Collide-O-Scope (Norfolk Coast Investigation Stories Book 1)

by Andrea Bramhall

  Kate indicated her turn out of habit.

  “Will she kill her?”

  “I don’t know, Jimmy,” Kate finally said. “Might be best not to think about it right now.”

  Kate couldn’t stop herself. She pictured Gina battered, bruised, and bloody. She imagined all the potential torture devices that were available in the everyday home. It all depended on how creative Ally wanted to get and how much she wanted to know where Matt was. Given everything that Matt knew, Kate guessed she wanted to know a whole lot.

  CHAPTER 35

  “See, the thing about knife wounds, Gina…no, no, no, stay with me now. No passing out again.” Ally tapped Gina’s cheek quite softly and Gina slowly opened her eyes.

  She wished she hadn’t. She was in her hallway, a picture of Sammy right in front of her on the wall. Her hands were tied at the wrist and held over her head. The rope lashed over the banister rail and pulled tight. Her coat was open and Ally was slicing the buttons off her shirt.

  “Oh, hello again. As I was saying, the thing about knife wounds, is that they hurt the most when they’re fairly shallow.” She drew her knife across Gina’s stomach scoring a thin line across the soft flesh. Blood pooled in its wake and ran down her skin in a trickle. Gina expected it to hurt and was shocked when it didn’t. Instead she felt the cold steel, the tickle as blood ran, the heat that radiated outward and along her nerves. Then the heat grew teeth and gnawed at those same nerves.

  “See?” Ally continued. “The idea is to cut at the nerve endings to maximise the pain but not wound so badly that your, erm, subject loses too much blood and passes out.” She grinned. “You’re more than able to do that without any help, aren’t you, chick?” She grabbed Gina’s cheek between her finger and thumb and squeezed in a mock gesture of affection, then followed up with a swift slap that split her lip and filled her mouth with the rich, salty tang of blood.

  Gina held her breath, determined not to cry out.

  “So, where’s Matt?”

  Gina shook her head. “Did you check your bed?”

  Ally slapped her again and grinned when Gina was unable to suppress the grunt of pain. “Not funny. Where is he?”

  “No idea.” She spat blood out of her mouth. “What’s this all about? I know you and Matt are friends, but seriously, Ally, this is too much.”

  “Nothing to do with friends. This is just business, chick. And no one gets in the way of our business.” She tapped the blade of her knife to Gina’s nose. “Now, where’s Matt?”

  “I’ve told you, I don’t know.”

  “And I know you’re lying. So I’ll mix a little business with pleasure.” She slashed the blade across her chest, the red welt appearing just above the fabric of her bra. Her left breast felt as though it was burning. Gina gritted her teeth. She couldn’t stop the tears seeping from her eyes, but she sure as hell wouldn’t scream. If she did she knew she wouldn’t be able to stop. And she couldn’t let Ally win. She closed her eyes and wished someone had noticed she was missing by now. She hoped Kate was looking for her. And she prayed. She prayed that she was strong enough to keep her mouth closed and her daughter safe.

  “I don’t know where he is,” Gina said quietly.

  The third slice mark went down her belly crossing the other mark, as if Ally were slicing open a potato jacket. “This is fun for now, but it will get boring soon.”

  She bit her tongue to stop herself shouting out and tried to breathe through the agonising pain. She counted through wave after wave of cold, heat, and teeth as they attacked nerve after nerve. One through ten, then again. And again. She had to remind herself to breathe out. She didn’t want to hyperventilate and pass out. Again. “I can’t tell you what I don’t know, Ally, no matter how much you torture me.”

  “You know, that’s a very good point.” A fourth welt appeared over her right breast. “But I’m sure you do know. Now, tell me where he is?”

  Gina squeezed her eyes closed trying desperately not to give in. The urge to end the pain was incredible. The knowledge that she could end this was powerful. If she hadn’t been certain that her revelation would result in her death, she knew she would have talked. As it was, she knew there was only so much more she could take. “Perhaps he went on holiday.” Please, Kate, please save me.

