Читать книгу The Killing Files - Nikki Owen - Страница 15

Salamancan Mountains, Spain.

34 hours and 7 minutes to confinement

I ram my body hard straight into Dr Andersson.

She yells out, her torso toppling to the left, the knife slipping from her grip, clattering to the tiles. ‘Maria, stop! Please, don’t …’

She steadies and I think she is going to recover, her hand reaching to a gun behind her jacket, and so fast, without thinking, I haul my whole body up and head butt her in the face.

She reels back, a sharp crack indicating her nose breaking, blood spurting, the fall dislodging her gun and causing it to slide under a table.

I move quick, drag my body up, the bullet wound in my leg throbbing.

‘Maria,’ Balthus calls from the cell. ‘What’s happening?’

I survey the damage fast, the slump of Dr Andersson’s slight body, her twisted limbs.

‘She is alive,’ I say. ‘Injured.’

‘I don’t give a damn about her—just get the hell out of there. Get your notebook and bag and run!’

But my eyes catch sight of my ordered articles and photographs and sketches ripped on the floor pressed under Dr Andersson’s mashed up body, blood seeping from her ear. For a moment there is a quiet, macabre eeriness to it all as the summer sun glows through the windows, warm and serene over the utter devastation in my villa. I slap a hand to the wall, steady myself, everything spinning a little as I will my brain not to melt down at the chaos. One, two, three. One, two, three. I play out a waltz of numbers in my head, draw in a long breath then, looking up, acknowledge where my notebook is and, glancing at Dr Andersson’s splayed limbs, stagger towards the fallen gun.

Balthus crackles on the line. ‘Are you on the move?’

‘Yes.’

I step over a broken laptop, and stop. There is a torn photograph of my papa lying discarded amidst the mess. It is the one of him with his arm around me, except the picture now only shows me with Papa’s arm on my shoulder, and does not show his face or the rest of him, his body ripped off and in two. The sight of the photograph instantly bothers me.

‘Papa.’ I scan the floor, frantic. ‘Where is the other half?’

‘What?’

‘The photograph of Papa,’ I say to Balthus, twisting left and right, crouching down despite the searing pain in my leg, and clawing through the tattered paper that litters the floor. ‘She tore it in two. Papa is missing.’

‘Maria, you’ve no time for this.’

But I keep looking, ignoring Balthus, ignoring the sting in my leg, led on instead by the urge to stay connected to my father in any way I can. I lift up a heap of shredded newspaper then drop it, confetti pieces floating in the sun. ‘He taught me not to flinch,’ I say to myself. ‘Papa.’

‘Maria? Maria, I know this is hard for you, but you don’t have time for this. If MI5 don’t hear from Dr Andersson, they’ll come to the villa. And if they know where you live, chances are the Project do too.’

Yet it’s as if his words have no meaning. All I can obsess on is Papa’s picture.

‘Maria!’

I lift up files. I throw torn shreds of NSA articles and images around until the air becomes thick with paper and no matter how hard I try, no matter how much I tell myself to leave, I can’t, not without Papa, not without seeing his arm around me, safe, secure, knowing I’m not on my own, because I don’t want to be on my own, not really, not like this for the rest of my life. And then, as I turn, there, among the broken pieces of laptop plastic, I see him, Papa, his eyes shining bright as if he were still alive, warm, breathing next to me.

‘Maria, have you got it?’

‘Yes!’

I grab the picture, thrust it to my chest and standing, happy, so happy I have him close to me, even if it’s only like this.

‘Good. Okay, Maria. Now you need to run. Run now, yes?’

‘Yes. Yes.’

I turn, checking the room, glancing to Dr Andersson’s body on the floor, then, grabbing my notebook fast from where it lies half-hidden by a stack of half-toppled books, I go to hobble to my bedroom, to the hidden floor compartment containing my emergency bag. But, as I reach the door, there is an almighty scream that fills the room, piercing my ears.

Dr Andersson flies at me. ‘No!’

Her hand grabs me as she smacks me against the wall, the picture of Papa floating from my fingertips, notebook flying to the left. She slams me against the wall again, blood instantly spurting from my wound. Flipping me over, she digs her knee into my chest, pinning me down, but my right arm slips free and, crunching my fingers into a fist, I turn, punch her hard in the nose. There is a loud crack. Her head spins back, hand slaps to her face as blood spurts, a crimson slit sliced into her skin.

I shift faster now, heart racing, counting the entire time to focus, my body rolling away, quicker now, Balthus from the cell shouting at me over and over again to get to the door, to get out, but before I do, there is a scraping on my leg where the bullet wound throbs.

I look down. Dr Andersson has dug her nails into my skin, clawing at the injury and she is trying to reach my cell phone. ‘Just … Maria, don’t do this …’

Heat rockets up my leg and I scream out, stumbling forward, attempting to get to a stand, but my knees wobble and I tumble, my torso toppling forward, body a felled tree, slicing my scalp on the corner of a chair.

Blood splatters in my eyes, disabling my sight, the heat of it, the ooze cloaking my face. My hands flap in front of me as I frantically try to see, attempt to stagger to safety, but Dr Andersson gets to me before I can run. The blood clears and my sight kicks in, but now she has an arm locked around my neck, her hands grasping for my cell phone.

‘Who are you speaking to?’ she yells. ‘Who?’

I smack her hands away and then, spinning round, see it: her gun—under the table where it landed.

And now both our eyes are on it.

