by Ken Preston
Coffin placed a shiny, black helmet over his head and climbed back on the Harley. Emma watched as he coasted down the drive, and then, with a low, guttural roar, disappeared down the quiet, leafy avenue.
Emma twisted around, sat down with her back against the wall, and closed her eyes. That had been close.
Far too close.
Now that Coffin was gone, she decided that she needed to tidy Michael’s room. Best not to leave any sign that someone had been here. But she needed to act fast, just in case Coffin had gone for a quick spin around the streets, before coming back.
As fast as she could, the job made easier now that Emma’s hands were no longer trembling. She put the batteries back in the toy compartments, and placed the toys back in the toy box. When she was satisfied she had put the room back as she had found it, she crept down the stairs, the packs of baby wipes in her hands.
Cradling the baby wipes against her body with one hand, she pulled open the front door.
“What the fuck!” she said and dropped the packets on the floor.
“Ooh, contemgander the lovelable damselvety over thithertoo!” said the strange looking man blocking the doorway.
wiilllmmmaaaaaa!
Coffin braked and slowed the Fat Boy to a halt outside Angels. A police car was parked outside the club. There was no one in the car.
Coffin revved the throttle and pulled around the back of the club, parked up in the customer car park. He climbed off the bike and slowly flexed his right hand and gingerly rotated his shoulder. His right arm, from his fingers to his shoulder, was on fire. The journey from his house back to Angels was only a short one, but towards the end he’d had trouble gripping the handlebar with his right hand.
After finding out that Shaddock wasn’t a doctor, Coffin was seriously considering seeing a specialist. It wasn’t the scarring that bothered him, but keeping the use of his arm. After examining the wounds in his shoulder and forearm, Shaddock had done nothing more than sew him up, and supply him with a course of antibiotics. Did he really want to trust Shaddock with repairing his damaged shoulder, when he seemed to have learnt most of his doctoring skills from watching Casualty?
The problem was, he couldn’t exactly turn up at a hospital and ask for treatment. There would be too many questions, not the least of them being, what on earth happened to you, and which quack sewed you up?
First chance Coffin got, he would ask around, see if he could find somebody else, who was off the grid, to have a look at him.
But he might ask to see qualifications first.
Despite the pain, it had been good to get back on the Harley. Especially after going back into his house for the first time since losing Steffanie and Michael. He had thought to just have a quick look around, check that everything was okay, and gauge how he felt about being home. But he couldn’t do it. The hallway was as far as he got. Seeing the photos on the wall, the familiar surroundings, the silence, it had all been too much.
He couldn’t face the pain of going back in his home just yet.
But soon. The pain of losing his wife and son was never going to go away, but Coffin was a realist. He had to get on with his life. Maybe now was the time to get out of the Slaughterhouse Mob. Move away, start afresh. Hell, he’d lived in Birmingham all his life. Hadn’t set foot out of the West Midlands before he met Laura, and she insisted on them taking a holiday somewhere nice.
They wound up in Torquay, spent a weekend walking along the seafront, playing on the penny slot machines in the arcades, eating ice creams on the beach.
It had been hell.
But what if Coffin just got on his bike and rode off somewhere, anywhere? He didn’t have to stay in one place any longer than a night. Maybe he could take his Harley to the USA, ride up and down those long, straight roads through the desert. Just like that TV series he used to watch as a boy, Then Came Bronson. Bronson was like Caine from Kung Fu, travelling around the west on his bike, sorting out people’s problems. Watching that show had been responsible for getting Coffin into motorbikes. Bronson rode a 1969 Harley-Davidson Sportster, with the eye of providence painted on the fuel tank.
Coffin had sometimes thought about having an illustration painted on the Fat Boy’s fuel tank, but he could never decide what.
Coffin walked in the club through the back entrance. Chairs were stacked on tables, the bar in darkness, the silver and gold poles on the stage looking forlorn without a half-naked girl wrapped around each one. The only sounds were that of the cleaning lady pushing a vacuum between the tables, and the low murmur of conversation from two men at the bar.