  Ally sighed and made four more slashes in quick succession. “Maybe I’ll play noughts and crosses? I could make a grid on your back. That might stop me from getting bored.”

  Gina let the tears fall freely now. She didn’t fight them. She couldn’t fight them and the pain all the same time. Her silence was more important than her dignity now. “Please, Ally, stop this. Please. I don’t know where he is, I swear.”

  “Hmm, or snakes and ladders.”

  The malevolent glint in Ally’s eyes was terrifying. Gina swallowed hard. Survival. That was the best she could hope for. Just survive. For Sammy. “Please, Ally,” she sobbed, “Please don’t do this. I don’t know where he is.”

  “Liar. Maybe a chess board.” She twitched the knife back and forth like she was practicing the strokes.

  I’m going to die while she makes me look like a fucking board game. “Please, Ally. Please. You don’t have to do this.” She looked her in the eye. Oh, God, it’s like she’s dead inside.

  “No, I need something that’s more fun on my own.” Ally grabbed Gina’s hair and spun her around. Her shoulders were twisted painfully as Ally started to cut away the cloth from her back. “Solitaire. I’ll just mark out the board first.” She measured where she was going to cut. Gina could feel the soft practice strokes against her skin.

  The tears tumbled down her cheeks as she sobbed. The first true slice had the now familiar sensation of cold then warmth, followed by the teeth chewing on the nerve endings down her spine, and Gina shivered. Partly from the cold, partly from the pain, but mostly from fear. She’d reached her limit. She couldn’t talk her way out of this. She couldn’t save herself. The realisation turned her knees to jelly and she slumped against the rope holding her upright. Another slice across the base of her back bit. Then she threw back her head and screamed.

  CHAPTER 36

  “Armed response is on the way. ETA thirty minutes,” Timmons said.

  “Let me guess,” Kate said, “they’re coming from Kings Lynn.”

  “Yes.”

  “Great.” She closed her eyes and tried to calm herself down. “Are we certain that they’re in there?”

  “Lights are on and Stella heard a scream when she first arrived. Since then, we’ve heard some mumbling when we were close to the door, but nothing distinct.”

  Kate nodded. “So what’s the plan?”

  “Like I said, armed response is less than thirty minutes away.”

  “And until then?”

  Timmons shook his head. “We wait.”

  “You’re kidding?”

  “No.”

  “We don’t make contact at least?” Kate stared at him incredulously.

  “No, we wait.”

  “Sir, I think that’s a mistake. We should at least try to negotiate with her.”

  “I said, we wait.”

  Kate stared at him but knew she wasn’t going to get any further talking to him. She turned away from him and stared at the house. The lights were on and the curtains in the living room were open. She could see right in. She could see light coming from the upstairs windows too, but it was too weak to have been on in that particular room. It was more diffused, like it was having to travel a long way before it reached the window. It’s coming from downstairs. Which means they’re probably in the kitchen.

  Kate started walking, ignoring the whispered demands that she stop and get back to her colleagues. She was going to be in deep shit later.

  She didn’t care.

  She walked along the side of the house, careful to tread on clumps of grass or in the border rather than crunching across the gravel. She didn’t want to be heard. Slowly she rounded the back of the house, the lean-to and
shed providing adequate cover for her to see through the kitchen window without being seen. She peeked around cautiously. A very quick look. A fraction of a second. Just enough to see that there was no one sitting at the table and convince her that a longer look was possible.

  She inched a little farther forward and peeked between the ivy leaves. The room was empty. The lights were on, but there was no one in the room. Where the hell—

  A loud scream focused Kate’s attention to the left of her view. To the hallway. The scream sounded inhuman. The indistinguishable cry of any animal in pain and Kate wanted to smash her way through the glass and rush to Gina’s aid. She wanted to bring her suffering to an end and beat the living shit out of Ally Robbins for daring to lay a hand on her.

  She heard a knock on the door and a woman’s voice. Stella.

  “Ally Robbins, this is the police. We know you’re in there, and we know you have Gina with you. Come out now and no one has to get hurt.” Stella’s voice sounded muffled and far away. Too many closed doors between them.

  “Fuck you.” Ally shouted back through the door.

