by James Arklie
‘Thanks for looking after Bryony for me, Joe. But I want her back now.’
He raised his mask, turned away from Kline and walked across to the person Kline knew as Debbie Wilcox, but who to Brown was no more than a receptacle, an incubator, a machine that would keep his beloved Bryony alive.
*
Kline looked across at Angie. She half-raised her right arm. Now he understood her earlier message. She’d thought she could work her arm free and she had. Maybe, he thought. Maybe we’ll have an opportunity. Please God, give me my day.
Kline tried to assess his body. He’d been operated on without any anaesthetic, but hey, get real he told himself, back in the day it was a few glugs of whiskey, wood between teeth, then out with the saw and off with a leg. But how many survived?
His side throbbed. His insides squirmed. Only his immune system and God would know what infection was finding a new home in his body space. He only had one kidney to cleanse his body and his heart was in overdrive. A heart attack could take him at any time. He doubted a crash team was waiting anywhere near.
Kline knew that adrenaline was carrying him through this shock. He couldn’t let it wear off. He couldn’t let his brain wander off into the peace of death. He took a deep breath and went on the attack.
‘We had a deal, you murdering son of a bitch.’
Brown had his back to Kline as he worked. There was a laugh.
‘Never trust a psychopath, Joe.’
‘You can let Angie go.’
‘I need her. This is dying on me.’
This? Christ.
Kline opened his mouth to speak and then it struck him. He glanced across to Angie. The horror on her face told Kline she’d got it. Angie was also blood group AB.
Robert Brown suddenly straightened and stepped back. He turned to look at Angie. Kline wasn’t sure if he saw her or the new home for Bryony. In all his days as a policeman, Kline had never encountered such detached, disassociated madness.
He’d dealt with people with dementia, Alzheimers, murderers, crack heads, drunks; all off their heads, some violent, some not, but never anything like this. Not in this controlled, yet amoral, unseeing way. Brown was like an alien, not of this world.
It scared Kline that Robert Browns can exist, that, according to Cassie, we, our society, created them. But what worried him more was that they could interact and live amongst us. Smiling, suave, sophisticated, unseen, deadly.
Kline desperately hoped Angie had managed to free herself completely and he hoped Brown wouldn’t notice. Oh, how hope builds on hope. You build yourself a mountain of hope when faced with your own horror and death. The clatter of a scalpel in a metal tray brought Kline back. He had to stop his mind from drifting down the river of death.
In a considered, practical voice, Brown said, ‘In fact, it makes more sense…’
Bloody hell. Kline had to delay this. He shouted again, ‘And you have something I want back.’
Robert Brown swung round and the hazel eyes peered at Kline over the rimless glasses. He turned to the nurse. ‘Close her up and…’ He pointed at my kidney. I guess I was going on ice for a while.
Brown turned back, tugged his mask down to his neck, glanced at the gaping hole in Kline’s side, then mimicked him. ‘You mean, your little secret, the one that I stole?’
Kline blinked trying to hide the murder that burned inside him. For this alone, Kline would kill him.
Robert Brown made a thoughtful face, sarcasm written all over it. ‘How did your little saga go? Jenny is desperate for a child, but she is infertile. You are not only desperate for a child but also to please your beloved Jenny. That I do understand, Joe. So, up steps her sister, Evie. I’ll do it, Sis. I’m not married. I’ll be surrogate. My egg, Joe’s sperm. Your child. But I’ll still be there. I’ll be Auntie Evie and second mother, both at the same time. Happy families.’ Brown shook his head.
‘Not sure that would have worked out in practice, Joe. That has disaster written all over it. But we’ll never know.’
Kline felt his arms tense against the straps. His brain was starting to get thick and overwhelmed with pain, toxins and impending death.
Kline spat back. ‘You stole my baby. My son.’
‘Joe, that foetus was there. Like a gift. What was it, twelve, fourteen weeks? A fair-sized fella. I couldn’t kill her and just leave it.’
It? The bastard.
