“He’s coming,” she managed to get out between hiccoughing bouts of quasi-mirth.
I dropped my phone, it was useless. And pulled my gun. Swinging ‘round to face the still open door. The hallway was silent of stampeding feet, no more shouts or screams could be heard above the persistent blare of the fire alarm. A fire engine at Pitt Street, no more than thirty seconds away, started up.
I was out of time.
My eyes flicked down to Carole sitting tied securely to the table, then back up to the front door, my heart in my throat, my stomach bottomed out and on the floor.
Oh, fuck.
“It’s gonna be all right,” I said, both hands steady on my service weapon. I would shoot him if he stood in that door.
This had been a trap. I knew that now. I couldn’t leave, not with Carole still sitting chained up here. I couldn’t call for help, something was suddenly jamming the signal on my phone. I flicked my eyes around the open plan room, trying to find inspiration for a better strategy of defence.
And landed on a dome covered camera mounted on the ceiling in the corner.
“He’s been watching, hasn’t he?” I asked.
Carole laughed. Snorted back some snot and said, “He’s coming.”
And then a canister rolled into the room and a burst of gas and light and smoke filled the air.
I didn’t even have time to pull the trigger. I wouldn’t have been shooting at anything anyway. The canister had been the advance guard. As my body doubled over, and my eyes welled shut with bitter stinging tears, and my throat clogged up with gunk, and my chest burst apart with the need to breathe fresh air, I knew the rear guard was still coming.
“He’s coming,” Carole whimpered through her own toxic hell on earth.
And then I blacked out.
Chapter Thirty-Four
“When it looks like the end and you know you’re on your own. Don’t fucking think for a second you can’t still win.”
I woke up in small increments. The sound of a low, rhythmic humming fluctuated in my ears. And then the smell of burned candle wax tickled my nose. Followed, an indeterminate amount of time later, by the stretch of my neck as my head lolled back and forth.
My eyes felt like dead weights; I struggled to lift my lids. My arms ached. My chest hurt. Breathing was difficult. I was sure I couldn’t feel my hands. When I tried to shift my legs something rattled.
Oh, God. This was not good.
I forced my eyes open, but saw only black. It took too long to realise I was blindfolded. Panic set in big time after that.
My breaths sawed in and out of my mouth. My chest constricted with anxiety and whatever the fuck had been in that gas canister back in Greys Ave. I was sure I wasn’t there anymore. The fire engines would have arrived and even if Falkner had closed and locked the apartment door, ignoring the fire alarm, the neighbours who had seen me enter would have told the Police by now.
Something echoed in the room. Feet? Steps? Whatever it was, it sounded far away and nearby at the same time. I knew where I was long before I accepted it. My brain trying futilely to think of another conclusion, anything than ending up here.
Awareness returned in jarring and colourful clarity, despite the black cloth that covered my eyes. I was in the Irreverent Inferno. And I was tied to a fucking cross.
Another sound; a thump, followed by a swish. My mind raced trying to put an image to the indistinct noises. My imagination fuelled by too many dark years as a police detective and honed to perfection by a warped and twisted world.
I almost whimpered. The pathetic sound so close to spewing out of my lips. I bit down hard on my tongue and tasted blood. Then lifted my head and spat the tainted saliva out. I heard it splat as it hit the tiled floor.
“Do I need to gag you as well, Lamb?” a voice said with a very recognisable accent.
“Grand Master,” I replied, for all intents and purposes sounding quite normal.
Nathaniel Marcroft laughed. It was predictably chilling.
“Where’s Kyan, Mr Marcroft?” I asked.
“He’ll arrive with the others. Are you prepared to behave, Lamb?”
“You know my name,” I insisted. “Why not use it?”
“Here you have no name. No identity. Just the chance to transcend Hell.”
“I don’t want your Paradise,” I said, twisting my head when his voice moved in front of me. I tried to picture the cavern at the Irreverent Inferno. I tried to imagine the cross I was chained to where the altar would have been. That meant the majority of the vaulted space was before me, providing a vast area for my captor to roam.
