Truth or Dare

by Tania Carver

  He went into the bedroom to take off his clothes, grab his bathrobe. And saw a lump in the bed. A Marina-shaped lump in the bed.

  ‘Hey, gorgeous,’ he said, as quietly as he could, ‘you awake?’

  He stretched an arm across to touch her shoulder. Responding to his touch, she turned to face him. Then put the light on. Phil recoiled, pulling his arm back quickly.

  ‘You’re not Marina…’

  ‘Not yet,’ said a woman he had never seen before. ‘But I will be. Soon.’

  She sat up. Her hair was almost like Marina’s and she was wearing make-up that was an approximation of Marina’s. But it wasn’t her.

  Phil’s stomach flipped over.

  ‘What have you done to my wife? Where’s Marina?’

  The woman got out of bed, stood naked before him. Smiled. She began to move towards him. Slowly, languorously, swinging her hips to a lazy, sensuous beat he couldn’t hear.

  He backed away.

  ‘Where’s Marina?’ Fear in his voice now.

  ‘You won’t be needing her,’ she said, her voice low. Phil realised it was an approximation of Marina’s. ‘Not any more. Not with me here.’

  Phil stared at her. He genuinely didn’t know what to do. Whether to use force against her, restrain her, or get out of the house as quickly as possible.

  He looked around, desperately trying to find some trace of Marina. There were none. No bags, no suitcases. It seemed like she wasn’t back home yet. That was something. That was a relief.

  ‘Who are you?’

  The woman laughed. ‘Don’t you know? Really?’

  ‘You’re not Marina. Don’t even pretend. So who are you?’

  ‘I’m younger than Marina. Better than her. In every way…’ She moved closer to him.

  Something struck a chord in her words. Younger. What was that Marina had said on the phone? Am I too old for you? Fiona Welch said it… And Phil immediately knew who this woman was now. But he found that impossible to believe. That woman was in custody.

  ‘Better than her? You’re pathetic. I don’t know who you are, but just stop where you are right now. Don’t come any closer or I’ll have to use force to restrain you.’

  The woman laughed. ‘That might be fun…’

  ‘I can assure you it won’t be.’

  She laughed once more. ‘I’ve come a long way to be here. A very, very long way. I’m not going to let you stop me now…’

  She lunged at him, arms stretched outwards. Phil was ready. He grabbed her arms, twisted them down to the side of her body. Immediately she managed to get one free. Phil was surprised by her speed and strength.

  She punched him in the side of his head. He saw stars, felt pain slice through his jaw and cheek. She hit him again. Same place, more force. He loosened his grip on her.

  She slithered from his grasp, her naked body moving as if it were oiled.

  Phil made another grab for her, made to twist her arm behind her back. She dodged out of the way, a smile on her face, her eyes lit by an intense, almost erotic light.

  ‘Want to play?’ she said. ‘I’m warning you, I’ll win.’

  Phil looked around the room, all thoughts of making a clean arrest gone, now desperately trying to find a weapon to subdue her with. His eyes settled on the bedside lamp. It wasn’t very tall, with a thin neck and small shade, but it had a sturdy, heavy brass base. Phil grabbed it, ripping the plug from the wall as he did so, and swung it at her head.

  She ducked down, her body jack-knifing, almost bending in two. The lamp arced past her, connected only with air.

  Phil responded quickly, swung the lamp low. It hit this time, catching her shoulder. The woman’s hand went to it. She looked up, fire in her eyes, lips curled back, hissing at him.

  He swung the lamp again but she was ready. She managed to twist her body out of the way, roll over on the floor and come up by his other side.

  Before Phil could react, she pulled back her hand, flattening it out, bending her fingers down to make a hard ridge of knuckle and punched him hard in his kidney.

  Phil screamed, his body giving way on one side, crumpling down to the floor.

  She bent over him, did the same to the other side. Agony punched its way through Phil’s body, like his torso had been wrapped in razorwire and she was pulling it tight.

  She stood over him, looking down. Then took her fingers and moved around for a spot on his neck. Squeezed. Hard. It felt like Phil’s bones had been instantly removed and he lay there, a useless sack of skin and blood, still gasping in pain. He was paralysed.

