by Wes Markin
‘I saw you looking at me.’
Vanessa raised an eyebrow. ‘You can’t be serious!’
He turned to his side and pointed to the end of the aisle. ‘From there. You were staring.’
The cheek! ‘Sorry, boyo, but I think you’ll find it was the other way round.’
The young man turned to lay his book on the bookshelf beside them. She noticed that he had a red ribbon wound around the knuckles of this hand. ‘No, Vanessa, you were … what’s the expression … making eyes.’
‘How do you know my name?’ Her stomach suddenly felt like it was full of rocks.
‘And those eyes, Vanessa. I just love those eyes.’
He reached out and gently took her arm, and with the other hand, let the ribbon fall from his knuckles, until it hung loosely from between his thumb and forefinger.
‘What’s that?’ Her voice was shaking.
‘What’s this?’ He gestured down at the hanging ribbon. ‘Just an old bookmark.’
She sidestepped out of his grip and moved forward quickly. He allowed her past. She almost breathed a sigh of relief, but the breath caught in her throat.
Literally.
Her hands flew to her neck, and she clawed at the material wrapped tightly around it.
It had to be that red ribbon.
She wanted to scream but she couldn’t get any sound out. Her eyes began to water, and her mouth filled with a sour taste. Her entire head throbbed.
She threw herself backwards, but her assailant was too strong. Her chest started to burn, and the front of her head felt like it was going to explode.
Everything moved away from her; she was shrinking backwards into the ground.
She could no longer feel the sensation of her fingers on the ribbon but knew they were there.
When the blackness shut down her vision, Vanessa wondered, for the briefest moment, if she was still alive.
‘Poor Robin Crusoe…. Where have you been?’
Firth smiled over his favourite moment in the book. Crusoe had spent months teaching the parrot to say it back to him, and he’d finally succeeded.
Crusoe, unlike Mr Hyde, in another piece of literature Firth had re-read recently, never lost himself to animal instincts, never became a brute despite his isolation on this island. He remained self-aware at all times. He obsessively recorded all his daily activities in a journal, even when nothing of note actually happened to him. And now, here he was, teaching nature itself to voice his own self-awareness. Through a parrot.
Firth was like Crusoe. He would never lose himself to instinct, and disarray.
He slid the red ribbon bookmark between the two pages and closed the book.
Douglas Firth was, and always would be, very self-aware.
15
Mike cared. He truly did. Hold onto that, Jake. Dammit. Hold onto that.
Noticing that one of his son’s beloved gnomes in the garden had taken a tumble during the heavy rains, Jake went to his rescue. He restored the gnome, an angler, to an upright position, so it could continue to fish in the mud.
He looked down into his plastic bag at the wrapped presents. Sheila may have refused the money the other day, but she’d have to be seriously crabby to knock back these gifts for Frank.
As he knocked on the door, he did recall that his soon-to-be ex-wife spent most of her life in a crabby state, and conceded that, in all likelihood, he’d be hoisting these gifts home again.
Sheila’s mother opened the door. Her long white hair had been cut short into a bob, and he almost didn’t recognise her, but then she spoke, and his memories of a woman with a tongue dripping with arsenic came flooding back. ‘She’s not here.’
‘Where is she?’
‘Out.’
It didn’t take a genius to work out from which side of the family Sheila had inherited her abrasive tone.
‘I’ve got some gifts for Frank. There’s a train set, a children’s tablet, security protected and set up with learning apps, and a couple of DVDs.’
She held out her hand. ‘Give them here, then.’
‘Maybe I could see Frank myself? I’d like to give him these gifts.’
Jake could see the corners of her lips quiver. She was always so full of anger. ‘It’s not your day.’
‘Sheila wouldn’t mind. He’s my son—’
‘She’d mind.’
Jake put the bag into her hand.
He felt as if a match had been lit in his stomach. ‘You never did like me much, did you?’
‘Try not to take it personally. There are not many men that would be good enough for my daughter.’
