Carnal Acts

by Sam Alexander

  The lorry had stopped where the fence ended behind her. The driver was standing beside it. Then the furious sound of a motorbike approached. She shivered, having heard it before, racing up the slave-house street and screeching to a halt. One of her captors was on her tail. She guessed it was the pig whose head she’d stuck the fork into. He wouldn’t show any mercy.

  Taking the red velvet gown out of the plastic bag, she draped it over her other possessions, adding stones to them and placing the cowboy hat at the top. She stepped back and looked at her work. It looked convincing enough, a copy of how she was when she’d lain down to sleep against the boulder. She clambered over the rocks and took up a position as close to her dummy self as possible, the knives in her pockets. Then she looked behind. She couldn’t see beyond the profusion of new leaves, but she was open to attack from the man on the other side. She crawled away from that heap of stones and took refuge behind another. Now she was concealed from both sides – unless another attacker cut across the field to her rear. There wasn’t much she could do about that except keep looking over her shoulder.

  There was a rustle to her right and she saw a tall figure in body-hugging black leathers creeping forward. He also wore an orange helmet, the visor raised to reveal eyebrows that joined in the middle and what looked like the corner of a surgical dressing. She recognized him immediately, the pig. He was carrying a knife and some pieces of plastic. She knew what they were – a kind of handcuffs. He was planning on taking her alive. That made her even more determined to overcome him. She knew that long agonies would precede her death.

  An engine roared to her left and she caught a glimpse of the red pickup driving away at speed. Some seconds later a white car roared past, a siren suddenly ringing out. It seemed she had only one opponent now. Her fellow Albanian was close to the figure she’d made, ducking behind a fallen tree. She picked up one of the stones she had collected and waited. The helmet was a problem. She would have to hit him somewhere in the abdomen and rush him before he could react.

  Suzana felt sweat drench her armpits as the man slid over the tree and approached the dummy on all fours, the knife between his teeth. Suddenly she realised what she had to hit: his right hand. All the children in her village had learned how to throw accurately and with power. It was a question of survival, as the sheep dogs responded only to their masters and savagely attacked anyone who strayed close to the flocks. She swallowed hard and waited, watching the orange-headed figure draw closer.

  She needed to get the timing exactly right. If the pig got too close to the dummy, he would realise what it was. So she tossed another stone into the undergrowth to his left. He looked that way and she stood up, launching the stone at the hand with the knife. The crack on the knuckles was loud. The man screamed, which gave her a lot of satisfaction, and rolled on to his back, clutching his injured hand. She was on him in a flash, kicking the knife away and dropping a larger stone on his groin. The pitch of the second scream was markedly higher.

  Someone was crashing about in the trees behind the man in leather. She leaped over the rocks, leaving her belongings behind, and ran in the opposite direction. As she approached the end of the fence, she saw cars passing on the road, but there was no sign of the pickup or the police car. The low branches clutched at her hair and scratched her face. All she had were the clothes she was wearing and her blades. That would have to be enough. She still had her freedom and she’d hurt another of the men who had abused her.

  Suzana Noli was smiling as she jumped over the fence, crossed the road and disappeared into the steep woodland beyond.

  64

  Heck had gone over the hedge and alongside the fence with his heart doing a Keith Moon drum solo and his arms quivering. The fact that he’d picked up a damp length of four-by-two that had absorbed plenty of water over the winter didn’t help. It wouldn’t be much use in a fight with anyone serious, but he was buggered if he was going in barehanded on his own. On the other hand, the Albanian girl deserved the protection of the police even if she was a murderer and he wasn’t going to delay. That was how his mind worked, but his body wasn’t in agreement. There were jabs of pain in his lower abdomen and he was shaking all over.

  He heard branches crack ahead and caught sight of a bulky man running across the fallow field to the south – the lorry driver, presumably. They’d catch up with him later, though he had the feeling that he wasn’t a key player. He moved on, then stopped abruptly. He fiddled with his phone, putting it on vibrate mode; the last thing he needed now was a headbanger coming at him because his phone had rung. The quickest way to make progress was by walking through the stream. The water only came halfway up his calves, but it was surprisingly cold. He knew he’d catch another chill, let alone an ear-bashing from Ag about the state of his suit and shoes. She might let him off about the socks.

