To Tell the Truth (32 page)

‘Mick. They’re taking the kid back to her parents tonight and I’m on a boat back to Spain shortly. Me, Matt and Javier. Nothing is going to stop me being there when Amy gets handed over. I didn’t come this far and go through all this shit to give the story to someone else. Matt’s got amazing pictures of all these kids lying around the ground after the fire. Really dramatic. He’s even got a snap of the kidnapper seconds after he died.’

‘Listen, I know what you’re saying, but I can send someone to help. You’re actually part of the story now, Gilmour. Everyone’s all over it, trying to find out what happened to you, and how come you were in the middle of it all. We’re fighting them off here.’

‘Stuff that, Mick. I’ll get to that tomorrow. You can put a statement out or something. But I want to tell the story myself in the
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. I’m getting on that boat.’

‘The Lennons have said they’re not doing a press conference, only reunion pics. They just want their daughter back. What a picture that’ll be.’

‘I know. Imagine how they feel right now. I can understand them saying no to an interview, but that might change. I’m going to make an approach, Mick. I want that interview.’

‘Alright, you can try, but the story will be everywhere. And I don’t want you busting your gut if you’re not ready. I mean, Rosie: you’ve just been involved in a huge trauma. You could have been killed.’

‘Yeah, but I’m still here. I want to see if the Lennons will do a big sit-down with me. If anyone is in the driving seat it’s me, Mick. I helped get their daughter back.’

‘Of course,’ Mick said. ‘I’m sure when they take in everything that’s happened and your part in it, you’ll be in with a shout for an interview. Otherwise they’re ungrateful bastards as well as fucking liars. Oh, and by the way, Rosie, Sky News is also saying that the Spanish cops have arrested four men they intercepted on a boat coming from Morocco. Apparently they’re behind the kidnapping. One is called Leka or something. Albanian. He had a stab wound. Ring any bells?’

‘Yeah, just a few.’

She signalled to Matt who was at the taxi, pointing impatiently to his watch.

‘Listen, Mick. We’ve got other stuff here we need to
talk about when I get to Spain. Lots of big stuff on the porn movies they were making with these kidnapped kids. They stole kids from everywhere – Romania, Morocco, and further into Africa. And that Vinny bastard. We’ve got a lot of his movies.’

‘You’ve got them?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Did you talk to him?’

‘Er … not quite.’

‘How did you get them?’

‘No trick questions, Mick. I’ve got them, that’s all that matters. Javier had a look at one last night and he thinks the kid in it is the little boy from Tenerife who’s been missing for three years. Vinny killed him. He killed him on film. Snuff movies. That’s what Frankie Nelson told me in jail.’

‘You’re fucking joking. That’s on film?’

‘Yeah, On film. I haven’t seen it. Javier and Matt have it.’

‘The Spanish cops will want it.’

‘They’ll get it when we get back to Scotland – not before.’

‘Where’s this Vinny fucker now?’

‘Er … hard to say. But I don’t think he’ll be making any more movies. Forget him.’

‘I’m not sure I like the sound of that, Rosie. Is something going to come back to bite us?’

‘I wouldn’t think so. I need to go now, Mick. Matt and Javier are waiting. We’ll talk tonight.’

‘You take care, Gilmour. Don’t do anything daft. I’ve had enough excitement for one day.’

‘Yeah. I’m sure you have, Mick.’ She hung up.

* * *

In the office of the Maritime Rescue Agency in Tarifa, Jenny and Martin Lennon sat holding hands and watching the clock. They’d been told they would be reunited with their daughter within the hour. Outside, the press and broadcast media gathered for a glimpse of the boat’s arrival.

Jenny was clutching her daughter’s favourite soft toy, a furry rabbit with huge floppy ears. Amy never went anywhere without it. She hoped that if her daughter was traumatised, the rabbit would help her to feel secure. What if she’d forgotten about her mum and dad? Jenny had fretted all night after the initial euphoria that Amy was alive. She’d been gone for over three weeks. Nobody knew what she’d been through. Martin told her not to worry. As soon as she saw familiar faces, Amy would be fine.

The news had come in a phone call early yesterday evening. Martin had answered it, and as always happened every time the phone rang, Jenny watched his face for clues when he took the call. As soon as she heard the words, ‘Are you sure?’, she was at his side. He’d held his hand out to keep her at arm’s length while he pressed the phone to his ear, his face set in concentration as he listened.

