by Ellis, Tim
‘It’ll be our first evening apart. How will I survive without you?’
She gave a short laugh. ‘I’m sure you’ll manage.’
‘I’ll be like Romeo without Juliet, Marc Antony without Cleopatra, Paris without Helen, Napoleon without Josephine, Sooty without…’
‘Sooty?’ she said through her laughter. ‘Ring me in the morning, Andrew. You can wine and dine me tomorrow night.’
‘I’ll be counting the minutes, Princess.’
Smiling, she disconnected the call. Deciding the salad wouldn’t spoil she sent Jacob Hansen’s photograph to Randall and then phoned him.
‘Hello, Molly.’
‘I’m at Broadmoor.’
‘I was wondering if they might keep you.’
‘You’d like that, wouldn’t you?’
‘What is it that you want, I’m busy?’
‘I found out some things about Jacob Hansen. Did you get the photograph?’
‘The phone jangled a few minutes ago, but it’s a new phone. Hang on…’ He pressed some buttons until he found the picture. ‘Mmm.’
‘You always do that…’
‘That’s because I’m thinking.’
‘And… What do you think?’
‘This is Jacob Hansen?’
‘When he was twenty-one, ten years ago.’
‘There’s a look of Pike about him, especially around the eyes. Are you suggesting that Stratham Pike’s been hiding his crazy son in Broadmoor under an assumed name, that Jacob Hansen is Malachi’s brother?’
‘Interesting, I hadn’t thought of it that way round, but no I’m not saying that.’ He listened while she told him about Jacob Hansen’s parents, about his sister, Angel, and about George Hansen’s bigamy. ‘Frank has Lucy doing a database search for the Hansens, and then cross-referencing any of George’s aliases with deaths, births and marriages to try to find his other families.’
‘It seems that Dr Grady’s profile was pretty accurate,’ he said.
‘Yes,’ she grudgingly agreed, ‘so it would seem.’ ‘We’ve also put Pike back up on the suspect board.’
‘With the restraining order in place, it’s not going to do you much good.’
‘I’ve given Frank the task of finding out from the CPS how we can overturn the restraining order.’
He gave a snort. ‘I’m not feeling optimistic, Molly. Unless you’re keeping things from me, you don’t have any evidence linking Hansen to the murders. And apart from a passing resemblance to Pike, there’s no connection between the two of them. In effect, you have no new evidence for overturning the order.’
‘You always were a pessimist. What have you been doing?’
‘Pike is in Israel, flew out last night.’
‘So, you’ve been sitting with your feet up and twiddling your thumbs waiting for him to come back?’
‘Mostly. I did manage to obtain Pike’s credit card and telephone records though, but there was too much information so I paid a specialist to analyse them for me.’
‘Are you sure…?’
‘Don’t worry, nobody’s going to find out. I’ve not forgotten how to be discreet, Molly.’
‘Yeah, sorry.’
‘Anyway, now I have detailed information on Pike’s financial transactions and his telephone calls that I was wading through when you rang.’
‘Anything useful?’
‘Nothing so far. I’ll let you know more when I see you.’
‘We need to find out whether Malachi Pike was adopted. If I start digging…’
‘You want me to use my contacts to find out?’
‘It would be safer, Sir.’
‘Okay. I don’t suppose you want to meet tonight if you’re still in Crowthorne?’
‘I’m worn out. Can we make it tomorrow night?’
‘I suppose so. We should both have a lot more information by then.’
‘Did you visit that other building… Viking Wharf today?’
‘Too busy, it’s on my to do list for tomorrow.’
She told him what she’d found out about Jacob Hansen, and they decided to meet at six o’clock at Randall’s flat tomorrow night instead of tonight.
‘Goodni…’ but he had already ended the call. God, she hated him with a passion when he did that. ‘You fucking bastard,’ she screamed into her phone, and attracted disapproving looks from a couple walking past in odd coloured Pakamacs. She mouthed ‘Sorry’ at them, and imagined that Parliament had agreed to bring back hanging just for Randall.
