Written In Blood

by Alex R Carver

  Mitchell saw the eagerness in the teen and moved to curtail it. “There is a condition to me letting you go tonight,” he said. “Under no circumstances are you to go near Kieran Wright. I’ll be speaking to him in the morning, and I’m sure I can convince him not to press charges; if you go anywhere near him again, though, I’ll have no choice but to charge you with assault, attempted murder, and anything else that occurs to me. I don’t think you’d like that; if you add up all the sentences you’ve had previously, I don’t think they’d come close to what you’d get for attempted murder.” He was not sure how long a person could expect to get for attempted murder, but he had seen someone in the news recently who got ten years for it, and that was longer than any other sentence Oliver had got.

  “That bastard deserves whatever happens to him, and if I have to be the one to give him what he deserves, so be it,” Oliver said, heedless of the possibility that he could end up right back in the cell he had just left. “If you’d do your job, I wouldn’t have to deal with the sick bastard. Why the hell haven’t you arrested that murdering rapist?”

  “Because Kieran Wright isn’t a murderer,” Mitchell said. “Nor, as far as I know, is he a rapist.”

  “Didn’t Mel tell you what I told her earlier, about what that bastard did to Lucy?” Oliver demanded.

  Mitchell nodded. “She told me, but as I explained to her, even if Kieran did attack Lucy and try to rape her, there’s nothing we can do because it happened a while ago, and the report hasn’t come from Lucy herself. Since we can’t establish that the incident took place, we’ve got no reason to question to him over what has happened to Georgina and Lucy, especially when we already have another suspect.”

  “Who?” Oliver had no sooner asked that question than he realised what else the sergeant had said. “What’s happened to Lucy? What’s happened to Lucy?” He repeated the question without giving Mitchell, whom he grabbed by the front of his shirt, a chance to answer the first time.

  Mitchell freed himself from Oliver’s grasp, at the cost of a button, and straightened his shirt as best he could. “The same thing happened to Lucy as happened to Georgina,” he said. “Inspector Stevens and the search team found her body in the woods while examining the area around Georgina’s body; as far as we know right now, they were killed by the same person. And before you go off on one about Kieran, we believe that both of them were killed by Zack Wild.”

  “Who?”

  “He’s the guy that moved into the old Henshaw Cottage.”

  “How d’you know it’s him?” Oliver wanted to know, his whole body trembled as he fought the urge to race from the station in search of Zack Wild.

  “I can’t go into the evidence I have,” Mitchell said pompously, as though he actually had evidence, rather than just a belief that Zack Wild was guilty of the murders. “But trust me, Wild’s the one who killed Georgina and Lucy, not Kieran, so stay away from him and you’ll stay out of trouble.”

  “If you’re so certain he killed them, why the hell haven’t you arrested him?”

  “I did, but he’s got an expensive lawyer and she forced me to let him go. Believe me, I’m no happier about it than you are, but until I can find enough evidence to charge him, he’s a free man.”

  Down the corridor in the small locker room, Melissa listened to the conversation taking place between Mitchell and Oliver Ryder in disbelief. It was not the fact that Oliver was being released without charge that she had a problem with, she could understand that, even if she didn’t wholly agree with it; what she had a problem with, was Oliver being told that Zack Wild was their one and only suspect in the murder of his cousin and his girlfriend, when he had already been arrested for attacking the person he believed responsible.

  Her first thought was to confront Mitchell and demand to know what he was doing. No sooner had the thought occurred to her, than she realised that confronting her superior would be asking for trouble, which she didn’t want, especially when she couldn’t say that he had done anything wrong. Her mind raced as she considered her options, but she came up with no answers; she needed advice, and could think of only one person to get it from – her gran.

  Not wanting to give Mitchell reason to think that she had been listening to his conversation, even though that was what she had been doing, Melissa grabbed her things and headed for the door.