Kline thought back to the investigation. To the autopsy. He and Jenny had waited for the report that said Evie was pregnant at the time she was murdered. It was never mentioned. Kline had realised immediately. The killer had stolen the foetus. Their foetus. It made Evie’s death worse for both of them, but Kline had been hit the hardest. He was Kline’s son. Kline had even named him.
Charlie.
Kline knew he should have said something at time. He was leading the investigation. Jenny implored him to keep quiet, so he did. Deep down, he also knew that he wouldn’t be able to openly face his grief in front of friends and colleagues. So, he kept it quiet. Really, that makes it two secrets.
Robert Brown patted Kline on the arm and gave him a smile that hung like venom in the air between them.
‘It’s been our link over the years, Joe. It’s made us inseparable. The reason we were always going to get to this point. My way of ensuring I got you onto that table. However long it took.’
Kline watched Robert Brown wander to the other side of the operating theatre or whatever room this was. Kline had to stretch and twist his neck to follow him. Angie got Kline’s attention and gave him a nod. Her eyes were wide with fear and adrenaline. She knew there would only be one chance. She would give it a go when she thought the time was right. Kline shifted his head to take in the whole room. There was a female nurse near the door and there was Brown.
Kline shouted across to him. ‘Where’s Luke?’
Robert Brown was peering at the jars. There was a sickness growing inside Kline which had nothing to do with his open wound.
Brown waved a hand carelessly. ‘He’s gone. He’s killed for me. Waters, Bleakley, what’s his name…? Artie? Did the graffiti. I’m too old for all of that now.’
He sounded like a pensioner, chatting at the golf club about giving up jogging or sex.
And then he turned and took a scalpel to Kline’s heart. He walked back towards him with a jar in his hand. Kline knew what was inside. Who was at rest, inside.
Robert Brown held out the jar. ‘Here you are, Joe. Meet your son.’
*
Kline screamed out his rage and anger. He strained against the straps. Every muscle, every sinew, until he thought his whole body would pop. He was powerless. Frustration filled every cell of his body. He had been wronged. The man who did it stood in front of him with a winning, uncaring smile on his face, and there was nothing Kline could about it.
Worse. He was probably going to kill Kline in the next few minutes. Kline wasn’t a person. Kline was a thing. He’d taken from Kline what he wanted and would discard the rest as waste.
Point seven. Oh, fuck point seven and dehumanisation.
Kline focused on his son. He had a head, arms and tiny fingers, stubby legs and tiny toes. A tag of umbilical cord poked from his little round tummy. He would have fitted sweetly into the palm of Kline’s hand. The day before this bastard took her life, Evie had called Jenny to say she’d felt the first kick.
Beyond the jar, Kline could see Angie was sitting sideways on her bed. She’d picked up two pairs of scissors from a tray of surgical instruments. She and the nurse were eyeballing one another. Angie jerked her head towards the door.
The nurse opened her mouth, Angie slid off the bed towards her. She held a pair of scissors in each fist, she raised them, silently telling the nurse she would be first. The nurse decided raising the alarm was the best option and slipped out of the room.
Angie knew, and Kline knew, they only had minutes.
Kline had to keep Brown’s attention. ‘Let me hold him.’ The a
nguish in Kline’s voice was real. ‘It’s the least you can do.’
Robert Brown looked astonished. ‘You want to hold a jar? Or do you want me to remove him?’
‘Just release one arm and let me cradle him.’ Kline was sounding pathetic. A man desperate in the face of death to hold his son for one last time.
Back to Point One of being a psychopath. Sound believable. Conceal what you really are. It was Kline’s turn now.
Brown laughed, leaned forward and balanced Charlie on Kline’s chest, next to his heart. ‘There. Sweet. Father and son.’
Angie eased past a trolley, put down one pair of scissors and lifted a large glass sample jar. Then, in two steps she was on him. She smashed the jar across the back of Robert Brown’s head and drove the scissors into his back.
She yanked him round by one arm and smashed her forehead into his face. He fell against Kline’s trolley. Charlie rolled off and the glass container smashed on the floor.
Angie dragged Brown round and let him drop to the floor. She came towards Kline to release him.
