Blood Guilt

by Ben Cheetham

  “Calm down, Harlan. Sit back down and let’s talk about this.”

  Harlan shook his head, turning to leave. Gathering up the bags of shopping, Eve hurried after him, pausing to pay the bill, not waiting for her change. She caught up with him at the store’s entrance and gasped, “Wait! Slow down.”

  Harlan ignored Eve. As if he was being pulled along by an invisible chain, he ran through the streets to his car. One image kept wrenching at him – Susan Reed hammering at the door of his flat, calling his name. Calling to him for help. When he got to the car, Eve was no longer behind him. He didn’t wait for her. He jumped into the car and accelerated tyres squealing out of the car-park. He drove back to his block of flats like a man possessed, and sprinted up all twelve flights of stairs. Breathing raggedly, he arrived at his floor fully expecting to see Susan stood at his door. She wasn’t there, of course.

  Harlan’s shoulders sagged as though from unbearable weariness. Feet dragging, he entered the flat and crumpled onto the sofa. He sat with head hanging and eyes closed. Half-an-hour later, when Eve came into the flat, he looked at her and said, “I’m sorry.”

  A faint, tender smile passed across Eve’s features. “There’s no need.” She sat down next to him and gently took hold of his wrist. “We’ll get through this. I promise you. We can get through anything as long as we’re together. Say it to me.”

  Reluctantly, without much conviction, Harlan repeated Eve’s words. “Say it again and really mean it,” she said, placing her hands on either side of his face and holding his gaze with her own. He took breath and said it, and this time he felt the words in his heart and head, reassuring him, calming him.

  They held each other for a while, then they set about preparing a meal. “You know what we should do,” said Eve. “We should get out of the city for a few days. Go to the east coast. You remember that little B&B we used to stay at?”

  Harlan remembered, but he made no reply. The mere thought of leaving the city was almost enough to tip him back over into the seething storm of guilt.

  “I know you’re not comfortable with the idea,” continued Eve, “but I really think it would do you the world of–” She broke off at a knock on the front door.

  Harlan stiffened as though the sound frightened him. He looked towards the door, eyes standing out of their sockets.

  “You want me to see who it is?” Eve tried to sound casual, but a note of unease crept into her voice, as though, despite her best efforts, she was starting to be infected by Harlan’s mood.

  Harlan shook his head. He knew who it was. He knew it in his bones. His movements tense, he approached the door and opened it. And there she was, Susan Reed. She looked even thinner than she had done on the television, almost anorexically so. Her hair was greasy and uncombed. There were bluish smudges like bruises under her eyes. Her arms were hugged across her stomach as though she was in pain. For what seemed a long moment, she stared silently at Harlan, then she said, almost murmuring, “Can I come in?”

  Catching a faint tang of alcohol on Susan’s breath, Harlan stepped aside. Warily, as if entering enemy territory, she moved past him. He bit back an urge to apologise as she paused at the kitchen door, looking at Eve, who’d turned noticeably paler under her makeup. Their faces set into hard masks, the two women faced each other a few seconds. A bitter little smile of understanding tugging at the corners of her mouth, Susan continued into the living-room. “Nice place you’ve got here,” she said without a hint of sarcasm.

  This time Harlan couldn’t hold his apology in. “Sorry.” The word came out in a tortured whisper.

  Susan made a contemptuous hissing noise, as if to say, yeah sure you are.

  “What do you want?” Eve asked, her voice polite but cold.

  Susan shot her a savage glance, as if she considered her presence to be some kind of betrayal. “I want to speak to your boyfriend or husband or whatever he is alone.”

  Eve folded her arms. “Well you’re going to have to say what you’ve got to say in front of me, because I’m not going anywhere.” She turned to Harlan. “Am I?”

  Harlan struggled to return Eve’s gaze. “I’m sorry, Eve, but I think you should leave. I’ll call you later.”

  Eve stared at Harlan a moment, the hurt plain on her face. She leaned in close to him and her voice came in an aggrieved but concerned murmur. “Just remember what I said. You owe yourself. You owe us.” Then she snatched up her coat and handbag and left.

