Vampire Wake (Kiera Hudson Series One #2)

Vampire Wake (Kiera Hudson Series One #2) Page 2

Despite the overcast sky, I made my way on foot through Havensfield town centre. A cool breeze swirled litter along the gutter and I puled the colar of my jacket up about my neck. The streets with their rows of Victorian-built shops were just beginning to close for the day, and most of the shoppers had started to head home for the evening. Being a coastal town, seaguls squawked overhead and the mouth-watering smel of fish and chips wafted on the air.

It was just short of five in the afternoon, and I was annoyed that I'd wasted yet another afternoon being analysed by Keats. I hadn't meant to hurt her, and there was a smal part of me that felt bad for saying what I had. But hey, she asked for it right? I told myself. She wanted to know what I could see about her - so I'd told her - but had I needed to be so smug about it?

Whatever, it was done now and so were my weekly afternoon sessions with her, I hoped.

Quickening my pace, I made my way across town towards the newsagents. I wanted to buy a copy of each of the national newspapers before they closed up shop for the day. Since leaving The Ragged Cove and my suspension from work, I'd taken to buying as many newspapers I could each day. With the T.V.

permanently tuned to the news channel, I would sit on the living room floor of my smal rented room and search each of the papers for news stories involving any sudden disappearances of people. But what I was realy looking for were any stories relating to murder where the victims had been found with injuries to their throats.

I would spend hours shut away, my eyes scanning every page looking for anything that might suggest the return of vampires. If there were vampires, my belief was that the Vampyrus would be somewhere close by, and that meant Luke might be with them. Murphy had told me that they were going in search of Taylor and the other Vampyrus that were like him, unable to resist the taste of human blood. If I could find Luke, Murphy, or Potter again, then they would lead me to Taylor and perhaps my old trainer, Sergeant Philips, if he were stil alive.

I wasn't interested in finding Taylor and Philips in order to seek any revenge, or help my old coleagues destroy them - I hoped to be able to convince Luke, Murphy, and Potter to keep them alive long enough, at least, for Taylor and Philips to tel me what had truly happened to my mother. Ever since leaving The Ragged Cove, the thought of finding out what had happened to her and that image of Henry Blake's grey, cold hand clutching a lock of her hair wouldn't leave me. Nights had become almost unbearable, as I lay awake on the sofa, staring blankly at the news channel, my dreams and thoughts consumed by images of my mother and the nightmare that I'd lived at The Ragged Cove.

Night and day I thought about her and I wanted so much to keep the promise that I had made to my father.

I knew that she was stil alive and suspected that Taylor and Philips held the answers. When I wasn't thinking about my mother, I was thinking about Luke. I wondered if he were alright and if he had managed to survive the burns that he had received saving my life in the sky above St. Mary's Church. On my many walks to see Doctor Keats, I would look down at the paving stones and wonder if Luke were somewhere beneath me in The Holows. Then I would get to thinking that perhaps he wasn't beneath me at al, that he had recovered and was already above ground tracking Taylor and Philips like Murphy had said they would.

There was so much that I didn't know, and that was what was driving me mad. Sometimes, after my sessions with Keats, I would question my own sanity.

Had I realy seen the things that I had in The Ragged Cove? Had I realy been working the night shift with men that claimed to be a race of vampire bats? If I had been told such a thing by anyone, wouldn't I have had the same reaction to them as Keats had towards me? I mean this was the stuff of fairytales, horror movies, and books. But I knew that it had al been real, I hadn't imagined any of it. And in the darkness at night as I lay awake, the T.V. set flickering in the corner, I would think of Luke and the brief time that we had spent together. Those feelings that I had felt for him would come flooding back and they would feel as raw and intense as they had when he had held me close to him, when he'd kissed me and enclosed me in his wings.

Had I realy felt love for him? Or had it just simply been my emotions freaking out due to the unimaginable situation that I had found myself in? Had it just been lust? The guy was a hottie. But when I thought of him, his jet-black hair, bright green eyes, and fit body, I knew it was more than those things that made my soul ache for him. Like everything else that had taken place it, was hard to explain to myself, so how would I ever get the likes of Keats to understand or believe me?

Within days, of leaving The Ragged Cove and returning to my room in Havensfield, the nightmares had started. It was strange, because although I could see more than I always wanted to when I was awake, my dreams were a blur; a mosaic of broken images, distant voices, violence and death. The result was always the same; I would wake in my bed, but more often than not on the couch, with my heart thumping in my chest and gasping for breath. Then one night, as I sat gasping in air, I noticed something warm and wet trickling down my cheek. Dabbing at it with the tips of my fingers, I was horrified to discover that I was bleeding from my left tear duct.