  Come on, he told himself, mind on the job. You haven’t been in a clinch with a villain since the op, so you need to keep your wits about you. He peered through the foliage, hearing the sudden blast of a siren. The patrol car must have gone after the red pickup, but he didn’t have time to call them now. He moved on through the water, his office shoes slipping and sliding in the glaur. The phone started to throb in his pocket, but he ignored it. The motorbike rider might already have caught up with the girl. Then he heard a scream and he broke into run. There was another, more highly pitched scream. He clambered out of the stream and pushed through the branches, feeling their sharp points on his scalp and hands. It couldn’t be much further now, the cries had been close. What had the fucker done to the woman?

  Heck came out into a small clearing and took in the scene. A figure in dark red was lying motionless, head bowed forward under a leather cowboy hat. He remembered what had been stolen from Alice Liphook’s shed. Jesus, was this the Albanian girl? He ran forward, the bottoms of his trousers slick on his legs. As he approached he saw marks on the ground and skirted them – some kind of struggle had taken place. Then he got to the figure in red and touched it. A frisson of shock ran up his arm before he realised it wasn’t flesh beneath the long gown. He lifted the hat and a large stone rolled on to the ground. Smart, Suzana. But where’s the scumbag who was after you?

  He looked around and saw a bush to his left that had taken some serious damage. He went to it and parted the leaves. A leather-suited figure in an orange biker’s helmet was staggering over the fallow field beyond, upper body bent and hands over his groin. Heck turned to the right. The woman must have gone that way and she might slip past if the lads in the patrol car didn’t come back. What to do? This time he answered his phone when it started to vibrate.

  ‘Where are you, sir?’ DC Andrews asked. ‘Are you OK?’

  ‘Aye. Listen, our biker’s stumbling across the field to the south of me. I’m going after him. Get through the hedge and you’ll see us. Oh, and call the patrol car. I think the woman went in their direction.’

  He cut the connection and pushed through the bush, feeling thorns tear his suit. Jesus, he was in deep shit with Ag now. Too bad. He got over the fence and gauged the distance between him and the biker. A hundred yards at most. He could make it, but not carrying the club. He ditched it. Only after he was twenty yards into the field did he remember that the specimen would probably be armed. His stomach did a somersault. If the piece of shit had a gun, it would be curtains. He considered giving up and letting Andrews and the constable do the dirty work, but that went against the grain. He kept going, breath rasping and lungs struggling to inflate sufficiently. As he got closer, the man turned. Heck saw that there was blood on one hand. In the other was a knife. His heart missed several beats. Was Suzana lying in a welter of her own guts in the wood? He upped his speed, shoes sliding on damp patches that the sun hadn’t yet burned off.

  The biker yelled something in a foreign language.

  ‘Stop!’ Heck shouted back. ‘Police!’ That might not have been the best thing to say. The bastard knew what he was up against now.

  The
man in the helmet stopped, then transferred the knife to his other hand. ‘Come … English fuck. I cut … cock off.’

  Heck looked at the way he was staggering, the bloody hand on his groin. ‘Is that what she did to you?’ he asked, realising that his fear had disappeared. He went for him, running hard and then diving through the air like he used to do on the rugby pitch. His head slammed into the biker’s lower abdomen with satisfying force, hitting something metallic. He heard a rapid expulsion of breath. The man sprawled backwards, moans emanating from the open visor. Heck made a grab for the knife and tugged it from the weak grasp, tossing it over his shoulder. To his surprise he saw plastic cuffs sticking out of the guy’s jacket pocket. He quickly applied them to his wrists, trying unsuccessfully to avoid the blood. Then he took out a handkerchief and removed a semi-automatic pistol from inside the biker’s jacket.

  ‘Bloody hell, sir,’ he heard Eileen Andrews say from behind. ‘That was some tackle.’

  ‘Misspent … youth,’ Heck said, gulping in air. ‘The … woman?’

