The Domino Killer

by Neil White

  ‘Are people that calculating?’

  ‘I’ve been a defence lawyer for long enough to know the answer is yes. And do you know what else strikes me?’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘No one noticed him. He was the quiet one who took himself off to his own little private space. Your other brother was the go-getter, the lad around town, and you, well, you’re the little princess, daddy’s girl. What was he? The quiet middle one, ignored by all. These murders are his own little force field, his impact on the world. A desperate little man, obsessed with being noticed, except he’s found a different way, where only he knows what he’s done. A very solitary pursuit.’

  ‘And I played a part in it.’

  ‘Don’t dwell on that. I played a bigger part. I could have said something back then, about the man I’d seen follow Ellie. If he’d been caught, all these girls would still be alive. I let him stay free. I carry the guilt. You weren’t to know. I was.’

  ‘That’s a lot to carry around.’

  Joe reached into the box and drew out more envelopes. ‘Every one of these is partly down to me.’

  ‘It’s not a competition,’ Melissa said. ‘Let me look. Who else is there?’

  Joe handed Melissa a few more envelopes. They all contained the same thing: stalking photographs, a death shot, then press clippings. There was always something from the body – an earring or a necklace or a pen – anything that was a part of the real person. Melissa thumbed through them in silence. She shook her head occasionally, her eyes showing a mix of horror and disbelief, each death shot bringing an involuntarily widening of the eyes.

  When she’d finished, she put them face down on the table and covered her eyes. ‘I can’t believe this,’ she said.

  ‘And there’s the one I told you about,’ Joe said. ‘The envelope that’s less full than the rest, with no clippings or death pictures; just the stalking pictures.’

  ‘Show me.’

  Joe passed over an envelope that was thinner than the rest. It contained the pictures that had been sent to Gerald King, of the girl from the school he couldn’t identify.

  Melissa lifted the flap and reached in.

  As she looked through them, she went pale and let the pictures slip from her fingers onto the floor.

  ‘Melissa? What’s wrong?’

  She put her hands over her mouth. They were trembling violently.

  Joe bent down to retrieve them. As he did so, his gaze landed on a photograph frame on the wall unit behind Melissa. He hadn’t paid it any attention, not consciously, but the girl in the photographs had seemed familiar as soon as he’d seen them. Now he knew why. There were pictures of her all around the room.

  The girl in the photographs was Carrie, Melissa’s daughter. And Proctor had been stalking her.

  Sixty-seven

  Proctor gripped the steering wheel and screeched, his teeth bared, his wild.

  ‘Shit!’

  It was all going wrong. Gina Ross. Joe Parker. All of his past racing forward to mock him. He couldn’t let that happen. He should have killed Gina. He’d meant to, but he’d taken too long, had wanted to make her suffer before she died. That wasn’t how he did things: it was about the effect, not the act. Normally he killed quickly. With Gina, it had been about revenge, about emotion. He’d let it get out of control.

  One last act, that’s all he needed. He was leaving, he didn’t know where to, but he needed to make one final wave, something that would leave his stain long after he was gone.

  Carrie. It was always leading to this.

  Melissa had shut him out. He wasn’t going to allow that. He’d had to watch his niece grow up without knowing him.

  He shook his head angrily, even though there was no one else in the car.

  No, it wasn’t that. It was growing up without noticing him. Her uncle, Melissa’s brother, everyone’s rock.

  It was Thursday, he knew where she went. The youth club. He’d watched her there before. He’d always known it was coming to this. He’d just been waiting for the right time. It had arrived.

  He checked his watch. She’d be leaving.

  He drove quickly towards Ancoats, the shadowy blocks ahead shutting out the lights from the city centre.

  The youth club was in a restored church. He thought he was going to be late, people were spilling out onto the road, teenagers hugging goodbyes. Some were leaving in large groups, others climbed into waiting cars, and there were those who skulked home on their own. The quiet ones on the edge of everything. Like he’d been. He wasn’t on the edge any more.

  He slowed as he drove past the end of the street and looked down towards the church. He couldn’t see Carrie.

  He could drive round the block. She had to be nearby.

  Then he saw her just ahead, picked out in his headlights, wearing jeans and a T-shirt, her long hair flying in the light breeze. Ginger and luxurious, just like Melissa’s.

  Carrie was with just one other person, a girl smaller than she was.

  There was no time to make a plan. With no one else nearby, the youth club some way back, he had to move quickly.

  He swerved to the side of the road, thumping his front wheels onto the kerb, making Carrie and her friend turn around and back up towards a wall, fright on their faces.

  He jumped out of his car. ‘Carrie, I’m a friend of your mum. Come quickly. There’s been an accident.’

  Carrie looked uncertain. ‘What do you mean, an accident?’