Leaping from the couch, I raced to the bathroom and looked in the mirror to find a crimson stream of tears running from my eye. Taking a piece of tissue, I wiped it away, leaving a red smear across my cheek. At first I didn't do anything, teling myself that I must have unknowingly rubbed my eye in my sleep and scratched it with one of my fingernails. But it happened again the next night, and the night after that, a stream of blood- red tears flowing from my eye. For weeks I didn't mention this to Keats, I kept it to myself.

Then the red tears came during the day, but it was more than that. I started seeing things. I mean more than seeing. Those flash-bulbs would go pop again inside my mind's eye. Fleeting glimpses of crime scenes, bodies laying dead and bleeding, their eyes turned towards me. The images became more horrific - terrifying - like waking nightmares. I would get snapshots of catastrophes; buildings reduced to rubble; iron girders twisted out of shape; planes faling from the sky; trains crashing, piles of bodies stacked as high as mountains, limbs entwined like a grotesque puzzle; row upon row of open graves for as far as my eye could see. These images, however quick, came without warning and when I least expected them, they hit me like a blow to the head. They left me feeling confused, dazed, and nauseous. Then the tears would come, thick and red - almost black. It was as if holes the size of pinpricks had opened in my mind and was bleeding the anguish and suffering of those who I saw in those flashes.

In the end, I had to tel Keats - I had to tel someone. At first I didn't tel her about the visions I saw, just about the tears. Immediately, she sent me for CAT and MRI scans, but they found nothing. Doctor Keats became suspicious and that tone crept into her voice again, whenever I mentioned the tears. So I told her about the pictures I saw in my head. How it was like being in the dark, then suddenly the blackness is lit- up with a flash of white light revealing the gruesome scenes hidden within.

Keats wanted more detail. "Kiera, who are these victims you see?"

"I don't know," I told her with a shake of my head.

"Where are these bodies that you see?" she pushed.

"I don't know that, either," I said.

"What about the planes? The ones you see faling from the sky?"

"What about them?" I asked.

"Why are they faling from the sky? Are these catastrophes that have happened or yet to take place?"

"I don't know!" I insisted.

"What causes them to crash?" she pushed harder, the gap between her questions getting less, and reminding me of being cross-examined in court.

I felt I knew the answer to her last question, but I just couldn't say it.

"Wel? Who is responsible for these atrocities?"

she came at me again.

Al I wanted to scream was: The vampires did it! The vampires made the planes fall out of the sky. It was the vampires that brought those buildings to the ground and it was the vampires that killed all of those people! But I couldn't say any of that to her - because I didn't know if that were true myself.

With my world seeming to fal apart al around me, I knew that I needed to occupy my mind. It had to be kept busy. I needed a mental chalenge - some stimulus, a puzzle to solve to take my mind off what was happening to me. I needed to be back at work where I belonged - but I didn't know when or if ever that was going to happen. So I placed a smal add in the local paper, which read: Got a problem that needs investigating?

I'll solve anything! Email:

[email protected]

/* */

I soon realised that I should have been more specific in my advert, as the first email I received was from a guy who thought he was paying too much for his electricity and wanted me to find out why. The second was from a woman who had lost her cat and the third was from an old gentleman who...wel lets just say it was more of a medical matter. The fourth was not a great deal more interesting, it was from an old woman who had misplaced her wedding ring. Mrs. Lovelace was seventy-eight-years-old and had been married for sixty of them. Her husband had died in the last six months. She looked frail and vulnerable so I agreed to help. During one long Sunday afternoon and over several cups of watery tea, I got her to work backwards in her mind exactly what she had done and where she had been on the day that she had misplaced it. Eventualy she remembered taking it off and placing it on the kitchen windowsil the previous Thursday morning.

"My fingers are thinner than they used to be," she smiled. "I always take the ring off when I'm washing the dishes. Don't want it to slip off and lose it down the plug-hole, you see. But I get so forgetful these days and don't always remember to put it back on again. Frank was forever reminding me."

"Frank?" I asked.

"My late husband - his memory was sharper than mine," she said, a sadness overcoming her face as she thought of him.

"May I take a look in the kitchen?" I asked her, placing my teacup on the table that sat between us.

