The Siege of Reginald Hill Read online

  Okay. I’d pray more for my loved ones later. But now I’d better do the bare minimum to put my own soul in order. The bag, though hot and claustrophobic, was another blessing, really. A perfectly private prayer-space.

  I started by examining my conscience as closely as I possibly could, listing to my heavenly Father with brutal honesty every sin of act or of omission I’d committed since my last confession. No mortal sins, thanks be to God, though in truth I couldn’t remember when I’d last committed one of those. But I wasn’t going to sit around patting myself on the back about that. After all, of him to whom much has been given, much will be demanded. The Lord had surely blessed me very greatly, which made even the smallest failure of mine a very serious matter.

  Only when satisfied that I’d called to mind all I could, did I make a fervent Act of Contrition.

  I’m so sorry, Lord. I wish I’d done better.

  Then I said a rosary for Hill and everyone else involved, since their need for prayers was probably greater than anyone else’s, including myself, my predicament notwithstanding.

  Pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death… The words went through my mind again and again, and each time I felt I’d never heard them before, despite having given talks on them too many times to count. At the hour of our death…at the hour of my death…

  Pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death… A second rosary for my loved ones.

  At the hour of our death… A third for my parish.

  At the hour of our death… I was onto the fourth and last set of mysteries—for myself—when sleep began to snatch at me, weighting my eyelids and trying to suck my mind into blackness. Seriously? I’m being driven to my death and I’m nodding off?

  …sleep. Rest, Kyle…

  Well…if the Lord wanted me to sleep…and I’d that nagging sense he did…I was exhausted. And despite the joy waiting at the end, tomorrow promised to be a thoroughly beastly day, possibly the worst of my life—Hill would have to work hard to top the day Joe died, but I’d a feeling he was going to try. Undoubtedly, I’d face it better after even a few hours’ rest.

  I made a few more limping efforts to reach the end of the rosary, but under that gentle encouragement and the not remotely gentle pressure of my over-tired body, I quickly gave it up for a lost cause. I’d just get to the end of this decade, then…

  MARGO

  I kissed Bane, my hands sliding under his pyjamas…

  “Margo! Cut it out; don’t torture me!” He fended me away. “You know what Doctor Carol said.”

  Bother. I flopped down beside him, my head on his chest. “I’m feeling heaps better, Bane, you know that.”

  “Has she actually given you a green light?”

  I sighed into his pyjama top. He knew perfectly well she hadn’t. Doctor Carol had been quite clear that we shouldn’t have another child until I was a hundred percent again—and to be honest, I still felt far too emotionally raw to seek that, yet, even if we discerned it was the Lord’s will to try for another. But tonight, I just actually had the energy to want… Well. Bane wasn’t going to co-operate, and no doubt he was right. I was being irresponsible.

  “I saw your chart,” he scolded me. “It’s a cuddle night, right?” He hooked his arms securely around me and drew me close, which had the useful side-effect, from his point of view, of pinioning my naughty hands.

  “Yeah, it’s a cuddle night,” I grumble-agreed into his chest. Thwarted, my body retaliated by crashing from energised to exhausted. Thus proving Doctor Carol’s point, I suppose. I let my eyes close.

  “A very short cuddle night, this one…” I heard Bane mutter, but I’d drifted too far into sleep to respond.

  “Mummy?” A familiar, plaintive little voice from outside our bedroom door started to drag me back up from almost-sleep. Lizzie…

  But Bane pressed a quick kiss on my forehead and disentangled himself. “Go to sleep, Margo. I’ll take care of it.”

  I dropped back into sleep so fast, I never even felt him get off the bed.

  KYLE

  A sharp blow struck the back of my head and a grating voice sounded right in my ear. “This cocky young pup’s gone to sleep !”

  I blinked, momentarily disorientated by the darkness and the scratchy fabric that flopped against my face as I jerked upright. My back, shoulders, and wrists ached fiercely.

  A harsh voice spoke from very nearby, low and furious. “This old hound is sleeping too, so shut up.”

  Ah. Reginald Hill. My unfortunate predicament flooded my mind.