  ‘Your mum’s at the hospital. I’ve come to collect you.’ He stepped closer. ‘We can’t waste any time.’

  Her friend stepped forward. ‘No, don’t,’ she said. ‘Call your mum first.’

  ‘There’s no time for that. Come now.’

  Carrie looked at her friend, who was shaking her head. Carrie held up her phone. ‘Just let me call her.’

  He was losing control of it. Carrie was tall and athletic. He couldn’t let her make the call. She’d run away and he wouldn’t catch her.

  He reached into his pocket and produced a knife, the blade long and jagged, one he kept in his car to use against girls like Carrie. He lunged forward and put it against her neck. She screamed but he clamped his hand over her mouth.

  ‘Get in my car. Now!’

  Carrie’s friend screamed but he didn’t stop. He pressed the point of the knife into her throat, pushing in the skin and drawing a large drop of blood, before pulling her towards his car.

  ‘No, please, don’t,’ Carrie said, sobbing, but she didn’t resist or try to run away.

  Small punches landed on his back. It was Carrie’s friend, but she wasn’t strong enough.

  There were shouts further along the street, people from the youth club spotting what was going on. He had to be quicker.

  He opened his car boot. ‘Get in.’

  ‘No, no, I can’t. Please don’t.’ Her face creased in tears as her friend ran down the street.

  Proctor hit her with his fist, connecting with her jaw. She grunted and crumpled and dropped her phone. He forced her into the boot, lifting her ankles in as he slammed the boot lid, pausing only to collect her phone.

  He looked along the street. People were coming towards him, some running.

  He jumped into the car and stamped on the accelerator. There were bangs on the rear door as people reached him but he was able to get away, exhaust fumes filling his rear-view mirror as he glanced behind him.

  He’d done it. He let out a long breath.

  Now for the finale.

  ‘Where is she?’ Joe said to Melissa, looking around the room, his gaze catching photograph after photograph showing the girl from Proctor’s envelope. Some were posed school pictures; some were less formal photos: Carrie laughing with friends and or hugging Melissa.

  Melissa was panicking. Her hands trembled as she tried to steady her phone. ‘The youth club,’ she said. ‘She goes there every Thursday. Has done for a couple of years. It’s just somewhere for the kids to hang out.’

 
‘And it’s a pattern, easy to follow,’ Joe said.

  She pressed Carrie’s details in her contact list and muttered her name to herself. The phone rang out. ‘She doesn’t always answer,’ Melissa said, her voice deep with anxiety. ‘We argue about it all the time; I tell her that I need to know where she is.’

  ‘We’ll go there now. You keep calling. Check her social media. I’ll drive.’

  Melissa ran for the door, pausing only to slip on some shoes and grab her keys. They rushed out of the apartment, pacing as they waited for the lift.

  ‘It’s not far,’ Melissa said as they ran to her car.

  ‘You keep phoning her and direct me.’

  Joe climbed into the driver’s seat. Melissa was still trying Carrie’s phone, but without success.

  ‘Where am I going?’ Joe said.

  ‘To the main road. Go right. About half a mile, just behind a small supermarket.’

  Joe sped off, the engine loud between the high mill buildings. Melissa was calling Carrie’s number again. ‘Why won’t she answer?’

  ‘Won’t her friends be with her? She might be fine, just talking or whatever.’

  ‘You don’t know teenagers,’ she said. ‘Their phones are bolted to their hands.’ She threw her own phone into the footwell. ‘Fuck!’

  There was a small supermarket ahead, Joe ignoring the speed limits. ‘This one?’

  ‘Yes, down there.’

  There was a building next to a small church further along. Light spilled from an open doorway, catching the barbed wire along the gutters and the small crowd outside. Melissa was out of the car even before Joe had come to a stop, running straight into the cluster of teenagers jabbering at each other. Cars were arriving behind them, parents getting ready to collect.

  ‘Carrie?’ she shouted, pushing through the crowd.

  Young teenagers looked round at her. Some backed away. Others giggled. Some hid the glowing ends of cigarettes in their palms.

  ‘Carrie!’

  A girl stepped forward. It was Wanda, one of Carrie’s friends. She was crying. Her nose was bleeding. ‘Someone took her.’

  Melissa grabbed her by the arms. ‘When? Who?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ she said, trying to back away. ‘A man. He put her in his car and drove away.’

  ‘Hey!’ a woman said, pulling at Melissa’s arm. ‘Leave her alone.’

  Joe stepped between them, to stop a fight starting. ‘We’re just looking for Carrie. She’s gone missing. We’re sorry.’

  The woman let go of Melissa, scowling, but recognised the panic in her eyes.

  Melissa set off towards the youth club building, up a concrete wheelchair ramp and into a narrow corridor, before bursting into an open hall with wooden flooring marked out as a basketball court.

  ‘I’m looking for Carrie,’ Melissa shouted.

