There are voices in my head now.
Every day these disembodied voices grow stronger and more relentless. They madden me with their harsh cackles and calls for revenge. They want blood. Blake’s blood. I no longer dare attend group sessions. Fortunately, the policy here is that it is not compulsory. I dare not talk to anyone. What if I lose control and one of the voices takes over?
All of a sudden I hear a voice, a sweet, lost child voice. The questing innocence beguiles me, irretrievably draws me to her. She is in direct contrast to the usual threatening, sordid, obscene, and often downright menacing voices I am forced to listen to. I listen out for the unspoiled new voice and realize that all the other voices seem to have hung back.
The lovely new voice thrusts forward eagerly. I embrace it with all that I am. Perhaps I will be all right. Perhaps this new voice will keep me safe and guide me to the right path. Perhaps the phoenix sent this voice to me. Immediately I feel stronger.
You can’t trust anybody, it says in its uniquely fresh and wonderful voice.
I nod enthusiastically.
And you can’t give up on divine plans.
I nod again.
The phoenix has sanctioned them.
Of course the phoenix did. I listen intently as the beautiful voice elaborates on what must be the truth of the matter.
Blake must die just as you planned—a car crash on his way home from the hospital after signing over all his rights to the Barrington fortune. Then it will be the turn of his bastard child to die.
Afterwards, as planned, we will pay a little visit to the lying, cheating, cock-sucking cunt he married…and watch her die, slowly and painfully.
Twenty-Six
Blake Law Barrington
She comes toward me, her eyes huge, her face pale and drawn, and I feel a stab of guilt. When I found her she was bursting with life, an innocent thing in an orange dress. Look how careless I’ve been. Look what I’ve done to her.
‘What is it?’ I ask, holding her. She seems so small, her bones so breakable. She was not always like this, was she? No. Once she fought me on her terms.
‘Blake,’ she calls.
‘What is it?’
She swallows hard.
‘Tell me?’
‘Oh, darling. You don’t really want me anymore, do you?’
‘What?’
‘I know you love me, but you don’t desire me anymore.’
I shake my head. I will never understand women. How they can be so intuitive and so dense at the same time. I run a finger down her beautiful, beautiful nose to her plump lips. I remember the first time we kissed. I remember how they looked when that fucking pervert abused her at the party. I remember them when she was laughing at that drug dealer party she invited me to, and I remember them when she told me on our honeymoon that she was my captive slave. Seems so long ago. So much has happened. I wish I could go back. I can’t. Here and now is what I have.
‘Lit matches,’ I whisper.
‘What?’ she asks.
‘That night I met you I thought your eyes were like lit matches. So blue. The impression of something cool and yet it’ll burn your fingers.’
She bites that plump lip. ‘Have I burned you?’
‘Never.’
‘I’m so confused, Blake.’
‘Come here. I want to tell you something.’ I lead her to the sofa. We sit together, our thighs touching. If only she knew. Maybe I need to spell it out to her. Maybe I’ve been too distant. It’s my upbringing. Stiff upper lip. Better in than out.
I take her hand. It’s cold. I grasp it between my palms.
‘Your hand is warm,’ she murmurs.
I smile at her.
‘Tell me the truth, Blake. I can take it.’
‘Oh, Lana. Tell you the truth? Here’s the truth. Right now, I want to fuck you until you can’t remember your name.’
Her head jerks. She didn’t expect that. Of course not.
‘The only thing that stops me is your grief. I don’t want my method of dealing with grief to intrude on yours.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean the only time I forget that Sorab is gone is when I am inside you. That is the only time I don’t feel the guilt that I did not protect him. I did not protect you. I let my guard down. I was careless, Lana. I didn’t see her as she really was.’
‘So you still want me?’
I gaze at her. In time we will learn everything there is to know about each other. For now I will just have to show her. I take her hand and put it on my groin. It is hard and throbbing for her.
Tears gather in her eyes and roll down her cheeks.
‘What’s the matter?’
‘I really, really thought you had gone off me.’
‘Gone off you? Are you totally blind? There is no one else for me. From the day we met again at the bank I have never looked at another woman. Let alone wanted one. You’re the only one for me. I could take you right now if I thought you were up for it.’
She looks at me with her big, electric blue eyes. ‘I’m up for it.’
I take Sorab from my head and store him safely in my heart and I start to unbutton her top.
I drink her in. Glazed doe eyes, flushed cheeks and reddened lips. Oh yes. That’s my Lana. Her hands go to the front of my trousers and find me hard as a rock.
I smile. ‘See? Nothing has changed between us.’
‘Oh, how I’ve missed your body,’ she whispers as I lift her up.
Her legs wrap around my body tightly. I can feel the wetness between her legs seeping into my clothes. Damp spot on my shirt. It’s a good feeling.
‘I was so afraid your passion was gone.’
‘I can’t imagine what gave you such an idea.’
‘I don’t want you to be gentle.’
‘I didn’t plan on being gentle. It’s going to be as hard and dirty as they come. If you don’t shatter then you’re going to pass out,’ I warn, swooping down to crush that plump mouth that I bought another lifetime ago. Once when I was king of the entire realm, for as far as the eye could see.
