by Seb Kirby
I can only wait for the next images to appear.
Another girl.
Felicity.
Young. Intelligent. A lover of sport.
We’re talking about how we met running together through the park.
We’re back in that book-lined room.
There’s no lovemaking. She’s refusing, saying that she’s not like that.
I’m pushing her back onto the couch and she’s starting to scream.
My hands over her mouth to quieten her.
The tattoo. The single red rose on my left forearm.
This can’t be me. Can’t be me.
Yet I see those hands gripping poor Felicity by the neck.
I see the life leaving her body, her eyes bulging, her face reddening and then darkening.
I can’t look away. I’m forced to look on as she dies.
And I knew then that this had happened before.
Not that I’ve seen these visions before but that I’ve been here before, trussed up like this, being forced to watch these images of the girls being groomed and then killed.
This is the reason why I was seeing visions of the dead girls.
And I’m seeing those same images again now.
Cathy.
Rebecca.
Margot.
Felicity.
Over and over. To try to convince me that it must be me doing these things to those women.
But these images did not belong to me. Will never belong to me.
I moved my eyes to the left to pick up a movement I could just detect in the corner of my vision.
Not on the screen.
A forearm.
His forearm reaching in to check that the shackles he had me in were secure.
I knew that forearm.
I could see the red rose tattoo.
The fingers on the right hand.
Short index finger, long ring finger.
I knew those hands.
I felt the sharp jolt of pain as he reached in and injected more of the drug into my upper arm.
I knew then that this man who had me was the killer of those girls.
The same one who tried to kill me last time.
The one who will try to drown me again.
I struggled to break free with every ounce of energy I could muster but nothing moved, nothing gave way.
And then I had a sickening thought.
One that would not go away.
He didn’t intend to kill me last time.
He wanted me to be found half dead.
So that I would confess to his terrible crimes.
I sensed that he’d gone now and I was again alone, waiting for more to appear on the screen.
Another girl
Ashley. Tall, slim. A beautician.
Intelligent. Well-spoken. A beautiful, innocent smile.
Ashley saying she has work tomorrow. At Sorano Clinic.
Her smile once more. White, even teeth.
And then it ended. There was no killing.
I knew what this meant. Ashley was his next victim.
She was still alive.
I had to find a way to escape.
I struggled with all my strength but the ties at my hands and feet would not give.
The drug he injected took over and I sank into a dark, black hole.
CHAPTER 73
I came round.
Images of the killings of the girls continued to play before my eyes.
I could think of only one thing. I must escape and save Ashley, the one he planned to kill next.
My strength was returning as the effect of the drug he’d given me waned.
I could feel blood running from the plastic cuff ties at my wrists, the result of my efforts to break free. I made a concerted effort to forget about the pain, to concentrate instead on the notion of being free, no matter how faint that thought might be, and the thought that, though he’d planned everything in such detail, he might have made this one mistake in the tightening of the ties at my wrists. Then, a feeling of movement at my wrist, slight at first, as if the blood was acting to lessen the resistance to my hand slipping itself from the tie.
I had to believe. In myself. That I could break free if I tuned out thoughts of pain and concentrated on the act of movement itself.
My hands slipped out of the tie. First one, then the other.
I pulled at the clamp at my neck and face and broke the clamp free.
My feet were still bound and the tie could not be shifted. But I had enough freedom by now to stand and topple out of the cage in which he’d been keeping me.
I could see it now. The video player he’d set to back-project those images of the girls onto the transparent screen that he’d forced me to look at when inside the cage.
I looked around. I was in a small, windowless room. More like an underground chamber.
I was alone.
There was a door.
I shuffled on my back towards it and stood. The door was locked. I pounded against it with my fists. It would not open.
My immediate fear was that he would return before I could free the tie on my legs.
I searched the chamber for anything I might use. Then, I saw it. He’d been drinking beer at a small table while he watched as my torture ran its course. He’d left one of the bottles behind.
I hopped to the table and smashed the bottle against the wall. I picked up the broken bottle neck and used the sharp, jagged edge, where it had separated from the base of the bottle, to work on the plastic tie. It gave. My legs were free.
If I hid behind the door I might be able to overpower him when he returned. It would be worth it to discover once and for all who he was. This man who’d brought so much pain into my life. But I couldn’t be sure that he wouldn’t be armed. I searched instead for a point of escape.
There was metal grille in the ceiling above the table. I climbed up on the table, removed the grille, and climbed into a ventilation shaft. It was dark. Dust that smelled of years of animal decay choked my lungs as I crawled along the shaft. The shaft was on a steep incline that made it difficult to climb but I knew this must have been taking me upward, towards ground level and the light.
At the end of the shaft was another grille. I kicked it out and jumped out into a bright passageway. There were windows that looked out onto the street. There was an unmistakable medicinal smell. I was in an old hospital.