"Of course you can, my dear," she said, struggling out of her chair.

Taking her by the arm, I led her into the kitchen, and she pointed to the spot on the windowsil where she had last seen her wedding ring. The window was open and a breeze blew in and cooled the stuffy kitchen. I lent forward and inspected the area where she said she had left her wedding ring.

"Mrs. Lovelace, can you remember if the window was open last Thursday?" I asked her.

"Now let me see," she said, and scratched her grey wispy hair with her gnarled fingers. "Yes, it would have been. I always have the window open in the warm weather."

"Can I take a look outside?" I asked her.

"Outside?" she said, eyeing me with curiosity.

"What ever for?"

"Oh, I don't know," I smiled at her. "I'm just nosey like that."

"Go right ahead, my dear," she said, and shuffled behind me to the kitchen door.

Stepping into the smal garden, I could see a pretty-looking flowerbed in the earth directly under her window. Kneeling down, I brushed my fingertips over the Lavender that grew there.

"You're an excelent gardener," I said, gently pushing the plants aside so I could inspect the earth.

"Oh it's not down to me, a local man comes in twice a week and does it al for me," she said. "He's a terrific chap."

I had seen enough, so standing straight, I asked, "When was your gardener last here?"

"Let me see," she said, and scratched her hair again. "Last week sometime, I think."

"Nice is he?" I asked her.

"He's a lovely man," she said.

"What's his name?"

"Dave-something-or-other," she smiled. "I can't remember, and I only spoke to him this morning."

"How come?"

"He telephoned to ask if I wanted him to get me some more Fuschias. Apparently they're on sale at the gardening centre," she told me.

"You don't have an address for him, do you?" I asked.

"It's written down somewhere," she said, shuffling back into the house. "Now let me see...where did I put it?"

Folowing her into the kitchen, I watched as she picked up a tatty-looking handbag. Pawing through it she said, "I'm sure it's in here somewhere - he gave me one of these little card things with his number on it. Oh dear, I can't seem to find it now."

"Don't worry, Mrs. Lovelace," I assured her, then walked into the halway where the telephone sat on a smal round table. Anyone else caled you today?" I asked over my shoulder.

"No, I don't think so," she said back from the kitchen.

Lifting the receiver, I pressed the 'last caler' button and made a note of the number. Going back into the kitchen, the old woman was stil rummaging through her bag.

"Don't worry, Mrs. Lovelace. It wasn't important," I told her.

"Why did you want it?" she asked.

"My garden is a bit overgrown and I could do with a gardener, that was al." Then changing the subject, I added, "Have you got a picture of your wedding ring?"

Trundling back into the living room, she took a picture from the mantelpiece and handed it to me.

"That's me and Frank," she said. "One of the last pictures we had taken together," and I noticed her pale blue eyes begin to water.

In the picture she had her arms around her husband, both of them frail-looking but happy. Her left hand rested against Frank's arm, and I could clearly see her missing wedding ring. It was gold, with a yelow transparent-looking stone set into it. I guessed that the stone was citrine. On either side of the stone sat a cluster of tiny diamonds.

"It certainly is a beautiful ring," I told her.

"Wil you be able to find it?" she asked, her voice wavering.

"I'l do my best," I said, taking her hand. "Can I hold onto this picture for a couple of days?"

"Yes, but why?" she asked, giving me that curious stare again.

"Oh it's just a hunch."

"Ok, if you think it wil help, although I don't see how," she said, easing herself back down into her arm chair.

"I'l be back in a day or two," I told her, heading for the door. "I'l see myself out."

Climbing into my beat-up old Mini, I headed straight into town. Parking, I went to the local pawnbrokers. With picture in hand, I peered in through the windows, and there sitting on display, was Mrs.

Lovelace's wedding ring. Without my badge, I would never be able to seize the ring from the owner of the shop, so heading across the street to a nearby Starbucks, I caled the only person that I had stayed in contact with since being temporarily relieved of my duties - while I was mentaly evaluated by Doctor Keats.

Constable John Miles had joined the police force at the same time as me and not being the brightest of recruits he had soon acquired the nickname 'Sparky'.