Coffin sauntered over.
Best to get this done with.
Craggs was sitting on one stool, elbow leaning on the bar, steaming mug of coffee in hand. The mug had the Angels logo on it.
DCI Nick Archer was perched on the stool next to Craggs. He didn’t have a drink. He looked tense, unhappy, like he had a lot on his mind.
Craggs turned to face Coffin as he approached, and Archer stood up.
“Perfect timing, Joe,” Craggs said, his face breaking open into a wide smile. “This is DCI Archer, he wanted to ask you a few questions.”
Archer didn’t offer his hand. “You’re a difficult man to find, Mr Coffin.”
Coffin raised an eyebrow. “Most people would disagree, considering my size.”
“What happened to your face?”
“Got myself a kitten,” Coffin said. “He likes to use my face as a scratching post.”
Archer stared at Coffin, like he wanted to tell him to stop being a dick, have some respect. “Have you been in contact with Tom Mills, recently?”
“Not for a couple of days.”
“What about yesterday, at Hilton Park service station?”
Coffin tilted his head back a touch, put on a thoughtful expression.
“Nope, don’t believe I saw him yesterday,” he said, finally.
“But you were at the service station, right?”
“Not me, I don’t like motorway service stations.”
Archer sighed. “We have witnesses, Coffin, saw you there, with a young woman, Emma Wylde, driving a Ford Fiesta.”
Craggs laughed. “You see Joe fitting in a tin bucket like a Fiesta? It’d be like the Flintstones, where Dino sticks his head through the car roof at the drive-in. You remember the Flintstones, don’t you, Archer?”
Coffin chuckled, shook his head. “I used to love the Flintstones.”
“Yabba dabba doooo!” Craggs yelled, his old man’s voice cracking as he stretched out the vowel at the end.
“Wiillllmmaaaaa!” Coffin roared.
“You two are funny,” Archer said. “You both missed your vocation in life. You could have been a comedy double act, instead of a pair of thugs and killers.”
Craggs looked at Coffin, his eyes alive with amusement. “Did DCI Archer just accuse us of murder, Joe?”
“Sounded like it to me.”
“Maybe I should ring my lawyer, before Archer charges us. Are you going to charge us with something, Archer? Or were you just thinking out loud when you called Joe and myself killers?”
“Like I already said, we have witnesses, Coffin, saw you chasing Tom Mills, after he assaulted that man and stole his Mercedes,” Archer said.
“Tom assaulted someone and stole his car?” Coffin said and gave Archer a look of feigned astonishment.
“Doesn’t sound like Tom to me,” Craggs replied. “What do you think, Joe?”
Coffin shook his head, sighed deeply. “Tom’s a sweet guy, wouldn’t hurt a fly. These witnesses of yours, they must be mistaken.”
Archer stood up. “All right, all right, enough with the comedy routine. I knew I was wasting my time coming here.”
Craggs spread his hands out wide, smiled. “I wish we could be of more help, Detective Archer.”
“Of course you do,” Archer said, walking between the tables stacked with chairs, past the cleaning lady, pushing the vacuum around. She flicked the Vs a
t his retreating back.
“Archer!” Coffin shouted.
The detective stopped by the door, turned back to stare at Coffin.
“Shouldn’t you be out looking for the Birmingham Vampire, instead of wasting your time here, questioning me about an assault over which I had nothing to do with?”
Archer stared Coffin down for a couple of seconds. “If you see Tom Mills, he needs to hand himself in right away for questioning.”
“Of course, Detective Archer,” Craggs said.
Coffin and Craggs sat at the bar, watched Archer leave.
“Fucking filth,” Craggs muttered.
Coffin reached across the bar and grabbed himself a mug, filled it with strong, black coffee from the pot. “Anyone seen Tom, yet?”
“Not yet. But he’ll come crawling back soon enough, you can bet on it.”
