Micky’s eyes stray to Blair, now sitting in a corner, her coat discarded, her mask left outside the room.
“We don’t know.” It’s Blair who speaks. “I don’t want to think that Ben would leave but he did it before. I don’t want to think he’d do anything to hurt me. But this is his sister.”
“Do we assume the worst?” And in doing so, we’d break Blair’s heart.
“Let’s assume nothing. Let’s work on the premise that someone is up to no good. Security stays the same. We carry on with our intelligence on Majken and everyone else who gives us cause to worry and we wait for your government’s decision on trade and every fucking else they’ve been dragging out. Maybe they’ll finally give up on the idea that they’ll own Scotland again and move on.”
Micky’s eyes have narrowed and he looks at me as if he thinks I’m not telling everything I know.
“William isn’t going to give up on that. He likes the idea of being king.”
“It can’t happen.” Blair stands up, heads to the window. “If I marry, my husband would never be any higher than prince. He should know that.”
“William will probably think there’ll be a way to change that law.” It isn’t a flippant comment because it’s true.
“What about your father?” Micky says. He’s trying to read me and I know he’ll fail. When you live a world that’s foreign and strange, you learn to hide who you are.
“My father has his own agenda.” And it isn’t William. It’s oil. Because the love of his life has never been his family or his lovers, it’s something far more seductive. Something that oozes power and being Prime Minister never gave him enough.
“What’s his take on this?” Micky folds his arms.
“I wouldn’t know.”
“But you have a theory. And you’re probably right.”
I give a shrug and look at Blair, still staring out of the window. “Can you shoot?”
She turns around. “Me?”
I nod. “Do you know how to use a gun?”
She shakes her head. “I wouldn’t hunt so I never learned.”
“Let me teach you.”
Because she needed to keep herself safe. From all of us.
* * *
I find cans in the kitchen and take them outside to the sprawling patio area with flower beds that lie dormant for the winter. A few snowdrops poke their head above ground, early for the season. I stack the cans on a stone wall, balancing them carefully and then I take out the handgun I got from Micky and check it over, noting how clean it is, and polished.
Blair appears wearing a padded coat, almost drowning it in. Her hair is tied back and she’s wearing a hat I’m pretty sure is Ben’s.
“I’ve never shot before.”
“I know. This is why I’m teaching you.” I show her the gun and see her concentration fix on it. From what Micky had said when Blair wasn’t there, she’d always refused to be taught how to use it, claiming that was what security were for. Today she hadn’t argued or refused and instead I can see the stiffness in her jaw.
Stubbornness.
Determination.
I talk her through the different parts, the mechanisms, the theory behind it, then I let her get the feel of it, the silver coolness heavy in her hands, before I load the bullets.
It’s the perfect weapon for her, small enough that it won’t be difficult for her to control or fire, powerful enough that as long as her aim is good, she can use it to protect herself.
I stand behind her and place my hands over hers, showing her how to aim. Her back is pressed against my chest and I lean my chin on her shoulder.
Her first shot goes wide. Her second hits the first can, the third the next and then one by one she shoots them all down, murdering each one and then giggling.