I ran along the corridor and out into a large space where lines of seats hosted patients waiting for treatment. Accident and Emergency. A&E. But I had no intention of staying here any longer.
I picked my way around the benches and walked towards the exit doors. The patients stared at the sight of this dust-covered persona moving amongst them but no one spoke. It was a place of resigned acceptance.
As I approached the doors, they opened.
I made my way onto a busy street.
The sign said City Road. I was in the center of London, surrounded by the cacophony of rushing traffic and bustling pedestrians.
I turned to look back. White stand out lettering said Brookheath Hospital Emergency Admissions.
The dust on my clothes and in my hair made me look like a tradesman returning home from a day at work. It was a found disguise.
I patted my pockets. No wallet, no money, no travel card.
I hopped on a bus that I knew would take me back to the hotel. When the driver asked for my pass, I shrugged and showed him my open palms. He looked me over, taking in my battered appearance, and, in a gesture of solidarity, waved me aboard.
CHAPTER 74
Tim Mason approached the Hoxton apartment block with care, making sure there was no one following. It would be unprofessional, to say the least, to be responsible for letting anyone know where Geoff Tunny had been hiding.
Mason knew it was foolish to think they could side line him when he was the only one with the experience to bring the OAM story home. Despite what had been said, all the assurances given, nothing was
more certain than that Hamilton was planning to deny him any credit. That was if the editor ever got off the fence long enough to run with the story. He, Tim Mason would be denied a byline.
So, why was it only Geoff Tunny who’d seen that?
Yes, Tunny had been different. Tunny had understood the value of hard won journalistic knowhow, and, though it had been kept from Hamilton, a pact had been formed and they had worked together well. They had looked out for each other.
Until someone had chased Tunny to his death on The Strand.
Mason recalled the last time they had met, in this same apartment.
When Tunny had let him in, Mason had seen that the man was troubled. “I got over here as soon as I could.”
“Tim, you’re sure you weren’t followed?”
Mason had smiled. “Quite sure.”
“As soon as I heard that Montague had involved Mike Quinn, I knew nothing about this was going to be easy. He’s serious trouble. He all but rules Canary Wharf. And he has the men to make sure it stays that way.”
“But that won’t stop us exposing Montague, Geoff. That’s why I’m here. You can stay safe and leave everything to me.”
Tunny had looked concerned. “I don’t know how you’re so committed to doing this, Tim. Taking risks with a man like Quinn.”
Mason had smiled again. “Because of the story, Geoff. The story. It needs to be told and I’m the one to tell it. It’s my calling. What I’ve been put on this planet to do. Nothing can stand in the way of that. Nothing.”
“Of course, I know that, Tim.”
Mason recalled that he had been concerned that Tunny had been a trifle unconvincing in his reply. Was he pretending to understand when all along he was no less condescending than Hamilton and Markland and all the others? Mason had shaken off those doubts. They would have been too destabilizing. “So, let’s get down to business.”
They had sat on the old couch that formed the main seating in the apartment. Tunny had told him where the surveillance had taken them. “You know about the bug I had placed in Montague’s computer?”
Mason had taken this as rhetorical. “And it worked?”
“Well, it delivered. Had it in place for five days before Qui went in again and removed it. They had no idea it was there. In the meantime we retrieved a mass of information.”
“But they suspected they might have been bugged?”
“They must have suspected something of the kind once the break-in was discovered, even though they weren’t quick enough to find the bug in Montague’s computer. Yes, that’s when the problems started. They leaned on Hamilton. Threatened him. Made him go slow.”
“While they search for you?”
“Afraid so. Which brings us to where we are.”
“So, what did the bug deliver?”
“More than enough. In those five days I was able to trawl through Montague’s hard drive and back it all up here.” Tunny had pointed to the pocket drive connected to his laptop. “It’s all on there. A more or less complete copy of everything on Montague’s machine. Which boils down to a complete picture of OAM, where the money comes from, where it goes, how they invest it.”
“And it’s Ponzi? There’s evidence of that? Enough to sink them?”
“Twenty times over. But what’s there needs to be understood, put into context; it’s not incriminating until it’s analyzed. They’ve been clever in the way the whole scheme is set up.”
“Which leads us to Albert Emery?”
“Yes. I’ve been letting him know the game is up. Smoking him out. Telling him he needs to get out while he can. And that the way to do this is to take us through what we have and to give us that context, that understanding. If he does that, goes state’s evidence when we break the story and he shows contrition, he’ll get off with a couple of years.”
“And he’s prepared to play ball?”
“Not yet. Though I’m sure he’s close to breaking.”
“Where is he now?”
“That’s just the point. I can’t reach him anymore.”
Mason could hear Tunny’s words as if he was right there in the room again.
But what mattered now was finding the pocket drive.