‘We were happy … once … you forget that.’
‘I haven’t forgotten Jake. I bit my tongue for a lot of years.’
‘Bollocks you did!’
She shrugged. ‘Like I said, I bit my tongue. She could’ve, should’ve, done so much better. And the things you brought into this house …’
‘What do you mean?’
‘What do you think I mean, Jake?’
Of course, she knew everything.
‘The best thing you could do for Sheila, and your son, is just disappear. Leave. Your son is still young. Give him a chance. Take your poison away from him.’
Suddenly feeling light-headed, Jake took a step back. He closed his eyes and saw Lacey prodding Simon Young’s corpse with her foot. He saw her mouth moving, and read her lips: ‘Your first?’
‘She’s finally happy, Jake. Let her be. She’s with a good man. A reputable surgeon. Let your son have the father he deserves.’
She closed the door. Jake kneeled, taking deep breaths.
This isn’t over, Jake. You have Mike. You have your son. Regardless of what she says, you have him. Hold onto that. Hold onto Mike. Frank.
He stood up, and the fire lit moments before in his stomach, suddenly flared. He marched over to the angling gnome and launched it. It smashed against the garden wall.
As he walked away, he read Lacey’s lips again. ‘I always knew you had it in you.’
He may not have been his natural son, but Yorke still saw himself in Ewan. They’d grown very close over the years and had far more in common than they’d first realised. For example, both liked to lead situations with calmness and clarity, and desperately tried to find strength in others even on the days when their own resilience felt sorely lacking.
Due to the state of Yorke’s ribs, embracing was out of the question, so they touched heads for a moment instead. He then planted a kiss on his son’s forehead for good measure.
Yorke looked over at Lexi. ‘Thanks for putting up with him.’
To Yorke, she seemed unlike many girls her age. She wore long floral frocks and buttoned-up cardigans. She was stick thin, rather than slim, and Yorke wondered about her eating habits. Add to that, there was the social awkwardness. Many parents probably wouldn’t consider her the perfect catch for their bonny blue-eyed boy.
Yorke loved her. As did Patricia. Ewan was more content than he’d been in years. Their debt to this young lady was incalculable.
‘It’s my pleasure.’ She grinned, blushing. She adjusted her glasses. ‘He has to put up with me too.’
Patricia came up behind Lexi and put her hands on her bony shoulders. ‘Now how could anyone in their right mind, believe that?’
Ewan looked at all three of them in turn. ‘Sorry, who here is in their right mind?’
‘Good point,’ Yorke said. ‘And we won’t be either until we get out of this place.’
‘Mike – keep your voice down,’ Patricia said, ‘You’ll offend them! They’ve just treated you.’
‘Yes, and now I’m better. And grateful. But another day of hospital food and Jeremy Kyle might just have unwound all their hard work. Come on, last one to the car pays for the pizza.’
‘Better, eh? Then who is carrying your bags, pray tell?’ Patricia said.
Yorke shrugged. ‘Well, maybe better was an exaggeration. Slightly better?’
‘
Don’t worry, Auntie Pat,’ Ewan said, ‘I’ll get the heavy one. Uncle Mike has to save his energy to open his wallet.’
‘Now there’s something I’d love to see,’ Patricia said.
After checking out of the hospital, and taking the elevator down to the carpark, Yorke’s phone rang. He looked at the screen and saw that it was Willows. ‘You go ahead. I have to take this.’
Patricia’s fierce facial expression almost catapulted him back into the elevator.
‘Three minutes. Maximum.’ He offered an apologetic expression and then put the phone to his ear.
‘You don’t even know where we’re parked.’ Patricia said.
‘Last car on the left,’ Ewan said.
Patricia turned the fierce stare onto Ewan.
‘Oops. Come on.’ Ewan grabbed Lexi’s hand, and they went on ahead.
Yorke answered the phone. ‘Collette?’
‘I don’t know if I should be making this phone call.’
‘Well, it’s too late to wonder now, you’ve already made it.’
