Merciless: a gripping detective thriller (DI Kate Fletcher Book 2)

by Heleyne Hammersley

  ‘You bastard!’ she screamed, grabbing the pillow that lay next to his head and pushing it down onto his face. ‘You fucker!’

  She pressed down, hard. His hands reached up and grasped her wrists and she stiffened, prepared for a struggle but instead, she felt him pulling her hands more tightly down onto the pillow. He wanted this.

  ‘No!’ she gasped. ‘Not like this. I’m not going to make it that easy.’ Images of her research flashed in front of her eyes. Petechial haemorrhages, fibres in his mouth. She’d be caught.

  Chest heaving, she pulled the pillow back from his face and was met with a triumphant smile.

  ‘I knew you didn’t have the guts for this, you spineless little cunt,’ Dennis spat.

  She put the pillow back, holding it with one hand while she curled the other into a fist and pounded her father’s face through the thick layer of foam. He struggled. She leaned across him, using her weight to keep his upper body relatively still as she smashed her fist into the pillow again and again.

  ‘Had enough?’ she yelled.

  He stopped struggling and went limp beneath her. There was no smile when she removed the pillow, instead his face was contorted with pain and there was blood around his nose.

  Caroline quickly stripped off the pillowcase, intending to wash the blood off as soon as she could. She staggered to the bathroom, still breathing heavily, and ran cold water on a flannel before rushing back to Dennis’s bedside.

  As she reached out to clean his face, his eyes opened and met hers.

  ‘Clean up your own fucking mess!’ she spat, throwing the flannel at him.

  20

  The smell was getting worse. Caroline knew that she needed to bathe him but she hadn’t been able to face dragging him to the bathroom, stripping him down and holding the showerhead on him until he was vaguely clean. It was her own fault. She’d let it get this bad and now she was having to live with the consequences.

  She could smell him everywhere. In the kitchen, while she was making breakfast, she caught a whiff of his fruity aroma under the sweet, smoothness of her coffee and she had to throw the drink down the sink. In the sitting room, if she watched television for an hour’s relief she knew he was in the room above her, gradually rotting his way through the ceiling. She’d taken to sitting on the sofa under the window because the other chairs were directly below his bed, and she was half convinced that he would come crashing through.

  It had only been a few days. Bren had been round for Christmas, laden down with presents for Dennis but nothing for Caroline. She’d brought him a portable DAB radio, half a ton of sweets and biscuits, and some new pyjamas. The same ones he’d been wearing for three days. Caroline had lightened his medication for the visit, wary but convinced that he was too groggy to say anything incriminating to Bren. She’d been prepared to pass off anything incriminating he said as rambling but he’d been quite normal. He’d had plenty of morphine which was controlling the pain quite well, when she allowed him to have it, and he’d even managed to sit up in bed. Bren had made some comments about him looking better – as if he was going to get out of this alive – but Caroline knew that she was just trying to cheer him up.

  She needed to do something. She changed his pyjama bottoms regularly and he wasn’t soiling himself as often in bed, probably due to him being asleep for much of the day and asking for the toilet when he was awake. He knew that Caroline hated having to get him out of bed but she hated having to change his shitty pyjamas even more. Now, the rancid smell of sweat meant that she needed to bathe him properly. She’d briefly considered asking Bren, just for that satisfaction of watching the old bag struggle, but Caroline knew that Dennis couldn’t be trusted. She’d have to do it herself.

  She looked round the kitchen, hoping for inspiration, anything that might make the task ahead less daunting. She’d done a lot of cleaning since she’d been there. Bren’s efforts had been much like Bren; shallow, only surface-deep. Beneath the wiped table and vacuumed carpet lay years of accumulated filth that needed a thorough deep clean to make the place liveable. Caroline had started with the kitchen, scouring the grout with a toothbrush, buying a new vacuum cleaner and then shampooing the carpet, blasting the cooker with the most toxic grease remover that she could find. At first it was satisfying, she was making a visible difference, but she realised that it was displacement. What she really wanted to strip to the core was her relationship with Dennis and with her past.

  At least it was winter and she didn’t have to face the garden.

