Killing Freedom

by Ryan Casey

  ‘I know, Uncle,’ Jared said, smiling. ‘I know. Thank you.’

  He pulled away from the hug and stepped into the back of the truck.

  Gurdit turned and nodded his head at Jared. He was a bulky man, his arms as thick as tree trunks as they grasped the steering wheel. He had a brown mark right on the top of his bald head where exposure to too much sun had taken its toll. He didn’t seem like the sort of man who spoke much. Cindy half-smiled at Jared as he entered. Her eyes still looked dazed and distant, as if she were in something of a walking dream. Faith smiled too, but she moved uneasily. He could tell that she was still cynical about this whole freedom thing, but now they had a chance to give it a go, finally.

  After waving Mustapha off, Gurdit turned round to check that everyone was ready to leave before accelerating out of the village and towards the rising sun.

  The breeze brushed against Jared’s face as they turned the corner up the street and onto the open road. He looked round and smiled at Cindy, who smiled back at him. Faith half-smiled, too. It was something—progress. He stretched his arms along the side of the car.

  Nobody speaking was better than everybody arguing.

  He felt a smile twitch in his cheeks: He’d done it.

  Cindy pulled a notepad out of her pocket and began to jot a few things down as her hair danced in the breeze. ‘What’s that?’ Jared asked, catching her eye.

  She looked up at him then turned back down to the pages, closed off somewhat. ‘Oh, just an old pad I found at your uncle’s. I’ve been keeping a… a kind of diary. I like writing so I figured… it makes it easier. Have—how long is all this for, Jared?’

  Jared tried to speak but his stomach sank as his arms merged with the side of the car. The paper. ‘I know.’ The suit said he knew nothing about it. Nothing at all.

  ‘Is everything okay?’ Cindy asked.

  Jared blinked and nodded, bringing a smile back across his face. ‘Sure, sure,’ he said. ‘There isn’t long left now. You’ll be back home in… in no time. Just one last stretch.’ The lies burned against Jared’s throat. There was no going back. Why couldn’t he just spit it out?

  But the lies were the least of his concerns right now, as Cindy opened up the notepad again.

  The front page was torn at the bottom.

  The loose piece of paper on the money bag.

  How much did he really know about Cindy?

  Chapter Twenty

  Jared didn’t say another word during the journey. Cindy sat, resting her hands against the notepad. The torn paper at the bottom. Was it her handwriting? Did she know more than she was letting on to?

  After a few hours of travelling, the car began to slow down in the middle of a long open road.

  ‘The house is just up here,’ Gurdit said.

  Jared squinted as he saw a solitary house emerging in the dip in the road. The area was surrounded by fields, not a sight of human life for miles. Bees danced in the tall, unkept grass of the field. It really was the perfect hiding place.

  ‘How do we get into town?’ Jared asked.

  Gurdit grunted. ‘You don’t. I do.’ He spat out the window as he brought the vehicle to a halt, pulling himself out of the door and stretching as he stepped onto the dusty ground.

  Jared helped Faith out of the back of the vehicle and held Cindy’s arm as she hopped out too. He tried to be cool with her, tried not to give anything away, but it was difficult. She smiled at him before wincing and clutching her stomach as she stretched. The notepad almost slipped from her hands.

  ‘Want any help with that?’ Jared asked.

  She clutched the pad to her chest. ‘It’s okay. Thanks.’ She shuffled in front of him and surveyed the front of the house.

  He’d have to wait a little longer to see what was in the pad.

  Gurdit led them towards the house as the three of them observed the desolate surroundings. The house itself was slightly quainter than it had looked from a distance, with ivy-coated white brick and a brown wooden roof above. It was the perfect isolation, the sort of place they’d dreamed of living in when they were younger.

  ‘It’s like—’

  ‘—Auntie’s,’ Faith finished, smiling at him and turning her eyes to her feet as they edged inside the dimly lit porch area. The first thing that hit Jared as they stepped inside was the cool air, a respite from the heat of the journey down here. The brown tiles clicked as he walked against them. To the right, there was a large lounge with big leather sofas and a traditional fireplace. Next to that, there was a kitchen area, then a door to the patio outside, and a set of stairs that led up to the rest of the rooms.

