by Max Manning
71
On her knees in the centre of the room, Leah’s hands were bound behind her back, a thick strip of grey duct tape sealed her mouth. Her head slightly bowed, her eyes were fixed on the floor. Behind her stood Ray Partington. His long dark hair had been cut close to his scalp and dyed blond. His right hand was tucked into the pocket of his black coat. His left hand hung at his side, the serrated blade of a black-handled hunting knife glinted against his thigh. Partington smiled. ‘I wondered what the commotion was,’ he said.
His words caused Leah to raise her head. Her eyes widened at the sight of Blake standing in the doorway. He took a step forward. Partington raised the knife and placed the blade flat on Leah’s head.
‘At last,’ he said. ‘We’ve been waiting for you. The guest of honour. I don’t like being kept waiting and it’s not a good idea to get me angry. I’m not a particularly nice person, even when I’m in a good mood.’
He took his right hand out of his pocket, grabbed a handful of Leah’s hair and yanked her head back, exposing the soft flesh of her throat. She cried out, but the duct tape muffled the sound. Blake moved forward, but stopped when Partington slipped the knife beneath Leah’s chin.
Blake’s heart thumped against his ribs. He doubted he could reach Partington in time to stop him slitting her throat. The burglar alarm stopped. Blake prayed that one of Leah’s neighbours would have called the police. Partington laughed softly, as if he could read Blake’s thoughts and found them ridiculous. ‘Don’t pin your hopes on the police coming to the rescue. You know what this city’s like. As long as people feel safe behind their own locked doors they’d rather keep their heads down and not get involved.’
He’s probably right, Blake thought, but he trusted Fenton. ‘The police will be here soon,’ he said. ‘I called them a few minutes ago.’
Partington laughed again. ‘Nice try, but you’re a terrible liar. Lauren is going to die. I’ve never killed in front of an audience before. This will be an interesting experience.’
‘That isn’t Lauren Bishop. You know that.’
Partington stiffened. He yanked hard on Leah’s hair and pushed the blade against her skin. A single drop of bright red blood slid down her neck. ‘I know a lot of things. I know that I’m going to enjoy killing her, but she’s only the sideshow here.’
Unable to make sense of what he was hearing, Blake glanced at Leah. Her eyes were shut tight, her nostrils flared as they sucked in air. He took two steps back. He wanted to give Partington space and time. Space to breathe and time to think. ‘Believe me, Ray, I’m trying to help you. You deserve the truth.’
‘I am the truth. You tried to deny me, but the truth can’t be denied.’ Partington smiled at the confusion on Blake’s face. ‘I thought you were supposed to be smart, but you haven’t worked it out yet, have you?’
Keeping the knife against Leah’s throat, he released his grip on her hair and used his free hand to pull a folded piece of paper from his jacket pocket. He flicked it in Blake’s direction and it fluttered to the floor between them. Blake stepped closer, bent down and picked it up. It was an old, stained newspaper cutting. Under the headline ‘Wife stabbed husband while he slept’ was the reporter’s name: Adam Blake. Partington took hold of Leah’s hair again. ‘Read it,’ he said. ‘Let’s see if it jogs your memory.’ Blake skimmed the text. The defendant was Rachel Friel, of Lewisham, south London. The victim Peter Friel. ‘That was years ago. It must have been one of the first court cases I covered.’
Partington pulled the knife away from Leah’s throat, wiped the blade on his thigh and placed it back under her chin. ‘You do remember it then. Read me what it says, in paragraph eight, about my mother.’
Blake took a few seconds to find the right place and quickly read the paragraph to himself first.
Leah yelped under the tape as Partington jerked her head back. ‘I asked you to read it out loud.’
‘All right, don’t hurt her,’ Blake pleaded. ‘I’ve found it. It says that the accused, aged thirty-five, has no children.’
‘That’s exactly what it says. Can you explain to me how, if that was the case, I am standing here?’
Details of the court hearing were coming back to Blake. It’d been his first murder trial and he’d been disappointed when it had been adjourned for psychiatric reports.
