Standing back with the others, Campbell watched as the ambulance crew checked Tam over.
Although they could find nothing obviously wrong with him, the symptoms described by the others would normally have indicated a stroke.
"We're going to take you to the hospital, for further checks, just to make sure." The paramedic reassured Tam.
Then Campbell watched as Tam stood up and walked out of the pub with the ambulance crew, gently supported by one of the paramedics.
As they left, Tam turned, waved, and told the others to get back to the playing.
"Hopefully, I'll be back later. Keep the rest of my drink for me." He instructed.
Regardless of whatever had just happened to him, to any casual observer, Tam now seemed as fit as a fiddle.
--------------------
Alessandra just made it to the pavement outside the pub before vomiting violently into the gutter.
She felt dizzy and the world spun around her as she steadied herself against a sign-post, which curiously indicated 'Give Way' to traffic on the street. Which she just had.
The left side of her head throbbed with a migraine and she felt weak.
She took several deep breaths one after another.
"Are you okay, Miss?" a woman's voice caught her off-guard.
She turned to find a paramedic by her side, a concerned look on her face.
"Too much to drink. But I'll be okay," Alessandra lied. A white lie. But she'd been through this before with Robert and Lisa, and she knew that she would be fine.
"Are you sure?"
"I just need a few moments, then I'll be on my way. It was the last shot that did it."
The paramedic smiled and Alessandra watched as she crossed the road to an ambulance on the other side of the street. The violin player was just being helped inside.
Another wave of nausea coursed through her and she vomited once more.
After it passed, she felt a little better.
The pain in her head was beginning to subside, at least to manageable levels.
Leaving the side of the road she walked slowly to a wooden bench against the wall, which was not far from the entrance to the Greyfriars Kirkyard, the old cemetery of the Old Town in Edinburgh where the famous dog 'Greyfriars Bobby' was buried.
She sat down, put her head between her knees and took a moment to let the world come back into proper focus.
Her heart was still racing. Not just from what had happened with the man with the stroke, but what had happened immediately afterwards.
She had turned around and looked up and found herself staring straight at the face of DCI McKenzie.
He looked different, and at first it didn't compute, but then she realised he was wearing a disguise. The moustache and beard looked good, but they were not authentic.
It was his eyes that had given him away though. She had memorised them, and the moment she saw them, a little alarm bell went off in her head.
Unfortunately, at the moment she had set eyes on him, she was already planning how to best make it out of the pub without vomiting over its entire clientele.
As she had stood up, she'd grabbed her jacket and slipped it on, and automatically she’d put her hand into the pocket and checked the syringe.
Her head was awash with thoughts.
First, she was suddenly feeling very ill, unsteady and unable to focus properly.
Second, McKenzie had seen her. He had seen her face. And associated with the drama that had just unfolded, it could have the potential to make her face memorable. Likewise, everyone else standing around may remember the woman who went to the musician’s aid. She had to leave as soon as possible with as few people as possible seeing her face in any more detail than was necessary. She had been involved at the centre of a spectacle which was not exactly conducive to killing someone and sneaking away unnoticed.
Lastly, McKenzie was right before her. Her hand was on the syringe. The pub was crowded. It would only take a second... A quick, discreet lunge at his body as she pushed into him and brushed past him... And mission accomplished.
A wave of nausea had at that moment arisen within her, making all further rational thought impossible. She'd pushed forward then, and did bang into McKenzie, but purely in an effort to escape.
A few seconds later she was out of the door, her target left behind. Alive and well.
Now the power of conscious thought was coming back to her, she swore aloud, releasing a string of Italian profanities that her mother would have disowned her for, had she still known who her daughter was.
Alessandra stood up. She knew that going back into the pub and killing McKenzie was not a sensible option. Plus, she had left a sea of her DNA all over the streets of Edinburgh, which the paramedic and other witnesses could tie her to, in any subsequent investigations if she were to be seen killing McKenzie before trying to escape.
Plus, although she was feeling better, she was not yet capable of operating normally. If she were to attempt to complete the mission, she should have all her senses about her.
She knew better than to make any rash decisions now.
This was only the first day.
Another chance would present itself later.
For now though, she had to get away from there as soon as possible.
Standing up, she walked quickly to the nearest bus stop and caught the first one that arrived.
Ten minutes later, she alighted and caught at taxi back to her car.
Two hours later she was back in her hotel room, thinking back on the evening and pondering a single question.
"Why was DCI McKenzie wearing a disguise?"
Chapter 23
The Trossachs
Scotland
Sunday
11.05 a.m.
When Alessandra opened her eyes, two thoughts immediately hit her.