  21

  It was a walk of a little over five minutes from the police station to her gran’s, and Melissa spent it thinking not only about what she had overheard, but also about recent events in the village. She could not believe how quickly the atmosphere had changed; always before, Oakhurst, even at night, had seemed a pleasant and peaceful place, almost idyllic. Now there was a sense of unease in the air, it made her look around constantly and walk more quickly than she would have normally.

  The lights were out, a sure sign her gran had gone to bed, when she got to her destination. She could have knocked, Melissa was sure it would not be a problem, but she hated the thought of getting her gran up, especially when she knew how much of an effort it would be for her.

  Since she couldn’t talk over what was troubling her, Melissa headed for the pub; it wasn’t as good as a chat with her gran, but she hoped a few drinks would relax her, and put the conversation she had overheard from her mind, at least for a short while. She found the pub crowded, as though everyone in the village over the age of eighteen had come in for a drink, including a number of people who were just about never seen there, and assumed news of the two murders had reached them all and they were there in the hopes of learning something about the situation.

  On her way to the bar she saw Oliver Ryder, he was in a corner with his house-mates, knocking back shots as if he was trying to make up for lost time. While she waited for her drink to arrive, Melissa watched Oliver; she had not yet shaken the presentiment of trouble inspired by the conversation she had overheard between Oliver and her superior, and she wanted to know if Oliver was plotting that trouble.

  Before she could slip along the bar to a position where she could listen in on what Oliver was saying, she was distracted by a conversation Mitchell.

  “…kilt them girls,” Terry Dickens, who had the thickest accent in the village, and was fond of pointing out that his family had been farming in Oakhurst for more than fifteen generations, said. “Who were it?” he wanted to know.

  “Zack Wild,” Mitchell answered the farmer after draining half his lager in one long swallow.

  “Who’s tha’?”

  The question made Melissa wonder how many people in the village, or how few to be more accurate, knew who Zack Wild was. She had always thought Oakhurst a friendly and welcoming village, but the day’s events made it hard for her to believe that – it seemed that only about half the residents knew the name of their newest neighbour, and only a fraction of those who did knew anything about him beyond his name.

  “He’s the guy bought the Henshaw Cottage a few months back.”

  “What makes you think it’s him?”

  Melissa didn’t have to see the speaker to know that the question came from Rod Baylor – his accent was not as prominent as Terry Dickens’, but his voice was still easily recognisable.

  “I don’t think it’s him, I know it is,” Mitchell snapped angrily, unable to stop himself overreacting after the worst day he could remember. Draining his glass, he slammed it down on the bar and called for another.

  The answer failed to satisfy the mechanic, who asked another question the moment he heard it. “How d’you know? Just because he found the girl, don’t mean he killed her,” Rod Baylor said. “If anything, I’d say that makes it less likely he killed them.”

  “That’s not all I’ve got on him,” Mitchell said, stung into revealing more than he intended. “He didn’t just find Georgina Ryder, and her body was where just about nobody goes, he’s the last person to see Lucy Goulding – she went to see him yesterday afternoon, and he followed her down the road after she left his place. Plus he’s
got scratches on his arm, fresh ones, no more’n a day old. He claims he got them in his garden, but I’m sure they came from Lucy.”

  “So you’ve decided this Wild guy’s guilty ‘cause he’s a fitness nut who chose a scenic route for his morning run, and ‘cause after Lucy left his place, he took the only road that leads from his place to the village, or even from his place to town.” This time it was clear as day that the mechanic thought Mitchell wrong. “You’re clutching at straws, Lewis.”

  “The hell I am,” Mitchell snatched up his second pint and began gulping it down as quickly as he had the first. “He’s the killer.”

  “Then why ain’t you got him in custody? All of youse is here, ‘cepting the inspector; if you had someone in custody, one of you’d be at the station, keeping watch, or driving him to the station in town. If you’re so sure he’s the one kilt them girls, why ain’t you arrested him?”