  She drained her coffee mug, ran it under the tap and grabbed the rubber gloves that were lying next to the sink; she couldn’t bear the thought of her skin touching his. As she marched upstairs she could hear him stirring. He hadn’t had breakfast and the dose of Diazepam that went with it, and she hadn’t given him any morphine since the previous evening. He was awake and in pain.

  ‘About time,’ he gasped as she pushed open the door to the bedroom. His sallow face was contorted in agony and he was trying to pull himself into a sitting position. ‘I don’t know what you’re giving me but I think I need a lot more today.’

  She couldn’t move him, not while he was like this, he’d make far too much noise and she couldn’t risk the neighbours hearing. Instead she went back downstairs and prepared a dose of Oramorph in warm tea. She considered sedating him, but if he was lucid and not in too much pain he might be able to clean himself with minimal intervention on her part.

  ‘Here,’ she said, passing him the drink. She sat in silence, watching him spill some of it down the front of his pyjamas, making no attempt to wipe his chin. When he’d finished he put the mug down on the bedside table and let out a deep breath.

  ‘Give me a minute till it kicks in and then you can do whatever it is you’ve come up here for.’ He stared at her rubber gloves. ‘Hope those are for cleaning; it stinks in here.’ Every word came with a wince or a grimace but he was making sense and was obviously in a stubborn mood. Not the best time to persuade him to have a shower.

  ‘It’s you that stinks,’ Caroline said, looking at the stains on his rumpled pyjamas. ‘That’s why I’m wearing the gloves. You’re toxic.’

  He sneered at her. ‘You’re a fine one to talk. Do you think what you’re doing to me is right? Keeping me doped up like this? What’s the big plan? I’m dying anyway and it’s not like you’ve got the guts to kill me. I suppose you’re trying to make me sorry? What do you want; an apology? Not going to happen, love. You were as much a part of it all as I was.’

  Caroline took off one of the gloves with a snap. ‘I was nine!’ she yelled, slapping him across the face with the damp rubber. ‘How was I a part of it?’

  He flinched back but his expression was unrepentant. ‘You’re as much to blame as I am.’

  ‘And you’ve just lost your next dose of morphine. Let’s see how you feel when you’re in agony.’

  His face went paler but his expression was defiant. ‘Do your worst. See if I care.’

  She grabbed at his filthy pyjama top, almost pulling him out of bed.

  ‘Up! Now! You’re having a shower. It’ll not get rid of the poison but at least you’ll not smell like a rotting pig.’

  He shrank away from her, resisting her grasping hands.

  ‘Get up!’ she hissed, pulling him harder. He slipped sideways and his upper body sank to the bedroom floor, leaving his legs still under the duvet. Frustrated, Caroline grasped at his pyjama bottoms and flung his legs onto the floor to join his torso.

  ‘If we have to do this the hard way I can guarantee that you’ll have a night of agony,’ she whispered, leaning so close to his face that he shrank away as she sprayed him with spittle. ‘Now, at least try to get up.’

  He rolled over and hauled himself onto all fours, breathing heavily. Slowly, he managed to raise his upper body so that he was kneeling up. Caroline grasped him under one arm and hauled him to his feet. He’d lost body mass since she’d been staying with him and his frail frame felt like
that of a child. If she’d tried she could have probably slung him over her back and carried him to the bathroom fireman-style. They stumbled across the landing like a couple of drunks leaning on each other for support, and Caroline kicked open the bathroom door.

  ‘Right, sit there.’ She placed Dennis on the closed toilet lid and started to unbutton his pyjama top.

  ‘I can do it,’ he said, slapping her hands away.

  ‘Fine. Get on with it.’

  His hands shook as he laboured over each button until the garment was hanging loose from his shoulders like a becalmed flag. Caroline stepped towards him and stripped it from his upper body, flinging it out onto the landing.

  ‘Bottoms.’

  Dennis hesitated.

  ‘Oh, come on. It’s not like I’ve not seen it all before. Who do you think has been bathing and changing you in bed? The fucking fairies?’

  He flinched at the profanity but clung to the waistband of his pyjama bottoms with a skinny claw-like hand.

