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Still no answer came. I pushed the door and suddenly it swung inward. Vivian stood three feet from the frame and the first thing I noticed was her bulging eyes. The second thing was a wiry hand clutching her throat, and the third was the barrel of a gun pressed against her temple. The door widened until Ossian’s full scrawny form came into view. He wasn’t the most level-headed of characters at the best of times but he looked even more deranged than ever. The whites of his eyes sparkled like ice and his gums and yellowing teeth were bared to full effect.
“I guess you’re so hardened to narcotics, the sedatives didn’t scratch the surface,” I said.
“Child’s play, Rupert. You think I was going to fall for something like that? Call off the explosives,” he hissed. “Or your little lovebug here will get a bullet in her head.”
Vivian’s hands tried to pry Ossian’s from her neck but he was too committed. Her breaths stuttered and she squeezed her eyes closed, as if that would make it all go away.
“You know I can’t do that,” I replied.
He took a step forward, shoving Vivian through the door, making her stumble in the process. He held her up by the throat and practically carried her out into the lobby by her head. For that alone, I wanted to sink my teeth into his skull and pierce both his eyes with hot pokers.
“Just. Fucking. Do. It. Brother.”
I knew Hector and the guys had left the premises, so as well as having no gun on me, I had no back-up either. It didn’t matter; I wasn’t going to be the one to end this satanic beast.
“I’m not your brother.”
Vivian’s eyes widened and she stopped trying to fight.
“Elaborate,” he said, surprising me by neither confirming nor denying.
“There’s nothing to elaborate on.”
“This is your business you’re trying to blow up,” he said, though his voice has lost some of its earlier conviction.
I shook my head slowly. “It’s not my business. It’s never been my business. This is all yours and you’ve fucked it to the moon and back.”
His maniacal grin returned. “With your help.”
“Right, right,” I mused, stroking the stubble on my chin. “And me allowing customers out of arrangements you’d blackmailed them into is helping? And me blowing up a ship of supplies is helping? If that’s true, I’m far more helpful than I ever realised.”
“When this place goes down, your name will go down with it.”
“No, it won’t. Yours will.”
“There’s no getting away from the fact you’re a Thorn, Rupert.”
“I’m not a Thorn though, am I? I’ve never been a Thorn, and you know that.”
Ossian paled. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Come on Ossian, you must have been four, five when I appeared from nowhere. Iris hadn’t even carried a baby.”
His silence made me question what I’d assumed he knew.
“Don’t tell me you haven’t wondered why me and Hector look alike, but neither of us look anything like you and Sinclair. There’s no family resemblance whatsoever, and I can’t say I’m unhappy about that.”
In my peripheral vision, Ossian’s fingers twitched, loosening their grip of Vivian’s throat. She didn’t move a millimetre though – too petrified to take the risk.
“Now you’re probably wondering the same thing as me: how could Sinclair and Iris have lied to you too? If you didn’t know this, they’ve deliberately deceived you. Why?” I cocked my head to one side. “Why couldn’t they trust you with the truth, Ossian? Is it because they don’t trust that you wouldn’t say something and blow the whole story? Is it because they benefit from you believing their lie? Is it because you’re as much of a pawn in their game as I am?”
Ossian’s eyes tracked me as I strolled towards the security desk.
“I will do it,” he said in a thin voice. “I will kill her.”
“I don’t doubt that,” I said, with my back turned. “You’ve done far worse things.”
A desperate moan escaped Vivian’s lips and I hated myself for playing along with Ossian’s pathetic charade, but I needed to disarm him.
