Harte

by Robert Innes

  “So, tell us,” she said, leaning back in her chair. “Explain your great masterplan to us. We know that you’ve got a problem with successful women.”

  Frost turned his attention to her with a look of disgust. “Pardon?”

  “There was a pattern to the deaths, Thomas,” Sally replied hotly. “Julie Carlisle was the head of Joslin’s Technology, Donna Atkins was a regional manager to the largest supermarket in the city, Leanne Egan was a very successful self-published author, Grace Hodgekiss, a CEO and then Kerry, the woman you failed to kill tonight, she’s a politician, the face of Manchester’s place in the House of Commons. It’s not exactly hard to see a little man syndrome.”

  “And what about you?” Frost snarled to her, his mood seeming to change instantly. “How successful are you? It wasn’t your face that the world was seeing whenever one of those women died, it was your superior here.”

  “We’re the same rank,” Blake told him.

  “But she still answers to you, doesn’t she?” Frost replied, his eyes set on Sally. “And why? Because the public are hardly going to be reassured by some little trollop in a police uniform trying to play with the big boys? That’s basic human psychology.”

  “That’s basic chauvinism,” Sally said. “What happened, Thomas? Did Daddy teach you all that? Tell you that boys are better than girls? Bless. It’s no wonder you had to hide behind the little notes you left us beside each body. Not one person in the city would have been too scared to leave the house for somebody as pathetic as you.”

  Frost’s lip curled in fury.

  “Harte!” shouted Gresham into Blake’s ear, so loud that Blake was sure that Frost could have heard it through the wall. “Get this interview under control!”

  But before Blake could do anything, Frost had launched himself across the table and had his hands around Sally’s throat. She landed on the floor, her eyes wide in horror, Frost straddling her, his teeth gritted tightly in effort as he attempted to strangle her.

  “Learn some respect!” Frost yelled. “Know your place!”

  As an alarm blared around them, Blake took hold of Frost’s shoulders and pulled as hard as he could, but Frost now had his legs wrapped around Sally’s body, similar to the way he had with Kerry Nightingale.

  The door to the interview room burst open and two more officers, followed by Gresham, charged in, immediately grabbing hold of Frost and pulling him off Sally. She crawled to the wall and coughed heavily, massaging her throat, tears in her eyes as Frost struggled against the officer’s grip.

  “Get him in a cell!” Gresham ordered.

  As Frost was marched out of the room, he pulled back and looked Blake straight in the eye.

  “This isn’t the end,” he snarled. “Me and you? We will meet again! You and your little tart!”

  A globule of spit left his mouth and landed near Sally. As Blake knelt down to his friend’s side to see if she was alright, all they could hear was the sound of Frost screaming as he was dragged away down the corridor.

  One

  Present Day

  The village of Harmschapel was, typically, a place of habit. Normally, the only person who could be seen roaming the streets before seven o’clock in the morning was the postman, closely followed, once a week, by the bin lorry, rattling its way around the village before disappearing over a hill to the next location on its round.

  This morning, however, there was somebody else wandering through the streets.

  Blake Harte was walking slowly down the hill, carrying a carton of milk that he had bought from the shop, having been standing outside the door the second it opened. Blake was normally an early riser, having become used to waking up at all hours for his shifts as a police officer, but it was unusual for him to be up and about this early for any other reason. The past few months, however, had seen Blake’s sleep disturbed by recurring nightmares and now, the sight of him wandering the streets early in the morning because he was sick of constantly tossing and turning in bed in an attempt to get back to sleep again had become more common than he would have liked.

  The nightmare was always the same and stemmed from an incident that had happened to him as a little boy.

  When he was ten, Blake had broken into an old, abandoned house on his street, encouraged by the other children in his class as the house had become quite infamous amongst their fertile imaginations. When he had finally managed to climb in through the smallest of gaps in a downstairs window, the only way in or out of the locked, boarded up, old house, he had discovered the body of an old woman with a knife sticking out of her back.

