Recompense

by Alan Richards

  Why did she ever think her plan would work.

  Eighteen

  Alexa arrived at her car, she had no idea how she had actually got here. Her mind had been full of possibilities and more importantly fear.

  What was she going to do?

  Did she wait to see if the drug she had given to Felecia did have the side effect of wiping her memory of anything that had happened that day. Could she take that chance. She fumbled in her handbag for her car keys. Found them and pressed the button to unlock the car. She got in and sat in the drivers seat.

  What were her options?

  She could wait and see if Felicia remembered anything. That approach had one big flaw. If she did remember then it was all over. She could disappear. She knew people through her work that could get her a passport and false documents so she could get out of the country. That was giving in though. She had never given in to anyone or anything and she wasn’t going to start now. The final option was to finish the job she had started and kill Felicia.

  How would she do that though.

  As she had found out just a few minutes ago, you need to gain access to the unit by a nurse letting you in. The intercom on the wall was both voice and video so if she did get in the nurses would be able to identify her. Once she was in how would she get to Felicia’s bed without being seen and finally how would she finish the job she started yesterday. Shooting her wasn’t an option. A knife would be messy. It had to be a drug that she could inject into one of her drips.

  Alexa was pulled away from her thoughts by her phone ringing. She fumbled again in her handbag, took it out and put it to her ear.

  “Blake.”

  The voice on the other end was Trainer.

  “Ma’am. We need you back at the office. There is something you need to see.”

  “I am just at the hospital. I wanted to check on Mrs Fenner. What is so important?”

  “You really need to see it.”

  “Okay, I am on my way then.”

  Alexa put the phone back in her handbag, started the car and drove out of the car park. She couldn’t get over the feeling that everything was about to get worse, much worse.

  Nineteen

  Alexa walked into the detectives office of the station. She could see people at their desks on the phones, people working on computers, others talking with colleagues. The office was home to twenty detectives. She was in charge of all of them. She couldn’t help a wry smile that she had tasked them to find the evidence to convict Martin Fenner of the murder of Caterina and the attempted murder of his wife Felicia; when she was the murderer. She saw Trainer beckon her over from the corner of the office. He was stood at the door to one of the smaller rooms that was used for team one to ones or just for some privacy, you didn’t get much of that in a large detectives office. She diverted from the direction of her office and walked over to him.

  “So what is so bloody important that I have to see it right now?”

  Frank turned into the room and Alexa followed. She could see the whiteboard in the room with what looked like times down the left and right hand side of the board.

  “What’s this then?” she asked.

  “Its the timings of the murder and the sightings of Fenner.”

  “So what is it telling us?”

  She asked the question but she had already worked it out that if she was reading it right, Fenner had a perfect alibi for the time of the shooting. It was getting worse. Trainer started to explain the whiteboard.

  “On the left are the timings of the report of the gunshot and then the arrival of the ARV team at the house.”

  “Okay, I can see that.”

  “On the right are times that I have got from my interview with the club manager at the golf club that Fenner said he was at yesterday afternoon.”

  Alexa just stood looking at the whiteboard, she hoped that Trainer couldn’t see the panic that was racing through her body. These timings meant that Fenner was in the clear. She would have to task the team to look elsewhere for the suspect, for her.

  “Ma’am. Can you see what all this means?”

  “Yes I can. Fenner has an alibi and therefore he has been setup.”

  “There is more Ma’am.”

  How could there be more, she thought. Trainer was never this efficient. She had worked on the assumption that he wouldn’t investigate fully as he wanted to nail Fenner as much as she did.

  “More?” she enquired.

  “Yes.”

  Trainer explained that someone at the local garden centre had reported a suspicious woman in the car park and that he had sent a constable to question them and see if there was any CCTV footage. He turned towards the portable TV and DVD unit in the room and turned it on.

  “We got this footage from the CCTV at the garden centre.”

  Trainer fast forwarded the DVD to the point where a woman can be seen sitting in her car. She watched as she saw herself get out of the car, collect her rucksack and then walk out of shot. The panic that Alexa was feeling increased a hundred fold as she watched herself on the TV, how had she not known about the CCTV at the garden centre. The only plus point had been the fact she hadn’t used her own car.

  “Since when did they get CCTV, they had a break in six months ago and didn’t have it then.”

  “They installed it after the break in. They just didn’t pay much for it so the quality is awful. But you can see Ma’am. It is rather strange behaviour.”

  “It could be, or this person could have just parked their car there and gone for a walk. We don’t have anything to tie that person to the Fenner case.”

  “No Ma’am, but there is something. Something about this that I can’t put my finger on.”

  “Well until you do we need to carry on with door to door and now finding exactly who did shoot those women and tried to frame Fenner for it. She turned to the door, turned the handle and walked out into the detectives office.

  “Listen up everyone. Fenner’s alibi holds up, he can’t have been at the house when the report of shots fired was reported. We are looking for a different suspect. Frank will fill you all in.”