  “Ally, the armed response unit is on the way. They’ll be here in twenty minutes. Right now, it’s just us. We can work this out.”

  “I said fuck off.”

  “That’s not going to happen. I can’t leave while you’re holding a hostage.”

  Kate used the noise to step closer to the window.

  “I’m going to open the letter box so we can talk better.”

  “Don’t. Don’t you do it.”

  “Ally, put the knife down,” Stella said. Her voice slightly clearer to Kate’s ear. She must have opened the letterbox. “You don’t need to hold it to her throat. I’m not coming in. Keep looking at me.” Thank you, Stella. She grinned and pictured the scene that Stella was seeing. How she was filling in the blanks that Kate couldn’t see from behind them.

  “I said don’t.”

  “I’m not doing anything else, Ally. I just want to talk to you. All right? I’m just going to talk.”

  “I’ve got nothing to say.”

  “That’s okay. I’ve got plenty. I’ll just keep talking and you can keep that knife away from Gina’s throat, okay?”

  “I don’t want to talk.”

  Kate tried the handle to the lean-to and breathed out as it gave under her hand and the lock opened.

  “That’s okay, Ally, like I said, I’ve got loads to talk to you about. Like Matt, and Adam, and your dad, and Connie, of course. That’s what started this whole mess after all and it was you, wasn’t it? With the rifle?”

  Ally said nothing.

  “I’ll bet it was. All the guys that I work with, well, they all reckon your brother was the only one who could do it. But DS Brannon—you remember her, right?”

  Kate eased the door open an inch. Praying that it didn’t creak.

  “Well, she actually put money on you being the one who did it. She was right wasn’t she?”

  The door opened another inch in silence. Kate took another breath. She could hear a pained whimper. God only knows what that bitch has done to her. Stella kept on talking.

  “The boys all said it had to be another bloke to pull off a shot like that. But she said no. You would’ve done it.”

  Kate edged into the doorway, eased the door open another inch, and then slipped inside. The light was dim and her eyes were slow to adjust. Kate waited. Stella just kept on talking.

  “We’ve arrested your brother.”

  Shapes began to form in front of Kate. Tins of paint stacked on a shelf. A tool box under a coat rack that was filled with kids toys and waterproofs.

  “And your dad. He’s a feisty old bugger, isn’t he?”

  There was a shovel and a rake in the far right-hand corner.

  “Don’t worry, we didn’t hurt him, though. Your brother, on the other hand, was resisting arrest so he may have a bruise or two when you next see him. Mind, they’ll have probably faded by the time that happens.”

  “Fucking bitch.”

  “No need for that, Ally,” Stella said with a small chuckle. “It wasn’t me personally.”

  “I’ll kill her.”

  Kate picked up the shovel and tested its weight. Too big and heavy to be effective. If she missed Ally she might catch Gina with it.

  “No, you won’t. Even you can’t think that would be a clever idea while I’m here watching.”

  She put it back down as quietly as she could.

  “You can’t stay there forever.”

  “No, you’re right I can’t.

  Kate looked at the kids toys again. There was a rounders bat sticking out of a bag filled with soft balls and tennis balls. Perfect.

  “But I don’t need to. Armed response are on the way. Once they get here, well, I wouldn’t want to be in your position, let’s put it that way.”

  Kate gripped the handle of the short bat and slid it out of the bag, one inch at a time.

  “They’ll probably surround the place, and get cameras and shit in there. And they’ve got those cool night vision goggles and heat sensor stuff. It’s all high tech now, you know.”

  Kate held the bat in her hand, getting used to the weight and feel. Two feet of solid, rounded wood. Thirteen ounces of clubbing power. Absolutely perfect.

  “We arrested Matt too, you know. That’s where he’s been all week. With us.”

  Kate pushed her shoes off and slipped into the kitchen in just her socks. No point giving herself away before she was in position to do something.

  “He’s been very helpful, I’ve got to tell you. Helped us make sense out of the evidence that Connie left behind.”

  “What evidence?”

  Kate crept farther across the linoleum floor until she was at the doorway between the kitchen and the hall. Ally’s broad back obscured everything in front of her.

