Thinking of them didn’t help. In fact, it always made everything worse. Could there be any other reason why Declan hadn’t come for them than that he was dead? Her hand dropped to her abdomen. She’d promised herself she wouldn’t think those kinds of thoughts. Not while the baby was still inside her.
Goodbye, little lass, Fiona thought sadly as she watched Dr. Mac settle himself into the passenger seat with the baby. I pray you have a good life with people who love you.
Sinead toss a small valise in the trunk then got into the driver’s seat and the car roared to life. Fiona watched the sedan drive out through the gate. So easy to just hop in the car and escape. Just two fences, an eight man security detail, and one hugely pregnant belly standing between me and a life away from this place.
She glanced down at Ciara. And you, of course, little one. The child’s despondency seemed recently to have infected little Maeve as well. The two girls sat silently staring at nothing.
When Fiona looked back at the car park, two men were coming from the building. She knew exactly who they were. They would go first to the kitchen tent for a free meal and then on to the other side of the fence where the nonpregnant women waited. A chill ran through Fiona as she thought of Jill and Bridget on the other side of that fence.
It had been all Fiona could do to prevent Nuala from attempting to break down the fencing with her bare fists that separated them from the section of camp where Sinead Branigan lived.
Fiona had chosen her moment carefully to tell Nuala the terrible news about Abby but there could be no easy time to hear the words you’d been fearing for months. In a way Fiona was surprised poor Abby had made it as long as she had. The fact that she’d spent the last four months of her life, terrified and tortured before finally taking her own life was not something any of them in the tent would ever get over.
Although Fiona didn’t fault little Abby for her desperate choice, she knew suicide could never be the answer for her. She looked at Ciara as the child listlessly stared at her hands.
Fiona dropped a hand to her belly and smoothed her starched and spotless smock out over her baby bump. The longer she waited for help to come, the bigger and less agile she would be. The longer she waited, the more sure the nightmare that awaited her became. Is it already hopeless? Is escape even possible at seven months pregnant with two toddlers?
It wasn’t just the horror of Abby’s death that terrified Fiona. It wasn’t even the nightly horror that was surely happening to Megan now—and had happened to Abby and that awaited Fiona—that brought a needle of fear piercing her heart. It was the agony of knowing the baby she carried was safe only as long as it was inside of her.
“Come, Ciara,” Fiona said, holding out her hand to the child. “Let’s go get washed for tea.” Ciara ignored her outstretched hand. As Fiona walked over to her she caught sight of one of the men out of the corner of her eye. He was obese with a shaved head and was watching her, not forty yards away, separated only by a waist-high picket fence. Surprised that he would attempt eye-contact with her, Fiona didn’t immediately react but simply stared back.
He grabbed his genitals with one hand and pointed a finger at her, a smile as filthy and full of promise as any horror film.
Chapter 23
The morning after the compound attack was a solemn one, matched by a cold grey downpour that turned all the dirt paths to intersecting rivers of mud before their eyes. Sarah awoke early before it was light. Sophia was snoring noisily from Mike’s side of the bed. Deciding—especially after yesterday—that the girl could sleep a little longer, Sarah dressed quickly in jeans and a warm flannel shirt and pulled on a heavy sweater. Spring it may be, but it was still cold as ice floes in the morning.
Regan sat at the kitchen table. Sarah walked up and put her hand on Regan’s shoulder. She’d insisted on sleeping on the floor in the room with her mother’s body and Sarah couldn’t tell her no. In a way, it was a vigil and Sarah couldn’t fault Regan for needing to do it.
“Where’s Archie?” Sarah asked. She could see the blankets on the sofa were neatly folded.
“He and John went out front to deal with the wanker.”
Sarah glanced out the window at the rain coming down hard. What a miserable job that was—for everyone involved. Knowing Archie, he’d help the man dig the graves just to get the whole mess behind him.
And there was yet another more important grave to be dug today.