  ‘This is a taste,’ said the woman, getting right down beside him, whispering in his ear in Marina’s voice. Her fingers still digging in to him. ‘Just a taste. Of things to come.’

  Phil tried to speak, respond. Couldn’t.

  ‘You’re mine, Phil. Mine. From now on, I own you.’

  Phil just stared up at her. Questions hammered through his brain. Nothing came out of his stupefied mouth.

  ‘I just wanted to see you. Again.’ She smiled. ‘And I’m not disappointed. But I’m not quite ready for you. Yet.’ She bent down to him, tenderly kissed his forehead. Straightened up again. ‘Don’t worry, my darling. I’ll be seeing you again. Soon.’

  She took her hand from his shoulder, stood up. Crossed to the wardrobe and took out a full-length coat of Marina’s, put it on. Then she swept across the room, coat pulled round her, fluttering her fingers at him in goodbye, blowing him a kiss. She left, closing the door behind her.

  He heard her walking down the stairs, then the front door opening and closing. Sighed.

  He didn’t know how long he lay there, his heart hammering. Gradually, feeling began to return to his body, the pain of pins and needles taking over from the earlier pain, and he managed to sit up. As he did so, he heard the front door opening once more.

  Panic swept through him. The woman was back.

  He tried to pull himself to his feet, grabbed the door handle for support.

  He heard footsteps on the stairs, managed to open the door. He was ready for her. Or as ready as he could be.

  He saw a figure walking towards him.

  Marina.

  He sighed.

  ‘Hey,’ she said.

  ‘Hey yourself,’ he just about managed to reply.

  She smiled. ‘I’m home.’

  He collapsed onto the floor.

  PART FIVE:

  EPITAPH

  92

  T

  he Colchester crematorium was a mid-century redbrick building edging a Victorian cemetery. The mourners had filed in, taken their seats. Gary Franks and his team, Mickey’s most recent work colleagues, were occupying a space in the centre. Phil and Marina sat away from them near the back. Franks saw them, beckoned for them to join the team. Phil shook his head. It didn’t feel right somehow.

  Anni was at the front with her sister next to her, among Mickey’s family. She stared into the middle distance, eyes studiously avoiding the coffin that lay before them all.

  The room was bright and airy, verging on sterile. Music was playing as everyone entered, some old Queen tracks. Phil almost smiled. He hated Queen. And Mickey had hated his taste in music. It was one of the biggest causes of arguments when they drove together. Then what felt like a shadow passed over Phil as he realised he would never have those arguments again and he felt a gaping hollowness inside him. Mickey had been a good friend.

  The service started. To Phil and Marina’s surprise it was a humanist service. They had both felt sure that Mickey would have had some kind of religion lurking in his background, something he would have fallen back on out of childhood sentimentality or superstition, but apparently not. It made Phil think that there was even more to his old DS than he knew.

  The woman hosting the service began to speak. She talked of Mickey’s childhood, some of the scrapes he got into, his schooling, his friendships. She talked of his work in the police force and how proud he was of that. She mentioned Phil b
y name as the person in a professional capacity who had shown him what he was capable of. Then she went on to talk about Anni and how happy she had made him. The lectern was then given over to friends and relatives of Mickey’s who came and talked about what he had meant to them. The first one, his cousin, couldn’t finish what he was saying. Shaking so much he broke down in tears and had to be led away. The second speaker, a friend from his schooldays, fared better. He told some jokes about what he and Mickey had got up to, eliciting laughter from the audience. Then paused, as if realising that he would never be able to share them again. The rest of the room sensed what he was thinking. They were feeling the same thing.

  Phil felt his hand being squeezed. He turned. Marina was smiling at him. He returned her smile. Then he realised why she was holding him. He was crying.

  It had been over a week since Phil had narrowly escaped from the burning flat. Not to mention the woman in his house. And he still didn’t feel he had fully recovered from either experience.