And then come at me from.
“We all want Paradise, Lamb,” Nathaniel said. “Even when we think we don’t deserve it. Do you deserve it?”
I ignored the question. Answering would not serve a purpose here. Nathaniel Marcroft was batshit crazy. Any conversation with the man would only end up going around in circles. Probably nine fucking times, at a guess.
“Why am I tied to a cross?” I asked instead.
“It has to be a cross,” he mumbled, as though talking to himself. “Pay for our sins.”
“Have you paid for yours?”
“Little lamb,” he said right beside my ear, making me jump. The chains rattled, my wrists twisted, sending shooting stabs of pain down each arm. I couldn’t feel my fingers, but the coldness where they should have been told me I’d been hanging here a while. “We shall pay together, no?”
The blindfold came off in a sudden rush of brightness. Even though I knew the cavern was being lit by naked flames, I squeezed my eyes closed, feeling tears streak down my cheeks from the sting the light had caused. I sucked in a deep breath and blinked them open, aware Marcroft had just given me an advantage I couldn’t waste.
It took too long to focus. My vision was blurred beyond what normal light deprivation should have allowed. I didn’t feel drugged, but whatever had been in that cannister had a lasting effect. By the time I could see more than a few feet in front of me, I’d already heard her snivels.
“Carole,” I said, straining against the chains on my wrists and ankles. “It’s going to be OK,” I promised, in a blatant attempt to calm her with absolutely no regard to the facts.
I was chained to a cross in a madman’s chamber. And so was she.
Both crosses faced each other across the grand space of the Irreverent Inferno cavern, in a macabre display that made me think of a tragic Shakespearean play. Our feet were mere inches off the floor, making our bodies suspended low enough to be reached by any man of reasonable height. Nathaniel Marcroft was over six feet tall. He could reach our necks easily.
Had I got it all wrong? Was Falkner even involved? Had Carole actually said his name? Or was that gasp she’d given when I did over the phone been confusion, not fear? What the hell did Nathaniel Marcroft have to do with the HEAT arson attacks?
I felt woefully ill equipped to figure it out. The dots weren’t just disconnecting, they were flying apart inside my head.
We were both dressed in sheer, white, flowing dresses similar to what the woman had worn the night of Damon’s lust circle test. Carole’s swamped her fragile frame. Mine left little to the imagination. At least she’d been wearing a bra. I closed my eyes and then snapped them open locating Nathaniel Marcroft across the room.
He stood watching me. Not Carole. It was as if he couldn’t hear her murmured pleas to be set free. She couldn’t rock back and forth, like she had in the apartment on Greys Ave. But her body swayed, making the chains rattle and clink against the wood of the cross.
She hadn’t been blindfolded, which may or may not have been a saving grace. But Marcroft didn’t even see her, his eyes all on me.
“Comfortable, Lamb?” he asked.
“Is this what you did to Samantha Hayes?” I asked. “Helped her pay for her sins?”
“There are no names in here. Just transcendence.”
“You took her life, by squeezing her neck so tightly s
he couldn’t breathe,” I persisted.
“The pursuit of Paradise is paved in the depths of Hell,” Marcroft commented mildly.
“You left her lying on a pavement across the street, arms outstretched.”
“My pursuit has been more particular than others.”
“Legs crossed at the ankles, displayed as if crucified.”
“A work of art.” Was that in reference to Samantha? Or in regard to his path through Hell?
“But it wasn’t enough to just kill her,” I pressed on. “You had to make her lust for it.”
“Lust is immutable.”
“Was that why you killed her? Because she lusted?”
“Carnal malefactors, all of us.”
“Samantha was a carnal malefactor, wasn’t she, Nathaniel?”
“The journey to Paradise is the cleanser of sins.”
“You are a carnal malefactor, as well, aren’t you, Nathaniel?”
