by LJ Ross
Eventually, he turned off the motorway and headed deep into the heart of the countryside, past signs indicating villages with names straight out of folklore. For miles, he saw only the lonely beam of his car’s headlights, until the flicker of lights appeared to indicate a secluded house.
It was time to bargain for his life.
* * *
Denise watched Donovan with the same, fixed expression in her green eyes. If he had been less intent on regaling her with his brilliance and more focused on his task, he might have noticed that her pupils had returned to near-normal size. If he pinched her skin again, he might have observed a reaction this time.
Instead, Donovan sprawled in his leather chair and drank steadily as he set out his childhood, where he had witnessed casual violence between his mother and father with more fascination than was normal for a six-year-old child. He had killed his first pet, aged seven, and went into nauseating depth about that turning point in his young existence. He spoke eloquently of childhood traumas and sexual fantasies and it took every ounce of professionalism for her to remain completely impassive.
Every now and then, she made sure to dribble a bit. It risked his return to wipe it from her chin, but looked authentic.
“Everything changed with Amy,” he reflected, gesturing with the port glass. “She was so bright. So young.”
MacKenzie stared.
“Now, don’t go getting jealous,” he blew a kiss at her mute body, lying propped against the chair opposite. The clock chimed the quarter hour and he was dimly aware that he should move things along.
Just another minute, or two, he thought.
“Amy came to me as a private client,” he began. “She walked into my office one day and I was smitten.” He thought back to that moment, ten years ago or more. She had worn tight blue jeans and a snug top, her dark hair poking out beneath a floppy hat – the uniform of a student in the early years of the new millennium.
“She’d been seeing a young man, who worked at the hospital where she was a third year medic.”
Paddy’s face completely changed from middle-aged affability, to something hard and grotesque.
“That man is now a well-known personality,” he continued, silkily. “Though, back then, he was nothing. Do you understand? Nothing.”
Swallowing the last of his port, he leaned down to grasp MacKenzie’s jaw, forcing her head upwards to look at him.
“Pay attention, while I’m talking to you, Denise.”
He rubbed the pad of his thumb over her mouth, forcing her lips apart and for a hideous moment she thought he might kiss her.
Instead, he thrust her away in disgust. She slumped back against the chair.
“I made it my business to find him and to get to know the man who had sullied Amy. Edwards needed to know that she was my property.” They had fought, he remembered with a degree of fondness, but eventually he had overpowered the younger man. “I don’t mind telling you, Denise, I’ve let myself go a bit over the years. Used to be much fitter.”
He sighed, tapping his belly.
“But, then, what’s middle age for? It’s about time I enjoyed myself a bit. Life can’t all be work, work, work, can it?”
He considered another glass of port, but with an eye for the time, stretched himself and prepared to hoist MacKenzie from the floor and into his waiting car. With any luck, the street would still be empty and anybody happening to notice would see a well-respected neighbour escorting a fine-looking lady out to dinner.
He’d put in enough hours knobbing about with the locals, listening to their silly chatter about Neighbourhood Watch and charity coffee mornings. Times like these, it paid off.
“What was I saying?” He scratched at his ear. “Of course, I was telling you about Amy. She was a very special, very stupid girl. I was prepared to give her everything, you know. I was a romantic, back then. We began a relationship and, over time, she came to realise that Edwards was no good for her. He didn’t accept that, at first. He tried to take her from me. I couldn’t allow that to happen.”
He held the tips of his fingers against his lips, to still their quiver.
“I didn’t intend to kill her, at least not then,” he picked up the story again. “Like I say, I was younger, more at mercy to my emotions. I had a few bad moments just afterwards. I would think that the police were onto me. Every time there was a knock at the door, I wondered if they’d found her. Then, before I knew it, a year and then two years had passed. I realised I’d done a better job than even I had imagined. Without some bumbling nobody happening to find her after all these years, she would have remained there, in our special place, for all time.”