Then he looked at Jenny. ‘She’s alive,’ he’d said. ‘Amy’s alive.’ He went back to the phone.

Jenny’s hands went to her mouth in shock. Then Martin asked whoever he was speaking to if they would hold for a moment and talk to his wife. She heard the words herself. They’d found Amy and she seemed unharmed, but doctors were still checking her over in hospital. The Guarda Civil
were on their way to the villa to fill them in with the details.

When they’d come off the phone, Martin and Jenny had clung to each other, weeping with relief. Jenny kept repeating that she was sorry, that she knew she could never expect Martin to forgive her. She pleaded for one last chance. He didn’t answer, and just kept saying how he had to see Amy with his own eyes before he would believe it was really true.

Now they could hear a sudden burst of activity around the harbour. Jenny got up and looked out of the window where the journalists and TV cameras were camped at the quayside. A Guarda Civil car was driven to the edge. The office door opened and a policeman came in and smiled broadly at them.

‘The boat is arriving in only few minutes. Your daughter is coming.’

‘Thank you,’ Martin said.

They waited. They paced the floor. They sat down. They stood up, and sat back down again. Then, at last, they heard voices and footsteps in the corridor.

The door opened, and they held their breath as the female police officer came in. They stood up. They could only see the back of her head, a mop of curly dark hair in the policewoman’s arms, but Jenny would know it was Amy’s anywhere. She had dreamed of touching it, smelling it, every hour of every day.

‘Amy … ?’ Jenny took a tentative step forward, terrified it wasn’t her. Amy turned around as she heard her name.

‘Amy! Oh Amy!’

For a second, the little girl looked bewildered, then her face lit up.

‘Mummy!’

Jenny and Martin went to her with their arms out.

‘Daddy!’ Amy’s eyes widened with delight when she saw Martin.

‘There’s my beautiful girl! There she is!’

The policewoman handed Amy to Jenny, and Martin wrapped his arms around both of them, a family together again at last. At least for the moment.

Rosie stayed in the car with Javier while Matt joined the scrum of photographers outside the harbour rescue office. They’d been told the Lennons would come outside with Amy for a few minutes to give the photographers their pictures. But no questions, and definitely no interviews. Rosie stayed well out of sight, knowing any press or media who recognised her from the AP story would want to talk to her. She wasn’t ready for that yet.

Javier had positioned the car so they’d be able to see the Lennons coming out, but still stay in the background. Rosie would make her pitch for an interview later. Maybe tomorrow. Give them a night to get their breath back.

‘So – you okay, Rosita?’ Javier’s eyes scanned her face.

She wished she could lie to him, but he would know.

‘If I’m honest, Javier, I’m wrecked, actually.’

‘Me too.’ He leaned back on the head rest, his eyes half closed. ‘I thought we were finished in that fire. I really did.’

‘Yeah. We nearly were.’

He reached across and ruffled her hair affectionately, keeping his hand on the back of her neck and massaging it gently. It felt good. Rosie closed her eyes. Tears weren’t far away, but she bit her lip.

‘I could sleep for a week,’ she said.

‘When we get this finished, we should go out and have a big dinner. Let our hair down. Get blind drunk. Go mad.’

Rosie opened one eye and squinted at him, smiling.

‘I think we’ve had enough of mad for one week, Javier.’

‘
Olé
! Here they come.’ Javier sat up straight. ‘Look.’

The Lennons appeared at the doorway.

‘Jesus, Javier. That is some sight for sore eyes.’

Now the tears did come. And Javier wiped away his own as well as Rosie’s.

The press pack swung into action with shouts of ‘Over here, Martin … Jenny … Over here … This way … Amy … Smile.’

The cameras whirred, the snappers jostled for position among the TV crews. The Lennons stood behind the railing, holding up Amy and telling her to wave to the cameras, as if she’d just won a bonny baby contest at Butlin’s. Martin put her on his shoulders and she clapped her hands above her head.

The sorrow, the agony had gone from Martin and Jenny’s faces. They smiled, held hands, giggled together as Amy waved both hands and performed for the cameras, even blowing kisses to the delight of the press pack. The Lennons didn’t look broken. But they were. Rosie thought
she could see it. Somewhere in the eyes of Jenny Lennon there was a look that said, this is what is left of who we were. We will make the best of it.

