Matt Hilton: Blood and Ashes

Millie squeezed herself tightly, reluctant to leave the children unchaperoned for long. She held that pose for a beat, then it was as if she deflated and her hands swung listlessly by her sides. She sat on the well alongside me, head down. ‘You’ve come to tell me that this isn’t over with, haven’t you?’

‘Hicks and Gant are finished with,’ I reassured her. ‘The final few members of their organisation have been rounded up and are in jail. All the others are dead.’

‘Good!’ She snapped her head up and her eyes were no longer full of sadness. They were hard chips of ice, full of resolution. ‘They deserved to die.’

‘Perhaps.’

‘Perhaps? There’s no perhaps about it? They burned my sister to death, Joe.’

I wasn’t so sure about that any more.

‘Why would they?’ I asked.

‘To torment my father… What else?’

‘Hicks wanted your dad dead. Why would he have Brook murdered then wait so long before attacking your family at Adrian’s house? It doesn’t fit…’

Millie stared at me, realisation hitting her like she’d run full-pelt into a brick wall. ‘It was Vince Everett? Is that what you’re telling me?’

A couple of things Vince had said to me had got me thinking: ‘ What I sometimes have to do isn’t FBI procedure either,’ and even more damning; ‘ I had to get into his mind, become Vince Everett in every way. I had to think like him, act like him, do what he would do. It wasn’t nice being in his head like that, but I had to show those assholes that I was a worthy ally.’

To gain acceptance into Hicks’ hate-filled organisation, it wasn’t a stretch to think that they had demanded an act of loyalty from him. Had Vince’s test extended to murdering Don Griffiths’ daughter?

‘I can’t be sure, but it’s beginning to look that way,’ I said.

‘But he’s supposed to be one of the good guys…’

‘Sometimes the boundaries aren’t so easily defined.’ Considering even myself a good man wasn’t easy when my track record of violence screamed back at me in argument. ‘Vince works for the government. He does what they tell him. Maybe they ordered him to do whatever was necessary to infiltrate Gant’s crew.’

‘You’re saying that the government advocated it, that they are responsible for Brook’s murder?’

‘Not the government, just certain self-serving factions within it.’

‘What can we do about that?’

‘Right now? Nothing.’

‘I won’t accept that. My sister was murdered…’

I held up a hand. ‘No. Actually, there is something. You can keep on living.’

Millie snorted and made to walk away. I grabbed her wrist and held on to her, pulled her close and gathered her in my arms. Whispering, I said, ‘As much as it hurts, you must keep quiet about this. Your dad could still be seen as a threat to them. If you speak to anyone about Vince or his bosses, then I’m afraid I won’t be able to save you.’

‘Brook was my sister,’ she said. She looked up, her eyes filled with tears. ‘She didn’t deserve to die like that. The people responsible should be made to pay!’

‘I agree.’ I released her and she took a step backwards. I could see the devastation in her face. Her features had folded in on themselves. She was reliving the horror, seeing her sister burning to death in the wreckage all over again.

‘You’re going after them?’

The garrotte mark on my neck was a distant memory now, but it still burned.

‘I think that Vince will show up somewhere down the line.’

‘But you don’t think it will be here?’ She cast a fearful glance across at her home, thinking about the children.

‘That won’t happen,’ I reassured her. ‘Not unless you talk.’

Her eyes became slits again. ‘What if I shout it to the rafters?’

I stood up. ‘Come on, Millie.’

‘We could draw him here, couldn’t we? You could be waiting. You could get the bastard.’

Part of me considered the proposition, but only for a nanosecond.

I shook my head. ‘Forget him, Millie. Forget your hatred of him. Just get on with your life again.’

She looked disbelieving. ‘You’re going to let that bastard get away with this?’

‘I’ve no option,’ I said. ‘There’s always the chance I could fail and I’m not prepared to let that happen. Beth and Ryan still need someone around to love them.’

Millie’s head finally went down, and the relaxing of her shoulders made her look small and frail. It seemed my words had pushed through her anger and offered her something else to concentrate upon. She reached out tenderly and touched my chest. Then her fingers dropped away and she walked slowly across the green towards her house.

I didn’t follow.

My time here was over.

At least, I hoped so.

Maybe it was just the sun through the clouds, casting shadows in the alleyway across the green. For the briefest of moments, I was sure I’d caught sight of a face peering from within the darkness. But when I focused on the place, the face was gone. And so were the killer eyes I could have sworn were staring back at me.