S Bolton - Sacrifice

'Naturally. What about Melissa?'

He sighed. 'Melissa was a special case. Like you, never intended to be part of all this.' He glanced towards the open door of the cabin, glaring in Gair's direction. 'We do not use our own wives.'

'She found out?'

He nodded. 'She learned Stephen's passwords and went through his computer files one night.' He stretched out a hand, stroked my forehead again. 'Melissa was a very clever, very stubborn woman,' he continued. 'She was like you in so many ways. It struck me as the deepest irony that you should be the one to find her. Her mistake, of course, was in confronting Stephen, telling him what she knew. We had to act fast. At first, we planned to eliminate her, but she'd told Stephen she was pregnant and he didn't want to lose the child. It was his idea to substitute the other woman, the one from Oban. I was against it. Too many complications. But we'd pretty much run out of time.'

'And Kirsten Hawick. I know she's in my field too. Did you stage that accident? Did one of you drive the lorry?'

He shook his head. 'No, Kirsten's accident was genuine. We just exaggerated the extent of her injuries. She had a son. He lives on Yell now, a fine boy.'

Kirsten might have recovered. The almost unbearable grief I'd seen Joss Hawick enduring could have been totally unnecessary. I wanted to scream, but knew that if I did, I wouldn't be able to stop.

'Why do you bury the women? Why not just dump them at sea? Or burn them? If you'd done that, I'd never have found Melissa.'

'No, but we can't. It's against our beliefs. Our mothers lie in what is for us sacred ground. It's part of the way we honour them.'

'And I suppose it was just too great a risk to bury them all on Tronal. So you've created burial grounds all over the islands?'

He inclined his head, acknowledging the truth of what I was saying.

And Duncan? Duncan did this too? Drank…'

Richard nodded. 'He did. So did his father and his grandfather before him, and my father and grandfather and great-grandfather. We are the Kunal Trows, stronger and more powerful than any other men on earth.' He stood up, ready to return to the main cabin. I was so tired. I wanted nothing more than to slip into unconsciousness. And I knew that if I did so I would die. I had to keep talking.

'How many? How many of you are there?'

He paused at the door.

'Around the world, between four and five hundred. Most live here, but about a hundred years ago we started to colonize. We prefer islands, remote but with a strong local economy.'

My body was trembling and I felt a strong urge to vomit. I was going into shock but I was no longer in danger of losing consciousness. The pain was hell but I could deal with it.

'You're not special,' I said. 'It's all in your head.'

Richard's voice had fallen, as though he was trying to comfort a distressed child. 'You have no idea of the powers we have. Influence you couldn't even dream of. These islands, and many others around the world, belong to us. We do not flaunt our wealth but we possess it in immeasurable terms.'

'You're just ordinary men.'

'I'm eighty-five years old, Tora, and yet I have the strength of a man in his fifties. How ordinary is that?'

'Richard,' called Gair, 'I think I can hear an engine. I need to go up top and signal. Can you take the helm?'

Richard started to turn. 'Believe me if you can, my dear. It will make the next few months easier.'

He turned and left the cabin, closing the door and shutting me inside with the motionless Freya. I felt a moment of surprise that he hadn't sedated me. Maybe all that showing off about his so-called special powers had made him forget. Or more likely he figured the pain and blood loss would be enough to keep me immobile. I looked up at my leg. Blood was no longer pumping out and it was possible the artery wasn't severed after all. I risked lowering it and then raised myself up so that I was sitting on the bunk. The bleeding increased but not alarmingly. I looked at Freya. Still breathing, possibly not as heavily as before, but otherwise no real signs of life. I could expect no help from that quarter.

I sat on the bunk, thinking. It would be just about impossible to get the better of Richard and Gair, injured as I was, but I had to try. While they were separated, Gair on deck, Richard driving the boat and with his back to me, I had the best chance. Once the other boat arrived, Dana would go overboard and I'd be guarded, possibly drugged, until the police operation was over and I was safely back on Tronal.

I tried standing up. A stab of pain shot up through my leg. I took deep breaths, counted to ten, waited for the pain to subside. Then I stepped forward. Another stab of pain, not so bad this time.

Clinging to the shelf around the cabin I inched forwards until I reached the door handle. Motor launches have terrifically loud engines, but Richard had reduced the speed and I thought I caught the sound of another engine somewhere in the distance. I turned the handle and pulled at the door. It opened silently.

Richard was alone in the main cabin, standing at the wheel, peering forwards as though struggling to see ahead. We'd reached another offshore mass of stacks and the navigation was tricky. If I knocked him out – which was basically the plan – we could easily hit one of the huge granite rocks around us. Once the hull was breached, the launch would sink quickly and I'd have to launch a life-raft (always assuming there was one on board), get three unconscious women on to it and deal with a strong and violent psychopath. All this with only one good leg. Like I said, I didn't fancy my odds.

On the other hand… I really didn't like what was on the other hand.

I needed a weapon. Grandad's horse gun lay on a shelf at the far side of the cabin but I'd never be able to reach it without Richard seeing me. I looked all around. The floor was still slick with blood – my blood – and my stomach churned. I forced myself to look away. I checked the shelves that ran around the cabin and found where the boat tools were kept. I slipped my hand down. It was like a life- or-death game of jackstraws – dislodge one from the heap without moving the others or making a sound. Amazingly, I managed it. I raised my hand and examined my find. Some sort of pliers, thick steel, about twelve inches long. They would do. No point hanging about. I limped forwards, arm above my head.

Of course, Richard saw my reflection in the cabin windows. He spun round, catching my arm, pushing it down, behind my back. With my free hand, I pushed at his chest then, in desperation, clawed at his eyes. He hit me, just once, a heavy blow across the temples. Blood shot from my mouth and flew across the cabin as my legs gave way under me. I grabbed the lapel of Richard's jacket and clung on. As I toppled I took him with me.

We landed heavily, he on top of me. He pushed himself up. For a second, I could only stare at him, wait for him to act. Then I grabbed his earlobe and he yelled with pain. He hit my arm hard and I had to let go, but with my other hand I went for his eyes again. He sat up, straddled across me, pinning me down. With one hand, he grabbed my right wrist and held fast. With the other, he reached for my throat.

Knowing it could be the last sound I ever made, I screamed.

Richard's hand wrapped around my neck and squeezed. I thrashed my head from side to side but his grip wasn't budging. He was incredibly strong; I'd been a fool to imagine I could overpower him. With my left hand I struck out at his face but his arms were longer than mine and I couldn't reach him.

I tore at the hand holding my throat, dug my nails into skin, tried to wrench it away. The instinctive panic that goes hand in hand with oxygen deprivation had set in, giving me strength I wouldn't otherwise have had, but it still wasn't enough. Richard was no longer looking at me, but at a point over my head. He wasn't capable of looking me in the eyes as he throttled me. I think I took a small measure of comfort from that as the darkness began to grow.