  The incident had traumatised Blake for many years afterwards and it had become a staple of his life that night after night in his dreams, he would once again discover the old woman and he would be unable to move as her horrified expression stared at him. Sometimes she would even chase him around the house, but often she would just sit there, staring at him until Blake woke up. Although the nightmares had stopped as he had gotten older, the past few months had seen the dreams starting again, and he had once more become wracked with the same feelings of terror that had grasped him all those years ago.

  Blake pulled his ecig from his pocket and flopped himself wearily on a bench, watching a pair of starlings dancing in the sky above The Dog’s Tail pub. He was trying his hardest to stop smoking, again, but his ecig was starting to feel more inadequate as each sleepless night passed by. At least, he thought miserably as he watched the starlings chase each other over the rooftops and out of sight, the dream had not woken him up in the middle of the night this time. He glanced at his watch and sighed heavily, zipping his coat up to the top in an effort to keep himself warm.

  The dream had been different this time, he realised, though the details had already begun to fade away. He was sure that this time, somewhere along the way, the dream had featured Thomas Frost. He shuddered involuntarily. It had very little to do with the cold. The last thing he needed was Frost haunting him at night too.

  “I thought there was a distinct lack of snoring.”

  Blake nearly jumped out of his skin and turned his head to see his boyfriend, Harrison Baxter, standing behind him. He was wrapped up in his dressing gown, his Doctor Who slippers poking out the bottom.

  “I don’t snore,” Blake replied with a small smile.

  Harrison snorted. “Okay.”

  “What are you doing out here?” Blake asked him as Harrison sat down next to him on the bench. “It’s freezing, you’ll catch your death.”

  “I wake up to find my boyfriend missing,” Harrison replied. “At seven AM. Now that means he’s either having an affair with the postman, or there’s something wrong. Did you have another dream?”

  Blake nodded. He must have looked especially miserable and sorry for himself as Harrison pulled him closer and wrapped Blake in his dressing gown with his arms around him.

  “It’s alright. I promise. We’re going to make this okay.”

  There had been a time, when Blake and Harrison had first met, that such strength and conviction would have seemed inconceivable. Harrison had just experienced the death of his ex-partner, Daniel, who had regularly given him beatings due to his own problems, and then had found himself in another relationship with another man who had turned out to be a murderer. Blake had been there for him throughout that short but intense few months and had seen him gradually grow into a more confident young man, though it had taken some coaxing. Now, the tables had turned, and it was Harrison who had become the shoulder to cry on. The difference between them, that Blake was only too aware of, was that Harrison was much more forthcoming with his inner feelings than Blake had ever been.

  “I’m just so tired,” Blake murmured. “Why? Why are they bothering me again?”

  “You remember what your therapist said?” Harrison said softly, squeezing Blake in even closer to him. “It could be all to do with work. You’re a detective, Blake. That means that when murders happen, you have to be there. And it’s hardly all been
stolen garden gnomes and helping old ladies across the street. We’ve talked about this. Shootings, stabbings, strangling, the lot – and that’s only since you moved to Harmschapel. It’s bound to have shifted something in your subconscious.”

  Blake raised an eyebrow. “Since when did you believe in the subconscious?”

  Harrison shrugged. “Since I started going out with somebody who clearly had problems with his.”

  Blake chuckled and rested his head on Harrison’s shoulder.

  For a few moments, the two of them remained silent. The two starlings came back into view and Blake knew that his nature loving boyfriend was watching them without even looking at him.

  “Is Matti still asleep?” Blake asked at last.

  “I assume so,” Harrison replied. “Though he’s a quieter sleeper than you if he is.”

  They currently had a temporary lodger. PC Billy Mattison, an officer at Blake’s station had had a falling out with his girlfriend, fellow officer PC Mini Patil and the argument was entirely Mattison’s fault.

