Dark Games: (The Erin Dark Series: 2)

by Leon, Taylor

  He pulled the door open and ran- well, waddled- at speed out onto the dark patio and beyond that, the small grassy garden, his untucked shirt flapping in the light wind.

  We didn’t really need Moira to use her speed to catch up with him. I mean there was nowhere for him to go once he reached the fence at the back, but hey, if you’ve got the power, flaunt it. Moira was a blur in the darkness, racing past him like a gust of wind and re-appearing in front of the fence.

  We made our way over at a more leisurely pace.

  Vitchkov turned and faced us. I couldn’t be sure in the dark, but the moonlit highlights on his face suggested a degree of panic had set in.

  ‘What are you going to do?’ he spluttered, trying to catch his breath. ‘Call the police? Go on, you do that.’

  We didn’t say anything, just watched him steadily.

  ‘Or are you going to beat me up?’ he asked, looking at us one by one. ‘Kill me?’ He nervously laughed at his own words, looking past us at the house. ‘I have witnesses.’

  We all looked back up at the windows. The young girls were watching us, their noses pressed up against the glass.

  Behind me, Vitchkov said, ‘I suggest you ladies make a run for it, while you can.’ But his tone lacked confidence, even as he added, ‘you have no idea who I am.’

  Upstairs, Sara stepped in front of the young girls and pushed them back. Then her eyes met mine in a silent acknowledgement.

  She drew the curtains.

  ‘Well, bang go your witnesses,’ Bella smiled.

  The four of us turned back to Vitchkov and formed a circle around him.

  ‘Did you kill Elisa?’ I asked him.

  ‘You stupid whore,’ he spat at me. ‘I know people high up in this country who will make you disappear like this.’ He clicked his fingers.

  Make me disappear. How ironic, I thought.

  ‘He’s guilty,’ Frankie confirmed, after reading him again.

  ‘I’m not listening to this,’ Vitchkov snapped, and was ready to stride through us. But we raised our arms horizontally and, as we intoned the spell in time together, a bright ribbon of energy connected us and created a barrier that he couldn’t break through.

  We couldn’t hear him anymore either. Trapped inside the cocoon his face told me he was getting angrier, as he slammed his fists against the invisible wall. We continued the incantation while demons rose around him, thousands of tiny insect-like beings, surrounding him, covering him, suffocating him. He was screaming in terror now, as seconds past. Seconds that to him seemed like an eternity.

  Then the demons suddenly dropped away and took him with them.

  We dropped our arms and I took a deep breath. Damnations were short, but exhausting. My earpiece was still connected to Jessie, so there was no need to use the compact.

  ‘It’s done,’ I told her. ‘Are the emails ready to go out?’

  ‘I’ve hacked into his account and written them up,’ Jessie said. ‘He’s going travelling for a while. I’m sending them out to his closest friends and family. I’ve transferred money out of his account and booked him onto several flights for this afternoon. That should muddy the waters enough if, and when, his employers start looking for him.’

  ‘We need to do something about them,’ Moira said, motioning towards the lounge where Vitchkov’s bodyguards lay unconscious.

  ‘I’m not sure that’s our only problem,’ Bella said, looking up at the bedroom window.

  I turned and saw Sara watching us through a gap in the curtains.

  ****

  We stood in the front room, surveying the mess and the two men who were still out cold.

  ‘We could just damn them,’ Bella said. Typically, she was the least restrained out of us.

  I shook my head. ‘You know we can’t do that,’ I told her.

  Someone nominates “the worst of the worst” and then we must all agree unanimously. We must be one hundred per cent certain that the nominee is evil and shows no remorse. We are sending these people to hell, and once that’s done there’s no going back.

  Bella shrugged, bent down and nonchalantly picked up a big chunk of broken glass, placing it carefully on the sideboard. ‘I bet if we look into their histories, we’ll find they are just as bad as Vitchkov.’

  Moira and Frankie watched carefully to see my reaction. I was the cop, and so they saw me as holding the moral high ground.

