A Winter Grave

Chapter Twenty-Six

The fury had returned, and Brodie felt out of control. He saw the world through blood as he ploughed his way up the path to the door of the little police office. The wind whipped it out of his hand as he opened it, throwing it back to smash against the inside wall.

Robbie looked up, startled, from his computer, his battered face drawn and grey. His eyes opened wide as he saw Brodie framed in the doorway, snow swirling around him in the wind.

‘You fucker!’ Brodie shouted, and the younger man was out of his chair and vaulting over the counter almost before Brodie could draw another breath. The older man swung a fist, catching Robbie high on the cheek. But it wasn’t enough to stop the other’s momentum, and the two of them fell backwards into the snow outside.

Brodie felt punches falling about his face and shoulder, glancing blows struck in desperation. And he brought his knee up sharply to catch his assailant in the sweet spot between his legs. Robbie bellowed and rolled away, allowing Brodie to stagger to his feet, clutching at the door frame for support. The snow blew into his face and into the office behind him, icy air displacing warmth from the house. But Robbie was back on his feet, too, growling like a wounded animal. And he charged again, sending Brodie crashing backwards into the police office. Brodie struck the counter hard and felt pain shoot up his spine. The strength of the younger man pushed him backwards across the countertop, and fingers like steel rods closed around his neck.

Brodie knew he was no match for the young policeman, but he also knew how to fight dirty. He caught Robbie’s left ear and pulled as hard as he could, feeling soft flesh rip in his hand. Robbie screamed, immediately releasing his grip and staggering back against the door. It slammed shut behind him as he took a blood-covered hand away from his head, and Brodie saw that his ear was dangling by no more than a shred of skin. He propelled himself off the counter, and smashed Robbie up against the door, punching him in the throat, then smashing his forehead hard into Robbie’s nose. He felt bone dissolve under the force of the blow, and warm blood splashed over both their faces.

A shrill voice cut across the sound of battle. Piercing, imperative. ‘Stop it! Stop!!’

Brodie stepped back and turned to find Addie standing wild-eyed in the doorway to the house, a rifle raised to her shoulder, the barrel of it pointed at the two combatants.

‘What the fuck?’ she shouted, and took in the damage to Robbie’s face and the ear dangling from it. ‘Jesus Christ! What are you doing?’ Wide eyes flashed from husband to father, and back again.

‘Daddy!’ Cameron’s plaintive cry startled them all, as he squeezed between his mother’s legs and the door frame and ran to his father, sobbing and shocked by the blood and shouting.

Before Brodie could move, Robbie had scooped his son up into his arms, wheeling away to snatch a letter opener from the counter. He backed up against the wall, the point of the blade pressed to the boy’s throat.

There was a moment of incredulous silence in the tiny little police office, broken only by Cameron’s frightened whimpering. He clung to his father, not for a moment believing that Robbie would do him any harm, but utterly discomposed by the conflict.

Addie gazed in disbelief at the man who had fathered her child. ‘Robbie... what are you doing?’

‘Don’t do anything stupid,’ he said. ‘Put the gun down.’

She let the rifle fall a little from her shoulder, but held it in readiness to raise again should she need to. ‘For God’s sake, Robbie. Stop it. You’re not going to hurt him. I can’t believe you would hurt him.’ She turned incomprehension towards her father. ‘Why’s he doing this?’

Brodie was still breathing hard. ‘Because he’s already killed three people, maybe four, Addie. And he doesn’t see any way out for himself.’

Her lips parted, but there were no words.

Brodie said, ‘He killed Younger. And he murdered Dr Roy when he realised that the skin she recovered from beneath the dead man’s fingernails would reveal his DNA.’ He turned to Robbie. ‘Am I right?’

Robbie was breathing through his mouth as the blood began to clot in his nose. ‘Couldn’t let her check it against the database.’

‘Because all serving police officers have to give samples of their DNA.’

Robbie swallowed.

‘You’d already tried to set poor Calum McLeish up for it, just in case it all went pear-shaped. Doctoring the CCTV footage to make it look like he’d done it. And what did you do, borrow his pickup truck to push Younger’s car into the ravine?’ Brodie glanced at Addie.

Her face had set now. Disbelief giving way to anger. She nodded. ‘Every time we had wood to pick up.’

Brodie looked at Robbie again. ‘You knew there would probably be traces of paint left on the bull bars. Maybe even made sure there were. And then, of course, there were the gloves.’ He let his eyes wander to Robbie’s hands, then back to his face. ‘Bet you destroyed yours. So the only pair would belong to McLeish. And if we went looking for a match...’ He paused. ‘So what did you do to the poor guy? Just one more body left in your wake?’

Robbie’s face twisted itself into an ugly sneer beneath the blood. ‘No need for a live fall guy any more, is there? Thanks to you.’ He paused. ‘McLeish’ll burn now like everyone else.’

Brodie frowned. ‘What do you mean?’

‘You’ll find out.’

Brodie stared at him for a long time, before he swivelled his head towards his daughter. ‘He tried to kill me, too, at the hydro. And when he failed, he followed me to a meeting with Younger’s contact from the nuclear plant. Pretty much blew his head off. Then bundled me into an escape elevator and sent me down into tunnels contaminated with deadly levels of radioactivity.’ He turned back to Robbie. ‘And yes, I probably did get a fatal dose of the stuff. I’ve no idea how much, or how long it takes. Maybe I’ve only got a day or two, who knows?’ He forced an angry breath through his teeth. ‘But what you didn’t know was that I’m dying anyway. Fucking cancer. Dead man walking. All you’ve done is accelerate the process.’