  She turned and walked into her office. Shut the door and blinds. Her plan had failed, Fenner would walk. She needed to save herself now. Felicia had to die. And it had to be tonight.

  Twenty

  Alexa arrived back at the hospital, it was midnight and the place was eerily quiet. She had parked her car in a street away from the CCTV of the hospital, she had learnt that lesson the hard way. She had changed from her work suit into an all black outfit. She knew how to avoid the cameras in the hospital and she picked her route through the corridors carefully. Knowing where the intensive care unit was made life much easier than having to look at the signs to find it.

  She had spent most of the evening at home going through her options again, she could run, just disappear. She knew the right people to get new documents and she could be out of the country before anyone knew what had happened, before Felicia could describe her. The two had never met, she had only got involved with the Fenner’s when Tracey had started to offer up more intelligence on them, up until then it had all been down to Frank and he had never got anywhere in his pursuit of Fenner. Frank had spent years chasing them and when it looked like he was getting close a key witness would go missing or they would raid a location only to find that Fenner had emptied it hours before they arrived. Alexa had come to the conclusion that she had started on this route of killing so she would continue. She hadn’t managed to get to Martin Fenner this time but if she ran then she would never avenge the killing of Tracey, Fenner would never pay his Recompense for all his crimes.

  She arrived at the end of a corridor, turning left would take her down the corridor where the unit was. She stopped and looked around the corner. The police officer was still stationed outside the unit, she needed to get past him, get into the unit through the locked door and then get in and out without being noticed. This wasn’t going to be easy. After she had d
ecided not to run she had spent the rest of the evening working out how to get in and out quickly without being seen. She didn’t want to hurt anymore people than necessary.

  She had done some research and found that in the event of a fire alarm in a block all of the locks on the security doors would click open, it was a failsafe that made sure that people could get out and not get trapped if the power went off during a fire and the security doors wouldn’t open. She also knew that the intensive care unit patients wouldn’t be moved immediately, they would stay put until they knew there was an actual fire. There would be panic though; a night shift with minimal staff would mean the nurses wouldn’t notice her. The only variable was the Police Officer, what would he do?

  * * *

  Alexa walked back up the corridor the way she had come to the nearest fire alarm, broke the glass and pressed. The alarm went off immediately, filling Alexa’s ears with a deafening siren. She walked back to the corner of the corridor and looked around hoping the Police Officer had moved position. He had, she didn’t know where he had gone but she was going to assume into the Intensive Care Unit. His training would tell him to protect his charge and with a fire alarm now filling the corridors he would go straight to her bed, she had planned for that.

  Alexa pulled on the door and it opened, her research had been right she was in the Intensive Care Unit. She stopped at the entrance and looked up and down the main corridor, there was no alarm sounding in the unit only a flashing red light at intervals along the ceiling. She could see the nurses station halfway down with each room that held four patients off to the left of the corridor. At the end, just past the nurses station was Felicia’s room, she had been put in a private room at the request of the Police. The Officer wasn’t outside the door, had he gone into the room or just disappeared at the sound of the alarm. Alexa walked slowly down the corridor. She had assumed that having minimal staff on the night shift would mean that the sound of the fire alarm would make them check their patients and ready them for a possible transport. She was right. She reached the edge of the nurses station and it was empty. She quickened her pace and walked to the door to Felicia’s room. She had no idea if the officer was in the room or not, she had planned for him being outside the room.

  She slowly opened the door and walked into the room. Being a private room meant it had a window and the moonlight shed a small amount of light across the room. She could see Felicia in bed, asleep hooked up to the monitoring equipment showing her heart rate and blood pressure. Alexa looked for the drip that she hoped Felecia had. It was in her right arm, it looked just like water but Alexa didn’t care what it was as long as she had one. Her plan was to inject air into the drip right near to the arm, this way it would enter her blood stream and eventually reach her heart. She had read that she needed to inject at least fifty millilitre of air into the blood stream for it to be fatal. She had brought a one hundred millilitre syringe with her and planned to inject that much into Felicia. It would create an air emboli and prove fatal.

  She turned off the monitoring equipment, she didn’t want that sounding once the air reached her heart and started to do its job. She suddenly felt a presence in the room.

  “Why have you turned off the monitor? What are you doing?”

  She didn’t turn, she didn’t want whoever was in the room to see her face.

  “If you don’t want to get hurt, leave the room now. Let me do what I came to do.”

  “I can’t do that, I am her doctor.”

  She turned and saw a shadowy figure standing in the corner of the room.

  “I really don’t think you should be doing this Alexa.”

  Alexa moved towards the shadow in the corner, how did the doctor know her name. As she moved closer the shadowy figure moved into the moonlight. It was Letitia.

  “Letitia, you need to let me do this. Just walk away and forget what you saw,” Alexa pleaded.

  “I cant do that.”

  “Why?”

  “This woman is my patient, I have a duty to keep her alive and letting you kill her isn’t part of that and you are here to kill her aren’t you?”