  ‘Not bad, really,’ Faith said, turning to smile at Jared.

  Jared nodded, agreeing with her, and then he spotted Cindy and the lump in his throat began to swell again.

  Was it really okay?

  They settled in the lounge area, and Gurdit rubbed his hands together. He didn’t smile much. ‘Right,’ he said. It was a relief to hear him speak after the silent treatment in the car. ‘Few ground rules. You don’t leave without asking me. If you want anything, you think about whether you really want it, then you ask me. Is that clear?’

  Cindy looked concerned and opened her mouth before closing it again. She was still clutching the diary to her chest.

  ‘How long do we live like this?’ Jared asked.

  Gurdit looked at him with disapproval. ‘Until the coast is clear. You won’t be here forever. It might be for a day, or it might be for a hundred. I’m looking out for you. That’s my job, and what I’m hired to do, so I do it. That okay with you?’ The bulky muscles in his shoulders flexed automatically with every word.

  Jared nodded and turned back to smile at Faith and Cindy. Faith rolled her eyes and slumped onto a chair whilst Cindy rubbed her arms.

  ‘Do you… do you know how long I’m going to be here?’

  Gurdit flicked his eyes towards Jared. There was a silence in the room. ‘Jared’s dealing with that. You’re in the safest place right now. Don’t do anything to compromise that, okay?’

  Cindy groaned. ‘I just want to kno—’

  ‘Listen,’ Gurdit said. ‘That’s not my area. You need to speak to Jared about that. I won’t repeat myself again.’

  Cindy’s watering eyes fluttered around Gurdit’s face before she slumped back against the chair.

  ‘Right,’ Gurdit said. ‘I’ll be outside. Shout for me if you need me. If you need to get out of here, I have a codeword that I shout—it’s “fuck off,” okay? I never say fuck off. Fuck off is not in my dictionary. If you hear the words, “fuck off,” you fuck right off, okay?’

  ‘Okay,’ Jared said, nodding his head like an approving soldier.

  Gurdit shuffled his feet and pulled the door shut behind him, leaving Jared, Cindy and Faith in the lounge.

  ‘I guess we should get to know each other a little,’ Jared said.

  Faith rolled her eyes before disappearing into the kitchen to grab three glasses of water.

  Jared smiled at Cindy. He couldn’t stop his eyes from diverting towards the notepad clutched against her chest.

  The day progressed fairly slowly. Faith complained that she wasn’t any more free in this prison with that man outside the front door than she had been in her previous job, and Jared could tell Cindy wanted to ask when she could leave, but didn’t have the courage. Jared begged them both to give it a chance, for the time being.

  ‘It’s not perfect but we can make it work. Just for a while, we can make it work.’

  Cindy and Faith both decided to go to bed right after dinner, around seven-thirty PM. They argued that the tiring early morning of travelling had worn them out, but he would choose sleep over the alternative: awkwardly exchanged silence.

  ‘Night,’ Cindy said as Jared stepped out of the bathroom.

  He felt a buzz down his spine as she stood there, smiling at him. ‘Night.’

  She disappeared into her room, and Jared clicked his door shut—there was only
one thing on his mind right now.

  Jared sneaked down the creaking stairs and slipped into the lounge. He thought he saw something moving outside the front door, but remembered that Gurdit was still on lookout. He scanned the lounge—the sofa, the fireplace. She definitely left it in here. She must have.

  Then he saw it: the notepad, sat in the middle of the dining room table for all to see.

  He tensed his palms as he stepped over to it, the moonlight just about lighting up the room enough for him to see. Please be wrong. Please be a big misunderstanding.

  He took a deep breath as he pulled the dark cover open and saw the signature of his uncle in the corner. Must have been a gift from years ago. He turned the pages again. The words read like a diary.

  ‘I woke up somewhere I don’t know. My baby is gone. Don’t know what to do but keep hoping.’