She returned to the café and ordered another pot of tea, then sat down and began picking at her salad.
‘Who’s Andrew, Gov?’ Abby asked.
‘And what would you do with the information if I told you?’ She carried on before Abby could speak. ‘You’d tell the others, it would spread all over the station, and pretty soon Oprah Winfrey would be ringing me up to appear on her show to talk about my secret lover. I don’t think so, Abby.’
‘You’ve got a secret lover?’
‘Andrew is my dentist.’ She knew damn well that it was no use trying to deny anything now that Abby had a name.
‘So, he’s a dentist?’
‘Shut up, Abby.’
It wasn’t until five to five that they left Crowthorne. They joined the steady moving flow of traffic on the M3, but the M25 was gridlocked. She dozed most of the way back. Abby drove into the station car park at seven-forty. Molly still had an email to send to the Chief, but it was a short one: I’ll brief you in the morning, Chief. Then, she went back down to the car park, climbed in her car and drove home. At nine-thirty, she flopped into bed, and as she drifted off to sleep she realised that today had been the first day in a long time that she hadn’t developed a migraine.
***
He walked into the café and sat in his usual seat looking out on the world of King Street. What the hell was he doing getting involved with Kiri? Christ, she was half his age. He was flattered, of course, but wasn’t it complicating everything? Tomorrow he would walk away. After breakfast he would kiss her goodbye, and that would be the end of it. He should just get up and walk out of the café now without looking back. Why didn’t he do that? What was stopping him?
Kiri came up behind him, bent over and kissed him on the lips.
‘Spaghetti bolognaise, garlic bread, and a pot of tea,’ he said.
‘How’s your afternoon been?’
‘The Valium sent me to sleep for two hours, the rest of the time I’ve been reading reports.’
‘Have you found the killer yet?’
‘I know who it is. Now, I need to prove it’s him.’
‘Then what will you do?’
‘I can’t think on an empty stomach, will the food be long?’
‘You’re not going to tell me, are you?’
‘I was thinking, I don’t even know your last name?’
‘Sometimes, men are pigs.’
‘Only sometimes?’ He kept telling himself it didn’t matter, that tomorrow he would walk away, but he knew he wouldn’t.
After the café closed they went up to Kiri’s flat. He sat on the sofa beneath the floral prints. She opened a bottle of wine, poured each of them a glass, and then curled up on the sofa in front of the window watching him.
‘You need to make a decision,’ she said breaking the silence.
‘Which means?’ he said trying to delay the inevitable.
‘Between life and death.’
‘I’ve already made my decision.’
‘You thought you had, but now you’re not so sure.’
He took a drink of wine, but said nothing.
‘I’ve complicated things. The choice used to be life or death, but now you must choose between your dead family and me. If you choose me you’ll feel as though you betrayed your wife and children, but you don’t want to give me up.’
‘Mmm.’
She continued to watch him.
‘You seem to have all the answers, what should I do?’
‘I can’t tell you that.’
‘And why shouldn’t I just get up now and walk out of that door?’
‘Because you’re falling in love with me.’
Wine tried to slither past his epiglottis into his lungs and he began choking.
She passed him a paper tissue.
‘We’ve only known each other for four days,’ he managed to say once he could breathe again.
‘Love isn’t restrained by time.’
‘Very poetic.’
‘So, you need to make a decision. I’m not saying tonight, or even tomorrow, but when you confront the man who killed your family, you must decide whether you want to be with your murdered family or here with me.’
‘Mmm.’
Kiri swallowed the last of her wine and stood up. ‘I’m going for a shower. You can come and join me if you want.’
If he did go and join her, would it mean something? Would it be an admission of some sort? Would she be able to infer something from his actions? Relationships had their own rules, but nobody had ever told him what those rules were. He had the feeling of being in a minefield. One step in the wrong direction could tear him apart.
