by LJ Ross
There was utter silence in the room, but for the occasional scribble of pencil on paper.
“The same respect should be afforded to all citizens, regardless of the colour of their skin,” he said. “The attack on Daniel Odawu’s family home, here in Newcastle, was a shameful one that could have cost lives. I utterly condemn these aggravated hate crimes, and I know my team in the Major Crimes Unit has been working closely with our colleagues in Anti-Terror, and in GCHQ, to apprehend the person or persons responsible.”
He reached for a laminated image depicting the valknut and held it up.
“On your screens at home, you should be seeing a symbol. This symbol, which is often associated with the white supremacist branch of Odinism, was left at all three of the recent attacks.”
Ryan set the picture down again, and looked straight down the camera lens.
“I’m speaking to that group directly, now. If you were responsible for some, or all of these attacks, I ask you to claim them, before somebody else does.”
It was important to flush them out, Ryan thought, however he could.
“I also say to them, never for a moment believe we won’t find you. We will. Never think your deeds will go unpunished because, when I or one of my colleagues uncovers whichever stone you’ve made your home, we will be seeking to prosecute with the full force of the law.”
His tone had been hard and implacable, but now he made it conciliatory.
“However,” he said. “There may be one of you out there who is feeling uncertain, or worried that things have gone too far. If you come forward now and give evidence, we can protect you from harm. You can call 111, or the Incident Room number appearing on your screen now.”
Ryan ignored the flurry of questions and held up a hand to stave them off.
“Finally, to those of you watching or listening at home, I advise you to be vigilant. Particularly to those belonging to a racial, ethnic or religious minority, I ask you to please be aware of others around you, especially when travelling alone or to places of worship. If you notice anything suspicious, call the emergency number which is 999, the non-emergency police number which is 111, or the Incident Room.”
He repeated that number too.
“Turning now to the incident at Otterburn Ranges, I know that all those associated with the army encampment join me in extending their deepest sympathies to the family of Layla Bruce, who was killed in the early hours of yesterday morning during the course of a routine training exercise. Whilst our enquiries remain ongoing, I can confirm that none of the firers who participated in that exercise was responsible for her death.”
He heard the rumblings of confusion and shock amongst the gathered crowd, followed inevitably by the thrill of a new and vastly more exciting story.
“Chief Inspector—”
“DCI Ryan—”
He ignored the flurry of questions, determined to finish what he had to say.
“On your screen is a picture of twenty-one-year-old Layla Bruce. She was a vulnerable person, who was reported missing by her family in early 2015. We’d like to know more about Layla, and about her life after the time she left home in St Boswells. If you’re watching this, or listening to this, and think you knew Layla, please come forward. You can speak to us confidentially, anonymously, and at any time of day. Thank you.”
A tidal wave of reporters surged forward, and he barely held back his frustration.
“One at a time, please,” he said, and pointed to the first hand he saw, waving frantically at him from the front.
“DCI Ryan! Is it true that one of the soldiers at Otterburn Camp committed suicide, earlier today?”
Ryan swore inwardly. Private Stephenson’s family had requested confidentiality for as long as possible, and he also would have preferred a little longer than a few hours to complete enquiries, without the press sniffing around to sensationalise matters.
“A soldier lost their life earlier this morning, in an apparent suicide,” Ryan was forced to confirm. “Any further comment would prejudice the ongoing investigation.”
“Is the suicide linked to the death of Layla Bruce? Did the soldier murder Layla Bruce?” somebody called out. “Is that why no other arrests have been made?”
Despite best efforts, they could never prevent the leak of information such as this, nor the conclusions people would draw.
“No comment,” he said, firmly.
His eye caught on a reflection of the blown-up image of Layla Bruce in a camera lens, which was hanging on one of the exhibition stands behind him, and he thought of the person who had robbed her of life. Was it a crusade-killer, on some holy mission, or was it your bog-standard psychopath, incapable of feeling any remorse?
Ryan leaned forward, and spoke to that person now.
“To the person who killed Layla Bruce, I want you to know something,” he said, and the tone of his voice compelled the baying crowd to listen. “There isn’t anywhere far enough, or dark enough, for you to hide. You think you know these hills? These are our hills, too. Northumberland isn’t a hunting ground, and its people aren’t your prey.”
There was an infinitesimal pause, before he made a promise.
“In case it isn’t obvious, the shoe’s on the other foot, now. You aren’t the hunter, anymore. You’re the prey. My prey. That is all.”
CHAPTER 25
He listened to the press conference on the local radio, from the inside of his van.
You’re the prey, the detective said. My prey.
He caught sight of himself in the rear-view mirror and wondered, idly, whether he would have been better off dying in Iraq. Perhaps it would have been a kindness to eradicate the sickness; to eliminate the thread of dishonour he’d brought to the uniform and to Her Majesty.
