Whisper For The Reaper, Jack Gatland [good books for high schoolers txt] 📗

close to her captive, Jess swung her right hand, now gripping the loosened and pulled free wooden arm of the chair as a weapon up and from the side, a solid right-hand blow that connected hard on Ilse’s head, busting it open, and sending her tumbling to the ground. Quickly grabbing the fallen blade with her also-free left hand, Jess moved down to her ankles, using the far sharper edge to quickly snap through the bonds. Then, rising up, she kicked the chair aside as she looked down at Ilse, still on the ground.

‘You picked the wrong Walsh to play with, bitch,’ Jess snarled. ‘You’re under arrest. A citizen’s arrest.’

There was a noise outside of the workshop; it wasn’t much, most likely a cat, or maybe a fox clattering past, knocking aside a metal tile, but the sound distracted Jess for a split second—and that was enough for Ilse to attack, blood streaming down the left side of her face as she rose from the floor in a charge, spearing Jess hard in the midsection, almost folding her in two as she followed through, the two of them crashing back onto the floor.

Climbing back to her feet, Ilse spat to the side.

‘My turn now,’ she said.

Declan walked closer to Karl now.

‘So how do we do this?’ he asked. ‘We’ve got your gun, but there was no knife by Nathanial, so I’m assuming you still have that.’

Karl reached into his pocket and pulled out a syringe, filled with some sort of liquid. This shown, he placed it onto the floor between them.

‘Heroin overdose,’ he explained. ‘They have accused you of many things over the years, Declan. I am sure junkie won’t be a surprise to anyone.’

‘You seem sure that you’ll win,’ Declan smiled. ‘But I suppose the coin always favours the tosser.’

Karl went to reply, unsure on whether this was an insult or not, but Declan continued.

‘Why did you give Nathanial a coin?’ he asked. ‘I’m guessing that Ilse gave him it to pass to Rolfe?’

‘No, I gave it to him,’ Karl admitted. ‘I intercepted him outside the inn, and said that it was Rolfe’s, that he’d dropped it outside. I then followed him in to watch and left when Ilse did.’

‘You wanted Nathanial’s prints on the coin,’ Declan nodded now. ‘When it was found on Rolfe, forensics linked the coin to Nathanial Wing’s death. It validated the letter.’ He smiled. ‘Shame you didn’t think of the CCTV watching this happen.’

‘I am not some kind of master criminal,’ Karl shrugged. ‘I cannot think of everything.’

‘No, you’re just a murdering scumbag, like all the others,’ Declan replied. ‘Who has an urge, every two years.’

‘That’s how you beat the urge,’ Karl explained as he backed a little away from Declan. ‘I could do this every day, there are so many people out there that need to be removed. But I gave myself boundaries. I could only serve justice on an even year.’

‘Serve justice,’ Declan snapped. ‘What bullshit you speak, Karl. And my parents?’

‘Your father was a good detective,’ Karl looked to the ground. ‘Your mother was sick, and I knew I could help her. Nobody else would, and the pain would be unbearable. And your father? He was following Ilse, he was learning the truth about her, and me. I could not have that happen. I am truly sorry about Patrick, Declan. We could have done great things together.’

Declan stared down at the syringe filled with heroin. ‘Tell me about the CIA,’ he breathed. ‘Tell me why they’ll save you, no matter what.’

‘When the wall fell, the files were burned,’ Karl replied. ‘The Stasi, they didn’t want the West to know what atrocities they had committed, or who they had in various gulags under faked names. There were, shall we say, rotten apples in the departments, and they needed to be stopped.’ He shrugged, as if embarrassed at this. ‘I had friends in high places. I could go into rooms that others couldn’t. The day the wall came down, there was confusion. Nobody knew what was going to happen, but I did. And I went to headquarters, went into these high places with a holdall bag, and I filled up with every secret I could find.’

‘And nobody stopped you?’

‘Of course not. Everyone there was trying to save their own skins. But, on the way back I bumped into Karl Meier. He’d followed me, wanted to kill me. But he did not realise that I had been waiting. Before he could do anything, I had stabbed him in the chest and moved on. It was liberating. I had ended evil.’

Declan shook his head. ‘You’re truly a monster.’

‘I took these folders and walked to the American Embassy,’ Karl continued. ‘Offered to trade for certain privileges. One was to keep me safe if they ever placed me under trial.’

‘Your get out of jail free card.’

‘Yes. And at the same time, I hid other folders, ones on politicians that I knew would escape the wall’s fall unscathed. And, as the years went on, I would contact them, letting them know that I kept their secrets safe for them. This way if the Americans decided not to play, I had powerful friends to remind them of the promises they made.’ He looked out of the car park, up the bridleway towards Honey Lane.

‘In fact, my American friends will be here soon,’ he said. ‘We should wrap this up now.’ He pulled out a coin; it was a one mark piece, similar to the one that Rolfe Müller had held.

‘Heads or tails?’ he asked.

Jess kicked out with her leg, connecting hard with Ilse’s shinbone, sending it backwards and Ilse back to the floor as Jess clambered back up, grabbing a wrench from the sideboard.

‘My dad trained me in self defence since I was five,’ she said, moving her head around, loosening her shoulders. ‘But I’ve never needed to use it before. But don’t think that means I don’t know how to.’

Ilse rose, her nose now