  Mitchell glared angrily at the mechanic, and when he didn’t back down said, “We did arrest him, and we questioned him for hours, but his lawyer, some fancy bitch, probably from London, forced us to let him go ‘cause we ain’t got enough evidence to charge him yet.”

  “If you ain’t got enough evidence to charge him, how in hell can you be sure it’s him? Mebbe the killer’s someone else, and you’re leaving him free to ‘tack other girls ‘cause you’ve already decided this Wild guy’s guilty.”

  “Come off it, Rod,” Jack Peters, landlord of The Village Green, said as he poured drink after drink to meet the demands of his larger than usual crowd. “If it’s not this Wild, who in hell could it be? You’re not really trying to suggest it could be one of us, are you? We all know one another,” he gestured around the pub. “If one of us was a killer, we’d know about it. Wild’s the only stranger ‘round here, it’s got to be ‘im. If you’ve not got the evidence to charge ‘im yet, Lewis, you’d best find it, and soon, before he attacks anyone else.”

  “Believe me, Jack, I know that,” Mitchell said. “I should get something I can use from either the post-mortem or the forensics team, then I’ll nail him.”

  Melissa was a little disturbed by how willing her friends and neighbours seemed to be to believe that Zack Wild was responsible for the two murders that had occurred. Not knowing the man seemed to be all they needed to think him capable of killing not one but two girls. It was only a small comfort to her that of all the people in the village, Rod Baylor was not willing to make Zack Wild a murderer simply because he was a stranger.

  She had hoped to find some relaxation in a quiet drink at the pub, while she tried to work out what to do about the conversation she had overheard. That now seemed impossible since it was clear that the sole topic of conversation was the murders, and that was the last thing she wanted to listen to.

  Finishing her drink, she left so she could head home, in the hope of getting some peace there.

  22

  Zack woke with a start. His eyes flew open and he sat bolt upright in bed. For several long moments, he searched the darkness of his bedroom for what had woken him. Just as he was about to give up and return his head to the pillow, he heard it, the sound of people moving around furtively downstairs.

  He was out of bed and reaching for the torch on his bedside cabinet in an instant. The torch he snatched up was a foot long and heavy, perfect for either lighting up the darkness or using as a weapon, which was why he kept it close to hand.

  He kept the light off as he crept towards the door on tiptoe and pulled it open as slowly and as silently as he could. He didn’t want to alert whoever was downstairs to the fact that he was awake until the last possible moment.

  “What’s going on?”

  The question startled Zack and he reacted without thinking. He spun round, his torch raised in readiness to strike. It was only at the last moment that he remembered he had a guest. He managed to stay his hand before the torch struck home, but it was a close thing.

  “Dammit, Izzy,” he hissed in a voice that was made up of equal parts anger and fright. “You got any idea how close you came to being brained? I was half a heartbeat away from smashing you on the head with this thing.” He waved the torch in his friend’s face to emphasise his words, not that either of them could see it all that clearly, for the only light in the upstairs passage came from the moonlight shining through the small window in the bathroom.

  “Sorry,” Isobel apologised in a whisper. “Didn’t mean to surprise you. Have you got burglars?” she asked as more noises reached them from downstairs.

  “Sounds like it,” Zack said. “You go back to the room and keep quiet; I’ll be back as soon as I’ve dealt with whoever’s downstairs.” He was about to start down the stairs when Isobel caught his arm.

  “Shouldn’t you call the police instead of putting yourself at risk?” Isobel asked in a barely audible whisper.

  “It’s only a burglar, nothing to worry about,” Zack whispered confidently. “They’ll run off as soon as I give them a good scare.”

  It was Isobel’s turn to hiss in a mixture of anger and fright. “What if you’re wrong? What if whoever’s down there isn’t frightened, or they’re not just here to rob you?”

  “Why else would they have broken in?”

  “That sergeant believes you killed those two girls, maybe someone wants to do something about that.”