MacKenzie’s legs were cramping badly. Her left knee lay at an awkward right-angle, but in her supposedly comatose state, she was unable to move it to a more comfortable position. Besides, he was almost finished. It wouldn’t be too much longer before he would tell her about Claire Burns.
He stood up and she felt her heart stutter in her chest, her chest rising and falling too rapidly. She made a conscious effort to slow its rhythm, back to the slow, inconspicuous rise and falls of earlier.
As it happened, she was not his objective.
He moved back to the small mahogany cabinet and, this time, he brought out a silver bangle. It was the last one in his possession.
Moving back towards Denise, he lifted her slim wrist and clasped it around the limp bone, taking a moment to check her pulse. Slow and steady, he approved. That was good.
“Just a little present, my dear,” he admired the way the silver serpent glinted against the pale skin and then let her arm fall back into place.
“The serpent is, of course, very symbolic. Originally, I bought ten of those bracelets, for another purpose entirely.” He sniggered, like a naughty schoolboy having disobeyed his headmaster. “Instead, I gave one to Amy and decided to keep the other nine, just in case. Well …”
His eyes snaked away, to rest on the unseen photographs hidden inside his mahogany cabinet. Briefly, their images flashed in his mind, replaying the sensations, the power and the pleasure of it all. Desire made his voice thicker, when he spoke again.
“The one on your wrist is the only one I have left. You should feel very special, Denise. I don’t hand them out to just anybody, you know.”
MacKenzie thought of eight other young women, probably dark-haired, who were missing presumed dead. She wondered where he had killed them, where he had hidden them.
“I think it’s perhaps best if we continue our little discussion on the road,” he said, almost sadly. “Much as I’m enjoying myself, I can see that you’re looking a lot more wide-eyed than you were a few minutes ago. Quite apart from that, I’m not in the habit of shitting in my own back yard,” he boomed out his laugh.
MacKenzie watched him check and double check the contents of his bag, then roll his shoulders as he moved around the coffee table.
* * *
“Get out of my way!” Phillips was squared up to Ryan, his short, muscled physique tensed for battle. It took every ounce of strength and training to hold him off.
“Listen to me, Frank. Listen!” The pummelling stalled, briefly, and the small collection of firearms officers and detective constables in position around the house raised their eyebrows in collective amazement. “The minute he admits to anything, we’ll be in there like a shot, but he’s prattling on about his childhood. We need him to talk about Amy or Claire or even one of the others he might have done. Hopefully, he’ll squeal about Geraldine Hart, too.”
Phillips battled against his instincts, which were strongly urging him to ram his SIO to one side and barge through the front door.
But he was a policeman first and foremost.
“The minute – the minute, he breathes anything useful, I’m going in.”
Ryan nodded and let go his vice-like grip.
In his ear, MacKenzie’s breathing rose and fell in comforting waves.
* * *
The car eng
ine slowed and Gregson held his breath when the engine stopped altogether. Ahead, light streamed onto the driveway from a powerful spotlight and a large dog bounded from the direction of the front door. Slowly, Gregson stepped out of the car and allowed himself to be sniffed.
“What the hell are you doing here?”
The dog was called off, eventually.
“I didn’t know where else to come,” Gregson stammered.
“Your present troubles have nothing to do with me.”
“It’s Circle business!” Gregson shouted, no longer calm, nor reasonable.
“Let me take an educated guess and say that the reason you’ve arrived on my doorstep, sweating like a pig and stinking of desperation, is that you’ve failed to silence Lowerson. Correct?”
Gregson looked on with hatred. It was true, he had failed, but some small part of him rejoiced in the knowledge that, when his back was against the wall, he wasn’t a pure born killer. But now he needed help. If word got around that he’d bottled it, he would be the one found with a knife in his belly.
“Look, I said I would support you, that I would give you my loyalty if you run against him.”
“And?”
“I need something in return!”
A pause, followed by a long-suffering sigh.
