by Diane Hester
On the third and top floor she came to a shower block. More than any area she’d glimpsed so far, the filthy tiles and echoing stillness filled her with a sense of desolation. The victims of the campus strangler had died in these wretched surroundings, totally cut off from the rest of the world.
Just off the showers she found a locker room. She hadn’t planned to touch anything but when she saw one locker door standing ajar she moved closer to look inside.
An open sports bag lay at the bottom, its bright blue canvas a vivid contrast to the drab olive steel. Clearly not a remnant from a former worker. Had it belonged to one of the victims? Finally something she could show Mac?
Lindsay squatted, set down her phone and, using only the tips of her nails, opened the bag.
A pair of what appeared to be surgical gloves lay atop some folded clothing. Men’s or women’s clothes she couldn’t tell, but once again the colours were bold, the items fresh.
She couldn’t see anything else in the bag—no wallets or purses, watches or jewellery. Deciding no prints could be left on the gloves, she picked them up for a better look at what lay beneath.
An electric chill raced up her arms, slammed her chest and gripped her heart, nearly stopping it. As the gloves fired off more and more images, she flinched and jerked, gasped and twitched.
She threw down the vile objects and jumped to her feet.
With her bandaged hands clapped to her mouth, she stumbled back—away from the locker, away from the gloves, away from the monstrous images they’d shown her—out through the door.
And into a wall not gyprock but human.
She spun around and froze at the sight of the man before her. Not surprise but horror held her immobile. The shock had come when she’d touched the gloves, when she’d finally seen …
But, no, it couldn’t be. She had to be wrong! Mac had already—
‘So you see me at last.’
She forced her lips to form the words. ‘Doctor Ikeman.’
‘I knew you wouldn’t be able to resist following me in here.’ He tipped his head, a gesture so charming, so perfectly ordinary, a part of her almost responded in kind. ‘How does it feel to have completed your mission and found the man no-one else could? Do you feel empowered, Lindsay? You should. You’ve silenced all the disbelievers.’
He took a step forward, forcing her back into the locker room.
Her mind raced. There was still a way out of this. If she could convince him she didn’t know. ‘What … what are you talking about?’
‘Oh, please. A girl with your gift? You couldn’t possibly have handled those gloves without sensing what I’d used them for.’
She side-stepped across the front of the lockers. ‘No, really, I have no idea. I didn’t see anything.’
‘I knew it would only be a matter of time before you saw it all anyway. Especially once you’d freed yourself of your terrible guilt.’ His expression grew anguished. ‘How you must have suffered through this. Experiencing the pain of each victim. Not just the emotional but the physical as well. For that I am truly sorry, believe me.’
In a blink he moved to block her retreat, pressing her back against the lockers. ‘You must understand I never intended that. But how could anyone have predicted such a thing? How could I have possibly known?’
Slowly, dreamily, he reached up to trace the line of her jaw with a manicured nail. ‘Please, tell me you understand.’
‘I understand,’ she managed to gasp.
‘In a way this is a tremendous relief for me—you finally seeing the truth. We can be honest with each other now. Totally honest. You want that, don’t you?’
She felt the locker’s cold steel at her back. ‘Doctor Ikeman—Ron. I swear to you—’
‘You are truly unique, you realise that?’
She swallowed. ‘Am I?’
‘By any standards your gift is extraordinary. Surely you must know that by now.’ His eyes filled with sadness; he lowered his hand. ‘I do so wish I could go on studying you.’
‘Mac knows I’m here,’ she blurted out.
Laughing, he turned and stepped aside to the open locker. ‘The cretin who arrested the wrong killer? The man who’s done nothing but doubt and torment you through this whole affair?’
He bent and fumbled in the sports bag then rose to face her. His smiled died. ‘You love him, don’t you?’
She edged another step towards the door.
‘I was the one who believed in you. I’m the one you should’ve chosen.’ He settled himself. ‘I suppose even those with vision have blind spots. Well, sadly your hero is tied up at present. For the rest of the day, as you told me yourself.’
Ikeman slipped the first glove on his hand, snapped the cuff and started towards her. ‘Which gives us time for one last game.’
Chapter 47
‘Just get in, I’ll explain on the way.’ Mac gunned the engine and roared off the instant Sam closed his door. He swerved the Prado through the station car park and swung out into flowing traffic.
‘This message from Lindsay,’ he said, holding up the paper Sam had given him three hours earlier. ‘Tell me exactly what she said. Did she say she’d already found the factory or simply that she knew where it was?’
The big man frowned. ‘The latter. I think. I’m not sure she really—’
‘Did she say where she was calling from?’ Mac steered the Prado around a bus and accelerated up North Terrace.
‘I assumed her apartment. Isn’t that where you talked to her last?’
‘Well, she’s not there now. I called Davis at the front desk and he says her flat’s empty and her car is gone.’
‘I don’t get it, Mac, what’s the problem?’
He pulled his phone out and hit Lindsay’s number again. ‘I’m afraid she drove off to find the place herself.’
‘How would she even have known where to look?’