‘I think there’s a simple explanation for this,’ Blake said. ‘I take it you were put into care when your mother was arrested?’ Partington didn’t answer. ‘Well, once a child is in care nothing can be printed that might identify him or her.’
Partington lifted his left foot and jammed it into Leah’s back sending her crashing face down on to the floor. ‘That’s your justification for denying my existence?’
Blake held his hands up and took a step back. ‘Okay, keep calm,’ he said. ‘Are you really telling me you’re doing this because your name was left out of a newspaper report all those years ago?’
Partington’s eyes narrowed. ‘That cutting was in a box of my mother’s belongings they gave to me when she died. She hanged herself. Killed herself because of that article. Because of what you wrote.’
Blake shook his head: ‘You don’t know that, Ray. I’m sorry that happened to you, but unless your mother left a suicide note there is no way of knowing why she did it.’
Partington pointed at the newspaper cutting. ‘You don’t get it, do you? That’s her suicide note. You wrote her suicide note. When she read that, when it dawned on her that I no longer existed in her life, she knew she had nothing to live for. She put that cutting in the box with her stuff because she knew it would be sent to me. She wanted me to know so I could put things right. I kept it with me. I waited patiently, year after year. I knew the time would come and when it did I was ready. Your return from Iraq made the news big time, didn’t it? That’s when I recognised the name. That’s when I knew my time had come.’
Blake’s head was spinning, but things were falling into place. The coverage of his ordeal had been Partington’s trigger. ‘That’s why you chose Lauren. That’s why you started beheading your victims. But Lauren had left me by then. Why not come straight for me? Why did the others need to die?’
Partington sneered: ‘I killed them because I wanted to. I am a killer. I exist. I, Killer. They were enjoyable diversions on the way to you. A demonstration of what I’m capable of. You’ve seen the hysteria on the internet, the newspapers. My followers adore me. No one can deny my existence now, can they?’
Blake desperately tried to recall every detail of the reports on Partington’s childhood, searching for a weakness he could exploit. ‘You’ve got me now,’ he said. ‘You don’t need to harm Leah. You can let her go.’
‘I can, but I won’t. It’s touching that you care so much, but that only makes me more determined to let you watch me deprive her of her existence, like you deprived me of mine. Like you deprived me of my mother.’
72
Time was running out. Blake edged closer, trying to put himself into a position where he had a chance of throwing himself between Partington and Leah. ‘I’m asking you to think carefully for a moment, Ray. If this is some kind of sick revenge on the world then you’re setting yourself up to be disappointed, let down again. Like all the times you were let down before. When you were a child. Little Ray Friel.’
Partington’s head snapped back as if he’d been slapped in the face. Eager to press his advantage, Blake chose his words carefully, firing them like bullets.
‘You know what I think? I think you’ve only got yourself to blame for the bad things that happened to you and your family. Your mother killed your father then herself. That’s no one else’s fault. Certainly not mine. From what I’ve heard, Ray Friel was a sick little bastard and Ray Partington is an even bigger, sicker bastard.’
Partington said nothing. He lifted the knife and stared at his reflection in the blade. His eyes darkened. Blake braced himself, aware that his chances were low. A knifeman as skilled and as fas
t as Partington could shred you in a heartbeat.
The shrill wail of a siren filled the silence, the sound close. ‘They’re coming,’ Blake said, trying to convince himself as much as anyone else. ‘The police know all about you. All about Ray Friel. What you are. Every pathetic detail.’
Partington sneered at him. ‘Have you seen how many people have searched for and viewed my messages? What have you achieved? Who worships you?’
Blake said nothing, but edged closer. Partington mistook his silence for submission. He dug his right hand into his jacket pocket and pulled out a smartphone. ‘Video time,’ he said, lifting the mobile to get Leah in shot.
Blake took his chance and dived across the gap, driving his head into Partington’s stomach. Both men crashed to the floor, the knife slipping from Partington’s fingers. Blake grabbed it and staggered to his feet. Partington slowly hauled himself up, a pained smile on his face. Blake lifted the knife and pressed the point of the blade to Partington’s neck.