‘True … still …’
‘If I have to use the words beat and bush in the next sentence, Collette, I think you might just hear a grown man cry. It’s been a trying couple of days.’
‘Yes sir, sorry sir.’
Patricia was waving for his attention. ‘Sorry Collette, one second.’
He covered up the mic on his phone.
‘I always give you distance, Mike. Always. I accept who you are. But not today. You’re in no state. Don’t make me pull rank. Three minutes and then it’s over. Okay?’
Yorke smiled and blew her a kiss. ‘I’m buying pizza, remember?’
She caught the kiss, turned and walked away. He returned to the conversation with Willows. ‘Even though Operation Tagline has been immolated, and I’ve been put out to pasture, you’re about to tell me something sensational, aren’t you?’
‘There’s been a murder. In Southampton.’
‘Who?’
‘A twenty-one-year old student studying English. Strangled. Actually, the forensic pathologist is saying garrotted. Either with wire or strong material of some kind. In a library, sir. Can you believe it? In a bloody library.’
Yorke resisted the pull of the crime. Resisted the urge to do what he did best. ‘Why are you telling me this, Collette? It’s Southampton’s issue.’
‘Sir, it’s SEROCU’s issue.’
Yorke felt the pulse in the centre of his head. ‘Sorry?’
‘The victim, Vanessa, was a Young.’
The pulse became a throb. ‘She’s a Young?’
‘Buddy’s granddaughter by his only daughter, Bethany.’
The throb became a pounding. ‘What else do you know?’
‘I’ve got a close friend at Southampton. She told me that there was skill in this execution. It was a hit, Mike. But he swaggered in and out of the library and has been caught on camera.’
‘Borya?’
‘No. Much younger. There’s no match in the system.’
‘Another person who doesn’t exist. Another product of Article SE.’ Yorke took a deep breath, trying to settle the agony building in his skull.
‘We have to step away now, sir.’ Willows said.
‘Why the bloody hell are you phoning to tell me then?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Jesus, Collette, you usually have an answer for everything!’
‘Not this time.’
‘Herbert Wheelhouse’s niece ends up dead because he was skimming from the Young family. Now, Buddy Young’s granddaughter ends up dead. And another ghost. A disappearing killer.’
‘Not coincidences, are they?’
‘No, they’re not, Collette. But this isn’t ours anymore, and I’m sure Robinson will have already reached the same conclusion as we have. He’ll be visiting the accountant George Johnson as we speak. Johnson will then give up the fact that Wheelhouse funded the hit on Buddy’s granddaughter, Vanessa, and everything will be wrapped up.’
‘Sounds about right, sir.’
‘Good … but you don’t sound that convinced …’
‘Because I’m not.’
‘Bloody hell, Collette. Why?’ He clutched his forehead.
‘Because of that old expression you always use. If someone tells you it’s raining, you should always go out and check.’
Yorke sighed. ‘Listen, if I go, Madden and Robinson will flay me alive, and then my wife will disembowel me.’
‘Nice images.’
‘Statements-of-fact … okay, Collette …. I want you to go to Johnson now. Interview him. Find out if he knows anything, and if he does, report it back to me and I’ll go cap in hand to Robinson to get him on the right trail.’
‘I will do, sir.’
‘And Collette?’
‘Yes, sir?’
‘Don’t go alone.’
‘Of course not. I’ll see if Pemberton’s free.’
The machines that sustained Buddy Young’s life hummed and whirred.
The shrivelled old man was propped up by three pillows; his hair was gone; his head was dotted with liver-spots; and his sallow skin hung from shrunken bones.
Walter Divall, Buddy’s most trusted lieutenant, couldn’t believe that this used to be Public Enemy number one. Age really was merciless. Far worse than a bullet. Walter was suddenly content with the way he had chosen to live his life. Going early as a result of his profession would be a blessing in disguise.