  ‘They’re looking, but there’s a large forest on the other side of the road. If she’s got in there, they won’t find her easily.’

  Heck watched as Constable Jackson went after the fat man at the far end of the field. He took him down with a decent though rather high tackle. ‘The … the pickup?’

  ‘They lost it. Local guy, obviously – knew the farm tracks. Probably up to no good as well. The rear registration plate was plastered with mud. Red, Japanese make probably, they weren’t sure which one.’ Andrews stuck out her hand and helped Heck up. ‘Who’s this, then?’

  ‘Ask … him.’

  She did.

  ‘Fuck … you,’ came the reply.

  Heck and Eileen looked at each other.

  ‘A real charmer,’ said the DC.

  65

  ‘Hello, Nicholas,’ Victoria Favon said, when she opened the door. ‘Isn’t Michael coming in?’

  ‘No, he’s got something to do in Corham, Lady Favon.’

  ‘You know you should call me Victoria.’ She took his arm and led him into the hall. ‘Vicky, if you like.’

  Nick glared as her right breast pressed hard against his arm. ‘Stop it!’ he said firmly, pulling away. ‘Hello, Evie.’

  Nick!’ There was a smile on Evie’s lips, but her eyes took in her mother with suspicion. ‘Come into the library. I’ve got something to show you.’

  ‘I’ll bet you have,’ Nick heard Victoria say.

  ‘What happened?’ Evie asked, closing the library door behind them. ‘I’ve seen that look on Victoria’s face before.’

  Nick avoided her gaze. ‘I don’t know,’ he mumbled. ‘She …’

  ‘I’ll rip her head off.’

  ‘No,’ he said, grabbing her arm. ‘Turn the key, won’t you? I don’t want her walking in.’

  Evie laughed. ‘Neither do I.’

  Afterwards, they got dressed and sat at the table.

  ‘I’ve discovered something else,’ Evie said.

  Nick leaned against her. ‘So have I. Not only do I love you, but you’re wonderful.’

  Evie turned and kissed him on the lips. ‘You’re sweet.’

  ‘I mean it. I’ve never said that to a girl before.’

  She laughed. ‘But you have to a boy?’

  His eyes widened. ‘No, I haven’t. I’m … I’m a rugby player.’

  Evie nodded. ‘Who spends a lot of his time grappling with members of the same sex on the pitch and horsing around in the showers afterwards.’

  ‘Horsing around?’

  ‘You know what I mean.’ Evie’s expression grew more sober. ‘I’m touched, Nick. I am, really. But this is the beginning of things for us. Let’s not get carried away.’

  ‘You mean … you don’t love me,’ he said, devastated.

  ‘I think I just showed how I feel about you on that prickly rug. I’m only saying we shouldn’t get ahead of ourselves.’

  Nick’s head went down. ‘I’m telling you how I feel. Isn’t that what women want?’

  ‘I appreciate it, I do. To be continued, OK?’ She waited until he nodded. ‘Now, look at this.’ She brought a document up on the screen. ‘Remember Jaffray, the slave one of my disgusting ancestors tortured?’

  ‘How could I forget?’

  ‘Well, I’ve been doing some research into the slaves’ religious beliefs.’

  Nick read what she had written:

  Native religions were banned in the plantations and celebrants mercilessly hunted down. In recent years, people’s attention has been drawn to voodoo and the transformation of the old religions into spell-casting and the like, largely in the melting pot of New Orleans and by means of its music. The gris-gris rhythms and the blues singers who howl about their mojo and John the Conqueror root have become known around the world. But that’s superficial. The real thing is vodoun, the ancient religion of West Africa, which was taken west by the slaves. The spirits, the vodoun, govern the world – the sun, the earth, the wind, the rain, the trees, the plants and the birds, intermediary creatures that move between earth and sky.

