Wicked Leaks

by Matt Bendoris

  Kelly could see danger and fury in his eyes mixed with bitter emotion. But she believed she also saw a glimpse of compassion, as she had seen many times before with people when they were reaching the end of their lives.

  She moved over to the couch, where she took his pulse, which she felt pumping hard. She placed her fingertips on his temples to take his temperature, which was running high. Suddenly Kelly was overwhelmed by the loneliness of the months since her divorce. Here was a man who understood how it felt to be all by yourself in the world. The stress they had experienced together over the last few days had swept them together, and now an intense emotion gripped her like never before.

  Kelly clasped the back of Monahan’s neck and pulled his mouth towards hers. They kissed passionately as she straddled him. Everything tingled, from her hardened nipples to the small of her back. Monahan slipped her blouse off effortlessly, while Kelly hurriedly took off her jeans and panties. She manoeuvred on top of him, pulling his face tightly into her as he kissed her breasts. Kelly then arched her behind to let him enter her, and they finally relieved the passion they had both craved and needed.

  41: Forgiveness

  April Lavender was snoring in her armchair when her cat, Cheeka, woke her up by repeatedly pawing at her face. She took several seconds to try to focus on the clock on her smartphone before realising she needed to put on her reading glasses, which were still perched on her head. It was almost 11pm. She berated herself for sleeping so long and forgetting to feed her cat, which was as hungry as she was.

  April almost had to prise herself from the armchair as she had been perfectly moulded into the seat. She fed Cheeka and made herself a sandwich as she was feeling peckish too, even though she had eaten earlier. As she headed back to the sitting room to switch the lights out, she noticed an envelope on her doormat. She ripped it open and immediately knew who it was from:

  Dear April

  I am sorry. I miss you. I should not say things I say. But I am from Italy. I am a passionate man. But I was also wrong to say and do those things.

  Please forgive me. Please take me back.

  I love you.

  Luigi xxx

  The engagement ring was taped to the middle of the letter. April ran her finger over the gold and diamond jewellery before re-reading the letter, hearing Luigi’s Glaswegian/Italian accent in her mind as she did so. But she was too old to be married to someone so fiery. Maybe thirty years ago she would have thrived on the excitement and the passion, but now just the mere thought of it made her exhausted.

  ‘I’m sorry my old Italian stallion,’ she said aloud, ‘But I think I’ve had a lucky escape.’

  42: Hardware

  ‘So what’s that?’ Kelly asked, as Monahan unlocked his long, metal gun case.

  ‘This is your British Army L115A3. Accurate between 600 and 800 metres, but can also be effective at over 1,000 metres, which, for the purposes of my next job, I sincerely hope it will be.’

  ‘You do know most men smoke after sex. They don’t play with their guns.

  ‘I’m not most men.’

  ‘Is that from your days in the SAS?’

  ‘Nah, the SAS and SBS will use something different.’

  ‘SBS?’ Kelly said quizzically.

  ‘Yes, the Special Boat Service, which everyone seems to forget, although that’s just the way they like it. Anyway, depending on the task, the Special Forces have a wider selection of weapons available than the regular forces, but I always preferred the L115AE. You get to keep it after your 100th kill. Officially I have forty-three confirmed kills, but that was before I was taken off the books.’

  ‘So you’re like that American Sniper guy – what’s his name, Chris Kyle? What was he? 160 confirmed kills or something?’

  ‘You know your military history.’

  ‘Nah, I know my movies,’ Kelly chuckled.

  ‘The Americans are mental in that they will have a different sniper rifle for the marines, army, SEALS, you name it. They get pretty anal about their weapons – well, they’re American, aren’t they? Born with a gun in their hand and all that crap. They have them customised and fitted by a gunsmith to be ‘their’ rifle. The Brits aren’t such loonies.’

  ‘So are their guns better, then?’ Kelly asked.

  ‘That’s like asking a builder which is the best power drill. He might have a preference, but it’s more a case of the skill of the bloke using it, rather than the equipment. I fear the man holding the gun, not the gun itself. If he knows what he’s doing, you’re fucked. If he doesn’t then you’ve got a good chance of survival.’

  ‘Can you tell me more about your life?’ Kelly asked.

  ‘There’s not a lot to tell. I was adopted. Didn’t know my natural mum or dad. They were from Inverness, I think. I ended up in a children’s home by the age of fourteen. My adoptive parents couldn’t handle me. Understandable, really. Once I was told I’d been adopted I was a right little shit. So I was sent packing. To be honest, the care home was perfect for me. It was full of little scallywags like myself. It was lawless, but I loved it.’

  ‘Didn’t you miss your adopted parents at all?’ Kelly asked.

  ‘Not at all. It’s weird but I always felt I was adopted. That they weren’t part of me. When they finally told me the truth, I went right off the rails. Then I signed up for the army on my 16th birthday and finally I knew I was home. Travelling, drinking, women and guns. And being paid for it all. I loved it. The beauty was, if you showed any signs of being halfway intelligent – being able to write your own name was a good start – then they promoted you. I soon realised I could go far. Especially since I was a shit-hot sniper. There’s a lot of maths that go into shooting from long range, but I just had a knack for it.’