But John was a sweet guy, dependable, and a loyal friend. Whereas my other felow recruits had given up on me, Sparky had stayed in touch. He had been my lifeline back to the police, just updating me with gossip realy, but it helped me maintain some kind of contact with the job that I longed to go back to. Sparky had never asked me about the 'vampire thing' which had caused so many raised eyebrows, sniggers, and condemnation amongst my peers. In fact, John had been pretty cool, and on the odd occasion that I had needed some information regarding my own enquiries, he had put his job on the line and run checks on the police computers for me. I knew that John wanted more than friendship, but I didn't have those kinds of feelings for him. The only feelings that I had for anyone like that was Luke, and I couldn't even be sure what they were anymore. But in return for the odd piece of information that John gave me to assist in one of my cases, I would sometimes cook him dinner or take him to the movies. John was awkward-looking, gangly, and shy and there was a part of me that I hated because I knew deep down I kind of used him. But knowing this didn't stop me from caling him up and asking him for his help - again.

John was on a day off from work, and joined me in the coffee shop within half an hour of my phone cal to him. Nervously kissing me on my cheek, he puled up a chair and sat opposite me. For someone who was in their mid-twenties he stil had a sprinkling of spots on his forehead and cheeks - giving him a constant flushed look. His eyes were a dul grey and his glasses always perched lopsided on the bridge of his nose, giving his whole head a slanted look.

"What is it this time?" he asked, almost sounding excited that I was including him on one of my cases.

"I need you to flash your badge for me," I told him, with a smile, knowing that I wouldn't have to work hard at getting him to help me out. I then told him about Mrs.

Lovelace's missing ring and how I'd found it sitting in the front window of the pawnbrokers across the street.

I explained to him that without a badge, I would never be able to convince the owner to hand it over and get a look at the CCTV to see who it was that had brought the ring into the shop.

After finishing our coffees, I folowed John across the street and into the pawnbrokers. Flipping his badge from his pocket, John spoke cooly to the owner and said, "I'm Constable Miles and this is Constable Hudson from Havensfield Police." Without giving the owner the opportunity to ask to see my identification John had started to talk again. I was impressed.

"The ring in the window, the one with the yelow stone, we suspect has come from a burglary," John said.

The owner, a smartly dressed man in his fifties with combed- back greying hair, looked back at John and said, "How can you be so sure?"

Producing the photograph given to me by Mrs.

Lovelace, I waved it under the man's nose and said, "This is how we know."

Puling a pair of spectacles from his suit pocket, he put them on and studied the picture.

"Take a look at the victim," I said. "That could easily be your mother sitting in that picture. Is your mother stil alive?" I asked him.

"Wel, yes..." he started.

"Lucky you," I cut in. "So she's not alone then, like this poor woman. See the guy in the picture?"

The owner nodded.

"Wel that was her husband. Married for best part of sixty years," I told him. "But he died just six months ago and someone steals the wedding ring that he gave her. Now who would do a thing like that?"

"I don't -" the owner said, but this time it was Sparky who cut in.

"So you don't keep records of who you buy from?" and without waiting for the man's reply, Sparky said, "That's very remiss of you."

Then looking around the shop at al the other display cabinets, I said, "So, if you don't keep records or receipts, how can you be sure that none of this other stuff hasn't be stolen? I guess we had better get a warrant and come back and seize the lot. What do you reckon, Constable Miles?"

"Gee, and there seems to be so many pretty items in this shop to go through," Sparky said looking at owner. "It could take months to work our way through al this stuff - I mean this place could be closed down for God knows how long!"

"Okay, okay," the man sighed. "He came in last Thursday with it."

"Who did?" I asked.

"Didn't give his name," he said.

"CCTV?" John asked.

The man nodded.

"We'l be taking that, and the ring," I said, and held out my hand.

We drove back to my rented room, and while John fixed us both up with a mug of coffee and a sandwich, I watched the CCTV disc on my DVD player. There was a camera right above the counter and it gave a clear view of anyone that approached it. I sped through the disc to the previous Thursday. At 15:22 hours that day, my man came into the shop and produced Mrs.

Lovelace's ring.

"I have him!" I shouted over my shoulder at John.

After a quick cal to the number I had taken from Mrs. Lovelace's phone, I sat back in my favourite chair by the window, with John sitting opposite me, and we waited. Within half an hour, the buzzer on the door below sounded. Pressing the intercom button, I told the caler to come up. Leaving my door ajar, I went back to my seat. Moments later, a plump-looking middle- aged man, wearing overals and muddy boots, stepped into my room. His hands were rough and dirty-looking, with mud under his fingernails.

"Mr. David Evans?" I asked, not getting up from my seat. "Owner of 'Tidy Gardens' who can be contacted via Tidy Gardens dot com, whose business address is fifteen Hayfields Road, Havensfield?"

