The Blood Road

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Duncan’s eyes snapped open and he grabbed the steering wheel, snatching the car away from the edge of the road. The headlights glittered back from the rain-slicked tarmac, sweeping past drystane dykes and hollow trees.

Don’t fall asleep.

Don’t pass out.

LIVE!

Madre de Dios, it hurt... Fire and ice, spreading deep inside his stomach, burning and freezing its way through his spine, squeezing his chest, making every breath a searing rip of barbed wire on raw flesh.

The wipers screeched back and forth across the windscreen — marking time with the thumping blood in his ears — the blowers bellowing cold air into his face.

He switched on the radio, turning it up to drown them out.

A cheesy voice blared from the speakers: ‘...continues for missing three-year-old Ellie Morton. You’re listening to Late Night Smoothness on Radio Garioch, helping you through the wee small hours on a dreich Friday morning...’

Duncan blinked. Bared his teeth. Hissed out a breath as the car swerved again. Wrestled it back from the brink. Wiped a hand across his clammy forehead.

‘We’ve got Sally’s O.M.G. it’s Early! show coming up at four, but first, let’s slow things down a bit with David Thaw and “Stones”.’

His left hand glistened — dark and sticky.

He clenched it over the burning ache in his side again. Pressing it into the damp fabric. Blood dripping from his fingers as he blinked...

Teresa walks across the town square, brown hair teased out by the warm wind. Little Marco gazes up from her arms, worshipping her for the goddess she is. The sky is blue as a saltire flag, the church golden in the summer sun.

Duncan wraps an arm around her shoulders and pulls her in for a kiss — warm and smoky from her mother’s estofado de pollo.

She cups a hand to his cheek and smiles at him. ‘Te quiero mucho, Carlos.’

He beams back at her. ‘Te quiero mucho, Teresa!’ And he does. He loves her with every beating fibre of his heart.

The car lurched right, heading for the drystane dyke.

Duncan dragged it back. Tightened his right hand on the steering wheel. Hissed out a barbed-wire breath. Shook his head. Blinked again...