  ‘Sounds very James Bond,’ Kelly replied.

  ‘Nah. For the most part it was sitting in the same spot for maybe three days on end doing recon. Then it’s all about endurance. The training was to see how you perform when you’re fatigued. But I was always a mentally strong bastard. I would never fall asleep, even when I was so knackered every molecule in my body was screaming out for it.’

  ‘Funny, that sounds like me after four straight night shifts in a row,’ Kelly chuckled.

  ‘Actually, you’re probably right. I’d never thought of nurses like that before. You still have to perform to the best of your abilities regardless of whether it’s your fifth night or your first. It’s the same with us. I’d say the single biggest battle in my line of work is fatigue. Just never figured it’d be the same for you. You’d make a good soldier.’

  They both laughed then Kelly kissed Monahan on the lips before she manoeuvred herself into position on top of him, ready to go again.

  43: Busted

  Connor watched April waving frantically in the car park. It wasn’t at him, but at another driver. He grabbed his man-bag from the passenger seat, locked up, then decided to watch what unfolded, just out of morbid curiosity. April was now doing her full semaphore signal routine, like those people with the orange paddles at airports, as she directed the driver into the space beside her car. Remarkably, April had managed to park between the designated lines for once, and not straddling two bays as she usually did.

  Connor began his slow approach, intrigued to see who April’s mystery driver was. The stranger stepped out of his car and was greeted by a gasp from the ageing reporter. ‘I’m so sorry, I thought you were someone else.’

  The man chuckled. ‘Well, thanks for finding me a space anyway,’ he smiled as he walked away.

  ‘Did you think that was me, you daft old bat?’ Connor asked.

  April turned round, red with embarrassment. ‘He has the same car as you. Look, it’s even the same colour.’

  ‘Was the same colour. I got rid of the silver one a year ago. I’ve got a red one now. A bit like your face.’ Connor switched to baby talk: ‘Do you
see my big red car over there?’

  ‘A year? I was just so pleased about getting into the car park before you.’

  ‘Hell will freeze over before that happens,’ he replied as they headed in the direction of the Peccadillo. ‘Remember the time I was coming back from Canada and made it into work before you?’

  ‘Oh, you’ll never let me live that down, will you?’

  ‘Come on, it was pretty funny. The red-eye from Toronto to Glasgow and, knowing you’re always ten minutes late, I could pick up my luggage and still make it in before you. Priceless.’

  April started to laugh, so much she had to stop walking. ‘That man must’ve thought I was some sort of mad woman directing him into his parking space.’

  ‘Yip. And he’d be bang on the money. Listen, I’m going to skip breakfast again this morning. I want to see if Kelly has been found yet.’

  ‘And you can’t do that from your phone? Don’t be daft. Breakfast first – you might not know when you’ll get to eat again.’

  ‘Yes, Mum,’ Connor replied as he walked and messaged DCI Crosbie at the same time. Heard anything, Bing?

  The three dots appeared on Connor’s screen as the detective messaged Connor back. Not yet. Although I’ve been told the bosses are going mad over your use of the word ‘kidnapped’ in your front-page headline.

  Connor knew why Crosbie was worried about that one. I don’t write the headlines.

  It was in your copy too!!!

  He had Connor there. I got that from a source.

  Well, that source is now regretting using that word.

  That’s always the case when people see it in black and white. Anyway, give me a shout if you hear anything.

  Will do. But I don’t start my shift in the call centre till 12.

  Connor checked his watch then, out of devilment, texted back. Well, you better boot Amy Jones out of bed as I bet she starts at 10.

  There were no dots this time and Connor imagined Bing showing Amy his text in bed. Eventually the one word response came through – Busted – causing the reporter to laugh.

  ‘What’s so funny?’ April asked as they approached the entrance of the Peccadillo.

  ‘Nothing much,’ Connor giggled. ‘Question: would you ever sleep with someone for a story?’

  ‘Not again,’ April said with a smile, which left her younger colleague wondering if she was kidding or not.

  44: A whore’s bath

  Kelly was woken by a gentle knock at her door.

  ‘Time to get up, hen.’

  It was Duggie. Despite the early hour, Kelly smiled to herself; she liked how he called her ‘hen’, an exclusively Scottish term for a woman.

  ‘I’ve got you a cuppa,’ he added as he pushed open the door to the bedroom, his bulky outline filling the entire frame.

  ‘Here you go. In ten minutes we have to be outside. I’ll leave you to it.’

  She smiled and thanked him, propping herself up on the pillows to drink her tea. She could feel she was still wet down below. Kelly hadn’t had sex for as long as she could remember, but she recalled all too well the aftermath, usually stuffing a pair of knickers between her legs to make sure she wasn’t left sleeping on a wet patch. Although, she was now slightly concerned that she hadn’t taken any precautions. Kelly hadn’t been on the pill since she was in her early twenties. She felt like a naughty teenager who had just done something she shouldn’t have. She rather liked the feeling. She felt desirable again. Not a word she would had attributed to herself since her pert and nubile days as a blossoming young adult.

  She finished her tea then washed herself at the sink: face, hands, armpits then between her legs. A classic ‘whore’s bath’. She giggled at the term.

  Duggie and Monahan were waiting in the lounge. They were in full camouflage gear. Monahan had even blackened his wheelchair.

  ‘Like it?’ he asked, spinning around.

  Kelly smiled again. ‘You’ll certainly have the element of surprise, that’s for sure. So, what’s the plan? What am I to do?’

  Monahan set out in detail what they had arranged. Occasionally Kelly would ask a question, but most of the time she let him talk. Duggie was strangely quiet. She thought that may have been because he was in operation mode: in the zone and ready for action. The big man didn’t utter a word. He barely looked in her direction. At the end of the briefing, Kelly made a point of brushing Duggie’s arm gently and asking, ‘Alright?’

  ‘Aye, hen. Aye.’ He looked sad. Kelly wondered why.

  All three of them took to the Land Rover, with Monahan behind the wheel. Duggie sat in front, taking the safety catch off his machine gun. Kelly was in the back, sat on the edge of her seat, with her arms resting behind each man’s shoulders.

  She was excited. She knew she shouldn’t be, but she was.

  45: Translation

  Connor had put a call into Police Scotland’s media team, and got the official response that there was no update on the whereabouts of Kelly Carter. But they did tell him that they had launched one of the biggest manhunts in recent memory, with over 100 police officers assigned to the case. That alone was enough to give him a line for the news editor’s insatiable daily list.

  Connor filed the story, which had about four paragraphs of new information, with the rest padded out with recycled material about the firefight at the farmhouse in Bannockburn. After that Connor had pretty much nothing else to do other than hope and pray DCI Crosbie would come up with a sighting of the missing nurse.

  A reminder notification popped up on his email. ‘Shit, we’ve got another bloody address to the masses in five minutes,’ Connor moaned.

  ‘What is it this time? Are they shutting us down?’ April asked, with dread all over her face.

  ‘Not yet. It’s our “digital future”, apparently. Not that we have one since they started charging people to read us online. I heard the figures are shocking.

  ‘What does Mail Online get every day?’ April asked.

  ‘Thirteen million hits. And rising.’

  April liked Mail Online, mainly for the so-called ‘sidebar of shame’, which was the paparazzi snaps of celebrities she’d never heard of on a beach she’d never been to. But she was addicted to looking at their honed physiques and six-pack midriffs. ‘How does Mail Online make money if they don’t charge?’ she asked as they made their way to the fourth floor conference room.

  ‘I haven’t the foggiest. Adverts, I’d imagine. I don’t know about you, but I always shut down any pop-ups immediately.’

  ‘What’s a pop-up?’

  ‘For f... It’s just as the name suggests. A little pop-up advert that appears on the screen of your app. You probably think cookies are for eating.’

  ‘I could murder a cookie right now.’

  ‘You’ve just had breakfast. You’re a bloody bottomless pit.’

  They had their pick of the seats in the conference room. They could both remember a time when there were so many staff it was standing-room only at any company announcement. Now it was something of a ghost town.

  ‘Thank you for taking time out from your busy days,’ the Chief Executive Officer said, beginning his address via video-link from the Daily Chronicle’s London HQ.

  ‘Not that we had much choice,’ Connor said under his breath.

  ‘Today we have exciting news about our vision for taking the company forward,’ the CEO continued.

  ‘Job cuts,’ Connor whispered, causing April to snigger.

  ‘To keep pace with the constantly changing digital world we have to adapt accordingly.’

  ‘Definitely job cuts,’ Connor said again, with two of his colleagues from the newsdesk now trying to stifle their laughter at his running commentary.

  ‘To do that, we need to be out there in the wider market. So our stories can be shared the world over. The only way we can d
o that is to end our online subscription service. We have learnt a lot from this experiment.’

  ‘Lost millions,’ Connor whispered.

  ‘And we will take those lessons forward with us. Over the coming months we will begin implementing a restructuring of the company.’

  ‘Oh, you better believe there’ll be job cuts.’

  ‘It will start with my decision to step down as CEO of this magnificent company.’

  ‘Given the bump.’

  ‘This will allow new blood to come in with new ideas.’

  ‘Someone younger and cheaper,’ Connor continued.

  ‘Who will be able to take the company forward to the next level.’

  ‘Several rungs down from where we are now.’

  ‘I shall give a more precise leaving date once we have informed our shareholders. But until then we shall hopefully have time to have a farewell glass of Chianti,’ the CEO concluded.

  ‘Ff-ff-ff-ff,’ Connor said, giving his best Hannibal Lecter impression. By now the whole room was chuckling at Connor’s quips, safe in the knowledge that it was only a one-way video-link.

  46: Boulder

  The rough road came to a clearing by a river and Monahan explained that he would need to stay with the Land Rover while Kelly went by foot with Duggie. His plan was to use Kelly as bait, to flush out the man he called a traitor. It was a high-risk operation but with a little bit of luck they would soon be back in the vehicle bumping their way over what passed for a road to safety.