The pain in her head had gone. She was feeling fine again.
And it was so quiet.
When she closed her eyes and listened, really listened...she could hear nothing.
Only the blood pulsing in her head.
When a bird passed by outside the window, whistling, the beautiful song it sung seemed far louder than it probably really was.
Rolling over to the edge of the bed and standing up, she moved slowly to the window, not entirely trusting herself, and opened it up.
A wonderful smell filled her nostrils.
Pine.
Flowers.
Fresh air.
She stuck her head out of the window and breathed in, deeply.
She breathed out, and no sooner had she relaxed than a smile began to grow on her face.
From where she stood, her view was amazing.
She could see out over a loch, with a beautiful mountain rising above it on the other side. Apart from the sound of some birds, there was nothing to be heard.
No cars. No aircraft. No people.
Paradise!
Pulling the curtains open she sat back down on the edge of her bed and stared out across the magical vista that came with the price tag of perhaps the best room in the hotel.
Money worth spending. Every penny of it.
Then a magical thing happened.
Her tummy rumbled!
The nausea was gone and she was now starving.
Last night she couldn't get rid of the food fast enough, and now she felt the urge to stuff herself stupid.
Thankfully, she had a lot more control over what went in, than what came out.
Breakfast could wait a little longer.
In the shower, she let the warm water rain down upon her, washing away the last vestiges of the evening before.
Until the moment she started to think about what had happened, she had felt wonderful. Refreshed. Reborn.
But the moment thoughts of the evening before entered her mind, confusion and sadness began to cloud her mind.
There was no doubt what had happened.
She had cured a man of a stroke. She knew it. Wit
hout a doubt.
She had seen the onset of the stroke with her own eyes, and then from almost nowhere a certainty had arisen within her that she, Alessandra Moretti, had the capability, the power to reach out and cure him.
To take the stroke away.
Stranger still, she had felt an overwhelming desire, and a compulsion, to help the man.
And she had.
She had cured him!
She.
Alessandra Moretti.
Had.
Cured.
Him.
In other words, she was not going mad. What had happened in the Loch Ness Hilton was real. It had really happened.
The knowledge that she was not going crazy lifted her spirits, however, only momentarily.
This knowledge brought with it confusion. Thoughts. Feelings. Questions which were beginning to bubble up within her, but she was not yet ready to face.
Then anger.
She didn't need this.
She didn't ask for this.
No. Alessandra Moretti had a life to live, and work to do. This, whatever this 'this' was, could not be allowed to interfere with her life's work.
She was a killer.
A good killer.
And today, tomorrow... or very, very soon, with luck, and careful planning,... she was going to kill someone again.
Thoughts of her next mission then brought her back to the chance she had had with McKenzie.
He had been there and she had actually had an opportunity to deliver the poison into his body, but she had messed up. Thanks to the 'this', she had lost an ideal opportunity.
She remembered the old saying, 'opportunity only knocks once.'
She knew that saying to be wrong, because opportunity was always something she created for herself, but she couldn't help regretting how close she had come, only to have lost the chance.
Through something that she could never ever have planned for.
Switching the water off and wrapping herself in a towel, she walked into the bedroom and sat back down on the edge of the mattress.
And what was with the disguise?
She knew it was a disguise because it just didn't look real. It was good, but not good enough.
Which begged the question again, why was he wearing it?
The answer was obvious.
He was hiding his face.
Why?
Because obviously he knew something was up. He was taking precautions.
Trying to evade detection.
Detection from what?
She swore in Italian again.
There was only one obvious answer. DCI Campbell McKenzie knew that someone was looking for him. Somehow, someone had warned him.
She swore again.
Alessandra also knew, only too painfully, that when a target gets wind of the fact that they are being hunted, that things start to get difficult.
Very difficult indeed.
Opportunity only knocks once.
Perhaps the person who first came up with the phrase had himself been an assassin.
If McKenzie had gone into hiding, perhaps her opportunity, the one she got for free, had just passed.
If so, the next opportunity may cost her dearly.
--------------------
After a slow lunch, Alessandra put on a jacket and wandered down to the edge of the Loch. She sat on a rock looking out across Loch Achray, the waters still and quiet. She breathed in the fresh air and savoured the moment. Eventually, her eyes wandered across the water and up the side of the mountain on the right-hand side, Ben Venue.
Without thinking, she started to map a possible route to the summit. It had been years since she had climbed a proper mountain, but in the meantime she had developed a love for hillwalking. The views you could get from the top of some mountains, especially Scottish ones, were incredible.
She'd seen the pictures in her books and now she longed for the opportunity to actually do some proper walking.
This place was really special.