"Why, yes," he said, looking at both me and Sparky. "You caled me about some gardening that you need done?"

"That's correct," I said, not taking my eyes from his.

"But I don't understand," he said, scratching his untidy hair, "you live in a flat - you don't have a garden."

"No, I just like watching people dig themselves holes," I said back at him.

Looking at me totaly confused, Evans said, "Is this some kind of joke?"

Placing Mrs. Lovelace's wedding ring onto the smal coffee table that sat between Sparky and me, I said, "I don't think stealing from a seventy-eight-year- old woman is a joke."

The gardener looked down at the ring then back at me, his face white - the colour of paper. He opened and closed his mouth like a drowning fish.

"What have you got to say about that?" I asked him.

"'I-I don't know..." he stammered. "I've never seen it before."

Snatching up the ring, I said, "Have it your way, Mr. Evans, but this gentleman over here is a police officer and is ready to take you into custody."

Hearing this, Evans dropped to his knees at my feet and gripped my ankles.

"Please, I beg you!" he cried. "This wil ruin me - my family and my business!"

Kicking him away, I shouted, "Pul yourself together, man. It's only yourself you have to blame for the situation that you now find yourself in. You have tears of pity in your eyes, now that you have been caught - but where were your tears for Mrs.

Lovelace?"

Stil on his knees, Evans looked at me and, through his tears, he said, "I'm so sorry. I have been a fool.

These last few months or more have been difficult for me. What with the credit crunch, most of my business has dried up. People can't afford to have their gardens tended to by me. It's a luxury that most people can now il afford."

Showing him no pity, I said, "And so it is hard for milions of people up and down the length of the country, but do they al take to stealing from the elderly to supplement their wages?"

Sniffing, the man wiped his eyes with his dirty hands. "No they don't - but you must understand, I was desperate. Never before have I stolen anything.

But I am behind with my mortgage and the bank is close to repossessing my home. My wife and children wil be thrown out onto the street."

I didn't doubt that what Evans was teling me was the truth. I could tel that he was no hardened criminal, but stil, I was angry with him for what he had done to Mrs. Lovelace. I looked at him; he was pathetic and a very smal part of me felt sorry for him.

"Get up!" I snapped at him.

Like an obedient child, Evans stood, while Sparky and me remained seated. Then wringing his hands together, he looked at me and asked, "How did you know I had taken it? What led you to me?"

"Mrs. Lovelace contacted me as I am in the occasional business of solving...how can I put it? Little problems for people. I got her to work backwards in her mind and remember exactly where she had last seen it. She led me to the kitchen windowsil, where she had removed it last Thursday so she could wash the dishes.

After a very brief examination of the windowsil, I could clearly see one muddy fingerprint, which suggested that it had been taken by someone with dirty hands. It wouldn't have taken a genius to have worked out that someone who spent much of their time with their hands in soil had removed it. After examining the flowerbed beneath the kitchen window, I found boot prints in the earth."

"But of course my foot marks would be there, I'm her gardener," Evans sniffled.

"You do a lot of your work standing on tiptoe, do you?" I asked him. "There were a set of prints that showed you had been standing on tiptoe just beneath her window. This is where you stood and reached in and took the ring."

"But...but," he said sounding astounded. "How did you find the ring?"

"The fact that Mrs. Lovelace didn't report any other missing valuables, suggests to me that this was a crime of impulse. Just as you have told us, you are struggling financialy and on seeing the ring, you saw a way of solving your problems - albeit a mere quick fix.

But you weren't thinking of the long-term consequences or of the outcome should you be caught for your crime.

I knew that this theft was a crime of impulse - to make a quick buck, dare I say. Therefore you would want to get rid of the ring as quickly as possible and convert it into some cash. You wouldn't sel it to friends - they would have wondered where you had come by it - no, you are an amateur - you don't mix in criminal circles and wouldn't know anyone to pass it to. So needing the money quickly, you took it to the only place in town that would be interested in buying such an item - the pawnbrokers. So that was the next stop and there was the ring. You were smart enough not to leave your details, but the CCTV proves that it was you." Then smiling at him wryly, I added, "The chain of events weren't very hard to folow."

"I see," said Evans, sitting slowly into an armchair by the door. "So what happens now? There has been no real harm done, don't you think? Mrs. Lovelace has her ring back."

