Lost - Michael Robotham [138]
Howard will get his retrial and our only hope of maintaining his conviction is if a jury believes Kirsten’s story. Defense barristers will be queuing up to dismantle her credibility as a confessed kidnapper, extortionist and manager of an escort agency.
I was wrong about Howard, wrong about Mickey, wrong about almost everything. A child killer is going to walk free. I am responsible.
Things get messy when police shoot people. They get even messier when it’s an ex-policeman. There will be an inquest and an investigation by the Police Complaints Commission. There will also be drug tests and psych reports. I don’t know enough about morphine to say if the opiates are still in my system. If I test positive I’ll be swimming in shit.
The man I killed hasn’t been identified. He rode a stolen motorbike and carried no papers. His dental work was Eastern European and he carried a fully automatic machine pistol stolen from a Belfast police station four years ago. His only other distinguishing feature was a small silver cross around his neck inlaid with a purple gemstone, chariote, a rare silicate found only in the Bratsk region of Siberia. Perhaps Interpol will have more luck.
Visiting hours are over but the nursing sister has let me in. Although flat on her back, staring at a mirror above her head, Ali gives me a bigger smile than I deserve. She turns her head, making it only partway before the pain catches in her throat.
“I brought you chocolates,” I tell her.
“You want me to get fat.”
“You haven’t been fat since you were hanging off the tit.”
It hurts when she laughs.
“How is it going?” I ask.
“OK. I managed to stand this afternoon.”
“That’s a good sign. So when can we go dancing?”
“You hate dancing.”
“I’ll dance with you.”
It sounds too maudlin and I wish I could take it back. Ali seems to appreciate the sentiment.
She explains that she has to wear a special cast for the next three months and then a canvas brace with shoulder bands for another three months after that.
“With any luck I’ll be walking by then.”
I hate the expression “with any luck.” It’s not a resounding affirmative but a fingers-crossed, if-all-goes-well sort of statement. What sort of luck has Ali had so far?
I pull a bottle of whiskey from a brown paper bag and wave it in front of her eyes. She grins. Two glasses are next, pulled from the bag like a rabbit from a hat.
I pour her a glass and add water from a tap in the sink.
“I can’t really handle a glass,” she says apologetically.
Reaching into the bag again, I produce a crazy drinking straw with spirals and loops. I rest the glass on her chest and put the straw in her mouth. She takes a sip and gasps slightly. It’s the first time I have ever seen her drink.
Our eyes meet in the mirror. “A Home Office lawyer came to see me today,” she says. “They’re offering a compensation package and a full disability pension if I want to leave the job.”
“What did you tell them?”
“I want to stay.”
“They’re worried you might sue them.”
“Why would I do that? It’s nobody’s fault.”
We look at each other and I feel grateful and undeserving all at once.
“I heard about Gerry Brandt.”
“Yeah.”
I watch the subtle change in her, a little shrinking created by a single affirmation. Something shifts inside me as well and I get a sense of how much pain she’s endured already and the months of operations and physiotherapy still to come.
A swatch of her hair, shiny black, has come loose from a bobby pin. She drops her gaze and sets her mouth defiantly. “And you found Kirsten. We should drink to that.”
She takes a sip and notices I haven’t joined her. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m so sorry. It was a stupid, foolish quest. I just wanted … I just hoped Mickey might be alive, you know. And now look! You’re here and people are dead and Rachel is grieving all over again. And tomorrow Howard is going to get his retrial. It’s my fault. What I’ve done is unforgivable.”
Ali doesn’t answer. Outside the sky is tinged with pink and the streetlights