  As Jared flicked more of the pages, he reached the one that had been torn. The rest of the page was blank. Jared tried to picture the handwriting attached to the side of his bag. Was it the same? Some words looked the same. But the tone—it was inconsistent.

  ‘I don’t know what to do but trust.’

  And more words—fragments of thoughts and contemplations.

  ‘He says things will be okay but I don’t know whether to believe him.’

  Jared’s fingers shook as he held the pad. She was curious. She wasn’t as naïve as she seemed.

  ‘Not telling the truth about something. Two more days and I’m out.’

  They had to be careful. He had to tell her. He—

  ‘You don’t trust her either then?’

  Jared’s whole body froze as he spun round to the other side of the lounge, dropping the notepad back to the table.

  Just Faith. Just Faith.

  ‘It’s—it’s not that I don’t trust her. I just want to make sure this work—’

  ‘Bullshit,’ Faith interjected. ‘I saw the way you looked at her in the car. I’m surprised she didn’t notice it too. Something tore you apart, don’t lie to me.’

  Jared scanned his sister’s stern face. She was good, good at getting to the root of people’s emotions and feelings. She’d have made a fantastic psychologist, or something like that, if she’d chosen to follow that path. He pulled himself away from the diary and walked to her side. ‘I just thought I saw something unusual in that diary, but it’s nothing. I was wrong. But I’ll keep an eye on her. We’ll handle her.’

  Faith narrowed her eyes as she looked at Jared, quizzical in her gaze. ‘I’m not sure I can trust you to keep your word on that, brother, but I’ll just have to assure you that I’m keeping a very close eye on her myself, right?’

  Jared nodded. ‘Right.’

  Faith turned back to walk up the stairs. ‘Something’s definitely not right with her, though.’

  Jared paused and pondered the thought. ‘What do you mean?’

  Faith smirked. ‘Damsel in distress. Loses everything. Willingly runs off with… with a set of strangers. One of them was supposedly robbing her house. Nothing fishy strike you about that?’

  Maybe it was fishy. Or maybe she did just have faith in him. Maybe she wanted to give him a chance. She believed him that the police were corrupt, and the people out there who killed Brian and Carl were watching her too, waiting for a chance to kill her. That was possible, right?

  ‘Just be careful, Jared. Be careful about how many lies you tell. Remember who we’re dealing with here.’

  ‘Raymond won’t—’

  ‘No, he will. If he hasn’t already, he will. Wake up, brother.’

  She disappeared back up the stairs, taking little care to mask her footsteps as they creaked against the wooden steps.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  The following day, an envelope arrived through the letterbox.

  Jared noticed it when he stepped down the stairs to join Faith and Cindy for lunch. They’d eaten breakfast together earlier and barely spoken a word. But after the notepad incident, he had to talk to Cindy. He needed to convince her to stay put.

  But this letter, staring back at him. Who could possibly have posted it? Gurdit had gone into the city to pick up some supplies. He’d told Jared that he’d have to keep an especially low profile, and that he’d cut the TV aerial. Apparently the murder of Brian and Carl was front page news and an appeal to find the missing Cindy was gathering momentum by the day. No word from Raymond either. He didn’t know how long they had, but he had to try.

  Jared picked the envelope up from the floor and rattled it to see what was inside. Nothing heavy—could be powder. Seven, maybe eight jobs ago, he’d handled some white powder from an envelope. Nasty rash, burning skin, and a painful cough for three days. Didn’t want any of that again.

  Before opening the envelope he peeked through into the lounge. Cindy sat as she always did: hands on her knees, distant. Faith smoked on a cigarette and looked up at her occasionally. He turned back to the envelope and undid the seal.

  Inside, there was nothing but a piece of scrap paper. Jared unfolded it, being wary of something invisibly nasty, but it seemed clean. He pulled the paper out of the envelope—it was completely blank.

  Except for the blue lines, 1.44mm in length. Slight creaming of the paper, either through age or design, probably both.

  It was a piece of paper from Cindy’s notepad.