‘When she described the area to me this morning I told her it sounded like the old marina. Between that and that bloody gift of hers she may have stumbled onto the place.’ Lindsay’s number was still unavailable ‘Damn!’ He tossed the phone on the dashboard.
‘I gather that’s where we’re headed now then. But, Mac, what’s the rush?’
‘You remember Lindsay’s childhood friend, the one who drowned?’
‘Adelle Phillips.’
‘And the name of the bloke we picked up this morning?’
‘Graham Phill—’ Sam’s gaze snapped towards him. ‘Jesus.’
‘Turns out Adelle was his daughter. Shaunwyn’s abduction had nothing to do with the campus murders. He was after Lindsay and grabbed her by mistake.’
‘But, Mac, the Phillips girl’s been dead for over ten years. If the father’s been after Lindsay all that time wouldn’t he have found her long before this?’
‘I didn’t have time to get it all out of him. He admits to being institutionalised. Maybe that slowed down his search for a while. Maybe when he got out he’d come to terms with it, at least at first. Until he saw Lindsay’s picture in the paper and read about the other girls’ deaths.’
‘And that stirred him up again.’
Mac thumped the steering wheel. ‘How could I not have picked up on the name? Phillips. Jesus!’
‘It’s common enough, mate. Give yourself a break.’
No worries; I’ll be sure to tell Lindsay that.
Sam looked over. ‘So you’re afraid Lindsay might have stumbled into something?’
Like the real killer. ‘If her visions about that factory are accurate …’ Mac stamped his foot down on the accelerator.
***
Lindsay burst through the work room door just as Martha Daniels had done in her dream.
Somehow she’d managed to find her way back through the maze of corridors to the original chamber where she’d entered the building. She raced for the sliding steel door near the ramp and skidded to a halt just before it.
A heavy chain now hung from the handle,
sealed with a padlock. Ikeman had barred her only escape. With a cry of outrage, she yanked on the chain, managing only to hurt her hands.
She spun to scan the floor around her. A length of pipe looked the most promising. She grabbed it and swung it against the lock, again and again. Echoes ricocheted about the chamber, slamming her ears. Ikeman would be sure to hear it, but if she could get out in time it wouldn’t matter.
The pipe slipped from her bandaged hands and clanged to the floor. In the silence as she bent to retrieve it she heard a door slamming somewhere in the labyrinth she’d left behind.
Ikeman was coming.
At the chamber’s far end a third door beckoned, offering access to areas unknown, spaces she’d neither walked in her search nor seen in her dreams. Take a chance on what lay beyond? Or stand and fight; use the pipe as a weapon?
A louder crash came from the other direction. Ikeman again.
She froze at a thought. He’d been making blatant, almost regular noises since their chase had begun. Why wasn’t he trying to conceal his movements? Even in her fear she sensed his actions were coldly deliberate. Was he trying to drive her in this direction? If so, why? What was beyond that final door?
Another crash, closer this time.
She hefted the pipe. Too heavy to wield with effective force.
She dropped it and ran for her only option.
The door closed behind her, sealing her within the shadowy lengths of another passage, the extents of which she couldn’t yet see. She blundered on even as her eyes adjusted to the gloom.
When the floor grew uneven, she reached for the wall to steady herself. Trailing her fingers along its surface she slowed to a stop and raised her other hand up beside it, gripped by a sudden curious impression.
Mac had said once that the killer kept his victims alive for several days before strangling them. And in her visions the women had always been running, never bound or confined except by these walls. Was that why Ikeman brought them here? So he could hunt them through this endless maze, relive the game over and over until he tired of it? Or until they grew too weak to make the chase interesting for him?
She lowered her hands and gazed about her. Yes, that was it. The factory provided him the perfect arena. A place he could hunt his prey at leisure without fear they would escape him.
Which also explained the noises he made. The bastard wanted her to know he was coming. It was part of the game, part of what excited him about the chase.
And she just might be able to use that against him.
A series of doors lined the wall on her right. She rejected the rooms beyond as possible hiding places. She needed to put more distance between her and her pursuer.
The passage grew lighter as she neared a junction and she moved a bit faster. Around the corner a freight elevator—its wooden doors lying splintered within it—stood beside another shadowy staircase, with a hallway stretching away into darkness.
Which way would Ikeman expect her to go? Which way did he want her to go? Even with the ramp door locked, she’d have thought her best chance of escaping the building was still via the ground floor. And yet Jen Dawson had been forced to attempt it from a third-storey window.
A crash resounding from the work room behind her drove her up the stairs.
She didn’t stop till she reached the top floor. Praying her gift would somehow guide her, she chose a direction and ran up the passage, scanning rooms for a suitable place to enact her plan.
But around the first corner, her hopes dissolved. She was back at the shower block, having reached it this time from the other direction. No cover here—the stalls would be the first place he’d look. She stepped back into the hall and ran on.
A clanging rose up the stairwell behind her—Ikeman announcing his ascent up the stairs. Once he stepped out into the corridor he’d be able to see her. She ducked through the very next door she came to.
A storeroom filled with deep open shelves. She worked her way through their ranks to the back. A few rusted cans and rat-eaten boxes were all they contained. She bit back a cry—this was worse than the shower block! Too late now.
