My Bloody Valentine (Alastair Gunn)

Alastair Gunn

MY BLOODY VALENTINE

Contents

Prologue

Part One

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Part Two

Chapter 46

Chapter 47

Chapter 48

Chapter 49

Chapter 50

Chapter 51

Chapter 52

Chapter 53

Chapter 54

Chapter 55

Chapter 56

Chapter 57

Chapter 58

Chapter 59

Chapter 60

Chapter 61

Chapter 62

Chapter 63

Chapter 64

Chapter 65

Acknowledgements

Follow Penguin

For Anna

True devotion is deadly

Prologue

They taught you stealth; that was one good thing about them.

Maybe the
only
good thing.

Bull didn’t have to think about it as he reached the end of the alley and stopped in deep shadow, looking at the Tandoori restaurant out on the main street. His feet didn’t make any noise, because they’d trained him to move silently, no matter what sort of terrain he was on, or what kind of shoes he wore.

He sniffed the black air. It was dry and cold, but he couldn’t tell whether the smell of burning was real or just a memory. The permanent ringing in his ears confused everything, blurring the differences between now and back then.

He checked his watch.

Almost time.

Footsteps, left, two people, ten yards. Bull reacted, reaching into his jacket. By the time the couple passed he’d lit up and was facing the wall, smoking, swaying, taking a leak. Nothing to see.

He waited for them to pass and gave it a few more seconds before he turned back, glancing up at the camera above him; it was pointing down the road to his
right. There was no way it could see him; it couldn’t look straight down, and the next two cameras were in the wrong places to zero him, too. Motors whirred as the camera turned, and he imagined some unwashed civvy operator in a poky control room, chomping a burger and zooming in on drunk teenage girls as they fell out of the pubs.

He sank further into the darkness as the door across the road opened, right on schedule.

And there she was.

Rosa stepped on to the pavement; timid, alone, her fragile neck wrapped in a scarf, her bag clamped tight to her side. He watched her face in the darkness, seeing the usual signs. The bowed shoulders; the empty eyes …

Part of him strained towards her, nearly making him step into view, but it was a distant part, buried by years of torture and pain. He held back. Showing himself now wouldn’t help either of them; it was way too late for any of that. There was no room for compassion.

Or sympathy.

Rosa zipped her jacket and crossed the road in front of him, heading north towards the junction, not even glancing his way. Bull didn’t follow; there was no need. He knew exactly where she would go.

She’d followed the same pattern every week since coming here, to this new town; her new life. Finish work at eleven, tidy up and leave the restaurant by quarter to twelve. Wander along the high street, turn at the
bank on the corner and take the short route home, behind the Palace Exchange, through the dark, deserted paths.

Where Bull would strike.

He watched her trudge away up the high street. Was she walking even more slowly than normal? Pity flared again, but he forced it down. It was nothing, just nerves, caused by what he was about to do. But that didn’t make it wrong.

He approached the shadow’s edge, seeking a better view. Thirty yards ahead, Rosa had reached the bus stop at the end of the road. But just as Bull expected her to disappear around the next corner, she did something unexpected.

She stopped and looked back.

Bull shot sideways, losing sight of her as he slid behind the wall.
Had she seen him?
He wanted to look again, but what if she was watching, waiting for him?

A bus thundered past, the noise and fumes making him jump. His hands flew to his face, clawing at the dust blown into his eyes. He heard someone shout in the distance.

It isn’t real.

Bull lowered his hands, annoyed; renewed his concentration. He leaned around the corner and looked up the street. Rosa was still there, standing right where she’d been, not looking down the street towards him any more. But then he realized why she was there: she
was waiting for the bus that had just passed him and was now pulling into the stop.

She was going off plan.

He almost started forwards, only just remembering the cameras and stopping himself in time. The police weren’t looking for him yet, but they would be soon.

He couldn’t follow.

Rosa got on the bus, its doors closing behind her, and Bull swore as it pulled away, realizing this would cost him another week. She only worked here Fridays, on top of her day job in a sports outlet in the nearby retail park.
This
was his chance, and she was getting away.

But as the bus turned right at the end of the street, he noticed the number on its rear display.

121
.

Straight off, Bull knew what to do. He turned and headed back along the alleyway, into the dark. Rosa had caught that bus once before, a couple of weeks ago. She’d been lugging some heavy baggage, and had probably caught it to save her skinny legs. Bull hadn’t pursued her directly – it was always best to keep some distance – but he had waited for the next 121. He’d soon found out where she’d gone, because the bus followed the one-way system until two stops later, when it pulled up on Cecil Road, opposite Sydney Road.

Where she now lived.

Tonight she was tired or unwell, so she’d caught the bus straight home. It fucked up Bull’s plan, but he could
deal with that. He just had to adapt before he lost focus.

Because he needed to get this done.

If he was quick, he could cut through the paths and head her off. It was risky: hitting her between rows of houses rather than in a quiet alleyway. But the first hundred feet of Sydney Road were unlit, and mostly deserted at this time of night.

Bull picked up his pace, careful not to let himself sprint. His bad leg was already giving him shit, and there was no point getting there in time only to give his position away by breathing too hard.

He reached the corner and turned left, leaving behind the last traces of yellow light from the street, glad of the half-moon’s glow. The alley was narrow, wire fences either side holding back thick bushes and trees that hung above his head. He ran surrounded by darkness, so caught up in planning his first strike that he forgot all about the shopping trolley.

The mesh obstacle leapt out of the shadows just inches in front. He’d passed it earlier on, had shoved it against the fence. But it still filled half the path.

Bull jumped mid-stride, trying to avoid it. But his foot caught the metal edge and he fell, tumbling sideways. Wet leaves exploded around his face, and the heels of his hands ground painfully across the concrete as he slid to a halt.

He scrambled back up and kept moving, brushing the gravel off his palms, ignoring his clothes. The fall
would have put him behind, and he still couldn’t see the far end of the path. Pain ripped at his bad leg: stress on bones that were meant to be supported by muscle. He blocked it out and ran faster, clenching his teeth, feeling something grind between them. He raised a hand to his face. It was on his lips, in his mouth. From the fall.

Grit.

He coughed and spat. That shit was everywhere, carried in the air by the wind. He pulled up his collar and held it across his face. If that stuff got into your teeth, you were chewing it for days.