  An uneasy silence descended between Harlan and Susan. He motioned for her to sit on the sofa, but she shook her head. “Do you want a cup of tea or something?” he asked. Again, she shook her head. She fidgeted with her hands, her eyes darting around the room as if searching for something.

  At last, Susan began, “I need–” But she broke off, struggling to bring herself to say what was on her mind. Swallowing a breath, she forced herself to look Harlan in the eyes. “I need your help.”

  “I’m willing to do anything I can to help you.”

  “Do you mean that? You’ll really do anything.”

  Susan’s voice carried an edge that made Harlan hesitate a second before nodding. “I just don’t see what I can do that the police aren’t already doing.”

  “You can talk to William Jones.”

  “What would be the point of that? The police obviously don’t think he’s involved.”

  “Yeah, well they’re wrong,” Susan returned with a sneering scowl that mingled contempt with barely suppressed rage. “That fucker’s hiding something.”

  “What makes you think that?”

  “’Cos I saw him. I saw that sick pervert watching my Ethan and the other kids come out of school. And I saw him in the park with his paints and things, painting pictures of the kids in the playground.”

  “That’s certainly incriminating, but as I understand it Jones goes for girls, not boys.”

  “He goes for little kids. Girls and boys. Ask anyone around where I live and they’ll tell you what that filth, that fuckin’ vermin goes for.”

  As Susan spoke, her voice grew loud and splotches of angry red stood out on her pale cheeks. Harlan held up his hands in a calming gesture. “Okay let’s assume you’re right. If the police can’t get him to talk, what makes you think I can?”

  “Because you can do things the police can’t.” Susan’s eyes glittered with the same brutal intent that suffused her voice. “You can make Jones talk.”

  The deep lines that marked Harlan’s face grew deeper. The idea of trying to beat a confession out of a suspect went against both his natural instincts and everything he’d been taught. As far as he was concerned, police who used violent tactics were little, if any better, than criminals themselves. But even if he’d been willing to do as Susan asked, he wasn’t sure that he could do it. Merely thinking about it brought on a twinge of the same paralysis that’d gripped his limbs like a vice when Carl Gallagher attacked him. He dragged his feet across the room to the window and stared at the leaden grey sky.

  “You said you’d do anything,” Susan reminded Harlan, her voice insistent and pleading at the same time.

  “I know, but–”

  “But what?”

  Harlan turned to Susan. “I can follow Jones night and day. He won’t be able to make a move without me knowing it. I can even break into his house and search it while he’s out.”

  She shook her head. “The police have already done all that and it got them nowhere. Why do you think I’m here?” For a second, tears trembled on her eyelashes. She swiped them away as if she hated them, and when she next spoke her voice was edged with steel. “You want a chance, don’t you? A chance to wipe your conscience clean. Well this is it, and you better fucking believe me, it’s the only one I’m ever gonna give you. You do this one thing and then you can forget about me and my kids forever.”

  Not forget about you, thought Harlan. Never that. Never completely. But maybe, just maybe, move on from the memory enough to start rebuilding my life properly. H
e heaved a sigh. “Okay, I’ll do it.”

  Susan matched his sigh with a sharp breath of relief. “What will you do to him?” There was something almost ghoulish in the trembling eagerness of her question.

  “I don’t know,” admitted Harlan, his voice tight with strain. “Before I do anything, I need to ask you a couple of questions.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “Does anyone else know you’re here?”

  “No.”

  “Good. Let’s keep it that way. Have you made any public threats against Jones?”

  “I’ve only said the same as everyone else in my area’s been saying for years, that he needs his balls cut off and put in his mouth.”

  Harlan frowned thoughtfully. “With Jones being so widely hated, there won’t be any shortage of suspects for an attack on him.”

  “Yeah and you don’t have to worry about anyone saying anything to the coppers. They’d all be too busy celebrating if the bastard got killed.”

  Harlan looked hard at Susan. “No one’s going to get killed.”