Even from half a mile away, Hassan could tell there was too much smoke coming from his father’s place. He stepped on the accelerator, the car bouncing and scraping on the dirt track as he raced towards the farm. He pulled into the yard and jumped out.

‘Mother! Father! Salima …’

But he knew by the eerie silence, he was too late. The fire was dead, only the smoke was still swirling up to the sky. He pushed open what was left of the blackened, burnt-out door. Inside was a shell of the house that had been filled with laughter just days ago.

The first of the charred bodies he saw was that of his father, upright in his chair, burned to death where he sat. Hassan stumbled through the debris in a daze. On the kitchen floor, his mother’s body was spread out as though she’d been crawling to escape. Nausea rose in his throat and he vomited on the floor. He rushed, dizzy, into the tiny hallway and pushed open his sister’s bedroom door. To his surprise, she wasn’t burned like the others, and for a moment he thought she was alive. But when he got closer, he could see she was dead, tied to the bed, her face frozen in terror, her green eyes staring at him, asking why. He stumbled to what was left of the blackened, burnt out twins’ room, but there was no sign of them. They must have taken them.

Hassan collapsed to his knees, weeping. The sound of
his wailing startled the wild dogs who waited outside in the shadows.

It was getting dark by the time he came around. He teetered to his feet and staggered out of the house. He went to the well and splashed cold water on his face, then stood there, his face dripping, looking out at the blackness. He threw rocks and screamed at the dogs lurking determinedly at the edge of the yard.

Hassan dug in his jeans pocket and pulled out the rolled-up wad of notes he had taken from the fat man. Two hundred American dollars. He shoved the money back into his pocket. He turned and looked back at the house one more time. Then, in the stillness, as he was about to get into the car, he heard his name being called. He stopped and listened, looked around. Again he heard it.

‘Hassan, Hassan.’

The twins came running through the darkness and threw themselves into his arms. He scooped them up and hugged as they wrapped themselves around him. Then he ushered them quickly into the car.

The people who came here would be looking for him, so he had to move fast. All they had left was one other.

CHAPTER 41

Rosie sat drinking green tea on the terrace of her room in the Puente Romano. It was a very long time since she’d felt relief on the scale she did right now. After Bosnia, maybe, when she’d sat by herself in the hotel room in the northern Greek town of Thessaloniki after the long drive from the former war zone. She had been glad to be on her way home, but the scenes and eye witness accounts of human suffering she’d witnessed just days before had left her unable to speak to anyone without bursting into tears.

This time was different. This story had a happy ending, unless of course your name was Vinny Paterson. Rosie wondered how she would explain that little nugget to McGuire when she got home. But that was for another day.

Now she had to make up her mind how much of the Lennon interview she was going to tell McGuire. She could, if she wanted, give Martin and Jenny Lennon a break. Just tell the big, heart-rending reunion story of a couple who thought they would never see their little girl again. The
headlines wrote themselves. The
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would fly off the shelves, what with Matt’s reunion pictures, plus all the graphic dramatic snaps of the rescue in Morocco with the blazing building as a backdrop. But it wasn’t the whole story. To tell the truth, she would have to break hearts, ruin lives, shatter illusions. She remembered the hurt on Martin and Jenny’s faces when she’d put the allegations to them.

The Lennons had agreed to tell their story to Rosie for the
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. She’d made the initial approach at the villa when they’d got back after the quayside photo call for the assembled media. The Guarda Civil had appealed to the press to respect the couple’s privacy and give them time alone with their daughter, but Rosie went to the door later because she knew nobody else would dare. And anyway, the Lennons would have been told by the Guarda Civil of her role in tracking down their daughter’s kidnapper. McGuire told Rosie the Lennons owed her, big time. She was just glad he wasn’t negotiating.

Matt and Rosie had arrived at the villa before ten in the morning, and were surprised to be greeted with a hug from a smiling Jenny Lennon. People weren’t generally big on doorstep hugs in Glasgow, at least not with tabloid reporters, Matt had joked. Over coffee and biscuits, and with Amy playing on the floor, the interview was going well, with Jenny and Martin saying all the right things – the heartbreak, the terror that they might never see their daughter again, the joy of that moment when they were reunited. In theory, it was enough. It would
sell papers. But it wasn’t enough for Rosie. She saw Matt watch her anxiously as she began questioning them further.