  Silence from the Menace. With my hands secured behind my back, my hunched upright position was pretty uncomfortable anyway. So after a futile attempt to ease the pain in my shoulders, I bent to rest my chin back on my knees—and she whacked my head a second time. I ignored her, closing my eyes, but my heart pounded so hard from my abrupt awakening that sleep had fled far away. Still, probably better to pretend slumber. Pretence might turn into reality.

  The Menace clipped my head yet again. I’d a feeling I knew exactly how to put a stop to it, but…turn the other cheek, Kyle. I went on peacefully not-sleeping on my knees. Surely she’d get bored before long.

  Whack.

  Whack.

  I offered up each little pain for her salvation and tried to ignore her. Until she slipped her hand inside my cassock, her fingers running over my chest.

  “Handsome boy like you, wasted in that chastity belt around your neck?” she breathed in my ear. “Should be a crime. Was, until your stupid sister messed everything up…”

  Her hand kept moving—I abandoned my cheek-turning and kicked Hill’s seat as hard as I could.

  An explosive—and truly obscene—word broke from the old man. Sounds of rustling fabric and shifting came from where he sat, then light flooded the car behind my black weave. The Menace snatched her hand out, but was too slow.

  “You stupid sow!” Hill bellowed. “You think any pathetic little thing you can do means the tiniest thing compared to what awaits him? Just leave him alone!”

  Leave him alone and let me sleep, in other words. No doubt in daytime he wouldn’t care what she did—the worse, the better. Well, hopefully we’d get where we were going before Hill was well enough rested to reconsider.

  Sullen silence from beside me. I closed my eyes again, fighting for calm. The Menace’s behaviour—and Hill’s ominous words—had chased sleep so far from me I wasn’t sure it would ever return.

  Gird me, O Lord, with the cincture of purity, and quench in my heart the fires of sin, that the virtue of chastity may abide in me. I’d recited those words first thing in the morning as I fastened the wide cloth belt around my cassock and again only hours ago while tying the rope-like cincture in place among my liturgical vestments before offering Mass, and I clung to the prayer now. Lord, be with me.

  My skin prickled where she’d been pawing me. I wanted a shower more than I’d ever wanted one in my life. How I had wept in the confessional, in rage and in grief, as penitents tried to confess to having been assaulted by someone or other. How vehemently I had denied that they had done anything wrong, that anything needed to be forgiven. Not for them. At this moment, I understood more clearly than ever why they made such a heartbreaking, irrational accusation against themselves. In fact, I felt in need of my own counsel.

  Nothing she does to you means a thing, I reminded myself firmly, if she does it against your will.

  Poor consolation, but some consolation was better than none.

  How long had I slept before the Menace took exception to my slumber? How long had I now been kidnapped for? No way to know. I wanted more than anything to go back to sleep, but my body thrummed, adrenalin keying me to painful tension.

  Right. I’d pray again.

  Another rosary for my captors.

  One for me, since I never did finish it.

  Another for my loved ones.

  One for my parish…

  …I held the host between my forefingers and th
umbs, ready for the consecration. My parishioners were all there, and Margo and Bane and the children and my parents. Joe knelt in the front row, as well, just beside Margo. Uncle Peter—Blessed Peter—was next to him. Shouldn’t he be up here concelebrating with me? And Father Mark, too. Oh well, too late now. Maybe they’d arrived after the beginning. Concentrate, Kyle…

  My attention snapped back to what I was doing, to this most awesome reality taking place in my consecrated hands, to this most precious of my priestly tasks. My heart swelled. Nothing could compare to the joy and the honour of saying Mass.

  Adoration was more relaxing, it was true, and came a close second. No need to concentrate on words; no possibility of, heaven forbid, dropping something. Or Someone. Just me and Our Lord in the silence.

  But Mass still won… Concentrate, Kyle! What’s wrong with you today? I was never distracted now.