It’d been over two hours since Walter had broken the news to his bed-ridden boss. His beautiful granddaughter, Vanessa, the only light still shining in his decaying existence, was gone.
And not just gone.
‘Plucked from the world like a weed. Exterminated like a pest. Bleached out like a stain.’ Buddy had typed these images into a tiny keyboard sitting beneath his right hand. Despite being withered, this hand could still type. Just. The other hand was already an arthritic claw. Speakers alongside the life-support machines threw out the robotic voice.
‘I’m sorry, sir. It will be dealt with,’ Walter had replied.
Now, these two hours later, Walter returned with a little drawstring bag which was damp with blood.
Buddy Young’s eyes narrowed. Apart from the fingers on the hand that prodded the keyboard, his eyes were the only way you could ever really tell he was still alive. They were the same eyes that his late son, Simon, had inherited. Stony eyes. Eyes that seemed to bore through any person held by them.
In this instance, that person was Walter. And he had to admit to quite enjoying it. It made him feel alive. He inwardly smiled.
‘It was as we thought,’ Walter said.
A flickering passed over Buddy’s eyes, and he stared at the drawstring bag in Walter’s hand.
He wants to see … the sick old puppy wants to look at his trophy!
Walter obliged and opened the sodden bag beneath Buddy’s face. The old man’s eyes widened, and his breathing mask fogged over. The monitor also showed his heartbeat accelerating.
Buddy continued to type as he investigated the bag. ‘Such precision. You took away his connection to the world.’
Walter nodded. ‘As you asked.’
The typing was slow, and the tension of waiting for the robotic voice was palpable. ‘It is a fate worse than death. To sever that connection.’
‘I agree.’
‘Close the bag.’
Walter obeyed.
While Buddy typed out his message, Walter looked around his boss’s bedroom. It wasn’t really the room in which you expect a very wealthy man to while away his final hours. Floral wallpaper and bulky furniture from the 60s and 70s. It was certainly very traditional, and probably kept the old man at ease. It was the world in which he’d grown up. If Walter was ever in Buddy’s position, he certainly wouldn’t be opting for traditional. He would spend that cash. And spend it hard. He would rather be suffocated by flamboyance than drown in the ordinary.
‘You know what to do
next.’ Buddy’s surrogate voice came out with a burst of static. Walter flinched.
Buy you a new speaker, he thought.
‘Of course, sir.’
Walter waited while Buddy typed out the next message. He moved at the speed of the second hand on a clock. He resisted the urge to tap his foot, and stood rigid, hoping that the message was a farewell, so he could break free of the monotony.
It wasn’t.
‘You must use the best again.’
‘At such short notice, sir? I don’t think—’
Buddy didn’t need to interrupt with sound. He just needed his eyes.
Walter waited patiently for his employer’s impatient message. ‘Pay double then.’
Walter wanted to call that option into doubt but settled for a nod instead. He didn’t want to wind his boss up, and neither did he want to sit through another series of messages.
‘I’ll let you know when it’s done, sir.’
Walter was about to turn to leave when Buddy hit the palm of his hand on the keyboard. It wasn’t hard, but it was enough to stop Walter turning. He typed his message out and then gestured at the drawstring bag in Walter’s hand.
‘This time, that won’t be enough. This time, you bring me everything.’
No children. His number one rule.
From his car, parked on the other side of the road, Jake photographed the elderly Russian man coming out of his home with his visiting daughter. She was in her twenties, so his no-child policy was under no threat, and he would still be able to get some sleep at night.
His photographs would be time and date stamped, but he decided to be extra cautious. He checked his watch and scribbled in a small notebook. His employers valued precision above everything else. Their subsequent movements would be fuelled by Jake’s accuracy. Mistakes cost lives.
Luke Parkinson had learned this the hard way.
The frail Russian man struggled to walk, so his daughter, who had been born and raised in England following her father’s escape from Russia, held him upright.
Jake took some more photographs of the daughter helping him into her car and again, dutifully, wrote down the timings. He then flicked back through his notebook.