“I’m so sorry, Regan,” Sarah said, sitting down opposite her. Regan looked stunned, her eyes unfocused and bloodshot. Sarah could only imagine.
“I thought she was getting better,” Regan said.
“I know. I did too.”
“Now there’s just me and Da.” Regan looked at Sarah with such misery in her eyes. “But she was the best.”
Sarah reached out and took her hand. “Last night was terrible, darling. Not just your mother but…everything.”
Regan had killed a man last night. No matter what had happened before or since, no matter what she’d seen or done in the last five months, that was not going to be something she got over quickly.
“It was terrible,” Regan said with a sigh. “Do ye want tea, Sarah? Archie made a pot before he left.”
“I just want you to know you can talk to me.”
Regan laughed. “Cor, I’m not a Yank! But thanks all the same.” She stood up and brought back two mugs filled with hot tea from the pot. “Wish we had milk. Are you letting the Dago sleep in for a reason? I thought she had a hog to finish skinning.”
Sarah wasn’t fooled by Regan’s composure. She would have to watch the girl closely in the coming weeks.
“You’re right,” Sarah said. “We have a lot to do today and we need all hands on deck. I have no idea when Archie and John will finish with that business out front.”
“You’re sure you don’t want to kill him?” Regan asked as if this was a seriously flawed decision on Sarah’s part.
“Could you do that? Just execute him?”
Regan looked in the direction of the front gate where the man was. “I don’t know. Maybe.”
God. Are we all turning into cold, calculating murderers? Kill now in case they might try to kill us later?
“We need to pack up a few things and get ready to leave,” Sarah said. The words themselves made her tired. She massaged the small of her back as the baby moved energetically across her kidneys.
“Leave?” Regan’s mouth fell open.
“We have to, Regan. It’s not safe here. You see that, right?”
“How will Mike and Gav know where we’ve gone? And where are we going?”
“Some place safe and don’t worry. We’ll leave cryptic notes.”
Regan looked in the direction of her bedroom. “So Mum won’t be coming with us?” Her voice held a tremor of tears in it.
“I am so sorry, Regan. So sorry for your terrible loss. Ellen was a wonderful person. And she loved you so much.”
The tears splashed down Regan’s cheeks and she nodded as if she didn’t trust herself to speak.
“Today’s going to be a hard day,” Sarah said as she gave Regan’s arm a reassuring squeeze. “Let’s get on with it.”
By the time Archie and John came trudging back through the gate four hours later, Sophia had skinned the hog on her own and without complaint, and Sarah and Regan had washed and prepared Ellen’s body for burial. Archie and John stopped only long enough to eat a cold lunch of creamed corn, corn bread and goat cheese before carrying their shovels to the back of the compound to dig Ellen’s grave. Although the compound graveyard was situated outside the fence near the woods, Regan wanted her mother buried inside the walls. She said her mother always felt safe in Ameriland. Only one other person had ever been buried within the compound walls, and that was Siobhan Murray who had been murdered last fall. She was buried in her own front yard by her cottage, on the very spot where she was slain.
Regan asked that her mother be buried next to Siobhan. The two wom
en had been good friends and Regan reasoned they could keep each other company. Sarah could see the idea of it gave Regan comfort and she was glad something could.
In one of the pine coffins kept in the stable, Sophia, Archie and John carried Ellen’s body to Siobhan’s front yard. Sarah and Regan walked quietly behind them. As Archie and John lowered the box into the grave, Sophia gathered flowers from the pathway. Sarah was surprised to see Siobhan’s garden was in full bloom—early for this time of year. She remembered teasing the old woman about her flower garden—so impractical in a world where every seed counted for sustenance—but now the sight brought tears to her eyes. Gypsies’ Petticoats, Hawthorn blooms and fuchsia in vibrant abundance spilled out of the small picket fence enclosure that marked her front yard. How many times she remembered seeing Siobhan standing there, watering her flowers like they were her thirsty children.