She found it hard to believe, that even though it was supposed to be a tourist hotspot, here she was, sitting alone beside the Loch, with not another human being to be seen.
It was just her and her very own valley.
"Ding."
The moment was shattered by the technology of modern man. Civilisation had come-a-calling.
Looking at her smartphone, and slightly disappointed that there was a signal out here in Eden, she opened up the email which had just arrived in her inbox.
It was from the sponsor for the contract to kill Tommy McNunn.
No words. No trivial sentiments.
Just a telephone number.
Alessandra nodded.
She now had everything she needed. The rest was down to her.
--------------------
Before she could do anything more, she needed to check that her order from her suppliers had come in. As ever, she was uncomfortable with doing that until well after dark and when no normal minded decent person would be caught dead walking the forest at night time.
She spent the early afternoon thinking through her plan carefully, then about four o'clock she drove back to Stirling to the prison, parked the car a reasonable distance away, and then took to foot to survey the area in more detail.
Starting as close as she could get to the bottom of the cliff underneath where she was informed McNunn's cell was, she spent several hours hiking between there and the spot in the forest which would feature in the rest of her plan.
She located three good spots, equidistant from each other, where she would secure the wireless relay units she had ordered, and made a mental note of where they were. With any luck, she'd be back later. In the pitch dark.
The first two spots were in streets, surrounded by houses. The last one was in the middle of a field.
When she was satisfied she'd found the best places, she walked back to her car and drove to the nearest restaurant.
She was starving again.
Curiously, she'd noticed that on each of the three occasions when she'd miraculously found the ability to 'heal' people, each ‘healing’ had been followed by a ravenous appetite.
As she sat in the restaurant, her head buried behind a newspaper, she allowed her mind to wander back to the events of the night before.
When she thought of what had happened, it made her angry.
How long was this going to last?
Hopefully this was going to just turn out to be a small series of events that would only go on for...how long? Another week? A month? How many more times would it happen?
She gritted her teeth.
Just thinking about it made her more determined than ever to succeed in the next two missions.
Alessandra was a professional.
She was highly trained.
When she went on a mission, bar any biological disasters, she had the ability to lock down her mind, her emotions, her thoughts... just to focus on the mission on hand.
Her patience was immense.
And once she started something, she finished it.
Whenever she entered a 'mission mindset' she became a very different person, focusing only on the success of the mission at hand.
Alessandra was aware of this ability. She liked to think about it as a little switch within her mind that she could flick when needed. She also knew that when she flicked that switch, it was game on.
Sitting in the restaurant, with her face hidden behind the local newspaper, she closed her eyes.
She thought of what she had to do. She imagined it in her eye. She visualised success. And she 'flicked the switch.'
--------------------
After dinner, she drove back to her hotel, about forty-five minutes away, and retired to her bedroom.
A quick shower later, she powered up her laptop, logged onto the Tor network and went through the process of transferring all the recent funds which had arrived in her temporary mission accounts to her private, secure accounts in
Switzerland.
She should have done it before, but in Plockton her mind just wasn't there, and she never ever attempted the transactions unless she could think clearly.
The last thing she wanted to do was accidentally transfer a million pounds to the wrong account. Never to be seen again.
Once done, she lay back down on her bed, closed her eyes and went to sleep.
Her alarm woke her up several hours later at 1 a.m., and slightly refreshed, she left the hotel, got back into her car, and let if freewheel down the drive to the road outside the hotel grounds.
Once outside, she switched on her lights, started the engine, and drove to the forest on the edge of Stirling.
Annoyingly, it had started to rain.
This was bad for several reasons.
Firstly, because she would get wet.
Secondly, because the going through the trees and across the ground could be a little mushy and her feet were more likely to leave tracks in the muddy ground, which, optimally, was best avoided.
And lastly, because rain could affect her sight and the trajectory of a bullet.
Dressing accordingly, she parked the car as close to the tree line as possible, and got out.
Because of the cloud cover, it was pitch black.
Which was good and bad.
Good because, dressed in black, she was practically invisible.
Bad because... she couldn't see where she was going.
Which is why she had a night-sight headset in the back of the car, just in case of circumstances like this.
Switching them on, she put them on her head.
She'd decided to take out some of the small arms and explosives from the back of the car, and bury them in the hole her fresh supplies were hopefully in just now. It would probably be several days before she went back to Edinburgh, and for now, they were safer in the ground only a relatively short drive from her hotel, than in her boot.
As soon as she switched the night sights on, she had visibility of everything around her. Additionally, if anyone were to come anywhere close to her, or any animals decided to investigate, she could see them by their thermal images. They couldn't see her, but she could see them!
The Assassin's Gift Page 22