"Thanks to me and my coleague over there," I snapped. "If Mrs. Lovelace had not contacted me then your hope was that she would believe that she had misplaced the ring. Then what? The folowing month when you were short of money - would you have helped yourself to her pension money - taken a few notes from her purse when she had her back turned?"

"No!" Evans said, his voice wobbling again as if on the verge of more tears. "I swear. You have to believe me."

"Why should I take the word of a man that would stoop so low as to take something so precious from an elderly woman such as Mrs. Lovelace?" I scowled.

"Please don't arrest me!" he begged, sitting on the edge of his seat. "Please don't make this official."

Looking at Evans, I could see that his face had drained of al colour and he seemed almost near to colapse. Standing, I crossed the room to him. Looking down at him I said, "You disgust me Evans, but I do believe that you lost your head that day in the garden.

You saw the ring and believed you saw a way out of your problems. I believe that you have led a previously good life and it is not my wish to destroy what has, up until this point, been an unblemished life. If my coleague were to arrest you, it would only harm the very people you so foolishly believed you could protect - your wife and children. But my main concern is with my client, Mrs. Lovelace. She could wel do without the trauma of having to provide a statement to the police, and perhaps take the stand in court. But would be the realisation that you - someone she speaks so highly of and believes to be her friend - could steal her most precious possession, which would destroy her. I have no wish to break that poor woman's heart, when it is stil healing from the death of her husband. Therefore, I wil not be taking this matter any further."

Dropping from the armchair, and clasping hold of my trousers, Evans sobbed. "Thank you! Thank you."

Kicking him free, I dragged him to his feet and grabbed him by his dirty overals. Unable to make eye contact with me, Evans said, "How can I ever thank you enough?"

"There is stil the matter of the pawnbroker - he is stil five hundred pounds out of pocket thanks to you.

You wil repay him the money. I wil be caling him in the next day or two to see that you have. And you are never to go back to Mrs. Lovelace's home again. That is a customer you have now lost and by the sounds of it, you need as many as you can get."

"I promise," Evans sniveled. "I promise."

Releasing him, I shoved him towards the door and said, "Now get out of here!"

With his shoulders slumped forward and his head cast down, Evans skulked from my room. From behind me, I could hear the sound of clapping. Turning, I saw Sparky, stil seated in the armchair and slapping his hands together. Smiling at me, he said, "I've got to give it to you Hudson - you're a class act."

"It was nothing," I said, crossing back to my chair.

"I could see how you folowed each step of the case, but how did you know his website and home address? You only had his telephone number."

"That was easy. It's written down the side of the van that he arrived in." Then smiling to myself, I looked out of the window.

I returned the ring to Mrs. Lovelace that evening.

Once again, I went back to the flowerbed beneath her kitchen window, and making out that it had been there al along, I handed it to her. Slipping it back onto her finger, she wept with relief at having her wedding ring again.

"Whatever your fee, young lady, it would never be enough," she sobbed. "How much do I owe you?"

Taking her by the arm and leading her back inside, I told her she owed me nothing. In the folowing days, I hired another gardener for Mrs. Lovelace, giving him my bank account details so he could charge me directly for his labour.

"She's is to have the prettiest garden in Havensfield," I told him.

I reached the newsagents just as it was closing.

"I didn't think you were coming today," the paperboy said, as he opened the door to me.

"I got delayed, Jack," I said.

"Want a copy of each?" he asked, taking the pile of newspapers from the counter.

"As always," I smiled.

"What I can't figure out," the young lad said, "is how come you need so many newspapers every day.

They al pretty much say the same old thing."

"I don't have a social life," I said, taking the papers from him.

"Fancy going on a date then, Kiera?" he said, trying to make his offer sound like a joke.

"Maybe in a couple of years," I winked at him and left the shop. Taking one of the papers, I roled the others up and tucked them under my arm. Then looking at the headline splashed in thick black letters across the newspaper, my heart almost stopped.

Passenger plane crashes over Atlantic Ocean! Then, just like so many times before, those bright lights began to flash behind my eyes. And in those bright lights I could see an airline pilot screaming into his headpiece, "Mayday! Mayday! They are trying to breach the cockpit!"

As quickly as they had come, those blinding images had gone, leaving me feeling punch-drunk and dazed.

Then I heard the pitter-patter sound of raindrops splashing down onto the newspaper in my hands.

Looking down at the headline, expecting to see black ink running across the page, I was startled to see that it wasn't rain that had dripped onto it, but crimson- coloured tears from my eye.