Standing in Siobhan’s garden as Archie and John dug the grave reminded Sarah of all that they had lost. She still hadn’t wrapped her mind around Declan’s death. The very thought that the vibrant, wise-cracking gyspy king could be gone from this world was too heart-breaking to imagine. Sarah had brought Declan to Ireland after he and his family had saved her in the Welsh National Forest years ago. She’d returned the favor by introducing him to Fiona. Her eyes filled with tears as she drew out a small Bible.
This is for you, too, Declan, she thought. Because I didn’t get a chance to say goodbye and because I loved you like the brother I never had.
Sarah cleared her throat.
“These are those who have come out of the great ordeal,” she said solemnly. “They will hunger no more, and thirst no more; the sun will not strike them, nor any scorching heat; for the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of the water of life, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.”
“Amen,” the others said.
Archie wiped the sweat off his face and held his shovel in both hands.
“I’ll miss ye, Ellen Murdoch,” he said. “You were a strong fighter and a lovely woman, so ye were.”
John cleared his throat. “Rest in peace, Mrs. Murdoch,” he said. “I was honored to know you.”
Sarah nodded at him with pride as he stepped back. Sophia walked to the grave and sprinkled the wild flowers she’d gathered over the top of the box.
“I did not know you long, but you were the sweetest woman I have known,” she said. “Sleep with the angels.”
Sarah caught a glimpse of Regan’s face softening at Sophia’s words.
“We’ll miss you, Ellen,” Sarah said. “And we’ll never forget you.”
“No, never,” Regan said, her voice choked with tears. “I’m so sorry about everything, Mum. And I vow to ye on your sainted brow, to become the person you always saw in me. I love ye, Mum.” Regan broke down and Sarah drew her into her arms. She held her for a moment and then pulled her gently away from the grave while John and Archie began filling it up.
Back at the cottage, the three women waited on the steps of the porch for John and Archie to finish. The hog meat had been chopped into chunks and packed in salt and pepper in cooking pots. Five backpacks were loaded with spices, seeds, wine bottles, tea and coffee, mugs and utensils. They would be back for the rest later. When Mike returned with the horses they’d load up a cart and take all the rest.
Regan sat with red eyes, her focus on the front gate as if willing herself to think of the future. Sarah tried to imagine how she must feel—killing a man with a blade across the throat and then burying her mother and walking away from her the very next day. Sometimes life just sucked.
“Oh!” Sophia said, standing up. Both Sarah and Regan looked in the direction she was pointing. Archie and John were coming up the path from Siobhan’s cottage. Archie was leaning on John.
“Well, crap,” Sarah said. “What happened?” she yelled to them. Sophia ran to them to help support Archie on his other side.
“Archie tripped over the shovel,” John said. “He fell funny.”
“I’ll be fine, Sarah,” Archie said. He was limping badly. “It’s just a sprain. I’ll be right as rain in an hour. You’ll see.”
An hour later, they’d unpacked their bags and settled Archie on the sofa with his foot elevated. It was badly swollen but didn’t appear to be broken. In any case, they weren’t going anywhere on foot. Not today. And probably not tomorrow either. Sarah sat with Archie while Sophia and Regan put supper together and John chopped more wood for the cook stove.
“The key is not to over stress it,” Sarah said as she touched the puffiness around his ankle. She saw him wince.
“I’ll be fine tomorrow,” he said between clenched teeth.
“Did you not hear what I just said?”
They could hear Sophie and Regan talking in the kitchen. Sarah had worried about putting the two girls in the same room together but they seemed to be conversing somewhat normally.
“We’ll need to keep an eye on Regan,” she said in a low voice. “Not just about Ellen but you know…killing a man with her bare hands, that’s not something she’ll shake off any time soon.”
“Aye,” Archie said. “I talked with the lass a bit this morning, as I did with young John, too. But you’re right. I’ll watch her.”
She took his hand in hers.
“I have no idea what I’d do without you, Archie. Sometimes you read my mind better than Mike does.”
Archie blushed at the compliment and Sarah released his hand.