  Zack wanted to tell his friend that she was imagining trouble, but before he could do so, he realised that she might be right. He knew well enough from his time as a detective that the murder of someone, especially a young girl, could inspire strong feelings in people, even inspire them to acts of revenge.

  “Okay, you go and call the police,” he told Isobel, “while I head downstairs; I’m not going to do anything,” he said quickly before he could be interrupted. “I’m just going to see if I can find out who it is and what they’re doing here.”

  Before Isobel could stop him, Zack slipped down the stairs. He was stopped halfway down by a crashing sound; listening, he tried to figure out who had broken into his home, and what they were doing there. The moment he did, he had to stifle the urge to laugh – what he could hear was comical rather than threatening.

  “Watch what you’re doin’, ya friggin’ moron.”

  “You watch what you’re doin’; if I weren’t too busy tryin’ not to walk inta you, I’da seen it.”

  “You’ve walked into everything else, you might as well walk inta me. Why didn’t ya bring a torch so you could see what you’re doing?”

  “Why didn’t you? Here, I’ll pull the curtains so we can see what’s worth takin’, and be quiet, we don’t wanna wake anyone up.”

  “You be quiet, you’re the one making all the noise.”

  Zack could quite easily have believed that he was listening to a farce; the two men in his living room were clearly drunk, that much was obvious from their slurred speech, and the fact that their efforts to tell one another to be quiet were louder than the noise they were making stumbling into things. He should have been annoyed that they had broken in and were breaking his things, but the situation was too much like something from a Three Stooges film for him to be anything but amused, at least until another voice spoke up – the new voice sounded far more serious than the other two.

  “Shut up, the pair o’ you. Jesus! Anyone’d think this is the first time you’ve broken in somewhere.” The new voice may have spoken in a hoarse whisper, but it contained a level of menace that silenced the other two immediately. “And we’re not here to rob the place, we’re here to kill the guy kilt Georgie and Lucy. I’m gonna slice the guy’s heart out. He’s gonna be upstairs, in bed, not in here, so come on. If you wanna take his stuff, you can get it after I’ve done what I came here to do.”

  Zack felt himself go cold when he heard that, and he froze for several heartbeats. It was not the first time his life had been threatened, but all the previous occasions had been in the heat of the moment, and he had known that the people making the threats were not serious. As much as h
e wanted to believe otherwise, he knew that this occasion was different – whoever had come to his house had done so with the intention of hurting him, and he had brought friends, that made the threat a serious one.

  The moment he recovered from his surprise, he turned and hurried back up the stairs as quietly as he could.

  “Have you called the police?” he asked once he reached Isobel, who was still near the top of the stairs.

  “No,” Isobel said with a shake of her head that was only just visible. “I don’t know the number for the local police, and calling nine-nine-nine would be a waste of time, I doubt they could get anyone here in less than an hour. Anything could happen in that time.” She took a couple of deep breaths to calm herself, realising that she sounded panicky, and thought it ironic that for all the times she had represented criminals, both serious and petty, this was the first time she had been on the receiving end of a crime.

  “Go into my room and get my phone, the local police station is on speed dial four. Lock yourself in and call them.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  More calmly than he really felt, Zack said, “I’m just going to wait here and keep an eye, or an ear, on what’s going on downstairs. Go on, everything’ll be alright, just go and call the police.” He was relieved when Isobel, after a brief hesitation, made for his bedroom.

  Once Isobel had shut herself in, and he was sure she was as safe as she could be while still in the house, Zack tightened his grip on the torch and moved to a position near the head of the stairs. He was certain his friend would not approve of what he had in mind, but he had a plan for dealing with the trio who had come to kill him, or at least to assault him.

  He remained tensed by the head of the stairs while he listened to the noisy intruders begin their ascent and draw near. How they thought they were going to be able to sneak up on him while he was sleeping, when they were making so much noise, he did not know – even the heaviest of sleepers would have been woken by their racket - but under the circumstances he was glad they were too drunk to be quiet.