“Each circle is our right to atone.”
“Were you atoning for your sins when you asphyxiated Samantha Hayes with your bare hands?”
“The trap is being willing to leave them.”
I paused.
“You haven’t left them,” I whispered, suddenly seeing the dots connect. “You’re still trapped in the nine circles of Hell. And enjoying it.”
“There is so much to enjoy, Lamb. I shall show you.”
“And Samantha? Did you offer to show her too?”
He smiled. The bastard was several sandwiches short of a picnic, but still managed to stay just shy of crazy enough to admit premeditated murder.
“She was perfect, I should think,” I added. “A true believer in sin.”
“Lust,” he agreed, but said no more.
“Your favourite circle?”
“One of them.”
“The others? What circles make the top of your list, Nathaniel?”
“Grand Master,” he corrected.
I nodded my head, accepting the reprimand, feeling the stretch of my arms as I effected the movement. In this second he was lucid. He’d allowed the use of his real name before, because he’d not even heard it spoken. I had to press now or I’d lose him before he admitted his guilt.
“What are your favourite circles, Grand Master?”
He slowly walked toward me, the black of his robe swirling around his feet, swishing over the tiles in a manner that made it look like he floated; hiding his shoes. I forced my eyes to his face, unencumbered by the hood, which hung ineffectually down his back. He was alone in his domain with his lambs. He didn’t need to hide in here. Not when he was setting the stage.
I held still as he came abreast of me, his elegant finger coming out and resting under my chin. He tilted my head, making me look up at the arches in the ceiling. I felt his breath against my exposed throat, my rapid pulse more noticeable at this angle, the flesh taut over the fluttering flow of adrenaline fuelled blood.
A hot palm wrapped around my neck and pressed. Not enough to cut off my air, but enough to hint at it. The top of my head bit into the wood of the cross at my back. I wanted to swallow, but swallowing would hurt under the pressure of his hold. He tightened his fingers, the tips of them reaching far around the side of my neck, his thumb directly above my pulse.
I gasped for breath as he increased the pressure; short burst of air incompletely sucked in. My body strained, the chains rattled almost delicately above my head. Sweat started to coat my brow. I was beyond panic now, but I would not show it. I fought my body’s physiological response to being slowly strangled.
“Can you feel it, Lamb?” he asked. I couldn’t answer, even if every fibre in my body wanted to yell at him to get the fuck off. “I control your level of oxygen. I control how dizzy you become. How lightheaded. Sensations that mimic pleasure. You’ll start to hallucinate,” he whispered against the underside of my chin. “And if I time it right, if I perfect the art, I can have you addicted to the sensation and begging for more.”
“Sick,” I gasped, the pressure of talking making my vision darken. “Bastard,” I hissed.
His hand tightened and then all pressure was gone. I was left gasping for air, desperately wanting to touch my neck where I was sure bruises would be showing, and shaking from head to toe with a sudden release of endorphins.
I was alive. Always a cause for the body to celebrate.
“You would not have been a good example,” Marcroft commented, lifting his hood up to cover his face. “You aren’t yet willing to relinquish control. You fight your pleasure. It is offensive.”
“Then why am I here?” I croaked.
“Your circle is not one of the lower. Your circle is right at the top.”
I struggled to list the nine circles of Hell in my mind. I got as far as gluttony and had to start again. I could breathe easier now, but my body was remembering the feeling of not getting enough oxygen. The sensation of being out of control. There was no pleasure in it for me. And even if I failed Marcroft’s little “example” I was betting he received some form of pleasure from the act, all the same.
Limbo. The first circle.
Lust. The second.
Gluttony.
Greed.
Anger. Heresy. Violence. And Fraud.
That left only one at the top. The upper echelon of Dante’s Hell.
Treachery. I was destined for treachery, but for the life of me, couldn’t work it out.