  ‘You know they would have to be nominated and voted on.’ They looked at one another and nodded in reluctant agreement. ‘With Victoria,’ I added, just to make the point.

  I looked around the room at all the broken glass, and the drinks from the decanter splashed across the walls and the wooden floor.

  ‘Let’s clean this place up,’ I said. ‘Tie those two clowns up.’

  ‘What about when they come to?’ Frankie asked. ‘They’ve seen us, and they know the girls upstairs.’

  ‘They don’t know who we are,’ I said, thinking it through. ‘It’s not as though they’re going to run to the police. As far as the girls are concerned, I’ll deal with them.’

  I turned and left them there, making my way upstairs. Sara and the three girls were waiting for me on the landing. Sara’s eyes narrowed when she saw me. I don’t know how much of what we did outside she had seen in the dark. Not the damnation itself, no-one except for us could see inside the circle. But she had seen Vitchkov, there one minute and gone the next.

  ‘Go and get dressed,’ I said. ‘Then, you need to leave.’

  Sara stepped in front of the others to confront me. ‘It’s not as easy as that. We live here. This is our home.’

  I reached inside my pocket and pulled out the brown envelope Victoria had given me.

  ‘Take this,’ I said. ‘Share it between you. There’s enough money in there for you to get back up on your feet, somewhere new.’

  Sara was clearly the ringleader. She carefully took the envelope and signalled for the others to go and get changed.

  ‘Where is Vitchkov?’ she whispered to me. ‘What did you do with him?’

  ‘I promised I’d get you away from him, didn’t I?’

  ‘Out there in the garden,’ she stammered. ‘He was standing in front of you and then…’

  I put a hand on her shoulder. ‘He’s gone,’ I told her. ‘That’s all you need to know.’

  ‘Did you kill him?’

  ‘No, we didn’t kill him,’ I said, and that was true.

  ‘What are you?’ she asked. ‘What are they?’ She motioned downstairs.

  I leaned in and gently kissed her cheek. ‘You take care,’ I whispered and turned to go.

  ‘Wait!’

  I turned around and saw tears in her eyes. ‘You are my guardian angels,’ she said.

  I nodded and smiled back.

  Guardian angels.

  I like that.

  7

  CADE WAS GREETED on his first day back at work with a standing ovation. He may have been the newest member of the team, but he had already achieved hero status for taking a bullet whilst trying to save me several weeks ago. He made it through the back-slapping and handshakes, across to our bank of desks at the far end of the open plan office.

  ‘Good to see you back, Detective Inspector,’ I said and held out my hand.

  He grinned. It wasn’t as though we hadn’t seen one another during the month he’d been recuperating. I’d visited him several times since he’d left hospital, and spent that time getting to know my new partner.

  My new partner.

  I suppose that was the surprising thing. We had only been working together for a few days before he was shot, and yet I already felt closer to him than most of the other partners I had worked with.

  Cade grinned, a big beam of a smile and pulled me towards him. His light stubble brushed against my cheek. ‘It’s good to be back,’ he whispered.

  ‘Okay boys and girls,’ Arnie announced, striding into the office. ‘Enough lovey-dovey. Let’s get to work.’

&
nbsp; He marched over to our desks as we pulled apart from one another.

  ‘It’s good to see you, John,’ Arnie said in a low voice.

  ‘You too, boss.’

  Arnie nodded and turned to face the rest of the office. ‘Okay people, listen up. The vic’s name is Jennifer Brooks.’ He handed out some photo packs. ‘Forty-one years old. She was single and was living on her own. Worked as a PA at a software company in town. After work yesterday she met a few friends at the Nova Star bar in Benham near the lock and left them around half ten. CCTV footage shows her walking down the high street on her way home, but there are no cameras on the crucial section leading down to the canal.

  ‘There was no reason for her to leave the street and go down there. The initial examination suggests she was either beaten or took a heavy fall before she was strangled and thrown into the water.

  ‘We’re going to keep sifting through the footage while forensics continue to work the site. The bars were busy so we are hoping someone saw her and will eventually come forward. Interviews will be continuing this afternoon and tonight when the bars re-open.’