  The vodoun, or loa, were joined with Christian deities and saints on the Caribbean islands. Even though Christianity was the religion of the oppressor there, many believers were driven to accept it, at least in part. But others served only the loa, in particular the rada loa, the benevolent ones: Legba, who stands at the crossroads and communicates between mortals and the other loa; Loko, the patron of trees, plants and healers; Loko’s wife, Ayizan, the archetypal mambo priestess who controls initiation and the markets; and Damballah, the sky spirit, guardian of the cosmic egg, protector of the crippled, as well as young children. The loa helped the slaves survive their awful lives, instilling in them an understanding of the world beyond the plantations.

  But there were darker powers, the spirits of the dead. To keep them at a distance, worshippers turned to the ghede loa. They were dangerous, loud of speech and rude in their behaviour. They wanted sex and, in the paradoxical way of vodoun, were full of laughter and life despite their experience of the grave. They brought fertility and childbirth, especially under cover of night, but with a bright moon. They worked magic and trickery, but they were not witches – the ghede loa were far more powerful than humans who dabbled in the black arts.

  One of the best known was Baron Samedi in his top hat and dark suit, flashing a grin from his skeletal face. He brought with him his wife, Maman Brigitte, who was pale-skinned and had the same green eyes. She swore and shrieked at the Baron’s jokes before they copulated, bones rattling and tongues slipping in and out of the gaps in their faces. Baron Samedi protected the faithful from any spell or danger, but he was always short of time. The dead were many and he had to escort each one to the world below. There were times when he and his alternates – Baron Cimitière, Baron La Croix and the cruel Baron Kriminel – absented themselves.

  The Favons hated vodoun with all the passion they could muster and, as always, were inspired by selfish motives. They were hypocritical Christians, happy to read the Gospels on Sunday and exploit their slaves on Monday. They thought worship of the old religions fomented rebellion. That was why vodoun was criminalised. But the slaves and their descendants needed retribution for the thousands, the hundreds of thousands, who had lived and worked in extreme hardship and had died because of the estate owners’ greed. A terrible revenge would be exacted.

  ‘I don’t understand,’ Nick said, standing up. ‘Who will take revenge? You really do have a problem with your family, don’t you?’

  Evie’s face hardened. ‘Doesn’t everyone? Your grandfather killed innocent people in the former Yugoslavia, didn’t he?’

  Nick pushed his chair back and it hit the wooden floor with a crash. ‘He did not!’

  ‘All right, maybe he didn’t personally, but the soldiers under his command did. I’ve read about it.’

  ‘It was war,’ Nick said, gathering up his books and papers. ‘Sometimes I don’t get you,
Evie. What’s all this got to do with us? I tell you how great I think you are and you make me read about some crazy slave religion. And then you insult my grandfather. Thanks a lot.’

  ‘No, Nick, wait…’

  But he was already out of the door.

  ‘I’ll ring the general and ask him to meet you on the road,’ Evie called.

  ‘I’m going on my bike,’ Nick said, over his shoulder.

  Evie went after him, then stopped. She wanted to grab him by the arm, pull him round and kiss him on the lips. Who cared if Victoria was watching? She wanted to tell him she loved him and that nothing else mattered, but she couldn’t. Sincerity and openness weren’t in her genes.

  66

  Heck and Joni were standing by the lorry. The Albanian’s motorbike had been winched on to a tow truck, but not before the panniers had been opened. The contents, as well as the Glock and the knife taken from the prisoner, were in sealed evidence bags in the boot of the patrol car.

  ‘You’ll catch your death,’ Joni said, as her boss shivered violently. She had come over when Eileen Andrews reported what had happened. ‘Let me take you home and get you a change of clothes and shoes.’

  ‘No, I need to get over to the search site. The Albanian woman—’

  ‘Suzana.’

  ‘Suzana,’ he repeated. ‘She might be hurt.’

  ‘I’ll do it,’ Joni said, feeling the familiar tingling at the top of her spine and desperate to pick up the scent. ‘One of the constables can take you home.’

  They watched as DC Andrews came through the hedge with evidence bags full of the clothing and other gear that had been left among the trees.

  ‘It’s mostly stuff that was taken from Alice Liphook’s shed,’ Heck said. ‘Maybe she was heading for Scotland.’

  ‘Or the moors. Plenty of places to hide out there.’