  Recently, a new constable, Lisa Fox, had begun working at Harmschapel Police Station and it had quickly become obvious that she had turned Mattison’s head. What had started out as, Blake had hoped, harmless flirty banter had quickly turned into the two of them being accidently photographed in an embrace by the local newspaper. Patil had swiftly kicked Mattison out of the house and Blake had agreed to allow him to stay on their sofa. It made very little difference to Blake as today was his last day at work before he had two weeks off and was going to his old stomping ground of Manchester to see his best friend, Sally-Ann Matthews for her thirtieth birthday.

  “Come on,” Harrison said, linking arms with him under the dressing gown. “Let’s have some tea. It’s cold and frankly far too early to be having deep conversations without caffeine. You can help me feed Betty. I think she’s really going to miss you while you’re away.”

  Blake snorted in derision at the thought of Harrison’s pet goat as they stood up and started walking back to Juniper Cottage.

  “What, like the school bully misses his victim when he’s not there? That goat hates me. Almost a year you’ve been living with me and the most affection I’ve had from her is that one time last month when she didn’t try and break my kneecaps. And I’m pretty sure that was only because she tripped herself up on the way to trying.”

  Harrison started to laugh as they rounded the corner to the street where Juniper Cottage stood, lit up by the morning sunset.

  But then, Harrison’s face fell, and he stopped dead in his tracks.

  “Blake,” he murmured.

  Blake frowned as Harrison’s grip tightened on his arm and then looked to where Harrison was staring wide-eyed.

  Lying on the pavement on the other side of the road was the body of a man, face down on the tarmac. He was sprawled out at a strange angle, unmoving, and as Blake and Harrison got closer, Blake realised that he looked very familiar.

  “Is that…?” Harrison ventured.

  Blake knelt down by the man’s body and gently turned him over, taking in the face and sighing heavily. The tight jawline and flawless features of the man before them were unmistakable.

  “Yeah. It’s Tom.”

  “What’s happened to him?” Harrison asked, frowning. “Is he drunk or something? I only saw him last night. He seemed okay then. Well, as okay as Tom can be.”

  Blake’s tilted Tom’s head carefully to the side and grimaced. The hair at the back of his skull was matted and the tarmac beneath his head was stained with a dark red hue.

  “It’s blood,” Blake murmured. “I think somebody attacked him.”

  Ignoring Harrison’s gasp, Blake immediately placed his fingers against Tom’s neck. As much as an enemy that Tom had made of Blake since arriving in the village, Blake had no wish for him to die, especially like this. To his relief, he felt a weak pulsation in his neck.

  “He’s still alive,” Blake said sharply. “Call an ambulance.”

  As Harrison tapped on his phone, Blake looked closer at Tom’s injury on the back of his head. The more he examined it, the more he became convinced that he had been hit deliberately with something hard and that whoever the perpetrator was had most likely taken him by surprise. The main question Blake had, apart from who the culprit was, was why Tom had been out on his own so late that he was able to be discovered so early in the morning.

  “Tom? Tom, can you hear me?”

  Tom did not respond and Blake was sure his pulse was getting weaker.

  “What’s going on here then?” said a voice behind them.

  Neither of them had heard the approach of Sergeant Michael Gardiner. He was standing behind them with a surprised expression, his arms tightly behind his back.

  “It’s Tom Pattison,” he told Gardiner.

  “Oh, I’m fully aware of who it is,” Gardiner replied over the sound of Harrison on the phone to the emergency services. “Why is he on the ground in need of medical attention?”

  “She’s asking if he’s breathing,” Harrison told Blake, holding the phone tightly to his ear.

  “Barely,” Blake replied, ignoring Gardiner. “Just tell her he’s been hit on the back of the head with something, he’s got a weak pulse and he needs help now.”

  As Harrison continued informing the operator of the situation, Blake spotted a mobile phone next to Tom. The screen had a long crack along it, presumably having been dropped when Tom was hit.

  “Who was he on the phone to?” Blake murmured, before standing up and addressing Gardiner. “We better call the station. Tell them what’s happened.”