  ‘Motive?’ someone near the back asked.

  ‘Her purse was full,’ Arnie said. ‘So, it wasn’t robbery. Also, there doesn’t appear to be any sign of sexual assault. Of course, that doesn’t mean the attacker didn’t try, panicked and killed her when she fought back, but that is speculation. This was not a frenzied attack and the killer remained calm. Have a look at the third photo in the pack, and you’ll see why I say that.’

  I had the photo in my hand and tilted it so Cade could see.

  ‘See the markings on the back of her neck?’ Arnie said. ‘The killer either thought he had time to carve the number “2” into her, or doing that was so important that he didn’t care whether he had time or not. More to the point, and this is critical, there was another murder two nights ago outside London, and that victim had the number “1” carved into her.’

  There was a buzz of noise as everyone started talking to one another. Arnie raised his voice to quieten them down.

  ‘John and Erin, after this briefing I want you to follow up on that first murder. Wills, I want you to widen the net. Look for any other murders that have carried similar markings. Go back three months, then six months, then a year.

  ‘As my welcome-back gift, I’m assigning Detective Inspector Cade to head this case up with DS Erin Dark. Any questions? Good, then let’s get moving and find this bastard.’

  8

  ‘TALK ABOUT BEING thrown in at the deep end on your first day back,’ Cade said, looking out the side window while I drove. We’d left London fifteen minutes ago and were now heading up the motorway to a small village in Bedfordshire.

  ‘How are things with you and the ex?’ I asked. Cade had been having a torrid time with her just before he had been shot. His ex-wife had been planning to move up north with her boyfriend and take Cade’s son with them.

  ‘I can’t read her,’ he said. ‘Maybe that’s why we ended up like we did. One minute she’s making plans to leave London, and the next she’s round at my place making me dinner.’

  ‘Well, you do have Sean in common,’ I said.

  ‘I know. But sometimes she sticks him in front of the TV and we just sit and talk. Do you know how little we talked to one another when we were married?’

  Unnervingly, I felt a pang of jealousy when I thought about that. Twenty-eight and single, I had found myself attracted to my tall, handsome partner. But I was determined that my working and personal lives would remain separate. It was hard enough juggling being a cop and being part of The Coven. I didn’t need to add a further complication into my life.

  ‘Do you think she will still move away?’

  ‘Her head is set on moving to Manchester,’ he said, turning away and watching the green fields roll by.

  ‘What will you do?’ I asked, hoping he wouldn’t request a transfer.

  There was a long pause before he answered. ‘I don’t know.’

  ****

  Unsurprisingly, this was the part of the job that I hated the most. It wasn’t the corpse itself that got to me. I had already seen more bodies than I cared to remember in my short career. Unless it is someone you know you become immune. No, what got to me was when I knew they had been murdered, their life extinguished by an evil bastard who was trying to get away with it. Seeing a lifeless body on a slab, unable to tell me what happened or why, that was the hardest part for me. And theirs was a justice I was determined to serve, one way or another.

  The pathologist had laid the body out for us, under a sheet, inside the sterile room. His heavily lined face was emotionless as he introduced himself as Henry Leaves and asked us to step to one side of the trolley. He passed over a thin file to Cade, which he started flicking through while the pathologist spoke to us.

  ‘That’s a summary of my report,’ Leaves said in a crisp monotone. ‘Her name is Melissa Fairweather. She is thirty-two years of age. A local girl, she lived with her husband. They have a young girl, eight months old.’

  ‘She worked at a local estate agent,’ Cade said, reading from the file.

  Leaves nodded. ‘That’s right. She’d only recently gone back after maternity leave. She was attacked on her way home, cutting through the local park.’

  ‘Raped?’

  ‘No sign of any sexual assault,’ Leaves said.

  ‘And she wasn’t robbed either.’

  Leaves shook his head. ‘The Detective working the case is on his way over and will be able to tell you more about the investigation. But look here.’ He drew us closer to one side of the trolley and lifted the sheet. He turned her left palm up so we could see the single deep cut.

