Dead Heat

by Nick Oldham

  ‘He’s the one who’s going to die, not my daughter.’

  ‘Calm down, come on,’ he soothed her, ‘calm down.’ He was driving with one hand on the wheel, juggling the mobile phone as best he could – as ever it was a motorist’s nightmare that new mobile phones were too tiny to wedge between shoulder and ear. ‘You’re doing really well, Tara.’ He hoped he did not sound patronizing. ‘He actually doesn’t deserve to die––’

  ‘Yes, he does.’

  ‘No, no, listen,’ Henry said quickly, trying to make his point. ‘If he dies, he gets away with it. Don’t you see? Killing is too good for him. He won’t suffer. It would just mean that you are down at his level, can’t you see that, Tara?’

  She made no reply.

  ‘So let’s do it the proper way,’ Henry cooed. ‘Let’s just make sure that he gets to court and gets convicted and goes to prison for a long, long time. Shame the bastard.’

  ‘I want him dead.’

  ‘No, come on, that’s not the way to do it.’ Henry realized he wasn’t getting through to her. He changed tack, deciding it was better to give her no alternatives. ‘Look, we need to get him convicted, OK? That’s what we’re going to do, Tara. Put him up in front of a court, expose him, show him up for what a bastard he is and there’s some things you can do to help with that . . . First of all, is Charlotte all right?’

  ‘She’s been raped. How can she be all right?’

  ‘I think you know what I mean . . . is she there in the house with you?’

  ‘Yes . . . yes, upstairs . . . God, I want to pull this trigger . . . I want to see his face get blown to pieces.’

  ‘I know you do,’ Henry said. ‘I understand that, but you phoned me for help, so whatever you do, Tara, wait until I get there. I have to talk to you, face to face, OK?’

  No response.

  ‘OK?’ he pushed.

  ‘Yes . . . yeah . . .’

  ‘Right, what you’ve got to do is this,’ he started. ‘Make sure that Charlotte doesn’t have a bath or a shower or a wash.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Evidence . . . I’ll explain it when I get there. And make sure she keeps the clothing to one side she was wearing when she was attacked. We’ll need that, too.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘Hold on, I’ve got to put the phone down one moment.’ Henry was approaching a roundabout and felt he needed both hands on the wheel, particularly at the speed he was travelling. He lay the phone on the passenger seat, negotiated the roundabout and cursed when he saw the phone slide across the seat, away from him. He made a grab for it, missed, and it dropped down between the passenger seat and the door.

  ‘I do not believe this,’ he said with frustration.

  Coulton drove Charlotte home in the Bentley. He made her sit in the seat alongside him. She complied numbly with the instruction, now beyond thinking or reacting in any way to him. She sat there in an almost catatonic state, staring blankly ahead whilst Coulton touched her legs and arms as he drove. His hand ran up her skirt, he tweaked her breasts, then grabbed her right hand, pulled her across and forced her to put it into his trousers.

  She let it happen. She was doing something, but it meant nothing.

  Even when he took hold of her head and forced it down to his lap. That meant nothing, either.

  By stretching as far as his arms would go, Henry retrieved the phone, relieved there was still a connection.

  ‘You still there, Tara?’

  ‘Yes, yes . . . still here.’ Her voice sounded feeble.

  ‘I’ll be coming up to see you later. I haven’t finished with you. Once I get my energy back, I’ll show you what sex really is,’ Coulton told her as they stopped outside the house. He had noticed that Tara’s Mercedes wasn’t there, which meant he could do as he pleased. John Lloyd Wickson was home, but that wasn’t a problem. He reached across Tara’s lap, allowing his hands to slide over her thighs, and opened the door. ‘Go on, fuck off. I’ll be up when I’ve had a few drinks.’

  Charlotte got out and ran to the house.

  Tara Wickson lay quietly in the arms of the man she loved, snuggling up tight to him, feeling him taut and hard against her body. She reached down and held him. He breathed out, his hot breath in her face. She even loved the smell of his breath, always had done. He squeezed her bottom and slid a hand under her thigh, lifting her leg across him. He manoeuvred down the bed, squirmed, adjusted his position, enabling Tara to place his penis at the entrance to her sex, then to slide in.