‘Go on, do it,’ he said. ‘You know you want to. You’ll enjoy it. Trust me.’
73
Blake tightened his grip on the hilt of the knife. The weapon felt heavier than he expected. He pulled the tip of the blade away from Partington’s throat, then jabbed it back. Partington smiled.
‘You want to do it,’ he said. ‘What’s stopping you? I’ll give you permission, if that’ll help. Go on. Do it.’
Is it evil to destroy evil, Blake wondered? Wouldn’t I be doing the world a favour? Partington’s smile widened. He seemed to have an uncanny knowledge of what was going through Blake’s mind.
‘What are you waiting for? You can say it was self-defence. It was me or you. You’ve got plenty of time to get your story straight. You’d better get on with it though, because she’s choking pretty badly.’
Blake looked down and saw that he was right. Leah’s eyes were bloodshot and bulging, and she was sucking so hard on the tape he could see the outline of her mouth. He quickly dropped to her side and used his free hand to rip the tape from her mouth. She coughed violently, gasped for air and retched.
Blake gave her a concerned glance, taking his eyes off Partington for no more than a fraction of a second. A fraction of a second was long enough. Partington’s right foot connected with his left temple, sending him to the floor in a blur of semi-consciousness. When his vision cleared, he was lying face down. A couple of feet away, Partington stood behind a kneeling Leah, holding the knife against her throat.
‘Glad to see you’re back with us,’ he said. ‘I wouldn’t want you to miss the show. My followers are impatient. I can’t keep them waiting.’
Blake lifted his chin and started to push himself up. ‘Stay down,’ Partington snarled. ‘You had your chance and you blew it.’
Blake slumped forward into a prone position. He could see Leah’s lips were swollen and bloody, but at least she was breathing freely. He stared at the blade held across her neck, and thought about launching himself across the room. Pushing himself up on to his hands and knees, he tensed his body.
‘Back on your belly, there’s a good boy’ Partington sneered. ‘If you don’t do as you’re told there will be consequences.’ Blake dropped to the floor, shaking his head in frustration and using the movement to disguise the fact that he’d managed to slide a few extra inches closer.
He wanted to keep Partington off balance. Keep him talking about the one thing that made him uncomfortable. ‘So, your mother was sent to prison, Ray? I think I was working on another newspaper by the time her trial resumed. I guess she was sent down for a long time. That alone is enough to make someone suicidal.’
Partington slid the knife gently back and forth across Leah’s neck and Blake thought he’d overstepped the mark. ‘The trial never restarted,’ Partington said. ‘There was no need. They locked her up on remand while they compiled psychiatric reports. They were never completed. It’s amazing what you can do with a bedsheet and exposed plumbing when you’re desperate. The funny thing is she would probably have been sent to a nice comfortable psychiatric unit anyway. But it was your story that did for her. She couldn’t bear that I’d never be in her life again.’
‘I’m sorry you see it that way,’ Blake said. ‘But killing us is not going to change what happened. You know there’s no way out of here, so why take another life?’
Partington shook his head slowly. His left hand gripped the knife under Leah’s chin, his right hand rested on her right shoulder.
‘You still don’t get it. Why take another life? Why not? You’re not as stupid as you look, Blake, but you’re not as smart as you think you are. I knew you would work out who would be next. I knew you’d come running. I knew. You don’t think either of you are walking away from this, do you? Twice as gory, double the glory. Social media is going to explode.’
Leah’s lips were still oozing blood, but it was her eyes that caught Blake’s attention. Keeping her head as still as possible, she repeatedly rolled her pupils to peer down at the knife.
Blake raised himself up on to his knees. Partington glared at him. ‘Back on your belly, or I’ll bleed her out.’
‘You’re going to do it anyway,’ Blake said. He stood up quickly and lunged across the room. Partington stumbled and Leah took her chance. She pulled her head back, dropped her chin and sunk her teeth deep into the mound of flesh at the base of his thumb.