  There were two adults, a man wearing a vicar’s dog collar and a woman in her fifties, along with a small group of older children. The man looked at the others and said, ‘We’ve called the police. Are you her mother?’

  ‘Who’s taken her?’

  ‘I don’t know. A man in a car. He hit her.’ He stepped forward. ‘I’m sorry. We’re all sorry. I don’t know what else to say.’

  ‘Did you get his registration number?’

  ‘It happened too fast.’

  Melissa called 999 and shouted information about her brother down the phone. When she hung up, she ran for the door, but when she got outside she realised she had no idea where to go.

  Joe headed for the car. ‘Come on, to Mark’s house. We’ll start there.’

  His phone buzzed. It was Gina. ‘Gina?’

  ‘Proctor’s been here,’ she said, hoarse and breathless. ‘He tried to kill me.’

  ‘Have you called the police?’

  ‘Yes, they’re on their way.’

  ‘Where did he go?’

  ‘I don’t know, Joe, but you’ve got to find him. He’s settling old scores.’

  ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘Just find him.’

  Joe hung up.

  Melissa was already in the car, staring into space, her hand over her mouth, trembling. ‘Not Carrie,’ she said, almost to herself, as Joe climbed in.

  Once he was in the driver’s seat, he tried to call Sam. His phone was engaged.

  ‘Shit!’

  People had to move out of the way as Joe floored the accelerator, some swearing at him. He didn’t care. He had to find Proctor. He hadn’t saved Ellie. but he sure as hell wasn’t going to fail Carrie.

  Sixty-eight

  Sam was pacing, his phone ringing out, waiting for Charlotte to answer.

  He had something. Tremors of excitement rippled through him. The IP addresses had been the key.

  The first hit had come quickly, close to the bottom of the first page, where an IP address came back as the south of Manchester, the first one outside of the United States, away from the proxy servers. He’d highlighted it in green and carried on until a second Manchester hit came along, pinpointed on a map by a small icon, the same area as last time. He’d flicked back through the paper sheets excitedly, knowing he was onto something, looking for the green highlighter. When he found it, he’d checked the numbers and grinned.

  The same IP address.

  He’d almost smacked the table with excitement. From then on, he’d been looking for a specific number, skimming the pages, until he’d found eleven more. The coincidence of the numbers was too great; they had to represent a specific location.

  But he’d known he needed more than that. He had to link vodkagirl’s IP address to Mark Proctor. Then he’d remembered something: Helena Proctor had given him her email address, an email account her husband didn’t know she had.

  He’d sent her an innocuous message, asking her if she’d located any other evidence of his accounts, and then chewed his nails for five minutes until a reply came in. It had been short: No, nothing, not yet, but I’ll look tomorrow. Sorry.

  That hadn’t mattered. He had what he wanted: something from the Proctor household that would show up his IP address.

  A quick internet search had taught him how to find the IP address in an email, hidden in a long list of commands when he viewed the message header.

  The same. The IP address had been used to log into the No One Tells website using the name vodkagirl, who’d had some contact with the victim of the murder in the park, Henry Mason, whose bloodied fingerprint was found on the knife that killed Keith Welsby, who was known for becoming too familiar with pupils, and had worked at the same school that Helena Proctor’s murdered sister had attended.

  That was it, the umbrella that somehow kept everything close. Or was it a circle, everything looping back round to the start? Whatever it was, he’d made the connection to Mark Proctor.

  But what about a motive? The man he’d met who’d exchanged messages with vodkagirl had said it seemed like a big tease in order to obtain some kind of confession.

  The vodkagirl identity was just about getting men to confess their darkest secrets. If you cast the net widely enough, there’d be men out there with secrets they didn’t want revealing. Would that be enough for them to kill if they thought there was a risk that their secrets might come out?

  But why would Proctor want Keith Welsby dead? The case was all about Proctor creating grief so that he could revel in it. Why would it matter who his wife’s sister had been sleeping with?

  Perhaps Welsby had been looking into Adrianne’s murder, keeping up the hunt long after the police investigation had gone quiet. Had he tracked down the killer, realised that it was Mark Proctor and paid with his life in order to keep him quiet? The No One Tells site was used like an auditioning process. Dangle the thought that vodkagirl was really an underage girl wanting an adventure and you attract people with all the secrets. Once you’ve got the secrets, you’ve got the power: kill Welsby or your secrets will come out.

  But that would take a long time, and if Welsby knew Pro
ctor had murdered Adrianne, time was not on Proctor’s side.

  Sam wondered if it was something more basic than that, something Proctor had not factored in: had he grown to love his wife and blamed Welsby for allowing him to kill Adrianne? That’s how psychopaths are: they blame other people.

  But what dirty secret did Proctor have on Henry Mason that made him kill Welsby?