  Both gasped at the same time, looking deep into each other’s eyes.

  They made love slowly for the second time that night. Moving around each other’s bodies with familiarity, respect, ease and excitement.

  When it was finally over – it took them almost an hour – they lay coiled, arms and legs intertwined.

  ‘That was amazing,’ he whispered in her ear.

  She shuddered at his words. ‘Yes, it was. No one can make me feel like you do.’ She kissed his chest.

  They almost drifted to sleep.

  His breathing began to regularize. She lay awake, staring at the ceiling in the hotel room. A tear rolled down her cheek.

  For some reason he stirred with a jolt and woke up. He looked at Tara’s profile in the dimly lit room, seeing the tear glisten. He moved up on to one elbow. ‘What is it, darling?’

  ‘Nothing, nothing . . . Honestly, just feeling a little sad.’

  ‘Why?’ He moved a wisp of her hair out of her face.

  ‘Because we can never be together, because it will always be like this.’

  He had no answer to that one. He laid a hand across her and cupped her breast. She did not react and this puzzled him.

  ‘There’s something else, isn’t there? I can tell. I can read you like a book.’

  ‘You’re the only one who can. Yes, there is something,’ she relented.

  ‘Tell me,’ he urged her gently, ‘tell me.’

  Her chest rose and fell. Her mouth twisted in thought. She looked at her lover. ‘He knows about Charlotte.’

  He flipped back on the bed and swore.

  It was a cold drive home for Tara. She had felt guilty about not picking Charlotte up from the disco, phoning Jake Coulton to ask him to do it for her, but she had wanted to spend a little more precious time with her lover. They rarely saw each other these days and any time spent with him was treasured. In between seeing him she missed him dreadfully and would have loved to be with him always, but she knew it was not possible. Ever. Although things might change now, maybe.

  She drove and enjoyed the car. It was a sturdy refuge for her these days, a barrier against the world.

  Her thoughts were with the man she had left behind.

  Maybe now something was possible.

  She had tears in her eyes as she drove up the lane leading to the farmhouse. It was an effort to pull herself together, but she did.

  The house was quiet. The Bentley was outside, so it meant Charlotte was back, which was good.

  Her feet were leaden on the walk to the front door. She was so unhappy. It was only Charlotte that had kept her going these last few weeks.

  There was a light on in the kitchen at the back of the house. With quiet steps she walked down the hallway and peeped in. Jake Coulton was sitting at the table, his back to her, shoulders hunched. He did not move. She guessed he had a drink in front of him, as usual. He slept in a room in what was affectionately known as the granny annexe, but Coulton was far from a grandmother. Tara thought him more of a big bad wolf and did not like him much.

  She moved away from the kitchen, back down the hall and up the stairs. On the landing she stood still. John was in the main bedroom. He would probably be asleep and Tara had no intention of joining him. They slept in separate rooms now. She moved along the wide landing and knocked softly on Charlotte’s door before poking her head in. She expected her daughter to be well gone after her night at the disco. Instead she found her down in the corner of the room with a
duvet pulled up around her, two terrified eyes watching the door.

  Immediately Tara knew something bad had happened. ‘Honey, it’s me, Mummy. What’s the matter?’

  ‘Mummy,’ Charlotte croaked hoarsely, ‘oh, Mummy.’

  Henry wasn’t too far away now. He’d raced past two speed cameras, both of which had flashed at him and said triumphantly, ‘Hah, gotcha!’ He would be writing to the Chief Superintendent to try to get those rescinded, he thought, but knowing his luck he would end up six points richer and £120 poorer.

  Tara was still talking. She had not pulled the trigger yet.

  ‘Who’s in the kitchen with you?’

  ‘Jake Coulton and my husband.’

  ‘Right, right,’ said Henry, quickly running out of ways of keeping the dialogue going. ‘How are you feeling now?’

  ‘In control. In control of my life – at last.’

  ‘Tell me about the shotgun. What sort is it?’

  ‘Twelve-bore, single-barrel, pump-action, three cartridges in it and one in the breech with the safety off,’ Tara reeled off.

