‘Because she wanted my help.’
‘Why?’
‘Because I’d told her a little about my past.’
‘I thought that was “classified”,’ Healy said sarcastically, making inverted commas with his fingers.
‘I worked in the personal security industry after leaving the military,’ Ben said.
‘As what, a bodyguard?’ Healy said, not doing much to hide his contempt.
‘Kidnap and ransom negotiator,’ Ben replied. It was the only aspect of his former profession that sounded remotely legit. ‘Close protection wasn’t my main speciality.’
‘That’s why you asked if she’d been kidnapped,’ Nash said.
Ben nodded. ‘It was either one or the other. Kristen was clearly right to be anxious about the level of risk she’d become exposed to. She said she wanted protection. I told her I knew people in the business. We’d agreed to talk more about it this morning when I drove her to the airport.’
‘Why you? Why not go to the police?’
Ben almost smiled at that. ‘I can’t imagine.’
‘And you have no idea why, or more importantly from whom, she needed to be protected?’ Nash asked.
‘I told you, it wasn’t discussed. Maybe it would have been, if we’d had the opportunity, but as things stand I don’t know the answer to that. What I do know is that this was no random attack. She wasn’t in the wrong place at the wrong time. The killers didn’t just stumble on a lone woman on the beach. And no amount of intervention on my part, short of putting them in the morgue where they belong, was going to make any difference to that.’
‘I think there are enough bodies in the morgue already, don’t you?’ said Nash. ‘These men will be brought to justice.’
‘Not by you guys,’ Ben said. ‘You’re not in their league.’
‘That may be so,’ Healy said. ‘But then, it seems, neither are you.’
‘I wasn’t ready for them,’ Ben said. ‘Next time, I will be.’
‘That’s our job,’ Nash said.
‘You’ll never even come close.’
‘And where do you suppose you’re going to find them?’ Healy sneered.
‘Not anywhere nearby,’ Ben said. ‘They’re getting further away every second we sit here wasting.’
‘We’ll find them,’ Healy said. ‘Make no mistake about that.’
‘Healy, you couldn’t find your own arsehole in the dark,’ Ben said. ‘But maybe you’ll be able to find the hospital exit. Or do I have to call the matron to escort you out?’
The detectives stood up. Healy’s cheeks were flushed red and Nash was looking at the floor. Healy said something about needing to speak to Ben again as the inquiry progressed.
Ben said nothing more to them. Healy pulled open a gap in the screen around the bed, and through it Ben watched them file out of the ward.
He sat for a while, thinking about Kristen. It was only now that he was left alone that the reality of her death properly sank in. He gritted his teeth tightly at the thought of what those men had done to her. Kept picturing her lying there with blood oozing from the stab wounds all over her body. Bloody holes where her blue-grey eyes had been. Her throat gashed wide open, windpipe severed. Blood pooling on the stones, seeping into the ground.
He couldn’t bear it any longer.
He called for the nurse.
Fifteen minutes later, he was dressed and ready to check himself out of the hospital, despite Dr Prendergast’s protests that they should keep him under observation for at least twenty-hour hours. ‘If I drop dead of a brain haemorrhage in the hospital car park, you can tell me you told me so,’ he said to Dr Prendergast.
In a bathroom off the ward, he peeled the dressing away from his brow and quickly inspected the stitched-up gash under the hairline.
He’d live.
‘Fuck it,’ he said to the mirror. ‘Let’s get out of here.’
Ben didn’t return to the cottage for a few hours. The bus he took back from the hospital wound its unhurried way back through several villages and finally dropped him on the main road, quarter of a mile from Pebble Beach. From there, avoiding the guesthouse, he cut across a patch of wasteground and down a rocky slope that joined the coastal path where it curved around the headland. A short way further on was a little cove he’d discovered years ago. It was a place he knew he’d be alone, and solitude was what he needed.
He found a place to sit among a cluster of rocks overhanging the water, and took out his cigarettes. He lit one mechanically, shielding the Zippo flame from the wind with a cupped hand. He stared out to sea, watched the hissing foam boil around the foot of the rocks. The cigarette didn’t taste of anything much. He plucked it from his lips and tossed it into the surf where it fizzed briefly and then was gone.
He barely noticed the grey swell. All he could see was the choice that now lay in front of him.
It was a simple matter of two options. Left, or right. Black, or white.
The first option was to step back, yield to the police and trust them to deal with this. He’d meet with Kristen’s family, offer condolences and support. He’d hang around here for as long as necessary, do whatever he could to assist the authorities, but remain firmly in the background. He could be passive, patient and calm. Take a back seat and stay there.
But as he sat there, he knew in his heart that could never happen. He’d never been passive in his life, let alone supportive towards the authorities – two ingrained habits that right now didn’t seem a good time to start trying to break. That led him to the second option.
He thought again about Kristen, replayed one more time in his mind the brief period they’d spent together, and the way it had ended. He’d barely known her, and yet he couldn’t have felt the responsibility more heavily. Maybe it was because he felt so powerless to fix other things in his life that this pressed on him so much. He didn’t know why, and he didn’t care to ponder the reasons too closely. He just knew what felt right to him. In fact, he realised, there never had been a choice. This had to be finished his way, the way he’d always done things. The only way he really knew. No matter how hard he tried to stay off that road, it kept calling him back. Maybe it always would.
From the cove, he walked back along the beach. It was after lunchtime but he wasn’t hungry. He passed his cottage at a distance and barely glanced at it. He passed the crime scene, saw the police tape flapping in the wind and the Garda Land Rover parked on the shingle. Nearby, a pair of chunky, unfit-looking cops were scratching slowly about for whatever clues bare rocks could yield up. He had no doubt that pretty soon, they’d retire empty-handed to their vehicle and go trundling back to the comfort of the police canteen for their pie and chips.
Ben walked on towards the guesthouse. Inside, he found the reception desk unoccupied. While nobody was about, he grabbed the register and flipped it around on the desk to check for the names of the Belgian guests Healy had said had witnessed the attack. They weren’t hard to find. Monsieur and Madame Goudier had been staying for most of the week and were scheduled to leave tomorrow.
‘Room five,’ Ben said to himself as he headed for the stairs. Before he got there, what had once been the door to his office, now with a sign that said ‘STAFF ONLY’, swung open and Mrs Henry appeared in the passage. Her eyes were red and puffy. She stopped dead when she saw him, took one look at his battered face and instantly