The Night Stalker (Detective Jane Bennett and Mike Lockyer series Book 4)

by Clare Donoghue

  The hairs on Lockyer’s arms flickered. ‘Sorry, what did you move, Mr Goodland?’

  Jane blew out a couple of breaths as she followed the road around to the right, passing the sign for Walford’s Gibbet. She couldn’t remember the last time she had felt so unglued. She knew things must be bad when she had asked Peter to put his grandmother on the phone just now. She wasn’t just hysterical – she was desperate. There was movement to her right. She let out a yelp, but managed to stop herself from screaming. She put her foot down on the accelerator. There was no way in hell she was looking to her right. Whatever was there, she didn’t want to see it. She started humming again, relieved when the woods began to thin, to retreat behind her.

  She forced her shoulders down as she drove out onto the open moorland. Her lights swept across the snow-covered grass, heather and gorse bunched together as if for warmth. A herd of sheep was huddled by the roadside. She took her foot off the accelerator, glancing in her rear-view mirror as she did so. Her eyes snapped back to the road. ‘Nope,’ she said, ‘not looking. I am not looking.’ She didn’t know what was frightening her more: the thought of seeing another set of headlights or of seeing the ghost of John Walford coming for her, dragging her into the woods and leaving her there to draw her last breaths. ‘Oh, come on,’ she said. What was it about the dark? What was it about this place? ‘Oh, great,’ she said, as her lights illuminated the road in front of her. Dead Woman’s Ditch was just up ahead. Her chest was hurting. She rubbed it until she realized she was holding her breath and her heart was hammering away at her ribs, begging for some oxygen.

  She focused on a spot in the road at the very edge of her headlights. She wasn’t going to look anywhere but there. But she couldn’t stop herself. Her eyes kept flicking to her right over and over again. She could see the car park. She could see the beginning of Dead Woman’s Ditch. Her foot came off the accelerator without her knowing. Her breath stopped without her being aware. There was a man standing at the edge of the ditch. Jane’s brain turned to mush. She reached and reached, but she couldn’t hold on to a coherent thought. All she could hear in her mind were the words, it’s Walford. It’s Walford. It’s Walford. Her car drifted to a stop as she mounted the verge to her left. She couldn’t take her eyes off the man, but she couldn’t move. All she had to do was put her foot on the accelerator pedal and she was out of here. She would be away in seconds. Ghosts couldn’t outrun a car, could they?

  She felt a tear roll onto her face. She reached up. Her cheeks were hot to the touch. He had seen her. He was looking at her. He was walking towards her. Jane’s fight-or-flight response stalled until all she could do was shake, mid-fright, mid-flight.

  ‘’Twas a sheep’s head,’ Goodland said with a grimace. ‘Someone had hacked it off and left it there. And mind, they hadn’t done a good job. It was a right mess, blood and whatnot all over the place.’ He shook his head, putting his hand to Toffee’s mouth and letting it snuffle his palm, the horse’s breath filling Lockyer’s nostrils. ‘It wasn’t dumped there,’ Goodland said, his expression serious. ‘It had been stood on its neck right in the nook of the memorial, right where her name would have been if it hadn’t rubbed off years ago now.’

  Lockyer folded his arms. He wasn’t sure how or where to put what Goodland had told him. What did it add to the investigation? He didn’t know that it added anything. Like Chloe Evans, he could see no correlation with the sheep’s head and Pippa’s death other than, again, the proximity. Doddington was less than a mile from the crash site. ‘What did you do with the head?’

  ‘Brought it home and put it on the bonfire,’ Goodland said. ‘Didn’t think no one would want to see something like that. But,’ he said, his bushy brows rising again, ‘I never heard another word about it. I asked a couple of farmers I know if anyone was missing any livestock, and they all said no. So where did the body go, eh? It’s not every day you see a sheep with no ’ead. Reckon someone would’ve spotted it.’

  ‘Did you tell Barney or any of the rangers?’ Lockyer asked, as a pathway opened up in his mind.

  ‘’Course,’ Goodland said, ‘but like I told you, he reckoned it was kids. I mean, I know the younger generation aren’t like I was at their age. ’Tis all different, with drugs and what have you, but even so. Whoever did it was off their ’ead, if you ask me, like one of those Hannibal Lecter types. Killing animals then rubbing themselves down with the blood when they’s naked . . . whooping it up in the moonlight like some animal.’

