Dark Peak

by Adam J. Wright

  The living room door stood ajar, the way he’d left it when he’d come to bed earlier. In the darkness beyond that door was his phone. He needed to reach it and call the police.

  And what exactly would he tell them? That he’d heard a noise while he was asleep and the garden gate was open? Would that bring Derbyshire’s finest racing to Edge House, sirens blaring? He wasn’t even sure the gate had been locked in the first place. He thought he’d seen a padlock but he couldn’t swear to it.

  Maybe he was imagining things. A bit of wind and rain and an unknown noise in a lonely Gothic house on the moors had sent his mind into overdrive. There was no intruder and the noise he’d heard had probably been the gate blowing open and slamming against the garden wall.

  He hadn’t turned on the lights because he hadn’t wanted whoever was possibly lurking downstairs to know he was aware of their presence, but now he laughed inwardly at himself. Wasn’t stumbling around in the dark what every character in a horror movie did and didn’t he always mentally berate them for acting in such an unrealistic way?

  He found the light switch on the landing and flicked it on.

  The lights stayed off.

  Okay, no need to panic. Maybe the wind blew down a power line.

  Still, he’d be happier if he didn’t have to go downstairs in the dark. Telling himself he was letting his imagination get the better of him and that he shouldn’t be so foolish, he stepped onto the stairs. As he descended slowly, he listened to the house but heard nothing other than the wind howling in the eaves and the rain beating against the windows.

  When his bare feet touched the Persian rug, he paused and tightened his grip on the lamp. He just had to cross the foyer and he would be in the living room. Once he had his phone in hand, he could use its flashlight app and check the windows and doors. He was sure he would find everything as it should be. No shattered window where an intruder had climbed in, no broken door hanging off its hinges.

  He stepped forward off the rug and onto the smooth wooden floor. The floorboards creaked under his weight. Just a dozen or so paces and he’d be in the living room. Then he’d have his phone and wouldn’t feel so isolated.

  He took two steps. A sound reached his ears. It came from the back of the house. Mitch turned to face the corridor that led off the foyer but saw nothing other than the moonlit kitchen. What he’d heard had sounded like a hesitant footstep, like the sole of a boot scuffing on the floor, as if someone had gone to make a move but then changed their mind and stepped back into the shadows where they were hiding.

  Mitch froze. He had no doubt now that someone was in the house. He was only a couple of steps from the living room door. He tried to remember if that door had a lock on it, like so many other doors in the house. There was a keyhole below the handle but he couldn’t remember if there was a key inserted into it on the other side.

  If so, he could lock himself in there and call the police. If not, he was screwed. He was going to have to rely on the lamp in his hand versus whatever weapon the intruder was wielding.

  Maybe they’ll run away, he told himself. That footfall didn’t sound too sure of itself. If they know I’m down here and that I’ve called the police, they might make a run for it.

  But a part of him didn’t want the intruder to leave. The man in the kitchen probably knew what had become of Sarah, could even be responsible for abducting her, or at least have played a part in her disappearance. If Mitch could overpower him and keep him restrained until the police got here, he might be able to finally solve a thirty-year-old mystery.

  But the lamp in his hand wasn’t going to cut it as a weapon. He had to find something heavier, something he could use to threaten the intruder even if he didn’t have to use actual physical force.

  He slipped into the living room without touching the door at all, sliding his body sideways through the gap that was already there. When he was in the room, he crept to the coffee table to get his phone.

  It wasn’t there.

  His phone and the journal had both been taken from the table.

  Mitch’s blood ran cold. The intruder in the kitchen already had what he’d come here to steal. If he got away now, he’d take the journal with him and might never be heard from again. Mitch would never know what had happened to Sarah.

  His fear forgotten, he grabbed the pottery vase from beside the fireplace and rushed from the room, heading for the kitchen. His plan, only half-formed in his mind, was to knock the intruder unconscious and use the house phone to call the police. He was counting on the element of surprise to give him the upper hand. There was no way the intruder would expect Mitch to be on the attack.