Twenty-Seven
Lana Barrington
Jack calls me. For an instant his voice confuses me. It seems so near. As if he could pop around for a coffee.
‘Oh, Jack,’ I breathe. ‘Where are you?’
‘In Africa. Billie emailed me. Is there anything I can do?’
‘No. No, there is nothing you can do. Blake has it covered.’ My voice is bitter. ‘Turns out Victoria took our son to punish us.’
‘I can’t hear you properly. Who took him?’
‘Victoria.’
‘Who?
‘Blake’s ex?’
There is a shocked silence as he assimilates this fact. ‘I thought she was locked up in an asylum.’
‘She is.’ I suddenly feel tearful. In my peripheral vision I see a yellow Post-it pad. It has the faint indentation of the message on the note that was above it.
‘Then how can she?’
‘It’s called money and privilege.’ I open a drawer and take out a pencil and start to lightly run the lead over the message. A sentence in Blake’s handwriting starts appearing.
Jack sounds bewildered. ‘What happens next?’
‘She wants Blake to renounce his inheritance.’
There is an electric pause. The line crackles with it. ‘Is he going to?’
‘Yes. Yes, he is.’
I hear him breathe a sigh of relief and then uncomfortable words start pouring out of my receiver. ‘Thank God. It’s not that I doubted him, it’s just—’
‘Don’t worry, Jack,’ I interrupt. ‘They are a cold, calculating bunch and I don’t blame you for thinking that.’ I hold the note up and look at the message.
‘I’m coming back.’
‘Don’t, Jack. You can’t help.’
‘No, I’m coming back because I’m of no use here.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I’ll tell you when I get
back.’
‘You’re not in any trouble, are you?’
‘No. I just realized I’m doing more harm than good.’
‘All right, tell me when you get back.’ In my mind another sentence forms. After I get Sorab back. But I don’t say it. It’s unnecessary. As unnecessary as saying I miss kissing the wet crown of my son’s head as I lift him out of the bath. The real pain, the deep pain is in my bone. Hidden in the marrow. A ravenous thing, eating relentlessly, eating up the cells that hold me up. When I put the phone down I tear away the Post-it note. The scrawl reads:
The real target has to be me!
I look in the mirror. My eyes look frozen over.
Twenty-Eight
Blake Law Barrington
‘Wars should be directed so that the nations on both sides should be further in our debt.’
—Amschel Mayer Rothchild, Frankfurt 1774
I swipe my hand on the steamed-up mirror and look at myself. My eyes stare back, a hard blue. I blink. I look the same. The corruption and the ugliness don’t show, but surely I must be morphing into something unspeakably ugly. All my life I have manipulated laws and morals to advance myself and those of my class.
It was all real simple. Fake money, built upon fake money, built upon fake money. We stole it all from right under your noses. How? Simply seize control of the top of any organization and the rest… You followed like sheep.
You were so easily led, so wonderfully predictable. So lacking in vision. Like a herd moving blindly, either with fear or hatred. It was all so easy. Placate the deliberately dumbed down masses with entertainment. Hundreds of channels of mush and the mindless instructions to consume, consume, consume. Like an addict you saturated your minds with violence, pornography, greed, hatred, selfishness and incessant bad news.
Then… Oh look…a terrorist. He’s coming for you.
Let’s put the whole world on militarized high alert. Let’s intimidate!
And you rose to the bait. Or did you just look the other way?
Yeah, it was grotesque. But you bought it. Even now you’re content with your subjugations, right? Your illusions of security. Are your eyes glazing over? That’s why it was easy. You made it easy. Yes, you. Feel the spike of shame? No? See, why it was so easy for me.
Anyway…
One day, I went one step further. I killed a man, one I called Father. Struck Daddy fatally when he least expected it. And now I am being called upon to execute my sister. And still I do not flinch. Is it because I woke up this morning and the pillow under my cheek was damp? I had cried in my sleep. Or is it simply because I am a monster, a sociopath? Or is it rather just the law of the jungle?
Eat your opponent before he lays his table.
I am of the jungle. I saw her setting her table. I saw it in her eyes. That flash of raw, vindictive hatred teetering on hysteria—unmissable.
Once she fooled me. I mistook calculated revenge for hurt and deep sadness, even madness, but now I am older and wiser. I am a husband and a father and woe betide anyone who threatens harm to my little family.
This time I got her number. Yes, she will return Sorab, but that will not be enough for her. She is baying for my blood. Perhaps even theirs. No, when I think about it, her revenge will only be complete when I am dead, and Lana is a struggling widow that she can play with. And she will.
Like a cat with a mouse.
There is no other way around it. I played softly, softly with her, but she will have none of it. Now the kid gloves come off.
When she looked at me, she was not looking at her lost love, but at a piece that stubbornly refused to conform to desire, to meld with her. It was as if I was a part of her that had been denied her and she wanted it back. She wanted it like mad. Until she has subjected me in whatever way her sick mind deemed would complete her she will not stop.
Unless I rehash an old battle.