  ‘Put the safety on,’ Henry ordered her.

  ‘No way. It means I stay in control if it’s off.’

  Anger and bile rose in Tara Wickson like a monster breaking from the deep. She wanted to vomit when Charlotte recounted her tale of hell, and she began to seethe even more when Charlotte told her that Coulton had also tried to rape her in her own bedroom too, but could not get the necessary erection. Instead he had tried to go down on her, but Charlotte had fought him off until he withdrew.

  ‘Bastard,’ she whispered. She held Charlotte close and reassured her. ‘Wait here and don’t move.’

  The firearms cabinet was in the sixth bedroom, which had been converted to a study. It was hidden inside a cupboard and bolted to the wall to conform to stringent police regulations. All that was kept in there was the one shotgun, used for vermin control on the land. How appropriate, Tara thought, as she unlocked the cabinet and extracted the shotgun out of its clips. She often used the weapon for clay-pigeon shooting at a local club too, so she knew what she was doing with it, knew which end was which, knew the damage it could cause.

  She sneaked back to the kitchen. The door was still slightly ajar. Coulton had not moved.

  Tara sidestepped into the room, the shotgun held across her body.

  She watched Coulton for a few seconds. He did not move, could have been asleep, sat there.

  She tip-toed up behind him and rammed the barrel of the gun into the back of his neck.

  ‘You raped my daughter.’

  Coulton’s eyes shot open. Indeed, he had been drifting into sleep, his head nodding. His eyes opened like those of a doll and he became as rigid as a statue. The cold muzzle of the shotgun nullified the alcohol in his system.

  ‘Don’t shoot,’ he pleaded. He imagined his head being blown off. ‘Please don’t shoot. It’s not what it seems.’

  She jammed it harder into his neck. ‘You deserve to die, you bastard.’

  ‘It was a mistake . . .’ he began.

  John Lloyd Wickson appeared at the kitchen door in a dressing gown, shocked by the scene in front of him, bleary from alcohol intake. ‘Tara?’

  She looked at him, startled by his unexpected manifestation.

  Coulton used the moment, contorted round and made a grab for the gun. Tara was quicker. She danced away from him and held the gun aimed at his middle. ‘Get back and sit down.’

  Coulton was half out of his seat. He smiled callously and continued to rise, his courage enlarged by the presence of Wickson.

  ‘I said sit down.’ Tara raised the gun. ‘I’ll use it. I will. You violated my daughter and no court in the land will convict me of murdering you.’

  But he continued to rise and took a hazardous step towards her. One step was as far as he got. Tara pulled the trigger. The noise was incredible within the confines of the kitchen. The blast reverberated, pummelling eardrums with its aftershock. The shell blasted a hole in the cupboard door just inches to the side of Coulton’s head. Smoke rose. Wadding settled to the floor and a horrified Coulton dropped back into the chair, covering his head with his hands.

  Tara racked the gun with deliberation, her face a mask of hatred and resolve. ‘Next time it’s your head,’ she said and promised, ‘There will be a next time.’ She spun to her husband. ‘You join him.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Do as I say.’

  Meekly, John Lloyd Wickson complied.

  ‘Now, you lousy bastards, what do you have to say for yourselves?’

  ‘I’ve reached the track up to your house, Tara. If you hear a car coming, it’s me. Don’t worry.’

  ‘OK, OK,’ Tara said.

  ‘I’m only a couple of minutes away.’

  ‘He raped Charlotte,’ Tara said to Wickson.

  Wickson glanced sideways at his head of security, then back to Tara. ‘And . . . ?’ he said.

  ‘What do you mean, “And?” He raped our daughter.’

  Wickson shook his head. ‘No, Tara, he raped your daughter, not mine. She isn’t my daughter, she’s yours. There is a difference.’

  ‘Yes, she is yours, John, in everything but biology, she’s yours – our – daughter.’

  Wickson continued to shake his head and laughed. ‘You betrayed me. You let someone else impregnate you and then you claimed it was mine. You lied, you cheated. All to keep your way of life. She’s not my daughter and I don’t care. Now put the gun down and let’s get this sorted, Tara, once and for all.’