“This is a one-time deal, Arthur. I don’t want you darkening my door again, understand? When the time is right, I want you backing me.”
“You have my word.” Gratitude made his voice wobble.
Jane Freeman led the way back into the sprawling stone barn she had converted into a luxurious home over the years. One of the many perks of loyalty, she thought, but nothing could beat writing your own ticket.
CHAPTER 26
Paddy moved around the coffee table and hunkered down until he was eye-to-eye with MacKenzie.
“Let’s go, Denise,” he said brightly, before reaching out to grasp underneath her arms. In doing so, he brushed the material of her shirt, tugging it out of place to reveal a slim, flesh-coloured wire taped to the skin between her breasts. His face twisted as he struggled to compute the meaning.
He looked up from the wire into eyes that were wildly green and very lucid.
“I’ve got a little surprise for you, Paddy,” Denise ground out. Wasting no time, she slammed the heel of her hand up into the bridge of his nose, with a satisfying crunch.
He fell backwards, crashing back over the coffee table with a deafening thud. Glasses shattered onto the polished wooden floor beneath and blood streamed from his face, splattering down the front of his shirt.
MacKenzie rose to her feet on slightly shaky legs, glad to be in charge of her body and mind. She circled around the back of the chair, reaching for the heavy, glass ashtray, which had fallen to the floor. She held it like a club, ready to use as a weapon if necessary.
When Donovan reared upwards, he was all animal. Howling, he leapt towards her, the bulk of his body scattering the chairs aside.
“Bitch!”
She prepared to fight.
* * *
Outside, the moment Donovan signalled his intention to move, Ryan had given the order: “ATTACK, ATTACK.” Three teams stationed in a triangle around the house prepared to intercept Donovan if he managed to escape. Stationed directly outside the front door, two constables battered the oak door, which gave in after three good rams.
Phillips was first through the door, calling out “ARMED POLICE!” and Ryan followed closely behind with the firearms specialists. In a few short strides, they followed the sound of a loud crash towards the rear of the house.
“Denise!”
Phillips didn’t wait for the battering ram but kicked open the door to Donovan’s study with the strength of an angry carthorse.
He skidded to a halt, his face drooping into disbelieving lines when he saw the bloodied body lying still on the floor at the foot of the coffee table.
“You took your time, Frank Phillips!”
Dazed, they looked up from the unconscious body of Paddy Donovan and across to where MacKenzie stood, dabbing at a graze to her cheekbone with the edge of her shirtsleeve. Her other hand kneaded the aches which seemed to have leaked into her body, spreading in waves of pain from her neck. Now that the adrenaline was starting to drain from her system, the competing effects of Lorazepam and its antidote, Flumazenil, made her feel fuzzy. A headache throbbed, along with her right bicep, which sang with pain and victory but felt like a dead weight.
“Denise.” Phillips crossed the room to take her face in his hands.
“Frank –” She protested, a bit embarrassed, a bit moved. “I’m fine. Really.”
Phillips cleared his throat and rubbed his hands up and down her arms before hugging her to him.
“’Course you’re fine,” he said gruffly, stepping away deliberately. “Take more than some lunatic to knock you off your stride.”
“Good job, Mac,” Ryan added, with some admiration, then turned to issue instructions for Donovan to be properly tended by medics and transferred to a holding cell. “You pack a mighty decent punch.”
MacKenzie grinned.
“You think I do Pilates just to keep my ass pert?” She joked. “Knew that defence training would come in useful some day.”
“You might want to take a look inside that cabinet,” she added, with a nod towards the corner unit. “He keeps the key somewhere on him.”
Ryan checked Donovan’s pockets and found nothing. He ran light fingers over his shirt and the waistband of his trousers until he found what he was looking for.
“Bingo.”