He took his sleeping tablet with a gulp of wine, then put the wineglass down on the coffee table and began shedding clothes as he made his way into the bedroom. The bathroom door had been left open a crack. Naked, he stepped through.
Hadn’t he made his decision to join Sarah and the kids? Wasn’t he a man of his word? He certainly liked Kiri, but was it love? And even if he was falling in love with her, so what? Did his family deserve to be deserted twice by the man who was meant to protect them? Hadn’t he failed them once already? He knew nothing about the afterlife, but he had a vision of Sarah clutching the children to her and traversing a desolate landscape looking for him. Hadn’t he promised?
They made love in the shower, and then again in bed. Yes, he realised he was falling in love with her. He turned over and closed his eyes. She put her arm round him and they fitted together like two jigsaw pieces.
What about Sarah, Tilly and Mathew, did he deserve to live when they were dead? Did he deserve any happiness when he had failed them? In his mind, he could see them in the wastelands between Heaven and Hell waiting for him, hear them calling his name. Could he abandon his family again?
Sleep came eventually, but it was wracked with nightmares. The shadowy figure stalked his family while he watched powerless. The more he tried to reach them, to save them, the more unknown hands held him back.
Day Five
Monday, 9th November
Chapter Forty-One
Molly was sitting at her desk by seven-thirty wading through the mountain of paperwork in her intray. She had woken up at quarter to five feeling better than she had for weeks – maybe months – having had an uninterrupted night’s sleep. After two cigarettes, a strong coffee, and a shower – in that order – she put on clothes and – unusual for her – felt hungry. Scouring the kitchen for something within its sell-by-date and without green mould produced nothing that she would have eaten for breakfast, so she decided to head for work and find a café en route. As she was leaving the flat, she remembered the Pepper Pot café near the station and decided to have breakfast there.
There was a glut of parking spaces to choose from when she drove into the station car park at five past six. After parking she walked along King Street through the biting November wind to the café, pleased that it was open. Half expecting to see Randall, she was surprised when he wasn’t there. Looking tired, the white-haired waitress approached.
‘What would you like?’
‘Randall not about?’
The woman’s brow creased. ‘What makes you think I would know?’
‘Sorry, I thought…’
‘You’re the woman he met in here the other day?’
‘Yes, I’m Molly Stone.’
‘I’m Kiri. Did he tell you about us?’
‘He didn’t need to, I guessed.’
She nodded at the ceiling. ‘He’s still in bed.’
‘Okay.’
Kiri sat down in the chair opposite. ‘You know what he’s planning to do, don’t you?’
Molly wondered what the woman wanted from her. ‘What do you mean?’
‘When he finds whoever killed his family?’
‘I’m not sure…’
‘You must know. You’re helping him… He’s going to kill the murderer and then himself.’
‘I…’
‘You must stop him.’ Kiri burst into tears. ‘I love him.’
Christ, she thought, Randall worked fast. He’s only been out of the nut house for four days and already he’s up to his neck in a relationship. ‘If I can stop him, I will,’ she said. ‘I don’t want to be an accessory to murder, and I certainly don’t want Randall to kill himself, but once he’s made up his mind…’
She’d only come in for coffee and some toast. Instead, here she was comforting Randall’s fancy woman.
Kiri wiped her eyes with a paper tissue and blew her nose. ‘I’m sorry, we had words last night. I told him he had something to live for now. You need to talk to him too. If we work together maybe we can stop him.’
Yes, she’d known all along what he was going to do, and on some unconscious level had accepted it as inevitable. She had problems of her own to worry about. Randall was a grown man and could make his own decisions. The trouble was, she’d let him down before as his partner, and now she was doing the same thing again. Yes, she had to stop him killing anyone – especially himself. She held Kiri’s hands in hers and said, ‘Don’t worry, we’ll stop him.’
‘Thank you,’ Kiri said standing up. ‘What would you like for breakfast – on the house?’
Breakfast! She wasn’t hungry anymore. ‘A strong coffee and two pieces of wholemeal toast, please.’