  ‘Jane?’

  He was talking to her. He was reaching out to her. Without thinking, she lunged for the door handle and held onto it with both hands as Pippa had, but Jane wasn’t trying to get out. She was trying to stop him coming in.

  ‘Jane?’

  ‘No, no, no, no,’ she said, shaking her head and closing her eyes. She didn’t want to see. She didn’t want to see any more.

  ‘Jane? Are you all right?’

  Her panic stopped dead, the rest of her terrified thoughts crashing up against it, piling up with nowhere to go. She opened her eyes. The breath she was holding came flooding out in one big rush. ‘For fuck’s sake, Barney,’ she said. ‘Are you trying to kill me?’

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  13th December – Sunday

  ‘What were you doing up there?’ Jane asked, her breathing yet to return to normal. She took a step towards him and felt her foot go from under her. Barney’s hand wrapped around her bicep and held her firm. His face changed from red to green in the glow of the colour-changing Christmas lights illuminating the Farmer’s Arms car park. She had driven here in a daze, his truck in her rear-view mirror the entire way.

  ‘If you must know, I was having a pee,’ he said, putting her back on her feet but keeping hold of her arm as they walked towards the pub. ‘No law against that, is there?’

  ‘No, Barney, there isn’t,’ she said, ‘but you’re lucky we don’t live in the States. If I was armed, I’d have shot you with your dick in your hand – no questions asked.’

  He rolled his lips inward, which made the beard around his mouth stand out like whiskers. ‘That would have been unfortunate,’ he said.

  ‘Somewhat,’ she said, feeling her shoulders relax a little. ‘But why there? Could you really not hold it?’

  ‘I was just checking the area . . . you know, making sure the gritter had done enough so the main routes were passable,’ he said with a shrug, the action lifting her off the floor for a second. ‘I’m not strictly working but I’d never go by without making sure all’s as it should be.’

  ‘I think I can manage, Barney,’ she said, shrugging off his hand.

  ‘You’d think so,’ he said with a wry smile.

  ‘Don’t push it,’ she said, straightening her coat. ‘You’re already in my bad books.’

  ‘Hey, it’s not my fault you got yourself in a bit of a state,’ he said.

  ‘I was not in a state,’ she said, looking behind her.

  ‘You was saying “Walford, ’tis Walford”,’ he said. ‘Round here we call that a bit of a state.’

  ‘I never was,’ she said, taking on his accent and speech pattern without intending to.

  ‘White as a sheet,’ he said. ‘I thought I was gonna have to give you mouth to mouth for a second there.’

  Jane felt her cheeks heating. ‘I wasn’t . . . I think . . .’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ he said, giving her a gentle nudge – not so gentle that she didn’t lose her footing again. He steadied her, but then released his grip. ‘I promise I won’t tell anyone.’ He mimed pulling a zip across his mouth.

  ‘I appreciate that,’ she said.

  ‘Come on, let’s get you inside before you freeze to death. Wouldn’t look too good on us lot if we killed off one of the London coppers, now, would it? John’ll have the burner lit so you’ll soon warm up.’ The flashing lights illuminated the long thatched roof and tiny windows nestled under the eaves.

  ‘It’s a beautiful building,’ she said.<
br />
  ‘Dates back to the fifteenth century, though after the fire I’m not sure what’s original and what’s new. Place near burnt down back in the eighties.’ He pulled open a heavy oak door painted the colour of fresh olives. ‘After you,’ he said.

  ‘There’s not a lot you don’t know, is there, Barney?’ she said.

  They both turned at the sound of crunching gravel as a set of headlights swung into the car park. It was a squad car.

  ‘This’ll be my boss,’ she said. ‘You go on; I’ll see you in there.’ He nodded, ducked his head and let the door close behind him. Jane crossed her arms and walked back across the car park towards the squad car. ‘Hey,’ she said as Lockyer climbed out.

  ‘Are you late or am I early?’ he said, frowning.

  Jane looked at her watch. ‘I’m late,’ she said with genuine surprise. ‘Not sure how, though.’

  ‘Shall we?’ he said, reaching out for her arm.