Kline shook his head, panic in his voice. ‘No. Bind him with something. Fast.’ Kline saw a roll of surgical tape on the trolley at the end of Debbie’s bed.
‘There. Use that. Arms and legs.’
Kline watched her wind it round and round as Brown groaned and started rolling on the floor. His legs were bound tightly together and his arms bound behind his back.
Angie came to Kline, looked at his incision. ‘Shit, Joe.’
She undid his bindings. Kline looked down. Clamps inside him and on the edge of the incision. Blood dried and caked on his skin, fresh blood oozing. He touched his skin and it felt cold, clammy. Death was coming. He didn’t care. He had one thing left to do in his life.
He took a deep breath. ‘Bind me. Some strips across the wound and then round my body. Go over the opening.’ Just keep my insides, inside, he thought.
It took Angie about a minute, then she ran to the door, closed it and blocked it with a trolley while Kline slowly slid his legs sideways and off the trolley.
‘Morphine. Find me morphine.’ Kline pointed at a large fridge. ‘Try in there.’
Angie found a large vial and syringe in a packet. Kline ripped the top off the packet with his teeth. He read the label on the vial. A fraction of it was a lethal dose. He inserted the needle through the rubber plug and drew it all into the syringe.
Angie thought Kline was going to inject himself. ‘Joe. You can’t.’
Kline pointed. ‘Sit him up. Here. Against my table.’
‘Joe…’
‘Just do it, Angie. Just fucking do it.’
Pain was flooding through his insides like a tsunami.
She dragged Brown across and lifted him up. It woke him. It took him less than a second to assess his situation. He smiled.
‘Well, well, Joe. Now I’m about to find out if I was right. Joe Kline. Psychopath? Yes or no.’
Kline turned to Debbie Wilcox. Took two steps and found the switches on the wall.
‘First, I kill Bryony. You ready to see her die?’
Brown laughed. ‘An eye for an eye, Joe? How biblical. Yet the same old conundrum. Same as Jenny. Do I, don’t I? It was different with Jenny, she was already dead. But you flick that switch you commit murder. The murder of Debbie Wilcox. She is only in an induced coma. It can be reversed.’ He smiled again. The smile said, ‘I’m still the winner’.
Until.
The words sang through the pain in Kline’s body.
When he is down, don’t ask Caeser.
Kline flicked the switches and turned back to a man howling with pain and anguish. He struggled to get to his feet. Thrashed round on the floor like fish out of water. A maniac in a straight-jacket.
Angie’s mouth hung open. Kline glanced at her expression and realised she thought he’d gone crazy. A man who’d lost control.
Well, he had, but he hadn’t. The warmth was flooding his body with its reassurance.
He stepped back to Brown. ‘Does that answer your question, Bobby?’
Brown’s eyes burned. Spittle flew from his mouth. Hung in a white gob round his mouth. ‘You bastard. You fucking bastard.’ His eyes flashed with the cleverness of the Devil as he spat, ‘You won’t kill me. Jenny is alive inside me. I have her kidney. Kill me and Jenny is gone forever.’
Kline crouched down, grabbed his hair and jerked back his head. Brown’s Adam’s apple bobbed. His carotid arteries throbbed. ‘You think I want to let Jenny live inside a sick bastard like you?’
Kline moved his face closer. Eyes over eyes, noses touching, letting Brown see into the new darkness in his soul. Kline whispered the names, a roll call of revenge.
‘Evie, Jenny, Charlie, Artie and only God and the Devil know how many others.’
Brown choked for a breath. Swallowed against the constriction Kline was creating.
‘Hundreds, Joe. Hundreds.’
Kline pressed the needle against Brown’s neck; he heard a sharp intake of breath from Angie.
Brown swallowed again, his eyes never leaving Kline’s, his voice quiet. He knew now. I am you and you are me. The knowledge made his body relax.
‘I always wondered what it’s like to die, Joe. I used to watch the light fade from their eyes and think, ‘What’s happening? Where are they going? What are they thinking and feeling?’