After drinking two mugs of coffee, nibbling at the toast, and popping a migraine pill into her mouth, she walked back to the station wondering how she could stop Randall. It was true – once he’d made up his mind to do something he was a stubborn pig – she couldn’t recall ever having changed his mind on anything before. This time though, there were lives and careers at stake – not least hers – so she had to try.
The pile in her intray had been reduced from twelve to two inches. After transferring the ten inches of completed paperwork to the administrator’s desk, she went to the kitchen and made herself a coffee. Next, she logged onto the network and dealt with her seventy-three emails. By the time she’d finished, these had been reduced to thirteen. She had an email from the Chief informing her that she had a meeting at New Scotland Yard with the Commissioner this morning and wouldn’t be in until ten o’clock at the earliest. That suited Molly just fine. It meant that she could catch up with the team and point them in the right direction before the press briefing at nine o’clock.
At half past eight she entered the incident room to find the team waiting for her.
‘Morning,’ she said. ‘God, Paul, you should have warned me to wear my sunglasses. Around his neck he had on a tie with rainbow spirals swirling down it. ‘That’s the worst tie I’ve ever seen you wear.’
‘Thanks, Gov. I’ve found a new place on the Internet that caters to my specific tastes.’
‘Weird?’ Lucy offered.
‘Sick,’ Abby said.
‘I prefer to think eccentric,’ Paul countered.
‘Let’s get on with it, shall we?’ Frank said. ‘I’m sure the Inspector has more important things to do than discuss the merits of God-awful ties with you lot.’
‘Thank you, Frank, but we all have more important things to do. Right, what did you find out about the Hansens?’
Lucy stood up, dragged a mobile white board centre stage and flipped it over. ‘As far as we could ascertain, George Hansen had three more families besides his legal one.’ Lucy had created an impressive genogram on the board. ‘As you can see…’
‘Bloody hell, Lucy,’ Tony said. ‘So tha
t’s what you were hiding from us yesterday? Good job.’
‘Thanks, Tony, it’s not often you say something nice to me.’
‘I always mean to, but…’
‘You two sound like you’re in love,’ Frank said. ‘Shut the fuck up and get on with it, Lucy.’
‘Sorry… At the top is George’s legal family, which consists of him, his wife Lizzie, Angel, Jacob, and the dead Gary – the cross indicates that they’re dead.’
‘Good job with all the dates, Lucy,’ Abby said.
‘Keep going, Lucy,’ Frank pressed.
‘Do we have a picture of George?’ Paul asked.
‘Why?’ Lucy said.
‘Well, this guy married a twenty-nine year-old and three other women when he was forty-seven or thereabouts, he also fathered nineteen children that we know about. He must have looked like a Hollywood superstar.’
‘You’re just jealous,’ Tony said.
Paul grinned. ‘Damn right.’
‘I could get a mugshot. There’s one on the system, but I can tell you now that he wasn’t much to look at.’
‘He must have had a long…’
‘All right, Tony we don’t need any of that…’ Frank interrupted him. ‘Carry on, Lucy.’
‘George Hansen died in a fire during a burglary in 1985. If you look at all the marriages, births and deaths, they range between 1976 and 1985. My assumption is, that if he hadn’t died prematurely, he would have had a lot more wives and a lot more children.’
‘Maybe there are more, but you haven’t found them?’ Paul said.
‘It’s a possibility,’ Lucy agreed.
‘I see Lizzie is still alive?’ Molly observed.
‘Only just, Gov,’ Lucy said. ‘She’s in the Royal Marsden Hospital in Chelsea, on Wilson Ward, she has neck cancer. I phoned yesterday, and the doctor I spoke to said she has a month at most.’
Molly turned to Abby. ‘You and Paul can go and speak to her. Take a video recorder with you. Find out her life story. She’s the only one who can tell us what happened all those years ago.’
Paul shuffled in his seat. ‘Couldn’t Lucy go…’
‘You’re going with Abby, Paul. Seeing all those cancer patients might give you a nudge to quit smoking.’