Grey eyes turned stormy as they surveyed the trove of evidence inside that cabinet; there were ten coloured folders, clearly labelled with the names of ten women, organised into what he presumed was date order. In the first folder, a single picture of Amy Llewellyn smiling brightly for the camera was pinned to a stack of medical notes on her psychological health and, above them, a sheaf of handwritten notes in the form of a personal journal. That would make for interesting reading, he was sure.
Eight other files listed the names of women he knew were missing, some of whom he recognised from Phillips’ list of like crimes.
In the tenth folder, there were several grainy, long-range images of Anna, pinned to a stack of newspaper cuttings and handwritten notes.
Yet there were no notes on Claire Burns or on Geraldine Hart.
Ryan looked back down towards the man who was starting to come around. He groaned and shifted on the floor while a police medic checked his vitals. Once satisfied that he wasn’t about to keel over, his wrists were quickly restrained.
Paddy struggled against the metal but eventually allowed himself to be lifted to his knees, then to his feet. Ryan stood apart, eyeing him with flat, emotionless eyes.
“This time, Paddy, it’ll be me asking the questions.”
* * *
When Ryan returned to the Incident Room, Anna was sitting back with a cup of lukewarm sludge and a Jaffa Cake, laughing along with Jeff Pinter and Tom Faulkner like old friends. On his arrival, all three came to attention.
“Ryan? What happened?”
Knowing what Donovan had intended, or at least having his suspicions proved correct, did not give Ryan any pleasure. It made his face hard and his voice harder.
“Exactly as we planned. Donovan confessed to Amy’s murder and there’s a truckload of evidence at his house. Faulkner? I need you to get over there and start going over it. We still don’t know where he killed them. See if your infrared lamps can uncover a kill site.”
Back to work, Faulkner thought, but with a degree of optimism he hadn’t felt in a long while. He murmured his thanks to Anna and made ready to round up his team.
“Jeff? Babysitting duty’s over. You had a date tonight. Why don’t you see if she’s still available?”
Pinter thought wistfully of the attractive blonde woman he’d met through an online dating service. He’d been nervous as a schoolboy but strangely relieved to receiv
e Ryan’s call for help. It meant he was still one of the team.
“Maybe we can have a late bite to eat,” he agreed, smiling fondly at Anna in farewell.
Anna hadn’t seen this particular mood on Ryan, before. He was prowling around, but instead of facing her with that direct, merciless stare which was so much a part of his personality, his eyes were evasive. In fact, they were avoiding her.
“Ryan? What’s the matter?”
She stood up and moved across to face him.
He didn’t answer directly but jerked a thumb in the direction of the door.
“What’s the beef with Faulkner?”
Anna crossed her arms, not appreciating the tone.
“Perhaps you should ask him –”
“I have,” Ryan bit out.
“In that case, you should be aware that Tom’s been having some financial troubles lately. We had a bit of a chat about how he could try to manage, juggle things around a bit, that sort of thing.”
Ryan listened with half an ear. He might have known it would be something completely prosaic that was troubling Faulkner. He’d have to have a word with him, talk about how the department could help. Hell, if the man was that hard up, he’d give him a loan. Thanks to various wealthy ancestors, money was one thing he didn’t need to worry about.
He watched Anna and felt again the burning guilt of having so nearly been the reason for her coming to harm. If he’d been too late, if he’d missed a clue, she might have been the next to be found inside a wall cavity up on a miserable, windy hill somewhere.
“Why don’t you tell me what’s on your mind?” She tried again.
“Nothing’s the matter,” he snapped. “Jesus! Why does it always have to be talk, talk, talk? It’s been a long day, chasing down a killer. How do you expect me to behave?”
Her eyes narrowed into angry slits.
“You could start by at least being civil,” she snapped.
“Sorry, princess, my manners fly out of the window when I’m trying to deal with homicidal maniacs,” he flung back.
Anna wouldn’t humiliate herself by becoming emotional. He didn’t deserve such consideration. Instead, she walked back to the desk to retrieve her bag and coat.