Unless I stop her.
By killing her…
I leave the bathroom and go looking for my wife. She is in the room she has designated as her new office. She is on the phone and I stand at the entrance watching her. In the last two days some change has come over her. Suddenly she seems to have thrown herself into her charity.
‘Yes, I understand. But we really don’t need them,’ she says, and puts the phone down.
I raise my eyebrows. ‘What’s your charity turning down?’
‘Vaccines that are almost at the use by date. A woman representing the pharmaceutical giants wanted to flog these vaccines to us. And when I said no, she was willing to give them away for free.’ She scrunches her forehead. ‘What’s that all about?’
I smile. Maybe another time I will tell her about that scam. ‘How are you?’
‘I’m keeping busy,’ she says bravely, as two large tears roll down her face.
I wipe them away with my thumbs. ‘Good. You keep busy. Is Billie coming over?’
‘Yes, she’ll be here at ten.’
‘Good.’
‘So you’re off to see Jay.’
‘Yes. I’ll call you after and let you know what’s going on.’
‘Could it be a trick?’
‘I don’t think so.’
‘Oh, my darling, I love you so much.’
‘Wait for my phone call.’
‘Always.’
I kiss her on the forehead, breathe in the scent of her, to fortify me on the most difficult day of my life.
The meeting with Jay is over quickly. Obviously, he thinks I’ve taken leave of my senses—it is in every ‘uh’, ‘um’ and uncomprehending pause that finds its way into his sentences. But he is too discreet to come right out and say it. I leave his office clutching copies of the papers Victoria requested. Copies of Sorab’s return, copies of my freedom from the world I somehow became trapped in. I feel a flicker of excitement inside me, but I hold back.
Too much can still go wrong.
I get outside on the street and a long black limousine with heavily tinted windows stops in front of me. The back door closest to me opens. I am not afraid of death. I never have been. I’ll do what I have to do to keep my family safe. I bend down, look inside, take a deep breath, and get into it.
‘Monfort,’ I state quietly.
‘And what should I call you?’ he asks tonelessly.
‘Hopefully, you won’t see me again, and that will be a moot question.’
He smiles. In the daylight his skin is particularly repulsive. White and translucent, the veins grass green. Like the damp underside of a frog.
‘But you will see me again.’
‘After today I’m finished.’
‘I’m afraid your services are still required. Stepping off the train is a dangerous business.’
I look at my platinum Greubel Forsey Tourbillion, acquired for a cool half a million dollars at Christie’s Important Watches auction two autumns ago. I take it off and place the timepiece on the console between Monfort and me. To anybody not in the know the gesture is meaningless, but to the true insider and the practitioner of dark esoteric energy, he will understand it perfectly. The gesture is unmistakable.
Then I get out of the car, close the door, and begin to walk in the opposite direction. Ten yards away Brian makes a U-turn and stops beside me. I get in.
‘Take me to that bitch,’ I say.
Twenty-Nine
Blake Law Barrington
I turn away from the window when I hear her come in. Not fast. Slowly. This is the last part. I am almost free. The lock on the chain is about to break.
The door closes behind her. She is dressed in a black and white suit, and her trademark black pearls encircle her throat. Her hair is shining and loose around her shoulders. Our eyes meet. It is impossible to think of her as anything else but my greatest enemy.
I hold out my phone.
She doesn’t say a word. Looks at the papers I have spread out on the plastic table, and takes the phone from me. Our fingers don’t touch.
She dials, waits for th
e connection and says just three words: ‘The Speculative Woman.’ Then she ends the call and puts it down on the table between us. I sit and so does she. Neither of us says anything. After a while she picks up the papers that are on the table and casually, as if they are a magazine that she does not care too much for, glances through them.
I turn my head and look outside. It is a beautiful day. The sun is shining. I am so tense I feel the tension inside my body wanting to manifest in some physical way. I take shallow breaths and control myself. The only sounds are of her flipping uninterestedly through the papers. After a while even she cannot be bothered to fake interest in them. She tosses them on the table and looks in my direction. I don’t turn to look at her so she, too, turns her head and looks out of the window
Twenty minutes later my phone rings. My heart is thudding so loud she can probably hear it. I pick it up and Brian says, ‘We got him.’
‘Thanks,’ I say, my voice sounding thick and guttural. For the first time since Brian called to say that Sorab had been kidnapped that lump of ice in my chest melts.
I look up at her. She is watching me curiously. As if I am an oddity she cannot understand. Or she is a child. The look unnerves me. I have arranged for her to be murdered. She is my sister.
‘Siblings used to kill each other for power and inheritance,’ she says.
‘I don’t want anything from your father. It’s all yours.’
‘Sometimes siblings just want revenge.’
‘Is that what you want, Victoria?’
‘I did.’
‘What’s changed?’
‘You have friends in high places.’
Surprised, I stare at her. ‘What are you talking about?’
‘You didn’t know, did you?’
‘Know what?’ I can feel the tension coming back into my body.
‘They are not done with you.’ And she smiles. A cruel taunting smile. ‘You can’t ride off into the sunset just yet, Blake.’
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