He’d liked it, you see.
The killing.
It’s what had first attracted him to the profession, years ago, but it wasn’t the kind of answer recruiters liked to hear. I like to kill people wasn’t high on their checklist of attributes to look for in a soldier.
To his credit, at least he had channelled his impulses. There might be sickness, but there was also logic, and reason. He chose his victims with care, and with precision, and limited himself to what he considered to be ‘undesirable’ members of society.
Take the creature presently trying to work her way out of the basement room, in the old pele tower he’d bought years ago. She’d be frantic, by now, just as the others had been. It would have been easy to kill her, there at the back of the service station, but where was the lesson in that? She spent her days stuffing heroin in her veins, and she opened her legs to pay for it all.
Was her freedom what he had fought for?
He shook his head, disgustedly.
At least he would give her a sporting chance.
So long as she could run, of course.
* * *
The woman’s breath was coming out in pants, now, as she stumbled around the darkened room.
“Help! Please, help!”
She clamped a hand over her own mouth, remembering that the engine she had heard was more likely to be him, not some kind stranger come to rescue her.
Oh, God.
Please, God. Help me.
Her hands splayed on the wall and she tried once again to find a window, or a hidden door…anything she could use to escape. At first, there was only damp stone, but then she felt the sharp nick of a razor, and the scratch of nails. She cried out, snatching her hand away.
Then, a thought struck.
The razors hadn’t been stuck all over the walls—only in one concentrated area, on the back wall.
Perhaps, as a deterrent to curious hands.
She licked her lips and placed her hands on the wall again, this time with extreme care. Her fingers tapped it, as if the wall were braille, moving in lines up and down. She was starting to lose hope, when her fingertips connected, not with the sharp end of some metal, but with something raw and wooden at about the same hei
ght as her head.
She risked placing her hands against it, and pushed slightly, hearing the give of a hinge at the top.
It was a window, she realised. Boarded up with plyboard, and painted many times in black.
Elation gave way to crippling fear, when she heard the sound of a car door slamming outside.
Shortly after, there came the soft tread of footsteps on the floorboards above her.
One, two, three…fifteen.
He’d stopped, directly above her head.
CHAPTER 26
The soldier and his dog made their way back to the underpass, bellies full of homemade chicken broth and bread. There’d been a big line at the kitchen, that night—the biggest he’d ever seen. It was the same at the shelter, too, and he’d known just by looking at it that he didn’t stand a chance, even though he’d saved the money all week to sleep in a proper bed.
When he’d been a younger man with a home of his own, he remembered wondering what kind of person ended up on the streets.
Couldn’t they get a job?
Couldn’t they sort themselves out?
He’d asked those questions, and more. He’d walked past men like him, along the same underpass, wearing his best togs—like the young philosopher the day before. He’d probably had a girl on his arm, too, but he hadn’t bothered to stop or ask any names. He’d probably turned away to stare intently at the floor, as most people did when they passed him now.
He found his usual patch, which was blessedly clear of any usurpers or suspicious-looking yellow puddles and began to make their bed for the night. He had some fresh cardboard, which he laid out first, and then huddled into his sleeping bag. The lass down at the shelter hadn’t had a room for him, but she’d run the bag through the wash, so it smelled like lavender.
Nice kid, he thought. She didn’t have to do that.
He looked up and down both sides of the underpass, along its shadowed concrete tunnels, and leaned his head back against the wall. The dog settled himself against his hip, resting its wolfish snout against his thigh, and looked up at him, as if to say, “Well?”
“Bossy,” he muttered, but obliged the mutt with a long scratch between the ears. “There. Is that better?”
If dogs could smile, this one did.
* * *
She began to tremble, and she stood still, her body frozen in fear.
The footsteps had stopped somewhere above her head, as if he already knew where she was. A fatalistic sense of doom washed over her, as her body slowly began to shut down, accepting the inevitable.
There was nobody to miss her.
Nobody to care.
For the best, for the best, for the best.
But then, something happened. Some forgotten part of herself cried out, a primal scream to remind her that her life was precious. Just as precious as anybody else’s.
She spun around to the wall and pressed her hands against the small wooden rectangle above her head and began tracing her fingers over the edges to search for an opening, or a hinge. The nails and razors caught her skin until the warm blood ran over her wrists, but she gritted her teeth and bore down.
Above her head, the footsteps moved again, and she let out a small, whimpering sound of panic.
He was coming for her.
* * *
They’d come for him, again.
Alfie Rodgers had brought reinforcements, this time, and the soldier knew his thinking time had come to an end.
“Hello, mate! Nice to see you!”
Alfie was flanked by three heavy-set men of different ages, but each of them had the cold, dead eyes of a shark. He looked this way and that, but the underpass had grown quiet, now that most people had settled themselves in one of the many bars and restaurant dotted around the city.