  Her bitter blue eyes returned his gaze with a sudden flash of hatred so intense he involuntarily winced. “Not deliberately, but as we both know sometimes things happen that we don’t intend to happen.”

  A sense of immobility spread through Harlan’s body like an injection of cement. Lumps stood out at the corners of his jaw where his teeth locked together. When he spoke his voice had a hoarse, hollow sound. “After I do this, the police are going to come straight to your door. So you’ve got to make sure you and your boyfriend have got solid alibis.”

  “Neil works at the hospital from six until six every night except Sunday.”

  “That’s good. Have you got a mobile phone?”

  “Yes.”

  “Give me your number.” As Susan told Harlan her number, he punched it into his phone. “I’ll call you and let you know when I’m gonna do it. Whatever you do, don’t come here again.”

  “I won’t.”

  A moment of silence passed between Susan and Harlan. She continued to look at him, her expression bouncing back and forth between anger, hate, fear and desperate hope so rapidly it made his head reel. Blinking from her gaze, he motioned towards the door. With a strange hesitating reluctance, she headed into the hallway. She turned suddenly and gripped Harlan’s wrist with her cold, damp hand. All that was left in her eyes was the agony of a mother fearing for her child. “I’m not stupid. I know that the chances are Ethan’s dead. But I’ve got to believe he’s still alive. And even if–” Her voice caught in her throat. Swallowing her pain, she continued, “Even if he’s not, I still want him back.”

  “You realise it could take years to find him.”

  “I don’t care how long it takes. The moment Ethan went missing my life stopped. Since then time has had no meaning.” Susan’s nails dug into Harlan like thorns. “Just get my little boy back for me.”

  “I’ll try.”

  Susan shook her head frantically. “Don’t try. Do it. Do whatever it takes.”

  “I…” Harlan’s tongue could barely force the words out through his teeth. “I will.”

  “Promise me.”

  “I promise. Whatever it takes, however long it takes, I’ll find Ethan.” As Harlan spoke, a sick feeling settled in his stomach. It was madness to make such a promise. A life of fruitless searching or a long jail sentence, as far as he could see those were the most likely outcomes of his words, but even so his conscience compelled him to say them.

  A little of the tension left Susan’s face. She released Harlan’s arm, and with a seemingly unconscious movement, wiped her palm on her coat as if she’d touched something dirty.

  Harlan opened the front door and poked his head out, glancing in both directions. When he was certain there was no one lurking about, he said, “Put your hood up and keep it up until you’re off the estate.”

  Susan pulled up her hood. “When will you call?”

  “Soon.”

  Harlan watched Susan get into the lift, before shutting the door. He moved to gaze out the window again. She emerged from the tower-block and hurried, head down, across the car-park. Harlan scanned the streets for anyone who appeared to be watching her. There was no one. When Susan disappeared from sight, he lifted his gaze to the heavy-bellied clouds. He had his chance, but it was as thin as a razor blade. An all-or-nothing chance that would either allow him to retrieve his life completely or completely consume whatever was left of it.

  He took out his phone. A long moment passed before he worked up the nerve to call Eve. She was on the other end of the line in a couple of rings. “I can’t see you for a while,” he told her.

  “Oh really? Why’s that?” Eve didn’t sound surprised. There was a fatalistic quality to her voice, as if she’d prepared herself to hear what Harlan was saying.

  “I can’t tell you why. And if anyone asks, you never saw Susan Reed at my flat. Okay?”

  “Well if I’m going to lie about that, I might as well go the whole hog and provide you with an alibi as well?”

  “Why would I need an alibi?”

  Eve huffed her breath. “Don’t bullshit me, Harlan. I can deal with all the other crap. Just don’t bullshit me. Okay?”

  “Okay.”

  “I don’t suppose there’s any point trying to talk you out of whatever it is you’re going to do.”

  “No.”

  “You’re going to end up back in prison. You know that, don’t you?”

  “It doesn’t matter what happens to me.”