  Stuart Hinchcliffe’s place had been examined by the SOCOs with their usual attention to detail. Apart from the body of Glen Looker in the workshop it had yielded up an arsenal of weapons, enough, said Phil, ‘to equip a small army of Omaha tax dodgers.’ Tasers, crossbows, rifles, automatics. Also stun grenades and gas. ‘Explains how he managed to capture Darren Richards, then,’ Imani had said.

  ‘I think it’s clear,’ said Phil, back at the office, ‘that Hinchcliffe murdered his sister.’

  ‘Where’s the body?’ asked Cotter.

  Phil shrugged. ‘No idea. And we can’t ask him now.’

  Nadish had put in a bid for the jukebox if nobody came forward from the family.

  ‘What about his father?’ Phil had asked Cotter.

  ‘Well, there’s a story. Committed suicide. Was under investigation for abusing neighbourhood children. Lost his job as a result of it.’

  ‘You think he abused his son?’

  ‘The way he turned out?’ said Cotter. ‘I’d put money on it.’

  The media had gone into overdrive. Hinchcliffe’s story was manna from heaven for the tabloids. Books were rushed into production and there was even talk of a film being made.

  ‘Who d’you want to play you in the film?’ Marina asked, not entirely seriously.

  ‘Not sure,’ said Phil. ‘Well, George Clooney, obviously. But knowing my luck I’ll probably get one of the Chuckle Brothers.’

  Marina laughed. ‘As long as it’s the good-looking one.’

  Phil just stared at her.

  Sperring was on the mend. He was out of intensive care and into an ordinary ward. Being amongst other people was starting to get to him.

  ‘I keep telling them I’m well enough to go home,’ he said when Phil and Cotter went to visit him. ‘But they don’t bloody listen.’

  ‘Then you should listen to them,’ said Cotter.

  ‘But don’t you want me back? How’s the place surviving without me?’

  ‘Surprisingly well,’ said Phil, smiling.

  Sperring bit back his retort since Cotter was there but Phil could guess what it was.

  They talked some more, brought him up to speed with what had happened. He had already gleaned most of it from other colleagues and the media.

  ‘What did I tell you?’ Sperring said. ‘Have I got good copper’s instincts or what?’

  ‘Yeah, all right,’ said Phil. ‘You were lucky. Don’t let it go to your head.’

  ‘Go to my head? I’m going to make sure you listen to everything I say from now on.’

  ‘We’ll see.’

  They left him while he was shouting at their backs, ‘Where’s my bloody Bell’s, then?’

  Outside the hospital, Cotter turned to Phil. ‘Well done, Phil. Seriously. You and your team did a great job. You came back from the fiasco at the Radisson and really came through.’

  Phil shrugged, looked around. The wind was getting up so he pulled his collar in close. ‘Thanks, ma’am, but it was luck. That’s all. We got lucky.’

  ‘You ever watch football?’ she said.

  Phil frowned. ‘You can watch some God-awful game that seems to be trudging along to a soulless goalless draw, and then suddenly one of the players scores. Usually by accident. And your team wins.’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Phil.

  ‘Lucky or not, it’s a goal. It’s a win.’

  ‘Thanks, ma’am.’

  She walked off. He watched her go.

  I got lucky, thought Phil. I dodged a bullet. But next time it might be different.

  Next time.

  It felt like Letisha hadn’t stopped crying for days. She had lost everything. Everything. Not just her possessions, which weren’t much to start with, but most of all Moses. She couldn’t believe it, would still wake up crying about it. She would dream that he was with her, that they were starting the new life together he had promised. They’d be driving away in his car, having adventures, laughing and happy. Then she would wake up. See the temporary room in the bed and breakfast the council had put her into. And start crying again.

  She tried to make do, to get on with life, but it was so hard. Just getting up in the morning was hard. And she hated all the other people in the bed and breakfast. Well, not hated. Just feared. She would lie in bed at night in her run-down room, smelling the mildew, seeing the breeze from the broken window lift the curling, damp paper in the corner of the room, and hear noises from the rest of the house. Crying. Laughing. Sobbing. Screaming in foreign languages. Then more sobbing. This was her life. What it had come to. She couldn’t see a way forward. Couldn’t see a point.