  ‘Oh fuck this!’ Caroline said. ‘I can easily just tip you in the bath and pull them off you.’ She reached out to push him and he hurriedly let go of his pyjama bottoms, wriggling them down his hips. He eased his buttocks upwards and slipped the trousers down his wasted legs.

  ‘Here. Have them.’ He tried to throw them at her but they fell too short.

  As she picked them up, Caroline realised that they were heavy with fresh urine. ‘You did that on purpose, you dirty bastard.’

  He just laughed as she hauled him up again and held him as he stepped into the bath, leaning on the wall to keep himself upright.

  She chopped at his arm with the side of her hand and he yelled and lost his balance. Caroline caught him just before he crashed into the bottom of the bath and eased him down until he was lying on his back. She wanted to let him fall, wanted him to shatter into tiny pieces but she couldn’t risk an injury that might look like she’d been neglecting him. Or worse. Caroline turned the shower on, knowing that the water would run cold for a few seconds but past caring about Dennis’s comfort. She ran it on his face, up his nose, in his hair until he was shivering and spluttering. Instead of allowing it to get warm, Caroline turned the dial into the blue zone and continued to train the water on Dennis’s prone body, running it from his face to his genitals and back again.

  His jaw quivered as he struggled to stop his gums from chattering and his whole torso was a mass of goose pimples.

  ‘Stop it,’ he managed to croak.

  ‘Sorry, can’t hear you. What did you say?’

  ‘Stop,’ he said, louder this time. ‘Just stop. I’ll wash myself. I won’t be any trouble.’

  His lips were turning blue and the shivering was starting to subside. He was dangerously cold.

  ‘Fine,’ Caroline said and turned the heat up full.

  The first scalding drops had Dennis writhing with a new agony. ‘Stop it, Caroline. Just let me get up.’

  She gave him one last blast of hot water on his groin and then turned the temperature down to something that he could tolerate.

  ‘Get up, you stinking pile of shit,’ she instructed. ‘And I’m staying. I’m not having you falling and breaking a hip. I’ve come too far to have you back in hospital.’

  She wiped the toilet lid with tissues and sat down, half watching her father as he soaped and rinsed. He barely resembled the man that she remembered. His flesh was grey and his thinning hair was unkempt. This man that she’d been afraid of for most of her life was nothing.

  When she decided that she’d had enough, she turned off the shower and bundled Dennis into a towel, almost dragging him back to his bedroom. She sat him on a chair in front of the ancient dressing table and told him to dry himself while she changed the bedding.

  ‘Your mum used to sit here a lot,’ he said. ‘When we were first married, she liked to make herself pretty whenever we went out. And then, after, she used to just sit, looking into the mirror like she didn’t recognise her reflection. That’s when I knew she was bad with her nerves.’

  Bad with her nerves. The code he always used for depression. Her mother had been depressed for half the time that Caroline had known her. Gone were the smiles, the teasing, the little rhymes and songs that she used to sing. In their place was a shell of a person. She looked the same on the outside but she’d been hollowed out by what he’d done.

  ‘Put these on,’ she said, holding out a clean pair of pyjamas. She refused to be drawn into a conversation about her mother.

  ‘I want to go back to sleep,’ he said, struggling into the pyjama jacket. ‘I’m tired now.’ His voice was slurring, the effect of the extra morphine that Caroline had administered. She knelt in front of him and managed to get him into the pyjama bottoms without pushing him off the chair then she hauled him to his feet and pushed him towards the bed, leaving him in the position that he landed in. She threw the duvet over him, gathered the dirty bedding and left him to sleep. She added the soiled pyjamas to the bundle and went back downstairs.

  The washing machine beeped as she set the programme for a hot wash that still wouldn’t make everything properly clean – nothing could – the house and everything, everyone, in it was tainted.

  It was time to end it.

  JANUARY

  21

  ‘Doctor Kailisa,’ Kate said, answering her phone on the second ring. ‘What can I do for you?’

  ‘I think it’s more what I can do for you. Do you have time for a visit? Dennis Lambert’s results are back and they have shown up some interesting anomalies.’

  Kate sighed. She didn’t have time for this. ‘Can’t you just tell me over the phone?’