Cameron’s whimpering had subsided, and the boy clung to his father’s neck, seemingly oblivious to the point of the letter opener pressed to his neck, or the tiny trickle of blood from where it had broken the skin. The child still seemed to have unwavering trust that his father would always protect him, no matter what.

Addie’s rifle fell away as she went limp, at first with disbelief, and then despair. All three adults stood breathing the same air, sharing the same space, adding loudly to the same silence. Three lives in total disarray. Hope, belief, trust, all gone.

Addie’s voice was very small when finally it was she who broke the silence. ‘Why, Robbie?’

And he breathed his pain into the room, closing his eyes in distress. ‘None of this was ever supposed to happen,’ he said. ‘They told me all I had to do was scare him.’

Addie said, ‘Who’s they?’

He scoffed. ‘Oh, they don’t have a name, or a face, do they? They send other people to do their dirty work. But they were going to ruin me. God, Addie, you know what a mess I’d got into. We were drowning in debt. They told me I would lose my job, my home, my family. All I had to do was this one little thing, and all my problems would go away. The slate would be wiped clean.’

Brodie said, ‘Scare the shit out of Younger.’

He nodded.

‘Only neither you, nor they, understood that here was a man who was prepared to risk radiation poisoning to get his story. He wasn’t going to be deterred by a few verbals, or a handful of punches. You were always going to have to kill him.’

Robbie’s head dropped to his chest. ‘It all just...’ He looked up. ‘Got out of control. A total fucking nightmare.’

Brodie said, ‘And there’s nothing you can do now to fix it, Robbie. It’s over. Give it up, for God’s sake. Bring the nightmare to an end.’

Silent tears streamed through the blood on his face. ‘An end for you, maybe. Not for me. Not ever for me.’ He looked at Addie, with what almost seemed like an appeal for sympathy. ‘I’m sorry, Addie. I’m so sorry.’

But there was no forgiveness in her eyes. He was still holding a blade to her son’s throat. ‘I never knew you at all, did I?’ she said. ‘All these years. A fucking stranger pretending to be someone I loved. Pretending to be someone who loved me.’ Her eyes strayed to Cameron. ‘Pretending to be someone who loved his son.’

‘I do!’

‘Then why are you holding a fucking knife to his throat?’ Her voice reverberated around the room in anger verging on hysteria.

And as if he only now realised what he was doing, he suddenly threw the letter opener away across the office and unpeeled his son’s arms from around his neck. Cameron’s sobs of uncertainty returned as his father held the boy out towards Brodie. ‘Here. He’s your grandson,’ he said. ‘Take him.’ And as Brodie clutched the boy to his chest, Robbie turned and fled out into the night, leaving the door swinging behind him in the wind.

Addie leaned the rifle against the wall and took two steps across the room to retrieve her son. Cameron flung his arms around her, and even in the midst of his distress and confusion, he turned his head towards Brodie and said, ‘Are you really my grampa?’

Brodie felt his throat swell up as he fought back the tears, and was unable to find his voice in reply. He simply nodded, and the boy turned away again with the acceptance of a child who has understood nothing of what has passed between his parents and this man who was suddenly his grampa. But it was overwhelming, and he clung desperately to his mother and buried his face in her neck.

Addie stared in quiet desperation over her son’s head at her father. Finally she said, ‘What’ll happen now?’

Brodie stepped across the room to close the door, then turned to face his daughter. ‘Well, there’s no point in me trying to go after him in the storm. He won’t make it out of the village anyway. Not in this snow.’

She said, ‘He has two hunting rifles. There was only one in the gun cabinet when I went to get this one.’ She inclined her head towards the rifle leaning against the wall.

Brodie nodded grimly. ‘Then he must have the other one stashed somewhere.’

‘What do you think he’ll do?’

‘It’s not so much a question of what he’ll do, as what he’ll try to stop me from doing.’

‘Which is what?’

‘Leave.’

‘But you can’t. Nobody can leave in this.’ She lifted her eyes towards the world outside.

‘No. But as soon as the storm is over, you and I and Cameron can fly out of here in the eVTOL. My guess is he’ll wait till we try to make it to the football field, then pick us off.’

Addie was shaking her head, still struggling to come to terms with it all. ‘He wouldn’t. Surely to God?’

‘He’s lost everything, Addie. It’s not a gamble any more. He has nothing left to lose.’ He paused. ‘If it’s any consolation, I don’t believe he’d hurt either of you. But he can’t afford to let me get out of here alive. Not with everything I know.’

She closed her eyes, as if by shutting them she could somehow escape this waking nightmare. When she opened them again, she said, ‘It would be crazy to try to get to the football pitch in the dark. Even if the storm was over.’

He nodded. ‘Yes. Whatever happens, we should wait at least until first light.’

Almost as the word light left his mouth, the light in the tiny office was suddenly extinguished.

‘Shit.’ He heard her curse under her breath in the dark. ‘Is that Robbie?’

‘I don’t know.’ Brodie fumbled his way to the window and peered out into the darkness. ‘It looks like all the street lights are out. Power lines must be down again.’

A match flared in the dark, and a flame flickered on the wick of a candle held in Addie’s hand. Cameron sat wide-eyed on the counter as his mother shut the drawer beneath the counter and took him in her arms again. ‘We’re well prepared,’ she said. ‘This happens too often.’ She handed him the candle. ‘Come through and I’ll light a fire. It’s going to be a long wait.’