The Initial Blow

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The Initial Blow Page 28

by Paul Vincent Lee


  Susan laughed ‘Oh, God.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Can’t keep it from you now my love.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘My name is actually Karen Susan Elizabeth Dornan. I’ve always hated Karen so Susan Ford it is going to be mister, OK?’

  ‘OK, Mrs Ford.’

  I fretted over whether to give Susan the ring then but felt I wanted a more romantic setting.

  ‘What have you got on tomorrow?’ I asked.

  ‘Surprisingly little; Eastern Division have taken on a lot of the work load; long story.’

  ‘Right, let’s go up to Loch Lomond tomorrow; long walk, lunch at Cameron House.’ I felt again for the ring in my pocket.

  ‘I’ve got something I want to give you.’

  Chapter 31

  It had been raining when Susan and I reached Loch Lomond so we had decided to go for lunch first, in the hope the rain would be off by the time we finished. Susan looked as beautiful as ever. We left Cameron House and drove further up the loch side, parked up and walked along a trail that eventually leads on to the West Highland Way. The loch was calm, the birds were chirping an early evensong in the mist and it felt at that moment that Susan and I were the only two people in the world. I reached into my pocket and took out the ring box. I opened it and gave Susan the ring.

  ‘Oh, Ray, it’s perfect.’

  ***

  Sitting in a Costa Coffee in Glasgow, Joe Turner didn’t recognise the number on his mobile screen but thought it might be his new lawyer.

  ‘Hello.’

  ‘Hello, is that Joseph Turner?’

  ‘Yes, it is.’

  ‘Of Turner Spanish Property Consultants?’

  Joe beamed, the business cards he had had printed were working. ‘Yes it certainly is; how can I help you, Mr…?’

  ***

  ‘I got it engraved’ I said to Susan

  Susan looked puzzled at first.

  ‘Lang?’

  ‘Yes, get it? Karen Dornan....KD......KD Lang.......great song writer.’

  She paused for only a moment.

  ‘Just like Kate Turner......KT....KT Tunstall....right?’

  ‘Right.’

  Experience told me that one blow would be all I would need. She didn’t even try to run. Detective Inspector Karen Susan Elizabeth Dornan knew her life was over.

  ***

  A few minutes later I, Azrael, roamed calmly through the gloaming. The rain had started again and its pitter-patter seemed to form tears on the leaves but I only heard the heavens applaud.

  I left the ring clutched in Susan’s hand. Criminal profilers often say that serial killers want to be caught, I can’t say if that is true of others or not, but for me the truth was that my work was done then, my mission had come full circle. I knew the “Lang” ring would lead to the “Tunstall” necklace and from there it would only be a matter of time. Susan had offered hope but ultimately, Eve, the Devil’s mistress, manifested herself in her too.

  The Azrael cards too were; perhaps subconsciously, the start of the end game for me. I had not used them before Kate; despite the previous killings. The first woman who should have loved me, my mother, betrayed me and now, many years later, “The One”, had also betrayed me. But both they, and many others, have been judged and will now suffer forever. I am content. I have no regrets other than Ivana Jakonowski. When our paths crossed at the staged meeting in the police station, I panicked. When Susan told me Joe Turner had been identified as having been at the hotel with Kate, I realised that Healy’s deviousness had back-fired and that he had taken Ivana’s “Yes” as referring to Joe; when she actually meant me.

  I would have let her live but the Lord called for her and I did his bidding; just as I always will.

  Epilogue

  It is now six months since Susan’s betrayal. I’ve been told Matt Healy left the police and; after being cleared of having any involvement with a killing in Spain, decided to open a bar in Lloret de Mar. He was last heard of drinking himself to death along with the other no hope ex-pats that haunt the town.

  Jack T’Baht was quietly forced out of the police after it came out that, on realising that Jill French’s flat in Bishopbriggs; was not far from his surveillance post, he had left his watch and gone to her flat. He went quietly on agreement that no mention be made of the semen stained knickers found in his pocket on his arrest.

  I am tired now. A young man called Brian will be along to see me shortly. His uniform is always spotlessly white and well pressed; his badge reads: Psychiatric Nurse. He passes four tablets through to me every day along with my dinner. He will ask how my writing is going and I will be pleased to tell him today that I am done; my story has been told.

  But she’s not there no more

  And my head replays that closing door

  As we walk away

  And I’m begging for me to stay

  Take me home

  Take her home

  Take us home

  Where we belong

  If you liked The Initial Blow:

  Hi, trying to earn a living as an independent writer is tough.....believe me, I know! The reason I’ve gotten this far is simple.....it’s YOU....the reader. If you enjoyed The Initial Blow, please take a few seconds to put a Review on amazon.co.uk or amazon.com. A couple of lines can be all it takes to make a big difference. Thank you. Paul.

  Keep in touch:

  Contact me anytime!

  By email: [email protected]

  On Facebook: Paul Vincent Lee Author

  Through my Website: www.paulvincentlee.com

  …..AND…..why not join my Mailing List too…..and get a FREE copy of: “The Maltese Orphans.”….or even if you would just like to receive up-dates by email.