  “Of course it bloody matters.” Eve’s voice was sharp with irritation. But it softened as she added, “It matters because I love you and I want to be with you.”

  I feel the same way, thought Harlan. He didn’t say the words, though. It wouldn’t have been fair.

  “So when can I see you?” asked Eve.

  “I don’t know.”

  “What do you mean, you don’t know? How long are we talking about here? Days? Weeks? Months? Years?”

  “However long it takes.”

  “However long it takes.” Eve repeated the words as though struggling to understand them. “So I’m supposed to spend my life in limbo, waiting for you.”

  “I’m not asking you to wait for me. I’m just trying to be as straight as I can with you.”

  “Oh, thanks.” Eve’s voice was loaded with sarcasm and hurt.

  “I’m sorry, Eve.”

  She sighed, not angry anymore, just sad and full of yearning. “Don’t be sorry, Harlan, just promise me one thing. Promise me that after all this is over you’ll come back to me.”

  “I promise.” Harlan’s voice was thick with suppressed emotion. He knew he couldn’t allow himself to feel too much, not while faced with the task before him. He had to be hard in thought and feeling, or else the paralysis would seize him, and he’d be powerless even to leave his flat. “I’ve got to go now, Eve. Take care.”

  Before Eve could reply, Harlan hung up. As he turned away from the window, the clouds burst and dirty black rain pelted the glass, ushering in an even dirtier, blacker night.

  Chapter 9

  On his way to Jones’s house, Harlan bought a hooded sweatshirt, a rucksack, a torch, a screwdriver, a crowbar, leather gloves, a balaclava and a roll of duct tape. He spread his purchases around several stores, paying with cash. He parked in an unlit side-street half-a-mile or so from his destination, pulled on the sweatshirt, and head bowed against the rain, continued on foot.

  By the time Harlan reached Jones’s street, the lampposts were blinking into life. Jones’s house was in the middle of the terrace, its front door soot blackened from what appeared to be a recent arson attack, its boarded up windows daubed with fresh graffiti. ‘DEAD MAN WALKING’ proclaimed blood-red letters a foot high. No light seeped out from around the edges of the rain-bowed chipboard. The house wore an air of desertion.

  Harlan slowed his pace, scanning the vehicles parked along the kerb. None of them were occupied. His gaze li
ngered on a black van across the street. Yanking his hood as far down over his face as it would go, he walked past Jones’s house. Near the far end of the street, he darted into a ginnel between two unlit houses. His gaze flicked back and forth from the van to Jones’s house. Neither showed any sign of being inhabited. Considering the amount of time that’d elapsed since Ethan’s abduction, he doubted Garrett would be keeping Jones under surveillance – unless it was for his own protection. Looking at the dilapidated, battered house, he also doubted whether Jones continued to live there. More likely, he reflected, he’d been put up in an ex-offender’s hostel until the anger against him died down. Guilt-tinged relief seeped through him at the thought.

  When a car pulled over outside the ginnel, Harlan moved off. Behind the row of terraces there ran a cobbled alley flanked by high brick walls and sturdy wooden gates with their house numbers painted on them. As he neared Jones’s gate, Harlan saw that he’d been wrong – a faint glimmer of light was visible through an intact upstairs window. His heart began to palpitate. A glance at the wall told him there was no way he was going over it – at least, not without tearing his hands to shreds. It was topped with a layer of cement in which was embedded nails and shards of glass. He turned his attention to the gate, which had a heavy-duty lock. After studying it a moment, he headed back to his car. He stopped at a phone box and called Susan Reed. The instant she picked up, he said, “You should stay in tonight.” Before she could make a reply, he hung up.

  Harlan sat hunched down in his car, watching the rain, trying to focus only on what he needed to do. But his mind kept turning to Eve – her face, her voice, the way her body felt when he held her in his arms. He turned on the radio to drown out his thoughts. There was no mention of Ethan’s abduction on the news. The media were losing interest. They’d wrung every last drop of drama out of the story as it stood. Now they were eagerly awaiting new developments.