The Wreckage

31

Holly opens her eyes, awake instantly, disturbed by something. She listens to the sounds of the city. Rubber on tarmac. Trains on tracks. Car horns and sirens.

Letting her heart slow, she turns back to the bed. The digital clock is glowing red: 2:47.

Lowering her head to the pillow, she stares at the water stains above her head and the cracked plaster rosette. For just a moment she remembers the night she waited for her father to return home from the pub to see the ruined ceiling and flooded room, her younger brother Albie cowering beneath the sheets.

Her father had a strange temper-placid one moment, explosive the next, with nothing in between; no safe ground or sanctuary or flashing light to warn her of the dangers ahead. She learned to read his moods by studying his face, discovering what lay behind his eyes where a fuse was always spluttering and hissing.

She hears the sound again-soft footsteps on the metal of the fire escape. Someone trying not to be heard. Awake this time. Her heart hammering. Certain.

The professor has the room next door. She moves to the interconnecting door and presses her head against it, the wood cool against the shell of her ear. No more sounds.

Opening the bedroom door, she peers along the corridor, left and right, deserted. There is a smell, something familiar yet disturbing. It filled her nostrils when Zac died. The man can’t have found her. He doesn’t know her name. She should wake Ruiz. He’ll know what to do. Keep her safe.

She looks at her bare feet, her T-shirt and panties. She should have changed. Something moves in the corner of her eye at the far end of the corridor. It’s gone. It might have been nothing. This is crazy. She needs Ruiz.

Moving in the opposite direction, towards the stairs, she can feel the worn carpet, the pattern faded long ago beneath her bare feet.

She knocks on his door. No answer. Knocks again.

It opens suddenly, pulling her inwards and she bounces off his chest. He grabs her by the hair and puts his hand over her mouth and nose. Not Ruiz, but a ghost who walks through locked doors. His lips brush against her ear. “Do you remember me?”

She inhales a breath.

“I am going to take my hand away. If you scream I shall kill you. Do you understand?”

He pushes her towards the bed and chains the door. He’s wearing a suit and white shirt without a tie and his hair is shaved at the edges, longer on top. The only light is from the window, a faint glow that paints the contours of his face in monotones, but not with detail or depth.

Words have turned to bubbles in Holly’s throat. She looks around the room, searching for Ruiz.

“Your friend is not here. He seems to have abandoned you.”

His eyes drift down her body, hunger in them.

“Why did you kill Zac?” she asks defiantly. “He never did anything to you.”

“He would not communicate.”

“That’s not a crime. He fought for his country.”

“Maybe I am fighting for mine.”

Holly looks at the bed. “Are you going to rape me?”

“I don’t rape women unless they’re whores. Are you a whore?”

“No.”

“Are you a virgin?”

“That’s none of your business.”

He smiles. “You think I’m evil, but it was a woman who betrayed the first man. Women are the sinful sex. You come to a man’s room in the middle of the night. Look at how you dress. You are like uncovered meat, and then you wonder why the dogs come and feed upon you.”

Holly sits on the edge of the bed, her knees close together, one foot on top of the other. The Courier takes the chair by the window. When he turns his head the light catches one side of his face. His eye is like an amber bead pressed into teak.

“Can you imagine all the germs that collect in a place like this,” he says. “The acts that have been committed on that bed by women like you.”

His eyes drop to Holly’s loins as though drawn there.

“Come here.”

“No.”

“You need to, Holly. Sometimes in life we are given a choice. This isn’t one of those times.”

Holly crosses the room.

“Kneel.”

“Please.”

“Don’t beg. Did you find the notebook?”

“Yesterday.”

“Where is it?”

“The journalists have it.”

Dropping to her knees in front of him, she can smell his strange odor. He takes the back of her head, pulling her closer. Running his fingers through her hair, he lets them trail down her face until his thumb brushes her lips and he pushes it against her teeth, smearing saliva across her cheek. Her eyes go in and out of focus.

His thumb passes her lips again and she opens them, taking his thumb inside her mouth, sucking it gently. He jerks his hand away.

“An offer like that is so typical of a woman like you. A manipulator. You claim victimhood, but you use your body and a man’s desire to get what you want. You think that if you can get me between your lips or your thighs that you can take control.”

“No.”

He pushes her away. “Get dressed, my little liar.”

“I don’t have any clothes.”

“I was going to wait here and kill your friend, but he has obviously found someone else to keep his feet warm.”

“Where are you taking me?”

The Courier stands and checks the corridor. “First we are going to get your clothes. I am not going to tie your hands and cover your mouth, but this gun will be pressed against your back when we walk from the hotel. If you say anything, if you smile or nod or alert anyone, I will kill them first and you will be responsible for their death.”