  “You’re saying you just found him like this?” Gardiner said, looking annoyingly sceptical. “Just lying out here in the middle of the pavement?”

  “Yes,” Blake said. He could already see where Gardiner’s imagination was taking him and he did not like it. “Don’t even go there, Michael.”

  “Go where?” Gardiner said innocently. “Oh, you mean to the assumption that because I’ve found you and Harrison standing over the barely alive body of someone who was threatening your relationship and has basically given you nothing but trouble since he arrived, that one of you is responsible?”

  Blake closed his eyes in an attempt to control his temper. It did not surprise him that Gardiner knew about the troubles he had been having with Tom. Harmschapel was the sort of village where gossip and rumours were aplenty as most people knew each other. He remembered it had not taken very long for the news of his relationship with Harrison to get around when it had first started, and he was often surprised by people he regarded as mere acquaintances asking him about details of his life he had assumed only a few people knew about. As well as that, Gardiner was about the only person he had met in Harmschapel, other than Tom, who just seemed to know how to push his buttons.

  “Just call the station,” Blake repeated slowly. “Let them know what’s happened. He’s still alive, we need to find out who did this to him. Whoever it is, they must live in this village, surely.”

  “Ambulance is on its way, Blake,” Harrison said, walking back towards them.

  “So why are you both up and about so early?” Gardiner queried. “You’re not due at the station till later this morning. Just fancied an early morning stroll, did you? How romantic.”

  “Michael,” Blake said sharply. “I am in no mood for this. Just call the station.”

  He glanced nervously at the house Tom was currently living in and sighed heavily.

  “I need to tell Jacqueline.”

  “Do you want me to come with you?” Harrison asked.

  Blake shook his head. “I don’t think so,” he said, glancing at Tom on the ground. “This is police business after all.”

  “Exactly,” Gardiner said, needlessly straightening the collar of his uniform. “And I think, for the moment at least, you should take a backseat on this one, don’t you? Leave it to the officers that haven’t got romantic issues clouding their judgment.”

&nb
sp; He pushed Blake aside and marched towards the door of Jacqueline’s cottage, knocking sharply on the door.

  Blake and Harrison exchanged annoyed looks as they waited for the front door to open.

  “Be tactful, Michael,” Blake said sternly. “Remember, she is his mother.”

  “I don’t need you to tell me how to do my job, DS Harte,” Gardiner replied pompously. “I am quite aware of the level of discretion required in a situation like this.”

  The door opened and Jacqueline stood before them. She looked, as might have been expected given the early hour of the day, quite dishevelled and tired, a dark blue, satin dressing gown wrapped tightly around her. Her bright red hair, which normally was pinned up in a tall beehive, was resembling something closer to a bird’s nest.

  “Michael,” she murmured. “What can I do for you?”

  “Your son’s been attacked,” Gardiner replied curtly, pointing at Tom on the ground.

  Blake rolled his eyes and turned to face the road leading towards Clackton, the nearest large town to Harmschapel, and where the ambulance would most likely be coming from. The morning was clear and, in the distance, he could just make out the sight of blue flashing lights.

  Jacqueline stepped out and wrapped the dressing gown tighter around herself.

  “Tom?” she said quietly, her eyes wide. “What do you mean?”

  She turned and gasped as she saw her son on the ground, her hand flying up to her mouth. “Oh my…” she whispered. “Tom? Tom!”

  Blake grabbed her as she went to run to him.

  “Jacqueline, come on, come on. It’s going to be alright. He’s still alive, the ambulance is on its way. They’re going to do everything they can.”

  “Well, I shall ring the station,” Gardiner announced as the flashing lights of the ambulance grew closer. “No doubt Inspector Angel will want to speak to you about this incident, DS Harte.”

  Blake ignored him as he gripped Jacqueline tightly.

  “We’ll find who did this to him, Jacqueline, I promise,” he said. “And he’s going to be okay. We found him in time, I know we did.”