Partington cried out, Blake saw the knife fall and turned his lunge into a full-blooded dive. His head hit Partington’s shoulder and the two men crashed to the floor. Blake used his momentum to roll on top of Partington and pin him down. A knee smashed into his groin. Blake’s stomach heaved. He was concentrating on not vomiting when Partington grabbed his shoulders and smashed his forehead into his nose.
The bone cracked and Blake tasted blood. He lay limp and helpless as Partington rolled him on to his back, and pressed a forearm across his windpipe. Blake coughed violently, choking as the blood from his broken nose filled his throat. He felt the pressure on his neck increase and looked up into Partington’s eyes. They held no mercy.
His lungs burned from lack of oxygen and his eyes bulged in their sockets. Partington lifted his torso ready to bear down harder and finish Blake off, but instead he froze, the look of triumph on his face replaced by astonishment. He twisted to one side, slumped on to his back, and emitted a low guttural groan.
Blake gasped for air and pushed himself up on to his elbows. Blood poured from a wound in Partington’s side, between his hip and his ribcage. Beside him, knelt Leah, the bloodied knife in her hand. Blake turned on to his front and crawled towards her. She wept silent tears as he prised the knife from her fingers, gripped it in his right hand and flopped on to his back.
74
A paramedic wrapped a blanket around Leah’s shoulders and led her away. Two others worked on getting oxygen into Partington’s system and stemming the flow of blood from the knife wound. Nearby, stood two Metropolitan Police firearms officers, their semi-automatic pistols drawn and pointed at Partington’s head.
Overkill, thought Blake. He’s not going anywhere. The paramedic who’d taken Leah to the ambulance came back in and turned her attention to Blake. The damage to his nose looked spectacular, but it was a simple break. She ran her gloved fingers gently over his swollen throat, feeling for internal injuries. ‘Can you speak?’ she asked.
Blake considered the question for a moment. ‘I think so,’ he whispered. ‘But it hurts like hell.’
The paramedic gave him a sympathetic smile. ‘I’m not surprised. Lie still and we’ll get you to hospital as quickly as we can.’ Blake nodded at the two men working on Partington. ‘Is he going to live?’ he rasped.
The paramedic shrugged. ‘Probably.’
Blake closed his eyes. ‘Pity,’ he said.
75
The trees, stripped of their leaves, stood black against the cloudless morning sky. Despite the early hour, the park bustled with families making the most of the weekend. Blake ha
d been pleased to get a phone call from Leah suggesting that they meet. He was less happy with her suggested meeting place. The spot where her sister had died.
Two weeks had passed since Partington’s arrest. It had been a hectic time. Blake found himself at the centre of a media circus eager to entertain the public with every detail of the drama. Blake’s part in the killer’s capture had been given prominence in most of the newspapers, despite his refusal to be interviewed.
He reached a line of skeletal oaks running north to south and walked between two gnarled trunks. In the distance, he could see the triangular patch of undergrowth near the park’s Gore Gate, which had hidden Lauren Bishop’s body. Taking a deep breath of cold air, he headed towards it
He’d seen Leah only once, a few days after the arrest, when he’d visited her in hospital. She’d not been seriously injured, physically, but the trauma had left her too frail and too frightened to return home. Blake recalled her lying pale and motionless in bed, unable to speak, or even look him in the eye. He’d sat beside her in silence until she fell asleep.
He reached the meeting place and looked at his watch. They’d agreed on 9 a.m. and it was five minutes past. He heard footsteps approaching the gate and looked up. His heart lifted when he saw Leah carrying a large bunch of flowers. She still looked a little frail, but her eyes were bright and her step brisk. He fought back a strong urge to go to her and stood his ground. When she reached him, she rose on to her toes and kissed him softly on the cheek. ‘Thank you for coming,’ she said. ‘How’s the nose? It looks painful.’
‘It’s not as bad as it looks. They tell me once the bruises go it’ll be as good as new. Maybe even better.’
Leah smiled and it made Blake feel good. ‘What about you?’ he said. ‘You certainly look better than when I last saw you.’