“Okay. What can we do to secure the place for as long as we’re here?” she asked.
Archie ran a hand across his face. “Rotating watches,” he said. “But if someone comes, being taken unawares won’t be our biggest problem.”
“Should we move further into the compound? Back where the gypsies were?”
“Hide, ye mean? Aye, maybe.”
Sarah watched Sophia and Regan as they set the table. John was jamming blocks of wood into the cook stove.
“I just hate moving everyone tonight,” she said. “Especially you. And it’s getting dark. Nobody’s looked in any of those back cottages in six months. Could be snakes and raccoons in there.”
“T’is nae snakes in Ireland.”
“I’m pretty sure that’s just a myth,” Sarah said. “But in any case, we’ll wait until morning to move back there. God, there’s always something.”
She stood up slowly, holding her belly with both hands and praying the baby—which an hour ago had moved lower—wouldn’t choose tonight as the night to make his appearance.
Chapter 24
The man who grabbed Mike’s shoulders was gaunt and emaciated. If not for his voice, Mike never would have recognized Terry Donaghue. A strapping six-footer with flaming red hair and a barrel chest, Terry was now a thin, quivering wreck. He clutched Mike with disbelief and pleading in his eyes.
By the light of three wavering flashlights, Mike saw the other men stagger toward him and Gavin as they stood just inside the doorway. The compound men. Frail, trembling, broken. One after another they touched his sleeve or hugged him and Gavin, their faces wan and wasted, their eyes too big for their faces, haunted and fearful.
Mike’s eyes adjusted slowly to the gloom and he could see bunk beds lined the walls. Everyone in the hut was awake and watching—either from their bunks or right in front of where Mike stood.
“Terry, man,” Mike said, his eyes refusing to believe this was the same man he knew just five months ago. “What is this place? What happened?”
Terry looked at Mike in confusion and then back at the other men.
“Ye don’t know?” he asked. “How is it yer here then?”
Gavin pushed past his father toward one of the bunks. He knelt at the bottom bed and a hand reached out to grab his.
Tommy. Terry’s older boy. Jaz’s love. Was it possible the lad was too weak to stand up? What the feck had happened here? It looked like one of those pictures taken in 1945 right afte
r the allies had discovered the Nazi death camps.
Carey still hadn’t moved from where he stood. Mike squeezed Terry’s shoulder. He nodded at the other men from the compound—men who had been with Mike since the day the EMP exploded over the Irish Sea.
“Are ye all here then?” Mike asked. “Who’s missing?”
The question seemed to weaken Terry. His shoulders slumped in defeat and Mike reached out to help the man back to his bunk.
“Declan’s gone,” Kevin said, his voice shaky and unsure, as if he hadn’t spoken in a very long time. “They murdered him before we even got here. Hobart, too.”
“And Barney,” Terry said. Mike winced. Poor Regan and Ellen. After everything they’ve been through, they lost him anyway. “He died just last night. Cor, he would’ve loved seeing you again.”
“How? Is there sickness here?” Mike asked. He heard the soft murmurs between Gav and Tommy and for a moment he saw Gavin turned into Tommy in five months time. Although never as big as Gav, Tommy still had not been a thin or spindly lad. To be turned into this five months from now…
“Not enough food,” Terry said. “And they work us hard nearly every day. We started dropping weight…” He lifted a hand as if the sentence itself was too much energy to expend.
“Who else?” Mike said looking around the dark room. He was faced with several sets of owlish eyes. In the state the men were in, even if they were compound men, he wouldn’t necessarily recognize them.
“The Carrigan brothers,” said a familiar voice from the corner. The man stood up and Mike saw the white of his clerical collar from across the room.
Son of a bitch. So this is what happened to him.
Father Ryan approached Mike but didn’t reach his hand out to him.
“Hello, Michael,” Ryan said. “Both Dez and Patrick Carrigan died last month within weeks of each other. One was beaten to death and the other just stopped eating.”
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