  He reached the kitchen and heard—and felt—the chilly wind blowing through the room. The windows weren’t broken. The back door was still secure. The door that led to the walled garden was wide open, though. The floor tiles were slick with rainwater, glistening in the moonlight that poured in through the opening. It seemed the intruder had already fled.

  His phone was on the floor, probably discarded there when the intruder realised it required a passcode. Mitch picked it up and keyed in the code. He found his contact list. After he checked outside, he’d call Battle.

  He went outside, into the overgrown garden. The wind threw rain into his face. He held up his arm to cover his eyes and went to the open gate, trying to see the intruder on the rain-swept moors. But the rain blinded him. He couldn’t see anything.

  Turning away from the gate, he retraced his steps across the garden to the house. As he reached the open door, a dark shape came rushing out from the shadows in the kitchen. Mitch had no time to react. The intruder threw him towards the doorway. Mitch’s head connected with the frame and he wasn’t sure if the cracking sound he heard was the wood or his own skull.

  The world tipped crazily and his vision became blurred. He squinted down at the phone screen, intending to press his thumb on Battle’s name and call him, but the screen was hazy and indistinct, like the rest of the world. Mitch pressed the screen anyway, unsure who the phone was now dialling, hoping that it wasn’t his doctor’s office or the garage where he took the Jeep to be serviced.

  The man who had pushed him was a shadow on the garden path, suddenly moving forward towards Mitch.

  Mitch stepped back instinctively, tripping over his own feet and falling backwards onto the garden path. The intruder lunged at him and Mitch felt something sharp pierce his gut. He let out a surprised yelp as pain lanced through him.

  He landed heavily, his head striking the rain-slick stone.

  The intruder stood over him, a blood-stained knife in one gloved hand, the journal in the other. Mitch couldn’t turn his head far enough to see anything else.

  Blood and rainwater dripped from the knife blade. A faraway voice in Mitch’s head told him that blood was his own and he might die now. If the knife had punctured anything vital in his body, he didn’t have much time left. If the man decided to stab him again, there wasn’t much he could do about it.

  He couldn’t die without knowing who had killed Sarah. Gathering up as much strength as he could, he said, “Who are you?” The words came out as weak as a whisper.

  The man with the knife let out a low chuckle. It was the confident sound of a man who not only held all the cards but was in control of his opponent’s hand as well as his own.

  Mitch realised he was still holding the pottery vase. Somehow, it hadn’t shattered when he’d fallen to the ground. He wondered if he had the strength to lift it and smash it against the intruder’s leg. It might be the final act of his life but at least he’d die doing something for Sarah.

  With a grunt of effort, he swung the vase at the man’s knee. It connected with a crack. Mitch hoped it was the sound of bone cracking and not just pottery. The vase fell apart in his hand. The man cried out and dropped the knife. It clattered to the path by Mitch’s feet.

  As the man bent to retrieve it, Mitch acted in desperation, kicking the knife along the path and into the t
angled undergrowth.

  The man limped after it. When he saw the limp, Mitch enjoyed a moment of satisfaction. But instead of savouring it, he turned his body towards the door and dragged himself into the kitchen, sliding on his belly over the cool tiles. His arms and legs were working but he couldn’t stand up. He didn’t have the strength for that. His skull felt as if it had been filled with concrete.

  A woman’s voice came from his phone. She sounded tired, confused. “Mitch? Do you know what time it is?”

  He tried to place the voice but couldn’t. It wasn’t Jess or Leigh. And it wasn’t the woman he’d been speaking to earlier about the murders. Elly, that was her name. It wasn’t Elly on the other end of the line.

  “Need help,” he whispered into the phone. He hadn’t meant to whisper, wasn’t trying to be quiet, but the words didn’t have enough strength behind them to be anything other than a soft susurration.

  “Mitch? What’s wrong? Where are you?” She sounded alert now, worried.