  ‘I’d rather not,’ Kailisa replied. ‘There is some physical evidence that I would like you to see as well as the toxicology and fingerprint results. Can you call in today?’

  ‘I can do better than that,’ Kate replied, intrigued. ‘I’m in the hospital now. I’ll be down in about ten minutes.’

  She explained to Hollis as they walked. It wasn’t like Kailisa to be obtuse so whatever he’d found must be interesting. They weren’t getting very far with the Maddie Cox investigation but a visit to the pathology lab might make up for the wasted time on the ward and if Kailisa said it was interesting, Kate was expecting fireworks. He was a master of understatement, making even the most outrageous injury or abnormality seem commonplace with his world-weary demeanour and his non-existent sense of humour. This could be good.

  Kailisa was gowned and gloved when Kate and Hollis crashed into his domain. He gave them both a hard stare as though they were inconveniencing him even though he’d extended the invitation.

  ‘I didn’t realise that you’d be bringing company,’ he said, glaring at Hollis like he’d never seen him before. Kate knew that Kailisa was precious about his lab and his victims and didn’t enjoy sharing with anybody that he deemed less than worthy.

  ‘I’ve got to learn sometime,’ Hollis said. ‘I’ve not been to many PMs and if I’m going to pick up anything it might as well be from the best.’

  Kailisa gave him a wry smile, the transparent attempt at flattery not fooling him at all. ‘Gowns and gloves, both of you. Oh, and DC Hollis?’

  The DC gave him an amiable grin.

  ‘Observe, learn, but keep your comments to a minimum, please.’

  He led the way into the dissection room where Dennis Lambert’s body was lying on a stainless steel table. Kate was surprised to see the corpse; she’d been expecting charts and numbers rather than any more physical findings. The pathologist stood at the head of the table and pointed to Lambert’s mouth where the lips looked dry and had a purplish hue which stood out against the waxy grey of the rest of the face.

  ‘After you left yesterday, I did further dissection of the lungs, checking for any signs of the disease having advanced further than we’d already seen. I found two tiny tumours and there was brown fluid in the upper bronchi and in the bronchioles of both lungs. A miniscule amount. I sent a sample for an
alysis and the results showed it to be a mixture of alcohol, probably whisky, water and an opiate.’

  ‘That was quick,’ Kate said. ‘It’s what Caroline Lambert said she left for him to drink. Whisky and Oramorph.’

  ‘And tap water. There was no evidence of there being water next to Dennis Lambert’s bed. Where did he get it from?’

  ‘Residue in the glass?’ Hollis suggested.

  Kailisa shook his head. ‘There is too much in the mixture for it to be a few drops in the bottom of the glass. I assumed that he might have gone to the bathroom and taken water from the sink in there.’

  It was a possibility.

  ‘However,’ Kailisa continued. ‘The blood work showed a high concentration of benzodiazepine. Enough for him to have had difficulty walking unaided.’

  ‘What’s–?’ Hollis began to ask but Kate nudged his foot with her own. Kailisa didn’t tolerate interruptions.

  ‘The benzodiazepine is most likely the Diazepam that he had on prescription. I sent off hair follicles with the blood tests and they confirmed the presence of the drug. In fact they suggested that Dennis Lambert had been using Diazepam for some weeks prior to his death. In large doses. He would have been bed-bound almost from the time his daughter took him home.’

  That didn’t fit with what Brenda Powley had said. She’d definitely said that he’d been active up to his time in hospital. She’d been surprised at his sudden decline, but here was a possible explanation. Had his daughter been keeping him sedated?

  ‘So how did he get the water?’ Kailisa paused like a teacher expecting the correct answer from a member of his class.

  ‘He didn’t,’ Kate responded. ‘Somebody got it for him. Or somebody mixed the drink for him. It looks like Caroline wasn’t being completely truthful.’

  The pathologist nodded.

  ‘Now, here.’ He beckoned them both closer to the table. Pulling back Dennis Lambert’s lips, he prised the mouth open. ‘Look.’ He shone a penlight inside the toothless cavity, scanning across the gum line. ‘See?’