“Is Samantha in Paradise?” I asked, in one last ditch effort to corner Marcroft. I knew he’d done it. The evidence was all there. And although nothing connected him directly to the actual homicide, the circumstantial nature of it was impossible to ignore.
I was lashed to a fucking cross and he’d just tried to asphyxiate me, all in an effort to mimic sensations of lust.
Sick. Fucker!
But I needed him to say it. It was a lifeline I seemed to be grasping for. I needed to hear him say it.
“Am I to end up in Paradise with her?” I pressed. “Is this what you do?”
Nothing. Not a fucking thing. I bit back the sob as though a lifeline had slipped through my fingers and disappeared.
When it looks like the end and you know you’re on your own. Don’t fucking think for a second you can’t still win.
Did you think that, Carl? When Kenny Tyndall pulled the trigger and you felt that bullet slide in? When the air rushed out of your lungs and wide open space yawned at your back? Did you think you could still win?
He promised to watch over me on the street. “Michaels for immediate protection. Pierce to keep an eye out for you in CIB. And now on the street, I’ll watch over you too.”
I lifted my head and looked toward the door to the cavern, willing Carl to come barging in.
He didn’t.
But Kyan Marcroft did.
He was dressed in his robe already, hood down, dark hair dishevelled, dress slacks peeking out from the gap in his open cloak. I could smell his cologne; expensive, subtle, it suited him. And didn’t. He was distracted, not paying attention. Clearly preoccupied. Until he made it several feet into the vast cavern and came to an abrupt halt.
His eyes landed on Carole first. A frown marring his handsome face. Then with a type of resigned fury he scanned the space for his father… and found me.
“Jesus,” he whispered. “Fuck!” he added. “What the fuck have you done now?”
Me? No, his father. Who came out of the shadows like some Machiavellian wraith.
“You like my lambs?” Nathaniel asked pleasantly.
“She’s a cop, Dad,” Kyan growled, taking a few steps in my direction.
“Stop!” Nathaniel barked. “She is willing.”
“Are you?” Kyan asked coming to an immediate halt. As if it could be at all possible I’d agree to be strapped to a fucking cross in a see-through white dress.
“No,” I ground out.
“Ah but, Lamb,” Nathaniel said. “Of course you are willing.”
“Not in this lifetime, p
sycho.” Not a negotiation tactic they teach you at Police College.
Nathaniel chuckled and then clapped his hands. A sick feeling settled in my stomach.
“Please don’t so this, Father,” Kyan pleaded.
“Unfortunately, you are unable to prove your worth this evening, son. She is destined for one who shows more promise.”
“I’ll do it,” Kyan said, standing taller. “Whatever you have planned, I’ll do it. But now. Here. With no other witnesses.”
What the fuck?
Nathaniel just shook his head. “The path to Paradise is not a secluded one, son.”
“She’s not willing!” Kyan shouted.
Nathaniel smiled. It was the smile I’d expected at the banquet earlier today. The one he’d kept securely under wraps. Creepy.
A hidden door scraped open on the opposite side to the one Kyan had used. Through it came another hooded figure. Bile rose up my throat as I thought of the possibilities. They were infinite. Not all the members of the Irreverent Inferno had been identified. But one in particular kept springing to mind.
Please, God, don’t let this be my father.
But I didn’t recognise the man. Relief was short lived when the body he dragged behind him was unceremoniously thrown on the cold, hard floor.
“Eagle,” I whispered, as Carole woke up from whatever stupor she’d been under and screamed, “Andy! Andy! Get me out of here!”
Chapter Thirty-Five
“We have reached the ninth circle of Hell.”
“You are willing, aren’t you, Lamb?” Nathaniel Marcroft asked, coming to stand in front of me, directly beside the sprawled body of Eagle.
Who lifted his head, bloodshot eyes staring up at me full of sorrow.
“Fucked up, Keen,” Eagle whispered, his voice clearly too hoarse to speak louder. “Didn’t know yous would be the one.”
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