“And when he does, I’m going to rip him apart, bit by bit, until he tells me what’s going on.” Coffin sipped at the hot coffee. “What do you think that was all about, with Archer? Didn’t seem like an official police visit to me.”
“You know him and that reporter are an item, don’t you?”
Coffin put his coffee down on the bar. “Emma Wylde?”
“Yeah, the same Emma Wylde you were cavorting with yesterday.”
Coffin ran his hand over his scalp and massaged the back of his neck. The wounds on his face and chest were itching, and he had to resist the urge to rip the dressings off. “It wasn’t a date, you know. We didn’t even kiss.”
“I don’t care if she let you slip your hand down her panties, you still managed to piss off her boyfriend.”
“You think that was why he came here?”
“What would you do in his position, your girlfriend’s seen running around with a known criminal?”
“I’d rip his head off.”
Craggs leaned forward, fixing him with a stare. “What the fuck, Joe? I didn’t say anything last night, but seriously, what the fuck? Since when did it seem like a good idea to hang around with a reporter? Not only that, but her boyfriend’s a fucking copper.”
Coffin opened his mouth to say something, but Craggs held his hand up, silenced him.
“And if that wasn’t bad enough, he’s the same fucking copper who’s had a hard on for you ever since you fixed Terry Wu! You mind explaining to me what’s going on?”
Coffin shrugged, sipped some more of the coffee. “There’s nothing to explain. We bumped into each other at the hospital, both of us looking for Tom. When Tom made a run for it, we went after him in her car.”
“A fucking Ford Fiesta.”
Coffin smiled. “It was a tight fit.”
Craggs took Coffin’s hand, gave it a squeeze. “Joe, I know you can take care of yourself, but you’ve got to be careful. This Archer, I’ve got a bad feeling about him. Fucking coppers are bad enough, but one that’s got his sights set on you? That’s your worst nightmare.”
“I can handle Archer,” Coffin said.
Craggs let go of Coffin’s hand. “I know you can, Joe. I just want you to take care, that’s all.”
* * *
DCI Nick Archer climbed in the police car, sat behind the wheel and watched the nightclub’s front door.
What an idiot you are! You should have got Coffin down to the station, questioned him on his own, away from the old man, away from the club. Why the hell did you have to come over here and make a fool of yourself like this?
But Nick already knew the answer to that question.
Emma.
Ever since he’d had that call from Collins at Staffordshire Police, Nick had been on edge. They had been the ones called out to the assault on the Mercedes driver. Coffin had been identified by witnesses at the scene. He wasn’t exactly easy to miss. But it hadn’t been until earlier this morning that Nick had received, what Collins termed, a ‘courtesy call’, to let Nick know that Emma had been identified as having been on the scene too.
What the hell had she been doing at Hilton Park services, with Joe Coffin of all people? If the witness they had was to be believed, Coffin actually got in Emma’s Fiesta and they drove off together, in pursuit of Tom Mills.
Archer shifted in his seat, tried stretching out his legs in the confines of the car. He was tired, and stiff, and ached all over. He was supposed to be in bed, getting a few hours’ sleep before his next stint on duty, coordinating the manhunt for the Birmingham Vampire. The psycho had seemingly just disappeared, which was incredible, considering his wounds, and the fact that he was naked. Surely somebody must have seen him?
But he’d gone, vanishing like a puff of smoke.
They had to make some progress soon, find the bastard before the papers started laying into them. It wouldn’t take long before the headlines started screaming about ‘incompetent police’, and ‘who was going to protect the city if the police couldn’t’. What did they know? They hadn’t seen Pierce and Webb, lying in a dark pool of blood, in the cellar at that house, their throats ripped wide open.
Why the hell did Emma have to be a reporter? Of all the girls he could have chosen to move in with, and he wound up with a reporter. But she was funny and sexy and, although she infuriated him so much at times, he liked that she was independent minded. Archer had never gone for women who just rolled over and gave in at the first sign of a fight.
But sometimes he just wished she would listen to him. Like yesterday. He’d told her not to leave the house, he’d told her it was dangerous. But no, she refused to listen to him, and wound up being associated with an assault, with Joe Coffin of all people.
