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
A groan, suddenly. The shudder of waking into pain. The soft, rasping whisper.
‘I’m a police officer … I’m looking for … looking …’
Roisin thrusts her hand under the van. Grabs a fistful of sodden coat, bloodied hair. Pulls at him as if he were sliding into the earth.
Watches as he raises his head, turns his face. Looks into her, as if reading words from her bones.
His face, a bloodied full moon; gouts of crimson spilling into one staring eye.
She raises her hands to her mouth. Inhales the scent of him; mud and earth and the iron reek of blood. Licks rain and blood from her lips: a gory communion; blood mingling on her tongue.
Breathes his name, as the eye starts to close. Stares into him with the ferocity of a wild animal defending her young.
‘Aector …’
The eye turns dark. Closes.
‘Aector. I’m here. You came for me. Saved me. Saved me again …’
A flicker of life; a sliver of eye, stark as the bone that winks through the trench in his cheek. A voice, half lost to the earth.
‘Roisin …’
She reaches into the dark space beneath the van. Rummages past the soggy fabric, the ragged gash in his gut. Takes his big cold hand in her warm, soft fingers.
‘Stay,’ she whispers, worming her way under the van. ‘Stay strong. I’ll get help …’
She feels him squeeze her hand. Feels the bulk of him, the great mass of arms and back and shoulders, pressed against her own fragile skeleton. Wishes she could wrap him in strips of herself – bandage him, cosset him, in the twists of her own being.
Takes her other hand, and makes a blade of her fingers. Paws at the earth. Claws a great trench into the ground around them. Keeps going long after her fingers tear and her nails are pulled from her skin.
And all the while she sings, her lips at his ear, her prayer into his heart.
‘You don’t die. You can’t die. You fight. You matter. You have a duty. You have my heart …’
TWENTY-SEVEN
Hessle Foreshore
McAvoy sits on the damp grass, his back pressed up against the peeling white paint and rotten wood of the little fishing boat. He has his back to the water. There’s little sun today, but the shadow cast by the Humber Bridge bathes him in a cold, bitter darkness.
Home is a couple of hundred yards away, back down Cliff Road. He can’t bring himself to be there alone. There are drops of Lilah’s blood on the carpet. Roisin’s blood on the wall. She punched the chimney breast until the skin was gone from her knuckles. A bruise was already forming on her forehead when she left; an ugly swollen patch of livid flesh. She hurt herself badly when Lilah came home. Had turned all her rage and fear and guilt upon herself and smacked her bleeding fist into her own temple until Lilah grabbed her hands and begged her to stop. Her questions came out in a torrent. Lilah, through the tears, through the pain, told her all she could. Told her about the man with the stick who’d risen from a pile of earth and leaves and dragged her brother into the earth.