  “This woman is the wife of a criminal who deals in girls, trafficking them around the world for profit.”

  “But why does she need to die?”

  “Because she can identify me as the person who shot her.”

  Alexa could see Letitia just staring at her, she knew that what had happened between them on Friday night would count for nothing, it was just sex. Would she have to kill Letitia as well as Felicia. She didn’t want to too but if it came to that..could she?

  * * *

  They had been staring at each other for what seemed like an age, Alexa knew time was running out. They would either discover there was no fire soon or the Police Officer would return to his post. She had to act.

  “Letitia please leave and forget you ever saw me,” implored Alexa.

  “I can’t.”

  “I don’t want to have to hurt you but I need to do this or my life will be over.”

  “Your life will be over if you do it as well. How will you live with yourself?”

  “Live with myself, her husband murdered someone I had grown to care about, so I will live with myself just fine.”

  Letitia moved close to Alexa and took her hand.

  “I lost contact with my sister years ago, losing touch or the death of someone close to you affects people differently. I tried for months to find her but found nothing. In the end I buried myself in my work and did nothing else.”

  “But if she wakes and identifies me then I will go to prison.”

  “And we will deal with that when it happens.”

  “What do you mean we?” Alexa asked.

  “Friday night wasn’t just sex to me, I like you Alexa and if you will let me then I will be there for you. Now lets get out of here.”

  Letitia pulled on Alexa’s hand and they left the room together.

  Twenty One

  Trainer was woken by his phone ringing. He looked over at his bedside clock, it read 12:15AM. He picked the phone up from his bedside table, hit the answer button and put it to his ear.

  “Trainer.” he answered sleepily.

  “Sir, it’s constable Pritchard. I tried ringing the station but no one picked up.”

  “Do you realise what time it is?” Trainer didn’t like being woken up at this hour, for anything.

  “Yes sir, sorry sir. Its just that there is a fire alarm going off at the hospital where Mrs Fenner is.”

  “And?”

  “Well sir, I wondered if it could be a distraction to try and come and finish her off.”

  Trainer was lost for words at the level of intelligence or lack of in some of the recruits they were getting.

  “Look, if it is then you are outside the door to the unit, don’t let anyone in.”

  “Yes sir... thing is sir...”

  Trainer sat up in bed, he didn’t like the sound of the constables voice.

  “Where are you constable?”

  “I couldn’t get a signal in the corridor sir, I had to come outside.”

  “Get back in there and check everything is Okay. Ring me back from the nurses land line if it isn’t. I DO NOT need waking up if she is still alive.”

  Trainer pushed the end call button, threw the phone back onto the bedside table and rolled over to go back to sleep.

  * * *

  Alexa let Letitia drag her through the Intensive Care Unit, the red lights in the ceiling still flashing.

  What if the Constable was back at his post.

  Alexa had to make sure she wasn’t seen, she hadn’t carried out the task she had come here to do but it would still raise too many questions if she was seen leaving the unit. She pulled on the door to open it. She ensured she kept out of the view of the cameras. She looked up and down the corridor, luckily it was empty.

  “Doctor. Is everything Okay?”

  Letitia stopped and turned, the constable was rounding the
corner at the other end of the corridor. Alexa carried on walking.

  “Yes everything is fine. I was in the Intensive Care Unit when the fire alarm went off. I need to go and find out if we need to move any patients.”

  “Is your colleague alright?”

  “Yes they are fine. Just one of the nurses not feeling well so I am taking them home.”

  “Okay, I better go check on Mrs Fenner.”

  The Constable turned to the Intensive Care Unit door and pulled on the door to gain entry. Letitia turned and walked in the direction that Alexa had gone. Her heart was pounding.

  What if he hadn’t believed her or he asked questions of the nurses.

  She turned the corner and saw Alexa waiting for her. She grabbed her hand and they walked to the exit.

  * * *

  The cool air of the night hit Letitia as the two of them left the hospital reception.

  “We need to get away from the hospital,” Alexa said.

  “We can go to my flat. Its just down the road. We can walk there.”

  “My car is round the corner. I can go home.”

  “Your not going home. We need to talk. I need to know what you were doing and why.”

  Letitia was still holding Alexa’s hand as they walked the five minutes to Letitia’s flat. She lived in a first floor flat in a converted house. The house was large and had been converted into two flats, one upstairs and one on the ground floor. Letitia guided Alexa round the side of the house and climbed a small flight of stairs, she took a set of keys from her pocket and opened the door to her flat. She beckoned Alexa to go in. Letitia followed flicking the light switch on to flood the small hallway with light. Alexa looked around and could see there were four doors leading off the small rectangular hallway, one on each side of her and two directly in front of her opposite the entrance door. She assumed it was a kitchen, living area and two bedrooms. She followed Letitia through the door to her left and found herself in the kitchen. Letitia had put the kettle on to make a drink for the two of them.