  The Maltese Orphans is an Agenda Bookstores Top 10 Crime Thriller Bestseller.

  The Inspector Thea Spiteri Crime Series; set on the beautiful Mediterranean Island of Malta, exposes the underbelly of Paradise…..and enthrals Mystery & Thriller Fans Worldwide.

  Visit: www.paulvincentlee.com : to download your FREE copy.

  What happened to Matt Healy? Find out in........

  The Maltese Orphans, now available in paperback, and on Kindle…..here’s a little taster.

  The Maltese Orphans

  Chapter 1

  Winter 2013 Spain

  As places for dying go, Malta seemed as good a place as any. Matt Healy looked through the haze of his life at the tiny dot on the map. It had been ringed by a beer stain from one of the many bottles of Estrella he had consumed the night before with Jim Frame, his once-upon-a-time work colleague from the now-defunct Strathclyde Police.

  Healy was slumped at the kitchen table in the small pension in Lloret de Mar that he now called home. He had smiled to himself when he first heard his flat referred to as a pension.

  ‘True, that’s what I am. A pensioner. Someone who lives on, and now in, a pension. God bless Strathclyde Police.’

  He and Frame weren’t really friends, more a case of two guys with an unbreakable bond of depression. Healy vaguely recalled their conversation from the previous night before Frame collapsed on the couch.

  ‘There’s only one thing you need to know about Lloret de Mar, Jim.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘It’s a shit hole.’

  ‘Why do you live here then?’

  ‘I’m shit.’

  Healy had known for a while that if he didn’t change his life, he was a dead man. He also knew he had to leave Spain. He couldn’t stay where he was and stay alive at the same time. He stared again at the map. ‘Malta it is, then.’

  Even for Matt Healy and Jim Frame, the copious amounts of alcohol consumed over the previous few days were beginning to take their toll, and with Frame due to fly back the next day, they had agreed to moderate their intake for the day and even to cheat: they would go for a proper meal as well.

  ‘What do you know about Malta, Jim?’

  ‘Not a lot; wh
y?’

  ‘I’m moving there.’

  ‘What…..when?’

  ‘Soon as.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I’ll die if I stay here, that’s why.’

  ‘What?.....and you’ll live forever if you move to Malta?’

  ‘No, but I might live for a day, really live, and that’s got to be better than this.’

  The relatively little Healy had to drink that day made no difference to his nightly torment. Healy didn’t think of them as dreams. Dreams were jumbled, incoherent, unreal. These were memories: real, painful and unceasing. Mother, never satisfied, often critical. No father to speak of, but a presence nevertheless. Years of dealing with the dregs of Glasgow. But, most of all, Dornan, Susan Dornan. Friend, colleague, boss, lover, bitch, corpse.

  Why Susan, why? Always……..why?

  Acknowledgements

  On looking back and thinking about everyone who had an influence on getting me to this point in my life; where I have actually written a book, I realised that there were just too many to mention……so I will just mention the main culprits…….and can I just say at this point that any mistakes in the book either factual or in prose are all mine.

  So thanks to: my dad, gone over 30 years but in my thoughts every day: James “Grubby” Kelly, English teacher par excellence; a beacon of light in a sea of disillusion. He won’t even remember me, but he was the only person in the Garnethill Colditz who ever showed that they saw something worthwhile in me. I thank him for that: Linda Jackson of Strathclyde University’s Creative Writing Department, for describing my early, hopeless writing efforts as “terrific” & for being a good singer!; Sinclair MacLeod, fellow author, IT wizard, font of all publishing wisdom and all round good guy: K T Tunstall, for being a great song writer & having inspirational initials: and all the singers and songs mentioned, I like your stuff……….Lori, you’re going to make it.

  Finally, but most importantly of all….to my two wonderful sons, Anthony and Paul, my reasons for keeping going and for making me proud of the way they have turned out despite my, no doubt, many failings as a father…..and, finally, to everyone I know for putting up with me telling them for five years that I was writing a book! I am indebted to you all.

  Glasgow

  2012

  ***

  Malta

  2016

  2nd Edition

  Life has moved on for me in the 4 years since “Defending Joe” first came out.

  I now life in Malta; and write full time of the exploits of a Maltese Pulizija Inspector / Superintendent named Thea Spiteri. Hopefully you’ll have a look.

  Those ‘who must be obeyed’ said that “my brand” required that “Defending Joe” be re-launched and re-named; hence ‘The Initial Blow’…..who am I to argue!

  Thank you all.

  Paul.

  But finally…….

  A word of caution for Would-be Authors:

  Many writers are tempted to use the ‘life stories’ of friends or relatives as a vague back-story to characters in their books. From bitter experience my advice on this is simple: don’t. People are always delighted when they find out that ‘they’ are in a book….until they read it! They are never happy and don’t seem to be able to accept that a fictitious character is not them.

  I have ‘lost’ 3 or 4 apparent ‘friends’…..2 of which I did genuinely regard as friends….and in one case the reason being that “I had insulted his parents”…..even though his parents were never mentioned; and ‘he’ was a fictional character.

  Sad, but true…..so save yourself from unnecessary pressure…..writing is difficult enough.

  Paul Lee

  2016

 

 

 


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