Quick, slick, she throws me to the side, lurching for the weapon, my shoulder slamming into the stone floor. She kicks me hard in the stomach and I reel back, the agony of it engulfing me, spiking into my consciousness.

‘Jesus Christ, Maria, why? Stay fucking still.’ She spits out some blood, looking round for the gun. ‘I didn’t want to fucking do it like this.’

But I can’t let her get the gun, can’t let her get to my cell and to Balthus. And then I spot my torn Papa photograph, lying lost next to ripped pictures of Mama, Ramon, Patricia and Harry, and a sudden rage courses through me, one phrase slamming into my mind—prepare, wait, engage.

I glance once more to the photographs and I fly. I fly at Dr Andersson and punch her throat, straight on the windpipe, and her whole body instantly folds, collapsing in with a strange gurgle as her hand clutches her skin. I scramble up, eyes scanning the floor. The gun. Where is the gun?

‘Stop!’ Slam. Dr Andersson’s whole body lands on me. I stagger backwards at the weight of her, smothering me almost, impossible to breath, horrified that she is on me, touching me, and I hit out, my legs kicking at her shins, but it does no good. She topples me, my cell phone almost slipping away.

‘Maria!’ Balthus yells.

My face smacks the tiles, bones crunching as she knees me in the chest. Air shoots out and it feels as if I am drowning, as if every atom of oxygen is wheezing from my thorax as now Dr Andersson’s knees pin my torso down, her legs wedged into my skin.

‘So it’s the governor you’re in touch with,’ she says, spitting to the floor. ‘I know his voice. Maria, it’s over. Don’t drag everyone into this.’

She shifts to the right, blowing air on her face where her ponytail now hangs in strings of sweat on her face, and as I try and jerk my head out of her way, I see a glint. The bar. The iron bar.

I move fast, automatic. I whip my hand forward and with one swift movement, stretch my arm, grab the bar and, using all the force I can find, smash it over Dr Andersson’s head.

Her grip immediately loosens, her fingers go slack. She slips to the side, a slow groan sliding from her mouth and I waste no time. Pushing her off me, I scramble back, crawling on all fours, my eyes darting left and right until they finally land on the gun, wedged now into the wall. I grab it, chest heaving, and, staggering to a stand, point it at her.

‘My baby—’ she says, eyes rolling in her head. ‘It’s her … birthday …’ Blood loops round her ear now, pooling in the well inside it, and she drifts in and out of consciousness.

I pause at the sight of her, my brain stuck, torn between helping and running.

‘Maria?’ Balthus. ‘Are you okay?’

‘She is injured. I should help her.’

‘What? No. No! Is she down?’

‘Yes.’

‘Then go. Go!’

Swallowing, unsure what to do, but knowing Balthus is right, I secure the cell phone, turn, then, throwing one last glance at Dr Andersson’s broken body, I hobble away as fast as I can. But as I drag myself across the room somehow, Dr Andersson crawls up, fast and unexpected, catching me slap at the ankle.

‘Give me … the gun,’ she yells.

She fells me, topples me to the ground, clambering to my chest, fingers finding my throat where they squeeze hard. I choke, gasp for air. My arms stretch out as far as they can, the gun still in my fingers, but it is slipping now, teetering on the tips. My legs flap, nails scratch at her as I try to wrench her off me, but she presses harder, her hands nearly at my fingers now where the gun seesaws, teetering between life and death.

Tears roll down her cheeks. ‘I’m so sorry. I hate doing this.’

I feel myself begin to asphyxiate and it is hard to retain a grip on anything at all, the room swaying, my eyes bulging, about to explode. I look round at the torn articles on the floor, at the images of the friends and family that, without ever telling them, I do love. I thrash, yell, but Dr Andersson just digs in harder, strength coming from somewhere, her blue eyes fixed on mine, the sun shining on us and I feel it, there, its heat, and my mind goes to Papa, to his face and eye creases and his complete and utter acceptance of me for who I am.

I have almost no oxygen reserves left.

‘Ssssh,’ Dr Andersson says to me now. ‘It will all be over soon. Sssh.’

A warmth spreads over me, trickling at first then rushing in as, one after the other, faces swim before me—Balthus, Patricia, Harry, Ramon, Mama. And seeing them, watching the contours on their expressions, the grooves and lines, I start to believe that when I die, I will no longer be lonely and awkward and hunted down, but happy and free and regarded as normal.

‘Maria? Maria, fight her!’

Balthus? His voice swims into my head.

‘Maria,’ he shouts, ‘don’t let them win! Don’t let them win!’

His voice, hearing it—it sparks something within me, something that takes hold of the last flicker of a flame inside me. My fingers wriggle. Slow then picking up speed, I find, from somewhere, a fight, a strength and, instead of letting it slip from my hand, I begin to clutch the gun until my knuckles turn white and my breath grows strong. ‘Prepare. Wait,’ words whisper in my head. ‘Engage.’

I force myself to look straight at Dr Andersson and, gripping the gun as hard as I can, I make myself focus, make myself do what I am alarmed I’ve been trained to do, what I must do to survive.

I twist my torso.

‘No!’ Dr Andersson yells, eyes wide at the sight of the gun. ‘No. No … Her …her name is Briony. She’s three today. Three. I … I can’t let you get away. I can’t let you stop me.’ And then she goes to press down harder on my mouth, squeezing out the air.

And so I grip the gun hard.

And I shoot.