn’t suddenly sprout, they might also get away with it the year after. Had it been warmer Alex might have taken it off and draped it through the strap of his sports bag. But there was a cool wind from the north-east, and he stood hunched against it, drowned by his blazer. To his already distressed father it made him seem all the more pathetic.
Mackenzie had been wrong about the stragglers. The street was deserted. Amazing how quickly an entire school could empty itself. Motors idling at the kerbside, pulling away each in turn, a well-practised daily choreography. In his day, Mackenzie had been made to walk to school, regardless of weather. Wet wellies chafing at red calves, shorts clinging to stinging thighs, coats draped over radiators to fill classrooms with steamy damp air on wet winter mornings.
Alex would be distressed, he knew, and late for his team’s five-a-side game with the club from Hayes. Although it was just a ten-minute walk to the sports centre, he had been drilled always to wait for one parent or the other. But today his unhappiness went deeper than simply being late for a game of football. Mackenzie saw it the moment he drew up at the gate. Head down, Alex opened the door, threw