Planting her foot on the second shelf, she pushed herself up, leaned across the top tier, and began levering her legs up behind her.
‘You know it suddenly occurs to me that I don’t have to make these noises with you.’
She gasped and clutched at the shelving’s edge. She’d jerked so violently at the sound of his voice—much closer than she’d expected—that she’d nearly lost her grip and fallen. As she struggled to raise her legs once more, she prayed his words would mask the ragged hiss of her breathing.
‘Your gift gives you quite an unfair advantage really. Even if I never made a sound, you’d still know where I was. You’d always be one step ahead of me. That doesn’t seem quite fair, does it.’
His comments were followed by a serious of crashes—the stall doors thrown open one by one as he searched the toilets.
On the top shelf, Lindsay dragged herself towards the wall. The aging metal creaked beneath her. She waited for Ikeman to start up again, then, timing her movements with the sounds he created, continued to inch-worm across the shelf.
‘Actually now that I think about it, I take that back. It would be quite thrilling knowing we were more equally matched. Your gift against mine. We could keep the game going for weeks, you and I. Far longer than with any of the others.’
His voice was coming from the corridor again, moving closer, nearly at the storeroom door.
‘It really is a pity we can’t indulge ourselves; I would so enjoy that. But sadly I’m on somewhat of a schedule this time. This must be done quickly, with a minimum of fuss.’
Lindsay pressed back against the wall, flattening herself as best she could. Ikeman was tall. Would he be able to see her over the edge of the shelf?
‘Obliging me on the latter will only be in your own best interests. Seeing as we’ve been through so much together, I promise to make it as painless as possible.’
Lindsay held her breath. His last words had come from right in the doorway.
And now they had stopped.
The silence stretched her nerves to the breaking point. Why was Ikeman just standing in the doorway? Why had he stopped his goading monologue? Had he spotted her perched on top of the shelving? Was he even now moving towards her? Smiling, reaching up—
‘Still, if you insist, I suppose we can indulge ourselves a bit longer. For a few minutes more at least.’
Lindsay felt the hot sting of tears. His voice had come from beyond the door. He was moving away, continuing his search up the corridor.
She lay motionless for several long minutes, barely breathing. The temptation to stay where she was was strong—if he’d missed her once, it could be hours before his search brought him back this way again.
But in the end she forced herself down from her perch. Hiding would only postpone the inevitable. She had to take steps. She had to act. And in the moments she’d lain there cringing and waiting for him to leave, she’d suddenly remembered. Something that in her panic she’d forgotten, and that hopefully Ikeman hadn’t discovered.
Her mobile phone.
The locker room was just back up the hall, past the showers. With luck her phone would still be sitting at the base of the locker where she’d set it down before searching the sports bag.
At the door she dared a look out into the hall. No sign of Ikeman.
She waited, listening. She couldn’t hear anything from either direction but presumably he’d continued in the way they’d been going.
She slipped out the door and started back the other way.
In the locker room she couldn’t see her phone on the floor where she’d left it. Still, her hopes refused to die. Perhaps, in their scuffle, it had been kicked beneath the locker.
She bent down beside it and felt with her hand. Nothing but dirt and cobwebs and filth.
She dropped to all fours, lowered her face till her chin sc
raped the tiles. Something was there! She could just make it out. The glint of metal sparking on a flat rectangular object.
She thrust her arm deeper beneath the frame, felt with her fingertips, hooked them around it, pulled it out.
And stared in horrified disbelief at the mouldering mouse trap.
‘Looking for this?’
Her head snapped up.
Ikeman stood in the shower-room door, holding her phone.
Lindsay slowly rose to her feet.
‘I’m afraid it isn’t working anymore.’ Ikeman made a pretence of checking her phone, then shook his head and held up his hands. ‘Must be the battery.’
He returned it to his pocket and looked around. ‘We seem to be back where we started, don’t we. Have you had enough, or shall we go another round?’
She ducked behind the row of lockers—just a single bank down the centre of the room. A barrier that wouldn’t protect her for long.
‘Did you think I didn’t know you were hiding in that storeroom?’ His disembodied voice bounced off the walls. ‘You’ll have to give me more credit than that if you’re to prove yourself a worthy adversary.’
Lindsay bolted. She never expected to reach the door but when she burst from her cover, Ikeman didn’t move from his spot. She expected to feel his hand on her back, but he never lunged, made not the slightest effort to stop her.
As she tore down the hallway back towards the stairs, she couldn’t help feeling she was doing exactly what he wanted her to do. Clearly he wasn’t through with the chase.
At the stairwell she paused. At some point the bandage on her left hand had torn and a strip dangled free by a thread. She ripped the piece off and dropped it onto the third step down. If he thought she’d gone that way, she might buy herself some time.
She headed up the passage instead, into an area she’d not yet seen. Two turns further, with no sounds behind her, she held her first hope that her ruse had succeeded. But around the next corner she tripped on what felt like a rolled-up carpet, and sprawled heavily, her body sliding along the floor.
Somehow she managed to hold back her cry. She’d tried to break her fall with her hands. The pain was exquisite. But not as bad as what seared through her leg. Pain that screamed louder when she tried to straighten it.
