Contents (48)
- PAST LIFE
- David Mark
- PART ONE
- PROLOGUE
- ONE
- TWO
- THREE
- FOUR
- FIVE
- SIX
- SEVEN
- EIGHT
- NINE
- TEN
- ELEVEN
- TWELVE
- THIRTEEN
- FOURTEEN
- FIFTEEN
- SIXTEEN
- SEVENTEEN
- EIGHTEEN
- NINETEEN
- TWENTY
- TWENTY-ONE
- TWENTY-TWO
- TWENTY-THREE
- TWENTY-FOUR
- PART TWO
- TWENTY-FIVE
- TWENTY-SIX
- TWENTY-SEVEN
- TWENTY-EIGHT
- TWENTY-NINE
- THIRTY
- THIRTY-ONE
- THIRTY-TWO
- THIRTY-THREE
- PART THREE
- THIRTY-FOUR
- THIRTY-FIVE
- THIRTY-SIX
- THIRTY-SEVEN
- THIRTY-EIGHT
- THIRTY-NINE
- FORTY
- EPILOGUE
- ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
He walks back to the van. Smokes one of the dead man’s cigarettes. It’s foul. He pockets the butt, and lights one of his own. It’s a brand called Jin Ling: a yellow packet, designed to resemble Camels, and pumped out in their millions by Russian counterfeiters. They don’t conform to any regulations: each stick a popsicle of poisons, rat-droppings, feathers, mites and pesticides. They have a tendency to stay lit, and start fires. They’re fresh off the boat. The aroma is distinctive: chemical and pungent. They are his one indulgence.
He puffs grey smoke into the air. Stretches his back. He grew uncomfortable in the journey back from the hotel, but it did not impede him. He sometimes wishes he knew anybody well enough to brag to. He killed one brother with his left hand – the other with his right. He is not so humble as to detest praise for his accomplishments.
A creak, to his left.
The low groan of a young woman waking up in pain …
And ahead. Lights. The soft yellow lights of a car making its way up an unfamiliar path.
An deabhil allows himself a smile, bares his teeth around the cigarette.
He hadn’t expected them so quickly. Before the dawn he will have the remainder of his money. The Heldens will have their prize. The Teagues, well … that was for another day …
The car comes to a halt. The engine fades to nothing. Then a big man steps out of the unremarkable car.
‘Hi,’ comes a voice: soft, shy, scared. ‘I’m Aector. I’m a police officer …’
And an deabhil’s smile glints like the edge of his blade.
TWENTY-TWO
8.24 a.m.
Hessle Foreshore
‘I have these spots. Do you think they are chicken pox? Why do you think they are called pox and not chicken spots? Do you get it actually from chickens? Do you think the first time a person got it they had eaten a spotty chicken? I suppose you wouldn’t be able to tell until you plucked its feathers and so it could be poorly and you wouldn’t know …’
Fin listens as his sister talks. Very little else is required of him. She’s very clever, is Lilah. Fin’s teachers say he’s very clever too, but he can’t help feeling they’re just being nice. He’s OK at stuff, and he works hard, but he knows himself to be somebody who’s largely unremarkable. He’s OK with it. He’s luckier than some people, who seem to get dealt a decidedly raw deal by the Fates. But Lilah, well, she’s got a mind like a rocket. Always half a dozen steps ahead. And fearless too. Bright and brave and sharp as a knife. She reminds him a little bit of Auntie Trish, though he’d never say as much. Fin knows that of his limited qualities is an ability to keep his mouth shut whenever there is a risk of putting his foot in it. Of the things he has learned from his dad, this is the one for which he is most grateful.