  ‘Sorted? In what way? You don’t even care he raped Charlotte, do you?’

  Wickson’s face was emotionless. ‘No.’

  It was at that point Tara Wickson knew she was very capable of killing two people in cold blood. Part of her, the devil in her heart, urged this to happen. She wanted to see both men dead. She could see a future, without them, never mind the consequences. The other part of her, however, the reasonable person, knew this was very wrong and stupid.

  Fortunately she recognized that the strongest part of her was the devil – which is why she picked up the cordless house phone from the wall by the Aga and called Henry Christie. He was the only person she could think of who could talk her down from this course of action: murdering two people.

  Several lights burned at the big house. Henry stood by the Astra and surveyed the front of the building. He thought he saw movement at one of the upper windows. It could have been the breeze blowing the curtains. He shivered, once again feeling vulnerable. His mouth was dry from so much talking and from fear because he did not know exactly what he was going to come across. All he had to go on were Tara’s verbals.

  He glanced towards the stables. The JCB was still there next to the crusher. They stood like prehistoric monsters, darker than their background. Menacing.

  ‘OK, Tara,’ he said into his mobile, ‘I’m walking up to the front door now.’

  Twelve

  A quarter of a mile away, another man shivered at the same time as Henry Christie. This man was laid out on the hillside overlooking the Wickson household. He was comfortable, but getting cold in spite of the layers of clothing on him. He had watched the arrival of Henry Christie with interest and, as Henry stood by his car, held him in the cross hairs of the powerful night sights on his rifle.

  He adjusted the sights minutely and zeroed in on Henry’s head, just to the temple by his left ear. The man had been testing the rifle the day before and knew it was perfectly sighted. The tip of his forefinger rested on the trigger. If he had pulled he would have blown a hole in Henry’s head, probably taken the top half of it off.

  Henry Christie would have been very dead indeed.

  If only he knew he had been in the sights of a high-powered rifle.

  But Henry was not his target.

  The man lifted his cheek from the stock of the rifle, his keen sharp eyes watching as Henry said something into his mobile phone, then walked up to the house.

 
The man on the hillside wriggled his toes to keep the circulation going. He adjusted his position slightly and manoeuvred the plastic straw into the corner of his mouth to sip the high-energy drink next to him.

  He was playing a waiting game, knowing that sooner or later his prey would appear. He was a patient man. Snipers had to be.

  The front door was unlocked. Henry pushed the heavy oak-panelled piece of wood open and crossed the threshold.

  ‘Tara, that’s me coming into the house.’

  She did not acknowledge.

  There were no lights in the hallway. Henry let his eyes adjust. He saw something at the top of the stairs to his left. A dark shape. Charlotte sitting on the top step, knees drawn up under her chin, rocking back and forth.

  ‘Are you OK for the moment?’ Henry whispered just loud enough for her to hear.

  She nodded.

  ‘Good girl. Everything’ll be fine.’

  He gave her the thumbs up, then turned his attention to the hallway in front of him. He knew the last door on the right was the kitchen. He braced himself and said, ‘I’m coming down the hallway and into the kitchen,’ into his mobile phone. He ended the call, probably the longest he had ever made in his life – and dropped the phone into his jeans pocket.

  It immediately started to ring, making him jump. He fished it back out and saw it was Jane Roscoe calling him. He knew he could not answer it. For the sake of Tara he had to keep things going, so he switched it off, put it back into his pocket, set off down the hall.

  ‘It’s me opening the door,’ he called softly and pushed it open, clueless as to what he would find. That old song, ‘Behind Closed Doors’, came to mind. ‘No one knows what goes on behind closed doors.’ Back to song lyrics again, he thought. It was mad, the things that went through his head at times of crisis.

  Had the sight that greeted him not been so horrendous, he would have giggled.

  Jake Coulton sat white-faced at the kitchen table. Henry immediately saw the shotgun damage to the cupboard door above his head. No wonder he looked pale. He had almost lost his head. Henry could smell cordite.

  Across from him was an equally pale John Lloyd Wickson in a dressing gown. His hands were palm down on the table and he looked very afraid.