Vanished by James Delargy (free novel 24 TXT) 📕

hole in his chest. Her mouth opened but nothing came out. She rolled over and faced the sun, the savage evening heat and thick blood scalding her eyes, as if seeking to blind her completely.

Ian appeared into her blurred vision, standing over her. The rifle was in his hands. Now would be the time to kill her. She watched his finger tease the trigger. She tried to find the sparkling blue eyes that had drawn her into this mess. To plead with him. For what? For mercy? But what was mercy? Was it him finishing her off? Ending her misery?

She didn’t find the answer, blinking furiously as the world washed away from her, leaving her in complete darkness.

134

Naiyana

She had spent most of the drive across the country in the back seat, fighting bouts of headaches, nausea and dizziness, but most of all she was besieged by the sheer weight of what had happened. Dylan was dead. Lorcan was dead. She was on the run with their murderer, dragged away from them as they lay in the sand. He had professed his love for her all the way out here. Every day if not every hour since. Probably because she was the only thing he had left. He blamed Lorcan for dragging Dylan into harm’s way. Blamed Lorcan for causing all this. For making him shoot.

She only blamed one person. Him.

He had taken her to this place and this cabin. It was his retreat apparently. For a couple of months a year, if he had the money. He had warned her about the mosquitoes but not the sheer number. They swarmed around her like the plague but with the repellent coating her she was invisible to them. If only she could get an Ian repellent. Or a memory repellent.

He had been out today and purchased wigs for both of them, but the blond wig he had picked for her was worthless. It would only make her stand out more given her Thai blood. The contact lenses too raised the same problem. She was small but hard to disguise. When he donned his blond wig and fake moustache it was hard to tell who he was. It was easy to think of him as someone else. And wish he was someone else.

The next day he brought her a black, short-haired wig. Wasting money on these disguises while they barely ate. Even if the mozzies could get to her there wouldn’t be any blood to drain soon.

The new wig didn’t help. She just saw herself in the mirror, blinded by familiarity. She was the cause of all this trouble, yet it hadn’t been worth any of it. With her hatred of herself swollen to bursting, her hatred for him only grew every day. But she was weak from blood loss and the crippling pain of losing Dylan. He’d killed her child and she was stuck with him. He was her crutch.

But after a few days and a few meagre meals forced into a stomach that wanted to reject them, she had finally felt stronger. Strong enough to do what she had to.

135

Emmaline

‘The presumption is that the animals dragged Dylan’s body away post-mortem. Lorcan was too heavy to move so they returned to finish him later,’ continued Zhao.

Emmaline stared at the cabin. Though a long shot she had been hoping to find Dylan alive and well. She supposed that there was still the slimmest of hopes. Forensics might have been wrong and it was another child’s skull.

She waited by Liang’s shoulder as he gave the signal. Two of the SERT team crept up to the front door of the cabin, their steps skilful and silent on the detritus. After a momentary pause and silent count they burst through the front door while another pair entered from the rear.

There was a sharp cry of ‘Don’t move!’ All her muscles tensed as Emmaline wondered just what was in there.

The cry of ‘Don’t move’ was quickly followed by a call of ‘All clear’. There was no gunfire, no physical altercation. The occupants taken by surprise or fatigue.

Unable to resist, Emmaline broke away from Liang’s short stride and ran, closing in on the door, twigs cracking under her urgent steps.

Up the front steps, she burst through the door, still unsure of what she was hoping or expecting to see.

Inside the atmosphere was fetid, the hut filthy. Food wrappers littering the floor, used medical gauze, wrappings, ointments and the intense aroma of two people cooped up in a small, humid room for too long. Accompanied by the ever-present tang of mosquito repellent.

Lying on the bamboo couch was Naiyana, covered by a thin blanket. She looked like she had lost weight, her cheeks gaunt, wearing an expression of haunted desperation. Beside her lay a clump of fur that at first Emmaline mistook for a small animal but which turned out to be a black wig. A blond wig lay on the floor in front of her. Streaked with red and loosely attached to Ian Kinch’s dead body. A rifle and a bloodied knife lay on the floor beside the couch.

Naiyana Maguire broke down in tears, her spindly arms reaching out, the tendons in her neck pronounced as she screeched at those who had disturbed her resting place.

‘He killed Dylan.’

Sucking in some air, the realization of where she was and what had happened seemed to hit her, her blinking pronounced as her voice fell away to a whisper. ‘I had to kill him. He killed my son…’

Emmaline had a thousand questions to ask. Like, what exactly had happened in Kallayee? To Lorcan Maguire. To Stevie Amaranga. To Mike Andrews. To her son. And what had happened after?

But Naiyana was babbling now, drowning in her grief.

The paramedics came bustling past Emmaline. Here to repair a mess that could never be rectified.

Acknowledgements

As I write this the whole world is in the middle of lockdown during this COVID-19 crisis. I have already