It had to be hidden somewhere in the apartment.
Mason pulled on the pair of latex gloves he’d brought with him and searched the whole place. He was careful to return everything he touched to its rightful place, opening drawers and cupboard doors with care, inspecting the contents and closing the same drawers and cupboard doors again with equal care.
This was where the perfectionism that so many around him mocked was his telling asset. No one would know he’d been here.
He found the pocket drive in the bottom of a drawer in the bedroom that contained Tunny’s underclothes, socks and the like, tucked away in a corner of the drawer beneath a pile of T-shirts.
With this, he knew he could now have confidence that he would be able to take his rightful place as the lead in breaking the story that would sink Tyrone Montague and OAM.
CHAPTER 75
When I arrived back at The Wentworth and made it up to our room, Janet was struggling to hold back her tears. “I said I’d never lose you again and this has happened. I should never have let you go. And I couldn’t go to the police to report you as missing.” She was shocked by my disheveled appearance. “You look like you’ve been through a war. Who were they, Tom?”
I sat on the edge of the bed and held her hand. “That doesn’t matter for now. The important thing is I know, Jan. I know what’s been happening to me.”
She listened in silence as I took her through what had happened since I’d left for the Dragon Bar. I told her about seeing Montague there. How I’d been delayed in leaving. I told her about the kidnap, how they’d drugged me and a single captor had taken me to the underground chamber. How I’d been trussed up and made to look at the screen. How I couldn’t move or look away. “I thought I’d be there for good.”
“You know where he took you?”
“To the basement in an unused part of a hospital. Brookheath Hospital. On City Road.”
She looked surprised. “It’s old and Victorian, I know, but how would he have had access to such a place?”
“I don’t know, Jan. The Victorians were obsessive builders of tunnels and basements and sewers under half of London. It’s what they did.” I paused to gather my thoughts. “I know now that this is how he’d planned it all along. To brainwash me into believing that I’d killed those girls when all along he was the one, living out his sick fantasies, videoing it all. He never intended to kill me. Just drug me and beat me within an inch of my life and leave me to do the rest for him.”
Janet tightened her grip on my hand. “You saw him. You know who he is?”
I shook my head. “He was there, moving about, but I couldn’t see his face.”
“But it could be Montague?”
“I can’t be sure.”
She held my hand. “There are the videos. They’re evidence. They’re enough for the police to find whoever is doing this.”
“I’m not sure I could face Ives.”
“He’ll have to believe you.”
I looked into her eyes. “There’s something more, Jan. He showed me his next victim. I think she’s still alive.”
“Then you have no choice. You have to tell Ives.”
CHAPTER 76
When I walked into Lions Yard police station and asked for DI Ives, there was slow recognition from the sergeant behind the desk that I was the one wanted for questioning in the Cathy Newsome case. I was taken straight to an interview room with the door locked behind me.
While I waited, I thought through what I’d asked Janet to do before I’d set off to the Dragon Bar. She’d posted the redeem slip for the diary from the left luggage office at Charing Cross station to Jason Blair at the address I’d given her with a message that told him to hand the slip over to the police if anything happened to her or me. My failsafe.
“You’re charging me?”
“It doesn’t mean that. Just that you’re warned that if you are charged what you say here may be used in court.” He paused. “So, why have you turned yourself in? Why, up ‘til now have you tried to avoid answering questions?”
I took a deep breath. “Something’s changed. There are new things you need to know.”
I told him about the kidnap and the encounter with the serial killer. He didn’t interrupt as I told him about the videos of the missing girls that I’d been forced to watch. “You see, Inspector, I saw his next victim. Another girl. Ashley. That’s what’s changed. You have to act now to save her. If it’s not to be too late.”
He held up a hand. “Hold on. Let’s get at the facts. You say you were held by a serial killer in a chamber in the basement of Brookheath Hospital. How’s that possible? How would anyone have access to such a place?”
He was making me feel unsure of facts I should be certain of. “I don’t know. Perhaps he knows someone who works there or is a volunteer there. Perhaps he’s found a way into a part of the hospital that’s not used any more.”
“And you’re saying he has the place fitted up with video equipment and a cage of some kind to imprison people and make them watch his videos?”
I nodded. “I can take you there. You can see for yourself.”
“And how did he get hold of these videos?”
“He makes them himself. He must wear a camera, something concealed and miniature, when he stalks his victims.”
I didn’t like where this was going. His voice conveyed nothing but skepticism. “And these are the visions that you told us about back in Lichfield?”
“No, they’re not my visions. They’re the reason I was having the visions. The cause of them. You see, Inspector, I know now that he’s done this to me before. He was the one who beat me and left me for dead in the North Dock. It was all part of his plan. He’d captured me, drugged me and exposed me to the evidence of his sick killing spree. Knowing that when I came round I, rather than him, would be of interest to you.”