Was that why her car had got smashed up?
And why was she lying to him? Was it just because she knew he would be angry with her, for not listening to his advice, and for being with Joe Coffin?
Or was it more serious than that?
Maybe her and Coffin were having an affair.
Archer punched the wheel of his car in frustration.
Don’t be an idiot! Emma wouldn’t do that. And what would she see in Coffin, anyway? The big bastard has a face like a squashed pizza.
Still ...
Nick called up Emma’s number on his mobile. He’d been trying to call her all morning, but he just kept getting her voice mail service.
Where the hell was she?
* * *
Emma could feel her mobile vibrating in her pocket, could hear the buzz.
“You’ve got a recally on your stelephone,” the tall, skeletal creature standing in the door said.
Emma said nothing, just stared at him, couldn’t take her eyes off him. He looked like the vampire in that old film, what was it called? Oh yeah, Nosferatu.
Keeping her eyes on him all the time, Emma squatted down and picked up the packets of baby wipes. Nosferatu watched her constantly, his dark little eyes tracking her movements. She stood up, slowly. He looked so painfully thin, a stiff wind would most likely blow him over. Emma thought about rushing him, pushing him aside and dashing for her car. Wouldn’t take much, he’d probably still be getting to his feet by the time she was driving off.
But something about him made her hesitate. Maybe it was his bizarre appearance, or the strange language he spoke in. Or maybe it was something else, an uneasy prickling running down her back, that told Emma he was stronger, faster, than he looked.
And she didn’t like the way he was looking at her.
Emma’s mobile stopped buzzing.
Nosferatu licked his dry, cracked lips.
Another figure stepped into view behind the tall, dirty, dishevelled creature.
“Oh, how delightful,” said the woman. “There is somebody home, after all.”
Not as tall as the man, but at least twice his weight, she was wearing a long, black coat and dark, wraparound sunglasses. Emma didn’t like this, not at all. Whatever their intentions were at Joe Coffin’s house, Emma didn’t really want to stick around and find out what they were.
Emma was forced to walk backwards as the two strange
rs entered the house. The woman closed the door behind her.
“Who the fuck are you two?” Emma said.
“This is my good friend and companion, Mr Corpse,” the fat woman said.
“Mrs Stump, she’s smashioning,” said Corpse.
“What did he say?” Emma said.
“He said that he likes you,” Stump replied.
She took off the sunglasses. Her eyelids were puffy and red, and her eyes were weeping. She wiped at them, and Emma went cold as she realised the hand was plastic, looked like something off a mannequin.
“Your eyes, they look sore,” she said.
“Oh, yes, they’ve been bothering me for days, now. Such a trial.”
“You’ve probably got conjunctivitis,” Emma said.
Stump stopped wiping at her eyes with the plastic hand. “Have I now?”
“Go to the chemists, you can get some eye drops. Clear it up in no time.”
“Why, thank you.” Stump turned to Corpse. “So nice to meet someone who’s prepared to help another person, isn’t it Mr Corpse? People are so unfriendly these days, so reluctant to get involved.”
“I’d likewish to inspeer her sunlicked buttarbuns,” Corpse said.
“What the fuck’s he talking about?” Emma said.
“He said he wants to have a look at your bottom.” Stump smiled, dimples forming in her pudgy cheeks. There was a fine tracery of red veins running over her bulbous nose. Her greasy hair was tied back off her forehead covered in spots.
“Is that right?” Emma said.
She took a step backwards, clutching the three packs of baby wipes to her chest. Why the fuck had she decided to take them all? All she’d had to do was take them apart until she found the USB stick, and then she could have stuffed that in her jeans pocket. Instead she looked like she was about to perform a mass baby’s arse wiping session.
Corpse’s eyes flitted about the hallway. His gaze settled on the portrait of Coffin and his family.
“Joe Coffin,” he said, as though he had discovered Coffin standing right in front of them.
