He sat in the car and waited until the ambulance had arrived before he drove sedately though the London traffic to the scrapyard. Declan guessed that the nut case wanted Michael to kill him. He had done what he had set out to do, and now he wanted to die. It was all so fucking mental. His punishment could be arranged, only at a later date. He wasn’t getting away with this that easily, not by a long chalk.

Chapter One Hundred and Thirty-Eight

Chapter One Hundred
and Thirty-Eight

Timothy Branch arrived at the hospital, aware that he would be expected to smooth everything over for Michael Flynn, and to make sure that Michael could get on with the business at hand with the minimum of fuss.

When he saw young Jessie Flynn he was, for the first time in his life, speechless. The girl was lying on a bed in intensive care, and Michael Flynn was standing beside her bed, holding her hand. He looked seriously ill too – his face was devoid of colour, even his lips were white.

But Jessie, young Jessie, was a terrifying sight.

‘Fucking hell, Michael, I’m so sorry. I’m so very sorry.’

And he meant it. Michael could hear it in the man’s voice.

‘He fucking planned this, Timothy. He shackled her to a bed, and he left her there to rot. Her heart gave out. The infection in her blood weakened it. Twenty-two years old and she had a massive fucking coronary. I got there too late. I was too late to help her.’

Michael started to cry again.

Timothy Branch automatically put his arm around the man’s shoulders; he couldn’t even imagine the pain that he must be feeling. To lose a child was hard enough for anyone, but to know she had been murdered – had died a slow and painful death – had to be unendurable.

‘Listen, Michael, I will sort this, don’t worry. I swear to you.’

Michael nodded. He appreciated the man’s promise – for the first time he actually felt that the man was trustworthy. But it was the way Jessie had died. Even a fucking no-mark like Branch couldn’t help but be affected. Just looking at her broken body was hard enough.

‘That bastard soaked her with cold water, he starved her, he fucking held her there with home-made manacles. You should see her poor legs. The fetters were so fucking tight they rubbed away every piece of her skin – they even scraped against her bones. She must have been in absolute agony, Timothy. My baby lived her last few weeks on this earth in excruciating pain, waiting for me to find her, to help her. But I was too late.’