  ‘I understand you now have another body in London with the number “2” carved into her neck.’

  Cade glanced back down at the file. ‘Unfortunately, yes. Ours was strangled.’

  ‘Well, this girl was beaten to death, although she did put up a fight.’

  Cade looked up at that.

  ‘She scratched him,’ Leaves continued, ‘and got blood under her nails.’ He twisted her hand round so we could see the nails.

  Leaves waited for me to give him a nod, and then he pulled the sheet down.

  There was a knock on the door, and we turned to see an older detective standing in the open doorway.

  ‘Ah, Detective Vranch,’ Leaves said. ‘These are Detectives Cade and Dark.’

  Cade broke into a massive grin. ‘George!’ he said to the detective, ‘I don’t believe it.’ They gave each other a manly hug in the doorway.

  ‘Uh, so you two know each other then?’ I ventured.

  Cade turned to me. ‘Oh, I’m sorry. George, this is Detective Erin Dark,’

  ‘Good to meet you,’ he smiled. He looked very old-school, the top of his shirt was unbuttoned and his tie loosened, his thinning hair a little untidy. A smart appearance was clearly not high on his list of priorities. But he had a gentle, friendly voice.

  Leaves excused himself after we thanked him, and left.

  ‘I heard about the shooting,’ Vranch said. ‘Thank God you made it.’

  Cade shrugged. ‘I try not to think about it. But, you must have read about Erin here, taking on the NID terrorists single-handed.’

  Vranch looked at me with raised eyebrows, and I felt myself blush. ‘That was you?’ he exclaimed. ‘I thought the name was familiar.’ He looked back at Cade. ‘And how is Mrs Cade?’

  Cade shook his head. ‘We’re divorced now.’

  ‘Ah, I’m sorry to hear that. I went through all that myself many moons ago, as you know.’

  ‘We go way back,’ Cade explained to me as we found some plastic chairs grouped together. ‘But we were only partners for, what was it? Eight weeks?’

  As we sat down, Vranch nodded. ‘Nine.’

  ‘It must be a lot quieter up here, away from London,’ Cade said.

  ‘It has been, up until now.’

  Vranch passed Cade
a second file. ‘This is a copy of my notes so far. You can take this with you and then send me yours once you start pulling them together.’

  ‘Leaves took us through the basics,’ I told him.

  ‘Did he tell you we got a blood sample?’ When we nodded, he added. ‘That’s been sent for analysis. We should have the results back in a couple of days.’

  ‘We’ll need to run a thorough check to see if our victims have anything or anyone in common,’ Cade said.

  ‘The only similarity we have so far are the markings,’ Vranch said, ‘and the fact that they were both women.’

  ‘The next question,’ I said. ‘is if this was number one and Jennifer Brooks was number two, is there a number three right around the corner?’

  9

  ELIAS JAMES CAME to the same pub every night except for Saturdays. On Saturdays, it was filled with yobs and their loose women out to get drunk and make a spectacle of themselves. On every other night it was filled with the more civilised locals, mainly his older generation. That was the kind of place he liked to come to, and was the closest he came to a social-life since Sylvia had passed away. Just a couple of pints each evening, and then he could drive home. As a seventy-three-year-old widower, what else was there to do except go home, watch TV and sleep?

  When he left the pub at half-past-ten, the moon was hidden behind a blanket of clouds and he thought he felt the first drops of rain.

  A woman called to him from behind, as he bleeped his car doors open.

  ‘Mr James? Mr Elias James? Is that you?’

  He turned to see an attractive slim woman standing alone in a short coat, tight jeans and knee high boots. Her hair was hidden under a small hat, and she had a wide mouth and welcoming eyes. She was smiling at him like a long-lost friend.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he replied gently. ‘But have we met before?’

  ‘Hayley,’ she said extending a slim, gloved hand. ‘You taught me many, many years ago.’

  He tried to think back, but couldn’t place the face or the name. There had been so many students over forty years, there was no way he could remember them all.