  “Help,” he whispered before blackness blotted out everything. “Need…help.”

  23

  The Moors

  Elly was sitting in front of the murder board in the living room of Windrider Cottage, attempting to intuit a hidden connection between the various elements in front of her but failing miserably. The fact that Olivia and Sarah Walker were both abducted seemed to point at Michael Walker, but where did Josie Wagner and Lindsey Grofield fit in?

  Could it be that Michael killed his sister and daughter but someone else was responsible for what happened to Josie and Lindsey? The accomplice theory was beginning to seem more and more likely. As far as she was concerned, the most likely candidate was Silas, Michael’s brother, simply because he also had connections with Olivia and Sarah.

  Her phone rang, the screen displaying Glenister’s number. Elly debated whether or not to answer it. He was obviously ringing for a situation report and she had nothing to tell him. The deeper she delved into the case, the more confusing it became.

  Well, Glenister was just going to have to understand that. Besides, she’d only been here four days so he couldn’t expect miracles.

  There was one part of the mystery she may have untangled. A phrase in the journal read:

  I looked upon a grave of daisies

  in a glade watched over by the Ladies.

  According to the poem that had been sent to the police, daisies referred to Lindsey Grofield, so Elly had assumed the grave of daisies meant the place where Lindsey’s body was buried. The fact that the word Ladies was capitalised in the journal had intrigued Elly and she’d Googled the word, along with the word Derbyshire. She’d discovered that there was a place called Stanton Moor a few miles south of the cottage and there was a Bronze Age stone circle there called the Nine Ladies. It wasn’t much to go on but it was something. Still, not anything concrete enough to tell Glenister until she’d done some more investigation.

  She answered the phone and said, “Hi, Jack,” through gritted teeth.

  “Elly, I assume you’ve seen the news today?”

  She wasn’t expecting that. “No, I haven’t. Why? What’s up?”

  There was a long sigh at the other end of the line. “Put BBC One on.”

  “Okay.” She went into the living room and used the remote to put the TV on and find BBC One. A newsreader was saying, “It’s believed the woman was strangled. The Derbyshire police are expected to give a statement later today.” In the corner of the screen, a video showed two scenes of crimes officers bringing a body bag on a stretcher out of a field and onto a road where an ambulance waited. The ambulance was parked in a village, along with police vehicles and a white crime-scene van.

  Villagers watched with interest and talked amongst themselves as the body was loaded into the back of the ambulance.

  “The body was found near Kinder Scout, a moorland plateau in the Peak District,” the newsreader said.

  “In an area called Blackden Edge,” Elly muttered.

  “That’s right,” Glenister said in her ear. “Blackden Edge. So I assume you’re on top of this? This book isn’t just a retrospective investigation anymore, Elly, it’s become a living, breathing thing. Wollstonecraft rang me this morning when the news broke. They’re excited because you’re right there, in the thick of it. But it seems to me you’ve been scooped by the local reporters.”

  “I wasn’t watching the news,” Elly said with a defensiveness that made her angry at herself. “The person I was sent to investigate is dead and the last disappearance was eighteen years ago. Why would I be watching the news?”

  “Because you’re a journalist.”

  “Not anymore,” she said.

  He ignored her. “So, if Michael Walker wasn’t the murderer, I assume you have some other leads?”

  She considered telling him about her Nine Ladies lead but decided against it. “I’m working on it.”

  “You need to find out what’s going on and how it fits in with the other murders. Bloody hell, Elly, you don’t know what’s happening right on your doorstep. What have you been doing all day?”

  “Working,” she said. She wanted to add that he was her agent, not her boss, but held her tongue.

  “Well, ring me when you have something. This murder is going to bring a lot of media attention. Make sure someone else doesn’t steal your thunder.” He hung up.

  Elly sighed and threw the phone onto the sofa. She could do without Glenister breathing down her neck but he was right about one thing: this new murder changed everything. There was a killer in their midst.