  She pulled away. ‘I can walk, you know.’ Since when was she a damsel in distress? First Barney, now Lockyer.

  ‘You say that,’ he said, turning her while holding her elbow, ‘but it seems to me you’re not cut out for country living. You move like Bambi on a new set of pins.’ He pulled open the door and ushered her inside.

  The heat hit Jane like a hairdryer. ‘That feels good. You never know how cold you are until . . .’ She stopped when she realized she was the only one talking. Almost every head in the bar was turned in their direction. In contrast, the diners in the room beyond seemed oblivious to their presence, their conversations a low background hum.

  ‘Looks like John gave people the heads-up that you lot’d be coming,’ Barney said, appearing beside her. He held out his hand. ‘DI Lockyer, I’m guessing? We spoke on the phone.’

  Lockyer shook his hand. ‘Barney,’ he said, looking him up and down. ‘Good to meet you. And thanks for your help . . . so far.’ Jane cringed at the insincerity in his voice.

  ‘You picked a good night,’ Barney said, either unaware or unfazed; she couldn’t tell which, though she admired both. ‘All and sundry comes down on skittles night.’ He turned and raised a hand in greeting, and at least half a dozen hands were raised in return. ‘Come on, they’ll stop gawking in a minute.’

  Jane followed Barney over to a long oak bar, Lockyer at her left shoulder. She spotted the wood burner blazing at the far end of the room beyond the diners. Beads of sweat popped out on her forehead, although she wasn’t sure if that was from the heat or the stares she and Lockyer were getting.

  ‘They don’t look very friendly,’ she said out the corner of her mouth.

  ‘Don’t mind them,’ Barney said. ‘They’re not keen on coppers, and they’re not keen on outsiders. So . . .’

  ‘They’re not keen on us?’ Lockyer said.

  ‘They’ll warm up in a bit.’ Barney raised his hand again. ‘All right, Trim? Where’s the wife?’

  ‘She’ll be up in a bit,’ said a man sitting at the other end of the bar, a glass of what looked like whisky in his hand.

  Behind the bar was a half-sized window with two stags’ heads mounted either side, and three shelves containing bottles of every type of alcohol imaginable. There must have been twenty beer pumps. ‘What can I get you?’ Barney asked, turning and putting his hand in the small of Jane’s back, bringing her forward until she was standing next to him.

  ‘Do you think they’d do me a cup of tea?’ she asked, rubbing her hands together.

  ‘Course,’ he said. ‘I’ll introduce you guys to John. John,’ he called, waving to a man wearing chef’s whites talking to the whisky drinker.

  ‘All right, Barney?’

  ‘John, this is DS Bennett,’ he said, gesturing down at Jane, ‘and this is DI Lockyer . . . the boss.’ He hooked his thumb over his shoulder at Lockyer.

  ‘Pleasure to meet you,’ Mills said, reaching over the bar and shaking Jane’s hand. ‘You’ll be the other London copper. I met your boss, here, yesterday.’

  ‘Good to see you again, Mr Mills,’ Lockyer said from behind her.

  ‘Can I get a cup of tea for the lady, John, and a pint of Angry Orchard for me . . . and you?’ he said, turning to Lockyer.

  ‘I’ll have the same.’

  ‘Two Orchards then.’

  ‘Coming right up,’ John said, grabbing two pint glasses from a shelf above his head.

  ‘Looks busy tonight?’ Barney said.

  ‘Always,’ John said. ‘The restaurant’s fully booked. I’ve had to turn down business. We’ve got three Christmas parties in.’

  ‘Ours isn’t ’til January,’ Barney said. ‘Never made sense to me to leave it ’til after the New Year. What’s the point? The festivities are all done by then and everyone’s broke.’

  ‘They do the same up in London,’ Jane said, relieved to hear the murmur of conversations starting up behind her. For all she knew they were talking about her and Lockyer, but at least they were talking.

  ‘Well, it’s hard to find places that can accommodate a big group,’ John said. ‘I gave my staff the night off and took them all out bowling down at the ten-pin bowling alley out by junction twenty-five, back in November. There was no way I’d have been able to do anything this month . . . or next, for that matter.’ Mills handed Barney a pint, which he passed back to Lockyer, and another one, which he took himself. ‘I’ll bring the tea over, OK?’

  ‘Sure,’ Barney said. ‘Why don’t you two get settled over there.’ He pointed to an empty table near the door. ‘I’ll give you a guide to who’s who, and you can then get to mingling?’

  ‘Thank you, Barney,’ Jane said. ‘We really appreciate it. You’re saving us a lot of time.’

  ‘Who wants the Hugo seat?’ Barney gestured to the bench on the left of the table, facing into the pub. ‘Or are you gonna brave it and sit side by side?’

  ‘What’s a Hugo seat?’ Lockyer asked, ushering Jane into the bench before coming in to sit next to her. He had made the decision for her, it seemed.

  ‘You’re in it,’ Barney said, sitting down opposite them. He made the two-person bench look like a child’s seat. ‘It’s the seat that faces out so you can see everyone and have a nosey at what’s going on.’

  ‘That would work,’ Jane said, ‘if you weren’t a wall of a human being.’

  He smiled and shuffled to the edge of the bench closest to the wall. ‘Better?’

  ‘Do you know Kevin Ashworth?’ Lockyer asked. Jane turned to look at him, as did Barney. ‘Jane tells me you knew Pippa Jones and you knew of Chloe Evans, so I was wondering if you knew Ashworth.’ He was talking as if they had been in the middle of a conversation. Jane felt her face flush. As an interviewer Lockyer had only ever had two settings: hard and harder.

  Barney seemed to pause for a second as he no doubt caught up with Lockyer’s change of pace. ‘I know Ashworth . . . when I say know, he’s not a mate, but I definitely know who he is.’

  ‘Go on,’ Lockyer said.

  Barney glanced at Jane before resting his arms on the table, spinning his pint glass with the tips of his fingers. ‘I know he’s a piece of work,’ he said. ‘You’ll be hard pushed to find anyone around here or Bridgwater way who has a good word to say about him.’

  ‘Hold that thought,’ Lockyer said as the waitress approached with Jane’s cup of tea.

  ‘Milk and sugar,’ the girl said, putting down a bowl of white and brown sugar lumps and a tiny jug filled to the brim with milk.

  ‘Thank you,’ Jane said. The girl turned to leave.

  ‘So tell me about Ashworth,’ Lockyer said, his voice loud and clear. Did he really want the entire pub listening to their conversation? Half the bar was already leaning in their direction. The whisky drinker looked about ready to fall off his stool.

  ‘He was wrong right from when we was young,’ Barney said. ‘He was a bully then . . . still is, by all accounts.’ He took gulps of his pint, swilling the contents around his mouth before swallowing. ‘He was growing weed by the time
he was fifteen . . . selling it, but he didn’t make enough . . . not enough to cover how much he pissed away on booze.’

  ‘He was drinking at fifteen?’ Jane asked, realizing as she said it that if the kid was smoking weed, drinking alcohol wasn’t really shocking. In Lewisham, being involved with either by the age of thirteen was commonplace in areas like the Aylesbury Estate.

  ‘Course,’ Barney said. ‘His mum wasn’t up to much. She wasn’t well. Had some disease or other, meant she couldn’t walk or something. Anyway, it weren’t long before he moved on to harder drugs: cocaine, ecstasy, and I hear he’s dealing heroin now.’

  ‘He’s never been caught dealing?’ Lockyer asked. He had taken a notepad out of his coat pocket, shrugging out of the coat as he spoke.

  ‘Sure,’ Barney said. ‘He’s been caught hundreds of times . . . even been inside once or twice, but never for very long.’ He looked at Jane, and then at his pint. ‘Everyone knew it was him when they found Chloe up in Shervage.’

  ‘Not Walford, then?’ Lockyer asked, his voice thick with sarcasm.

  Barney stopped and sniffed. ‘Do you want me to answer that, or are you just talking?’

  Jane could have kissed him. It wasn’t often someone put Lockyer in his place, but right now he deserved it. She had no idea what his problem was with Barney, but if he hadn’t said something, she would have. It was the guy’s weekend, his Sunday night off to chill out away from all these people, and yet he had come over here in hideous weather for them – well, for her, at least. Barney was an above and beyond kind of guy. He continued: ‘Because if you ask me, you’d have to be dumb to dismiss it outta hand.’