Kline leant closer to Brown’s ear, whispering as he slipped the needle into his carotid artery, unloading liquid morphine into his blood stream. Into the closest, fastest route to his brain.
Kline whispered. ‘I’m just like you, Bobby. Deep down, we’re the same.’
Kline sat back to watch him die.
Brown smiled a smile that Kline knew he would see for the rest of his life.
But Kline smiled the smile of the victor and let him see the killer in his eyes. Take that with you, it said, on your journey to Hell.
Because remember.
When the man is down…
Don’t ask Caeser.
*
Epilogue
Three days later.
Kline was propped up in a hospital bed in Paris. He’d been sewn up but, once again, was functioning on one kidney. Finding a replacement would have to wait.
A drip fed a powerful concoction of antibiotics directly into his blood stream. Doctors were talking to him about sepsis and looking concerned. Kline felt the best he had in years. He was looking ghosts in the face with the satisfaction of a man who kept his promises.
Angie was resting in a chair beside his bed eating a croissant that seemed to be stuffed with cheese and ham. She was staying in a local hotel and had bought coffee from a café outside the hospital. It was strong and bitter.
She pointed at it. ‘I’ve been doing some reading. Did you know that people with sociopathic and psychopathic tendencies prefer bitter things? Black coffee, gin and tonic, angostura bitters…’
All my favourite drinks then, thought Kline. He feigned interest. ‘Is that right. Interesting.’
There was a changing of the armed Gendarme at his door. They both glanced in, exchanged a few words and a joke. Kline wasn’t sure if they were keeping him in or potential assailants out. Apparently, there was some concern that Luke whoever he was, may come for revenge. Kline doubted it. Luke was off creating his own killing career that someone would have to stop one day.
Anyway, the French police had been very efficient when they’d arrived at the Chateau. Angie had held everyone at bay until they arrived, then she let them in. Kline had turned on Debbie’s life support as soon as Brown had died, but it was too late.
At Angie’s suggestion they’d left it turned on. They claimed they knew nothing about her death.
As for Robert Brown, they unbound him and left him on the floor. Kline pressed the syringe into Brown’s fingers to ensure it had his prints on it as well as Kline’s.
Then Kline told a story of self-defence, which, given the hole in his side and the removal of a kid
ney without any anaesthetic, was wholly believable.
They made it sound like Brown was moving in to kill Kline with a final syringe, they over-powered him and to defend himself, Kline used the syringe on him.
A French detective had asked, ‘Did you know what was in the syringe?’
Kline said flatly, ‘Non, monsieur.’
Same French detective asked with deceptive innocence, ‘You hit the carotid artery. Straight to the brain.’
Kline had smiled inwardly. High speed, toll free, motorway to oblivion. He said with a shake of his head and a sigh. ‘I know. Lucky shot, monsieur.’
Kline knew they weren’t stupid, but they were extremely practical. All sorts of liaison took place with Dave Barker. He had to give a full explanation of the operation, the investigation and the history. It took a couple of days.
Pierre Gaspin had appeared on day one, shaking Kline’s hand enthusiastically, and giving him a bottle of Beajoulais, ‘for later’. He stayed until he was really desperate for a Gaulouis and then shook Kline’s hand again, said ‘tres bon’ several times and left.
Messages came in from New Zealand, Australia and Greece. Kline was told in a phone call with Dave Barker that he and Angie were now gathering some kind of cult status.
‘You solved the enigma of the ALICE murders. Found the killer himself.’
Dave hadn’t mentioned the word retirement and, before he could, Kline jumped in with the news that he would be back at his desk in a few weeks. A moment of silence had followed before the subject was changed.
Kline reached into the cupboard beside his bed and checked on Charlie. He was back in a jar of preservative and they talked regularly throughout the day. Kline mainly told him about the two women who would have been his mothers. Enough to confuse any child.
Kline didn’t feel stupid, just felt he was making up for lost time. It was also Kline’s way of getting ready for the final act. When they got back to Southampton, Charlie would be cremated. He would take the ashes to visit Evie’s grave and then he would scatter them on the Solent, along with Jenny. To the wind and the sun.