  She wondered if Mitch had seen the news. Maybe she should call him. They’d exchanged phone numbers yesterday before she left Edge House, promising to let each other know if they discovered anything new. Elly felt for Mitch. She was doing this to try and get her career back on track, but he had a huge personal stake in identifying the killer. He might be able to finally know what had happened to his sister thirty years ago.

  “Speaking of sisters, don’t forget Jen’s coming today,” she reminded herself. If she went out, she had to remember to leave the key in the key safe by the door.

  Deciding to ring Mitch and tell him about the stone circle and how it might relate to the passage about Lindsey Grofield, she picked up the phone and dialled his number. No answer. She hung up when his voicemail kicked in.

  She hoped he wasn’t out tracking down some clue or other. Last night, they’d agreed to share all the information they had with each other. After finding Lindsey Grofield’s necklace, Mitch said he’d come to a dead end as far as the clues in the journal were concerned. So if he was carrying out his own investigation at the moment and that was why he wasn’t answering his phone, he’d already gone back on their deal.

  She shouldn’t be surprised, of course, she hardly knew the man. Yet something in his eyes had told Elly that he was trustworthy.

  “And I’m the expert when it comes to trusting men,” she muttered to herself. Sarcasm might be the lowest form of wit but at least it cheered her up a little.

  A knock at the door startled her. She went to it and opened it to find her sister on the doorstep. Jen was shaking rain off a Hello Kitty umbrella while she peered up at the grey sky with an expression of disdain. Unlike Elly, Jen had blonde hair and, also unlike Elly, she had it styled professionally every couple of weeks. Rain was her worst enemy.

  “Jen, I thought you weren’t going to be here until later? Come in.” Elly took the pink hard-shell weekend case from her sister’s hand and brought it inside.

  Jen followed, her eagle eyes inspecting the interior of the cottage as soon as she set foot in the hallway. “It’s quite quaint, I suppose. I’d have thought your publishers would put you up somewhere nicer than this, though. Surely a bestseller like you deserves a four-star hotel, at least.”

  Elly wasn’t sure if that was a jibe at Wollstonecraft or herself. Probably both, knowing Jen.

  “There’s a lovely view of the moors out the back,” she said.


  Jen smiled but it seemed forced.

  “Look, Jen, we talked about this. You didn’t have to come here.”

  “Yes, I did. As usual, you’ve got Mum worried. And, as usual, I have to put her mind at ease.” She stepped into the living room and spotted the murder board. “Well, I’ll leave out the bit about you turning the place into a police incident room.”

  “It’s just some notes.” Elly put Jen’s weekend case down in the hallway. “How about a cup of tea? You can tell me all about Trevor and the kids.” Anything was better than having Jen quiz her about the investigation. Elly didn’t want to reveal that the case she was working on—the “imaginary serial killer”, as her mum had put it—was connected to a murder that had occurred last night or that the killer was anything but imaginary.

  There was no need to worry Jen and worry her mum further. She intended to spend a day or two exchanging pleasantries with her sister before sending her home with the news that everything was okay and then getting stuck into the case again. In the meantime, she had to keep an eye on the news. The police hadn’t identified the victim yet, or at least hadn’t released her identity to the public. Once they did, Elly could explore any connections that might exist between her and the other girls.

  Jen rolled her eyes. “Well, they break up from school in a couple of weeks so I’m going to be run off my feet. And Trevor tries his best, bless him, but this morning he didn’t know that Wendy had to take her PE kit to school or even that William doesn’t like cheddar on his sandwiches, only cheese slices. God knows how he’s going to cope tomorrow morning without me there.”

  “Come in the kitchen and I’ll put the kettle on,” Elly suggested, wanting to break Jen’s dispirited mood. The view of the moors should have the same effect on her as it had on Elly when she’d arrived here. She took the Hello Kitty umbrella from where it was dripping on the hallway carpet and placed it by the back door. “Come and see the view, Jen.”