I gripped the wheel tighter. Trying to keep all my mixed-up emotions in check. Grief, anger, the realization that I was about to say goodbye to the mother of the wonderful daughter sitting next to me; a woman whom I talked myself into thinking that I loved when we first met, even though I knew it not to be the case. Someone I should have said goodbye to years ago. Which now left me with the sense of a sad long-term compromise; of staying put instead of walking out the door; of wasted time. All my timid, scared choices. All done in the name of … what? Keeping up appearances? Proving to my priest and the community that I was a responsible guy? Always having to do what was expected of me?

And now …?

Bing.

A text from Grazyna. Klara read it out to me:

Please hurry. Time is running out.

There was an accident on the highway. I ducked off the 10 and went surface all the way to North Hollywood. This cost us another twenty minutes. When we turned into our street it was almost 8 p.m.

‘If she’s gone now …’ I started to say.

As we pulled up in front of the house Klara asked:

‘What the hell is with the steel shutters being down?’

‘That’s another conversation,’ I said.

Out front I saw the white Subaru that Grazyna had been driving for the past few years. Klara and I looked at each other.

‘We’ll get ourselves through this,’ I said.

‘One way or another.’

We parked. We got out. Walked up to the front door. I rang the bell, knowing that – as the locks had been changed – I couldn’t get inside my own house. After a minute I rang again. No answer. Myself and Klara exchanged a worried glance. I turned the door handle and was surprised to find that it was unlocked. Knowing we were en route Grazyna must have decided to leave the door open. I pushed it forward. We walked inside. The front hallway was dark, lit up only by the fluorescent tubes in the kitchen down the hall.

‘Grazyna?’ I said.

‘Where is she?’ Klara asked.

Behind us came a voice. A woman’s voice. A voice I knew.

‘She’s out taking a walk until this is over,’ Teresa said.

The front door slammed shut and we were both grabbed from behind. I was spun around, my arm shoved up against my back, as the man who’d grabbed me forced his gun barrel into my mouth. Teresa had Klara also in a chokehold, a pistol against her head. Then, in a voice thick with doom, the guy asked:

‘So who’s going to die first?’

twenty-one

‘I TOLD YOU, Ricky, no guns, no violence.’

The voice of Todor coming out of the kitchen. Todor. Fuck. Behind me the guy holding a gun to my head hissed at him: