Flights of Angels (Exit Unicorns Series Book 3)

by Cindy Brandner

  “What is it, Jewel?”

  “I’m so afraid that I’ll wake up and find out we didn’t make it through this afternoon.”

  “Hush macushla,” he said softly. “’Tis alright. I’m here with ye. I’m here.”

  “I’m sorry I hit you earlier. I was just so afraid for the babies.”

  “’Tis no matter,” he said softly, and meant it.

  He waited until she fell asleep, exhausted by both the day’s events and pregnancy, before slipping out of the bed. He dressed, checked that Conor was still sleeping and then went outside.

  Lewis sat, shotgun still canted and ready, in the shadow of the pine copse. The sightline from there was broad, covering three angles of the house and with a view to the road lest anyone should chance to come down it. Owen wasn’t to be seen but Casey knew he was just out of sight in the crook of a tree, watching over this family that he and Gert had adopted as their own.

  Casey sat beside Lewis, a strange calm coming over him. It was fully dark now but the moon was high enough to provide light by which to see. No one could approach the house without them knowing.

  “You have to take care of this situation now,” Lewis said. The taciturn old Swede was always a man of few words, but one rarely mistook the meaning of those he did speak. “The threat you made this afternoon, you have to carry through on it or they will be back, and it will be much worse next time.”

  Casey didn’t answer, for the man was right. But vague words of agreement had no place here, nor did Lewis expect them.

  “Sometimes people are just evil, and it is no sin to kill such people.” Lewis had lit two cigarettes and held one out to Casey.

  “I’m afraid I’m a wee bit too Catholic to see things quite so black and white,” Casey replied, taking the proffered cigarette and drawing deeply on it.

  “It is what I did, long ago. It is why I left my own country and came to live here.”

  “What do you mean—what you did?”

  Lewis looked at him, blue eyes without expression. “I disappeared people.” He stood, but his eyes never left Casey’s. “I have to go home and feed my animals. Owen will take the next watch.” He nodded toward the pine copse where a small ember glowed and just as suddenly winked out.

  Lewis cracked the shotgun, preparing for the walk home.

  “Was it a long time ago, this job of yers?” Casey asked, quietly.

  Lewis’ eyes were still and cold as a Nordic lake in winter. “It was, but it’s not the sort of work a man forgets how to do. And I was very, very good at my job.”

  Somehow, Casey thought, watching the straight-backed old Swede walk off into the trees, he didn’t doubt it for a second.

  Chapter Sixty-eight

  May 1975

  At the Center of the Night

  David cursed the luck that had brought him here, standing on a dark country road somewhere just this side of the border with the Republic. His cover story had, of necessity, included a few dropped hints that he knew his way round making simple explosives—which he did, as it was part of his training. That did not mean he was comfortable with the use of them.

  The plan was simple enough but hardly foolproof. They would stake out this road, posing as part of the Security Forces, and while the vehicle they had picked out was stopped and the occupants thereof being frisked and questioned by the roadside, he, David, was to be installing the fifteen pounds of gelignite housed in a briefcase under the driver’s seat. It was set on a clock timer and would detonate on the other side of the border. The idea was that this would implicate the band in the van—their chosen target—for carrying explosives. The band was, of course, Roman Catholic to a man. David felt the sophistication of the plan was somewhat lacking, but this dirty war had little in the way of sophistication and plenty in the way of effectiveness.

  David had alerted his superiors to the presence of the bomb. They, in turn, had alerted Irish Customs, who were meant to confiscate the vehicle and hand it over to the bomb squad. His personal plan was to make damn sure the bomb was disconnected before it left this dark roadway. He wasn’t taking chances with any poor sod’s life and fifteen pounds of gelignite. This made it doubly unfortunate that Lenny McAskill had been picked to come along on this mission. Lenny, who was every unfortunate stereotype of the hard man Loyalist fanatic. Lenny, who was, David felt quite certain, a complete psychopath. Lenny who did not trust him, David aka Davey, one little bit.

  Lenny was a member in uneasy standing of the Ulster Defense Regiment. The UDR had been linked in the past with the British Security Forces and with the Redhand Defenders. Some said if the Army wanted a filthy job done, the UDR were the men they applied to, not openly, mind, but covertly and with complete denial afterwards. But even these men, green bereted and copiously tattooed with a variety of lurid symbols, were a tad nervous around Lenny McAskill.

  Lenny sat beside him in the ditch, adjusting a pair of sunglasses that David felt were a tad redundant considering the pitch-black quality of the night.

  Their target was a band—the ‘Havana Nights’—a regular sort of dancehall band that added spice to their repertoire with some Latin-based rhythms and drums. Their one big hit had charted in the UK in 1969 and they had been slogging the circuit of sweaty dance halls and grotty pubs ever since. Their only crime was the fact they were Catholic and their schedule was easy to track.

  David was aware that Lenny was watching him as closely and carefully as an owl sitting atop a barn roof watches a mouse cross the yard below. It made what he needed to do that much more difficult.

  The road was empty this time of night so that when the white van came along it was easily spotted. Lenny and Boyd stepped out, hands up and guns slung waist-height in the particular stance of British soldiers. The van slowed immediately, though David knew the occupants had to find it strange to see security forces on this stretch of deserted road at this hour of the night. Still, not to stop was to risk being shot through the windows.

  Boyd ordered the band out of the van and David was chagrined to see that some of them were little more than boys. If this didn’t come off as planned, if anything went wrong, he would be directly responsible for their deaths.

  He tried not to see their faces nor smell their fear. It made it too personal and he knew that was the road to certain disaster. Boyd nodded to him and he started his walk up the side of the van, the longest in some ways he had ever taken though few steps were involved. He hardly dared to breathe. Packing this much in explosives was a tricky proposition, akin to walking a high wire when your shoes were made from blown glass.

  The driver’s door was open, the light creating a small hollow vacuum at the center of the night. He set the briefcase down with the gentle delicacy normally reserved for the newly born and let his breath out a little.

  He could feel Lenny right behind him, the man’s body heat, thick and swampy, encroaching into his space. He was going to have to wire the explosives, so that Lenny wouldn’t suspect his true mission here.

  “Listen, man, could ye back off a wee bit? I’d not like to blow the both of us to kingdom come an’ yer makin’ me nervous with yer hoverin’.”

  Lenny gave him an arch look and backed away, heading toward the rear of the van and the roadway. It was ominously quiet, with only Boyd’s oily tones coating the night. The members of the band were silent and David had to will himself not to turn. The very air was taut with menace.

  There wasn’t a great deal of time to do this, but he would never be able to live with himself if he didn’t disconnect the wiring and the van blew up before reaching the border guards. He took a deep breath, steadying himself though the sweat was beading on his forehead. From the rear of the van he could feel Lenny’s stare and knew the bastard distrusted him to do the job. He eased the wires back out of their housing just a touch, enough so there was no contact point.

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sp; There—it was done. He clipped the briefcase shut and pushed it back under the driver’s seat. It was then the gunfire started. He crouched low and ran for the back of the van, peering into the dark where the bullets were sharp red traceries splitting the fabric of the night. All was confusion, Boyd shouting to cease fire, but the man with the gun—Lenny—wasn’t listening. It was too late anyhow, for David’s sight had adjusted in time to see the last member of the band topple forward into the ditch.

  He thought he might be sick, but he had become so accustomed to senseless violence that it no longer affected him as it once would have. It had all gone to smash and now there were five innocent men lying dead in a ditch because of this disturbed bastard.

  He didn’t even realize he was moving until his fist hit Lenny’s face, a satisfying crunch of bone and blood. His arm was grabbed and held back before he could land another blow, for he would not have stopped on his own until he had put the bastard to the ground.

  “What are ye doin’?” Boyd demanded, keeping his hold on David’s arm.

  “What am I doin’? It’s him that’s focked up the entire plan, isn’t it? I thought the aim was to blow up the van when it reached the border, not kill a bunch of boys that had barely the whiskers to shave.”

  The air was charged with violence, that particular scent of sweat and testosterone that made the very particles around a man throb with the need for action, for blood against his knuckles, something to relieve the crimson tide that surged in his body.

  “Aye, it was, but plans change.” Boyd turned away from him then, leaving David speechless with fury. He had been used as a dupe. And now there was the blood of five innocent men on his hands.

  Lenny grinned at him, a fine spray of blood drying on his face and into his clothes. David did not return the smile, cover be damned. For he knew now without a doubt, that there would come a time and place where this man would kill him, or he would have to be the one to kill.

  Quite frankly, he looked forward to the day of reckoning.

  Chapter Sixty-nine

  June 1975

  Butterfly

  Later, he would think he had been tired, had been focused on other things, had been aware of his surroundings but in a hazy, dreamy way that had been more about what awaited him at home than what was happening in his own vicinity. He knew better, always had. Still he was merely a man and a man sometimes was weary, sometimes had better things to think about, sometimes forgot. He shouldn’t have forgotten, but he did.

  Pat was wrapping up the day’s work, including a stack of paperwork that made him feel as if he were one of the lesser lawyers in Bleak House. Kate had already left for the day, putting a cup of tea to hand for him before exiting through the back to the mysterious person who drove her to and from work each day. Pat had watched out the door with no small curiosity about who it was that Kate relied upon. All he could determine thus far was that it was not her brother. He was familiar enough with Noah Murray’s face to know it wasn’t him. He was certain the man must know of his sister’s activities though, for Noah wasn’t the sort to allow so much as a mouse to move in his vicinity and not take note of it. Pat had been half waiting for months now for him to show up and threaten to part Pat from his ability to breathe.

  He was ready to lock up, his cup rinsed and put away, the paperwork still unruly but with some progress made, when David entered the back door as though a banshee were after him. David’s face was pale, dark dyed hair rumpled and sweaty. Pat had never seen him so rattled. It didn’t do a great deal for his own equilibrium to see the man so.

  “What the hell is it, man? Ye look as though ye’ve seen a troop of ghosts.”

  “You need to come with me. I can’t tell you why right now, so don’t ask me.”

  The look on David’s face told Pat he was worried about listening devices. Therefore he didn’t ask questions, merely retrieved his coat, locked up the front door and exited through the back with David.

  Once in the car, a Citroën that had seen far better days, David merely gave him a steely look and shook his head. So the car was possibly bugged as well. Pat sighed. Sometimes it felt as though the entire city was monitored by one huge listening device—which considering all the towers, was more or less the truth.

  They went north beyond the city, David driving with his usual suicidal intent, so that Pat wasn’t certain if his panic was due to what lay ahead or merely a certainty that death was rushing at them full throttle, about to come through the windshield.

  They traveled the coast near to Ballycastle, a stretch of beauteous rocky headlands which were lost on the occupants of the car. David bypassed the town, following farther along the coast as the road narrowed.

  When they slowed at last, Pat could see the hazy outlines of the great rocky upthrust that was Rathlin Island. David pulled down a narrow pathway where they bumped and jolted all the way down to the sea. There a small motorboat was waiting, bobbing on the waves.

  Pat felt his initial worry upgrade itself to a full blown case of panic as they got out of the car. He looked at David for explanation. While he did not share his brother’s phobia of the sea, he wasn’t so fond of it as to be delighted at the thought of taking a wee craft out onto those treacherous waves.

  “It’s your brother. He was taken this afternoon. I’ve had someone keeping a watch because I had intelligence that led me to think he might be in some danger.”

  Pat didn’t need to know more than that. He got into the boat without further question, David tossing him an oilskin coat that lay in the bottom. He had a good idea who had an interest in taking his brother and why. David cranked the motor and they roared off into the fading light, the sea choppy and grey beneath its frail hull.

  Rathlin Island sat six miles off the Antrim Coast across a rough stretch of water poetically called the Sea of Moyle. In terms of time, the island lay much farther away. It seemed of another century altogether. Enormous cliffs of limestone and basalt loomed up from the dark sea and small white dots swarmed the cliffs. The island was home to colonies of puffins and guillemots, kittiwakes and falcons, thousands upon thousands of them. The noise of them came across the water, audible even over the thrum of the boat’s motor, ghostly aerial specters that belonged to the world of air and water and rock. Pat shivered, his hair and any skin that wasn’t covered with the oilskin coat already soaked and salted.

  It was on Rathlin that Robert the Bruce had hidden, having fled the wrath of the English after the battles of Methven and Dalry. It was here as well that there had once been a thriving industry during the Neolithic Age, making axes from a fine blue stone called porcellanite. Like most sites in Ireland, it had its share of blood history as well, with the English massacring the women and children of the MacDonnell clan who had once sought refuge upon the island and had been hunted down with no more impunity than if they had been seals or otters.

  The tall cliffs were pocked with caves, some huge, some barely large enough for a man to crawl into, some long collapsed beneath the weight of the stone above. Some were stranded high up the cliff walls, relicts of a time when the great glacial seas had been far colder and far deeper. A natural stepping stone as the island was between Scotland and Ireland, the caves had become a refuge for men on the run, women forced into hiding and even—it was said—the Children of Lir. Though personally Pat thought, looking at the foreboding shadow cast by the cliffs, the tale about the devil living here seemed more likely than a band of enchanted swans.

  David began to yell over the roar of the motor, reasonably certain that even the British Army couldn’t manage listening devices on the open sea.

  “I have someone keeping an eye out because I was worried something like this might happen. I got a call early in the afternoon, that your brother wasn’t where he was meant to be. Being that that’s totally out of character for him, I knew something was wrong. Then someone called in to the lo
cal police that they’d seen something that looked odd being brought ashore here. I know certain lads of a particular organization occasionally use the caves here to hide contraband of various sorts, the ones high up and hard to access. I suspect they may have brought Casey here. But I think they’ll not have used the caves high up. It’ll be the ones at sea level we need to search.”

  Pat didn’t need to ask why they would use those caves. For when the high tide came in, which it would do within the hour, a man, if he couldn’t move under his own power, would either drown or be bashed to death against the cave walls. Then the body would be swept to sea and conveniently disappear. If the man were already dead, it would solve the same problem.

  He took a deep breath, swallowing a spray of sea water and trying very hard not to visualize what it would take to render his brother unfit to crawl from a cave with the high tide surging in.

  David had slowed the boat and was running parallel to the cliffs, eyeing the rocky foreshore with no small worry.

  “Here,” Pat said.

  David gave him a questioning look and Pat shrugged, shoulders tight as stone.

  “I don’t know why. Just a feeling that we should start here. We have to ask if anyone has seen anything, otherwise we’ve not a clue to go on, and precious little time.”

  David nodded and eased the boat into the small shoal area. They climbed a set of rock hills and found themselves in the small settlement Pat had noted, within moments of tying off the boat. The village was very little, only a huddle of six cottages, faces turned inward like malcontent sheep, each cottage thickly thatched and whitewashed, with wind-blasted backs and chimneys currently puffing smoke as it was nearing teatime for the occupants.

  Pat knocked at the first door and got no answer, though it was clear there was someone inside the small house as there was a visible twitch of a lace curtain. Next door was the same.