  I finished the words of consecration and Our Lord was there in my hands, hidden. I’d just started to raise Him—still gripped ever so carefully between my thumbs and forefingers—when an unseen force seemed to throw me forward…the Host flew from my hands…in slow motion, I grabbed for Him, desperately…but my hands wouldn’t move, my arms seemed to be pinioned behind me and suddenly black fabric covered my face, blocking the church—and the Host turning so slowly through the air—from my frantic vision… NO…

  Black fabric…the distinctive sloped shape of a car’s seat under me, the bite of the cable tie around my wrists…

  Oh. I’d been dreaming. I hadn’t just dropped the Host—thank heaven for that small mercy—the car had simply come to a halt, yanking at my already well overstrained shoulders and back. I wanted to play dead—well, play asleep—but the pain drew me, against my better judgment, to sit upright. I bit back any sound as fire ran down my neck and through my shoulders. Clearly not a recommended sleeping posture.

  “How are we doing, Croft?” Hill’s voice.

  “Only another twenty K, sir.” That must be the driver, speaking for the first time. He sounded a lot younger than the others, his accent English, like Hill and the Menace.

  “Good. You assist me. Jonas, deal with dear Kyle.”

  Deal with…? I didn’t tense up much, though. Would they seriously have driven me all night just to shoot me dead on some… Well, wherever we were.

  All that happened was that the imperturbable ‘Jonas’ ordered me from the vehicle—though his mutters grew irate as he struggled ineptly with my cassock. But soon enough he’d enabled me to take advantage of what was clearly a comfort break.

  “Stay there and wait your turn,” Hill snarled to the Menace as she tried to follow me out of the vehicle. Clearly, he was still peeved enough about his disturbed sleep to put punishing her above tormenting me. Or maybe it was his own privacy he was worried about.

  But…if Jonas was helping me, was the driver ‘assisting’ Hill? Was he…sick? How sick? Sick enough not to give a fig about the forthcoming election? A cold shudder ran down my aching back as fear washed over me. A strange dual fear—for myself, and for him.

  For myself, because if so, there was no way his proven political cunning would kick in at the last minute and save me. Huh, some part of my mind had clearly been hoping, hadn’t it? Just let go, Kyle. The Lord is waiting. You already gave your life to Him, remember? First at Confirmation, then on that Salperton road when you faked your death, and most irrevocably of all, when you were ordained. So don’t…cling.

  For Hill, because if he was dying, he was dying in such a state…and about to compound it with yet another act of torture and murder. Lord, have mercy on that man.

  “And if you need to do any medical stuff, do it now.” Hill spoke to Wallis again. “We’re not stopping specially.”

  A faint snicker from near Hill, then Croft the driver spoke in a—daringly?— familiar tone. “Are you sure these two has-beens are up to being on active service, sir?”

  Hill merely sniffed slightly. “They were available.”

  Jonas gripped my wrists hard enough to hurt as he marched me back to the car.

  As we set off again Hill and Croft exchanged a few more relaxed—but inscrutable—words about our route. They must’ve worked together before. Much good that observation would do me.

  The surface of the road grew rough. Every bump and jounce yanked at my shoulders. Sleep was impossible, but I felt considerably refreshed. I must’ve got quite a few hours, in all. At least I’d have my wits about me, now. Not that screaming in agony required much in the way of wits and that was, no doubt, all Hill and his video camera wanted of me.

  The jeep decelerated at last, the tyres crunching over a gravelly surface. And then we stopped. My heart rate rose again. Had we arrived?

  Yes. Doors opened, and everyone got out. Jonas ordered me out too. Sweat dripped down my forehead, even though the light behind the black weave was dim, dawn-pale, and the air still cool against my hands. I barely noticed the shoulder-pain, though it hadn’t gone anywhere. Lord, be with me. Joe, pray for me.

  Jonas and the Menace—firm, steely hands and soft, hot ones, I was pretty sure it was those two—gripped my arms, marching me along between them. Everything darkened, and our steps echoed slightly. We’d gone inside. We turned left…right…down some stairs…right again… I tried to fix the sequence in my memory, just in case the Lord did have an escape in mind for me, but it was hard to concentrate.

  Finally, a door closed firmly behind me and hands fumbled at my neck, loosening the drawstring. I closed my eyes to protect them as the bag was yanked off. I dreaded opening them again.