  Tiny, when he had recovered and been questioned by police, told them he had gone to Letisha’s flat to talk about his brother’s death. He blamed Moses for it. The police had asked Letisha to corroborate his story. She had no choice. It was either that or face jail for manslaughter. So she agreed. Told them Moses had done it. She felt like she was pissing on his grave and hated herself even more for doing it. She tried to put it behind her, get rid of the pain inside her. Eventually it just dulled down to an ache. Then a hollow, empty feeling. Numbness.

  Then she received a phone call. A publisher wanted her to tell her story. Gangsta girl. Serialised in the newspapers, on the chat-show circuit. Famous. At first she said no, retreated into her shell. But then, after another couple of nights in the bed and breakfast, she thought about it. And said yes.

  Now she had a publicist working for her. A ghost writer listening to her, writing her life story. Newspapers lined up ready to give her money. This was it, she thought. Her big chance. Her only chance.

  She would become a celebrity. Turn this into a career. Big Brother, whatever. They might even want her to get her kit off in the lads’ mags. Fine. As long as it paid.

  She could still feel the same hollowness inside her but now it was starting to crust over, a hardness form around it. And deep down, some part of her hated that. But she had no choice. It was this or nothing.

  And she had had too much of nothing.

  The coffin moved along on its conveyer belt, the curtains closed behind it. Mickey Phillips went to his second cremation.

  The mourners filed out of the funeral service, into the cold, hard daylight.

  The wake was at a nearby pub. Phil and Marina had intended to attend but after he found himself crying, Phil wasn’t feeling up to it. The service had upset him more than he had thought it would.

  Anni came over to them, hugged them both.

  ‘You coming to the pub?’

  ‘I think we’ll head off,’ said Marina. ‘Phil’s…’ She didn’t finish. Didn’t need to finish.

  Anni nodded, understood.

  ‘What about you?’ asked Marina. ‘How are you coping? Sorry. I bet everyone’s asked you that.’

  ‘They’ve got a right to,’ she said. ‘I’m…’ She sighed. ‘I don’t know. I’ve got people around me. You. My family. It’s going to be difficult going back to work, though. Expecting those doors to ope
n and see him walking through every day. That’s going to be hard.’ She nodded. Thinking about it. ‘Very hard.’

  ‘You could put in for a transfer,’ said Phil. ‘I could always make space on my team for you.’

  She managed a smile. ‘Thanks, but…’ She shrugged. ‘I don’t know if that might just be the same thing. You both there.’ She shook her head. ‘I don’t know. I’ll see.’

  ‘The offer’s there,’ said Phil. ‘Whenever.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  There were tears in the corners of Anni’s eyes.

  ‘Right,’ she said, trying to sound brave. ‘I’d better go to the pub.’

  She left them.

  Phil and Marina said their goodbyes, walked away from everyone else through the garden of remembrance.

  ‘Garden of remembrance,’ said Marina. ‘Colchester’s got an Avenue of Remembrance as well.’

  ‘That it has,’ said Phil.

  ‘That’s what this town’s all about. Not forgetting. For us anyway.’ She took his arm in hers.

  There was still something else, something they barely addressed but nevertheless hung over them, a sword of Damocles.

  ‘That woman,’ said Marina. ‘Fiona Welch. Whoever she was. Have you…?’

  ‘Have I heard anything from her?’ said Phil, finishing her sentence. ‘No. I haven’t. I would tell you if I did.’

  They fell into silence once more. Phil’s attack had become the elephant in the room for both of them. Any room. They no longer felt safe in their own home and were thinking of moving. There had been a full search for her that night but it was as if she had just vanished without a trace. No one knew who she was, where she came from. They knew she wasn’t Fiona Welch and she certainly wasn’t Marina. Phil had been questioned repeatedly about old enemies he had put away, anyone bearing a grudge against him, someone out to settle scores. Every investigation drew a blank. She seemed to not exist.

  Cotter had sent plain-clothes officers to guard the house and to escort, from a distance, Josephina when she went to nursery. But both Phil and Marina knew that wouldn’t last for ever. Funds were tight and if she hadn’t appeared by a certain point, no threat would be adjudged and the officers reassigned.