  “From Connie? Well, she left us some pictures, her body, of course, and some stuff in her diary that was really interesting.”

  “You’re full of shit.”

  Kate closed the distance. Six feet. Five feet.

  “No, no, I’m really not.”

  “What did it say, then, this diary entry?”

  Four feet.

  “Well, it tells us that you’re a drug-dealing, fucking scumbag and that you should really give yourself up.”

  Three feet.

  Ally laughed. “See? I knew you were full of shit.”

  Kate lifted the bat and set herself to swing it at Ally’s head. “Drop the knife and step away, Ally.”

  Ally twisted towards Kate and time slowed. In the next half second, Ally lifted her knife from her side and thrust towards Kate. Kate cocked the bat backwards and swung. They each made contact at the same time. Kate’s momentum spun her away from Ally’s knife as the bat crashed into Ally’s skull with a resounding thunk just above her left eyebrow. Ally slid down the wall and slumped on the ground. Kate looked down at her stomach and was shocked to see that her shirt was sliced open but even more shocked to see that her flesh beneath wasn’t.

  She glanced up. Gina hadn’t been nearly so lucky. She was hanging from her wrists.

  “You’re okay now, Gina,” Kate said. “You’re okay.” She touched Gina’s shoulder as she passed to open the door and let in the cavalry. Stella came in clutching a silver foil blanket. Tom ran up the stairs and cut through the rope that was holding Gina’s arms above her head. Paramedics ran in and checked for a pulse in Ally’s neck, then shouted for equipment. She was breathing fine.

  Timmons tugged Kate out by her arm and pushed her against the car. “Stay put this time.”

  The paramedics had Gina on a trolley. She clutched the foil blanket around her like a shroud, clinging to it as though it could protect her.

  “Gina!” Kate shouted and started towards her.

  Gina’s eyes met hers and she simply asked, “Sammy?”

  “She’s fine. I’ll bring her for you.”

  “Thank you,” she whispered. The tr
olley was wheeled into the back of the ambulance and then she was gone. Again.

  The ambulance tore out of the cul-de-sac and turned left, heading straight for Kings Lynn, and slowly everyone drifted back to doing what they needed to do. Kate stood where she was. Staring at the empty road where the ambulance had been.

  Stella bumped her on the shoulder. “Hadn’t you better get going?”

  “Huh? What?”

  “You told her you’d pick up the kid and meet her at the hospital.”

  “Oh, right. Yeah.”

  “We need her statement too.”

  Kate spun and looked at her.

  “When she’s ready. But the sooner the better, right?” Stella said.

  Kate nodded.

  “Don’t scowl at me. It’s my job.”

  “Sorry. Sorry, I know. Mine too. Will Ally be okay?”

  “Concussion. They’re taking her in for an X-ray just to be sure she can’t scream police brutality, but she’ll be fine. And so will you. Go on, get out of here. Tonight you can go be a relative.”

  “I’m not.”

  Stella laughed. “Maybe not, but you sure as hell act like it.”

  “Oh, crap.”

  “Only if she’s not interested.”

  Kate groaned.

  “And I’ve seen her look at you.” Stella patted her shoulder. “Go pick up the kid.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Just doing my job.”

  “How did you know what I was going to do? I didn’t even know.”

  Stella shrugged. “I didn’t. But once you broke ranks, I wasn’t going to sit on my arse. Besides, that bad stuff’s always harder to do with a witness there. Now go on, get out of here. I’ll see you bright and early tomorrow, and we’ll get started on the paperwork.”

  Kate groaned and walked stiffly towards her car. Paperwork. Lovely.

  CHAPTER 37

  Gina shivered under the blankets, her teeth chattering, pins and needles biting at her flesh. Every firing of every nerve ending stung as sensation returned to her numb body. Especially every thin line that Ally had torn across her skin. Ally had been right, though. Not a single one was deep enough to warrant stitches. Just row after row of those little white strips holding her together. Bitch. She was equal parts glad and pissed off that she couldn’t see her own back. Ally hadn’t finished her solitaire board, but she’d made a decent start on it.