“What’ve we got here, then?”
Alfie dropped down beside the dog, and reached out a hand to stroke it, but the dog let out a deep warning growl and bared its teeth.
Something flickered in the teenager’s eyes, something ugly and cruel.
Later, he thought. Business first.
“Right then,” he said, cheerfully. “Have you had a chance to think about my offer? Because I don’t think you heard me right, when we were chatting yesterday.”
“I heard you fine.”
Alfie giggled.
“It speaks! Look, lads, the spaz has a voice!”
The soldier looked at his animated face, imagined burying his fist in it, then remembered the kid was right. He didn’t have the strength in his hands, anymore.
“I think the problem here is, you don’t know what you’ve been missing. Does he?”
The men around him smiled, and began to move closer. Though the image was blurred, especially in his right eye, the soldier thought he saw a needle.
“This’ll only hurt for a minute, mate. Then it’ll be euphoric, I promise.”
The dog stood up and snarled deeply, his body trembling, ruddy brown fur standing on end as he prepared to defend his new master.
“Get rid of the fucking dog,” Alfie said.
One of the men brought out a retractable truncheon and raised it above his head, preparing to strike. The soldier and his dog both moved as one, the animal circling around, while the soldier raised himself to fight, one last time.
* * *
He was dressed entirely in black, in a Kevlar-enhanced bodysuit he’d commissioned from a contact in China. Looking at himself in the mirror, he thought he looked like Batman, or one of the other dark superheroes that society would never truly understand, but to whom they should be grateful.
Thanks to him, the streets were a better place.
He needed the ritual; he understood that a part of him—perhaps the only remaining part that was human—needed to think he was serving a purpose. It had to be more than bloodlust; more than the base desire to kill.
Some days, he really believed the lie.
He could spend many happy hours thinking of all his public service; but, as the recent police press conference had reminded him, society would never see it that way. The chief inspector would see him as a monster, some kind of freak.
And he would be right.
He heard a whimpering cry beneath his feet, and smiled to himself. There was no military exercise this evening—he’d already checked, and wouldn’t make the same mistake again. There would be nobody to interrupt him, this time, and he wanted to make the most of it.
Whistling an old Northumbrian ditty to himself, he reached for the night vision goggles hanging on a peg beside the door and slid them around his neck, ready to put on when they moved outside.
He hoped she’d last a bit longer than the last one.
She’d been a terrible disappointment.
* * *
They came from nowhere.
Later, all the soldier would think was that his guardian angels seemed to materialise from nowhere; four men dressed in jeans and dark t-shirts, their faces concealed, and their arms covered in tattoos. They fell upon Alfie and his goons with all the force of a typhoon, using fists and knives and righteous anger to drive them away, grunting and hurling threats as they went.
He lay on the ground, curled into a ball around the dog, whose breathing was shallow after several kicks to the stomach.
Their leader came over to kneel beside him and spoke through the woollen ski mask.
“Y’alreet, mate? How bad are you?”
“The dog,” was all he said. “The dog’s hurt bad.”
The man signalled the others, and they moved forward.
“Don’t—don’t hurt him,” the soldier said, barely holding back tears. “Please.”
“We ain’t gonna hurt him, mate. We’ll take him to the vet, how’s that?”
The soldier looked away.
“I don’t have the money to pay.”
“It’s on us, mate. C’mon, let’s get going.”
“How—how will I know he’s alright?” the soldier asked.
“You’re coming with us,” the man said, and held out a hand to help him off the ground.
Through his hazy vision, the soldier’s eye fell on a small tattoo on the underside of the man’s wrist. It was small enough to be concealed beneath the cuffs of a shirt, but large enough for its meaning to be understood by those who knew.
It was a black circle, with three interlocking triangles.
“You coming then, pal? You deserve better than what you’ve been getting out here. I’ve seen you here before, and I know you were a soldier. We need good men like you—principled men. Will you join us?”
The soldier looked across at the dog, who lay cradled in another man’s arms.
He took the hand that was offered.
CHAPTER 27
Almost giddy with the anticipation of what was to come, he moved the coffee table to the side and rolled back the woollen rug that covered most of the floor in the open-plan living space to reveal a trap door he’d personally cut into the floor. In the old days, when the stone tower had first been built, the basement beneath the wooden floor had been used as a cold store, for grain.
Now, he used it to store other things.
He paused, wondering what kind of mood he’d find her in. They were all purring and attentive, when they stuck their heads beside the window and asked if he was looking for business. They were smiling and polite when he gave them a smile and told them to hop in. Some of their smiles faded when he told them his place wasn’t far, but he’d been blessed with the kind of features most women—and some men—seemed to trust.