  What did Hill have in store for me? All the horrors of Hollywood flitted through my mind. Scorpions. Snakes. Jellyfish. Crocodiles. No, all too quick for Hill’s liking. Burning? Drowning? Suffocation? Poison? Or some fiendish combination of them all?

  But when I looked around, Jonas was just closing the door behind him. And then I stood alone in a small windowless storeroom. So. A makeshift holding cell. They weren’t…ready for me yet.

  I checked the door, but I couldn’t have got it open, even with my hands free. Metal, and very close fitting to its frame. I looked the walls and floor over, and remembered to inspect the ceiling above me, but it was all concrete. Yes, we’d gone down some stairs, hadn’t we? This was the basement. No way out. Only one way to pass the time, then.

  I knelt on the hard floor and began to pray again. Several hours sleep or not, a big lump choked my throat, and my eyes burned. Part of me definitely wanted to break down and bawl. I struggled to calm myself, determinedly casting my mind back to those cosy hours I’d spent last night with the Lord.

  That’s why you wanted me there, wasn’t it, Lord? So I could remember now and be comforted. Thank you.

  Gradually, my heartbeat slowed, that embarrassing desire to cry eased its grip, and I was able to rest quietly in the Lord’s love.

  But not for long. Footsteps soon tramped up to the door.

  So. Here we go, Lord.

  The door creaked open in an appropriately sinister manner. The Menace and Jonas—still wielding the video camera. As they took my arms, leading me off along a utilitarian concrete passage, all those imagined horrors began to teem in my mind again. Why had I watched so many adventure films in my life? Why hadn’t I only watched stuff about happy little kittens?

  We approached a door… Dissolved in acid? my mind offered helpfully. Buried alive?

  Shut up! I told myself, as they opened the door. I don’t care what it is, just so long as it isn’t— Then we’d stepped through the doorway and my thoughts trailed off in a silent wail of dismay. Close followed by a wave of self-mockery. Of course, it was this. What else would Hill choose?

  Hygienic-looking equipment filled the ugly concrete room.

  A fancy many-doored chiller cabinet.

  Wheeled trolleys spread with carefully laid out medical instruments.

  And in the centre, a gleaming metal gurney, complete with restraining straps.

  My stomach convulsed
, attempting to force its contents up my throat and out of me, but thankfully I hadn’t eaten now for over eighteen hours and a firm swallow sent the mouthful of bile burning back to its rightful place.

  Oh Lord, stay with me! A silent scream.

  Hill sat there in a wheelchair—yes, he was sick all right—looking decidedly smug. “So, Kyle. From the way that tanned young face just faded to the colour of silver birch bark, I take it a lengthy explanation of the procedure you are about to undergo would be a waste of breath on my part?”

  My body trembled, limbs quivering unstoppably. My mind roiled, lurched from side to side, as though seeking some escape, physical or otherwise, but there was nothing. Jonas and the Menace stood right behind me, Croft just behind Hill, a nonLee in his hand. Yes, Croft was young, not much older than me. His sunny face might’ve inspired hope, but a cold competence filled his eyes.

  Three white-coated men waited in the corner, but I struggled to take them in, except as a statistic. I was outnumbered, outgunned, helpless. Like every other priest, sister or Believer who’d ever stood where I stood, looking the same death squarely in the mouth.

  No, Hill had absolutely no need to describe the ‘procedure’. We’d studied it in seminary, all its hideous stages, from start to finish, because taking away the uncertainty of what was to happen lessened the fear—at least slightly—freeing more attention for prayer. Or so the theory went. Whether it was possible to pray much—or at all—while in that level of pain was a question…I was about to learn the answer to.

  Lord, stay with me!

  “You’re very quiet all of sudden, Kyle.” Hill smiled. “No bold words? Don’t fancy another nap?”

  Somehow, I unstuck my dry lips, though I had to moisten them before I could get words out. “Maybe in a minute. When I’m lying down.”

  Hill grinned in appreciation. “Oh, this is going to be fun, it really is.” He made a gesture to Jonas—a snip and the cable tie fell from my wrists.