  Jared looked at the envelope again: blank, hand delivered. Could she… could she be fucking with him? He turned round to face her again. She looked distant and transfixed by the fire that burned in front of her.

  Why would she do it?

  Jared stuffed the paper into his pocket and stepped into the lounge. Neither of them acknowledged him as he sat beside Cindy on the sofa. He looked over at his sister and nodded at her, the way he always had done when he wanted her to leave the room.

  ‘I’ll… I’ll grab some drinks for us,’ Faith said, standing up and smiling as she headed towards the kitchen.

  ‘Thanks.’ Jared bit at his tongue. Cindy needed to come clean; she needed to tell him what was going on and what her motives were. He just wanted things to be right between them. A fresh start. Why couldn’t she just let that happen?

  ‘I’m not going back home, am I?’ Cindy asked.

  Jared stomach sank. He wasn’t ready for this. He was supposed to start this conversation. Not now—he wasn’t prepared.

  ‘Just answer me, honestly,’ she said.

  There was no hiding. There was nothing he could do. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I-I’m so, so sorry.’

  A tear dripped down Cindy’s face and onto the bare flesh of her leg. She sniffed back the remaining tears and smiled. ‘I know. I know. Just… just why? I mean, Brian was a good man. I know he made mistakes, but he was a good man… He would never have got involved with something that went this far. It… I just don’t understand.’

  She curled up her head into her hands. Jared reached his arm out to comfort her, but backed out, stopped by the impenetrable wall he felt between them. He couldn’t touch her. He couldn’t break that barrier.

  ‘Brian… He got in a mess. And I did what I could, I swear.’

  ‘But Carl,’ Cindy sobbed. ‘Why? Why Carl?’

  Jared remembered that night when he’d spiked their drinks, the gun rubbing against his thigh. If he’d finished them then, would they have suffered less after all?

  ‘I’m sorry. I really don’t know. But that’s why… that’s why it’s important you’re here. You’re safe he—’

  ‘Who did it? Huh, who killed them?’

  Jared rubbed his hands against his face. A metallic taste grew in his mouth as he realised how long he had been biting his tongue.

  ‘Just tell me,’ Cindy cried.

  ‘They were people,’ Jared said. ‘People who Brian used to work against. I… I never told you this but I used to work for Brian’s associate. I was sent to your house to keep an eye on you because I’d… I’d had a tip that someone was after your boyfriend and your family because of a deal he�
�d made. I tried to protect you all, but… I’m sorry.’

  Cindy’s bulging eyes dripped with tears as she sighed and collapsed her head onto her knees. ‘It’s my fault,’ she said.

  ‘No,’ Jared said, brushing his hand against Cindy’s hair. It felt soft against his palm. Like years ago, when things were normal for that one brief period of time. Like her.

  ‘If—I was stupid. I had you tied up. If I hadn’t tied you up then, then…’ she descended into more sobs.

  Jared’s mind clouded. If she hadn’t tied them up, would he have killed them or saved them? What would he have done when he’d gotten to the money? One way or another, blood would have been shed. It just might have worked out differently.

  ‘No,’ Jared said. ‘If you hadn’t done what you did, then things could have been worse. But the main thing is that… I know it’s horrible, but you’re still here. And I’m here, and I’m going to make things safe and make sure the people who did this to you don’t ever get away with it.’

  Cindy sniffed. ‘These people… these people who were against Brian. What if they come back for us? For you? What will I do then?’

  These people.

  ‘We’ll be okay as long as we keep our heads down for a while,’ Jared said.

  These people. Jared caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror as Cindy continued to whimper into her cushion.

  He looked up to see Faith peeking through the kitchen door, wide-eyed, as Jared rested his hand on Cindy’s head.

  Was he smiling?

  No. He wasn’t smiling.

  He didn’t enjoy it.

  It was important not to enjoy it.

  Gurdit’s car arrived at around eight-thirty that evening. He had been gone for a while. He brought vegetables and gave them to Faith.

  ‘A little sexist, don’t you think?’ she said.

  Gurdit scoffed and plonked his big body down on the kitchen chair. ‘And your former profession, that wasn’t?’