by Rob Sinclair
Table of Contents
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
CHAPTER 20
CHAPTER 21
CHAPTER 22
CHAPTER 23
CHAPTER 24
CHAPTER 25
CHAPTER 26
CHAPTER 27
CHAPTER 28
CHAPTER 29
CHAPTER 30
CHAPTER 31
CHAPTER 32
CHAPTER 33
CHAPTER 34
CHAPTER 35
CHAPTER 36
CHAPTER 37
CHAPTER 38
CHAPTER 39
CHAPTER 40
CHAPTER 41
CHAPTER 42
CHAPTER 43
CHAPTER 44
CHAPTER 45
CHAPTER 46
CHAPTER 47
CHAPTER 48
CHAPTER 49
CHAPTER 50
CHAPTER 51
CHAPTER 52
CHAPTER 53
CHAPTER 54
CHAPTER 55
CHAPTER 56
CHAPTER 57
CHAPTER 58
CHAPTER 59
CHAPTER 60
CHAPTER 61
CHAPTER 62
Dark Fragments
Rob Sinclair
Copyright © 2016 Rob Sinclair The right of Rob Sinclair to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by him in accordance Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
First published in 2016 by Bloodhound Books
Apart from any use permitted under UK copyright law, this publication may only be reproduced, stored, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, with prior permission in writing of the publisher or, in the case of reprographic production, in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency.
All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental
www.bloodhoundbooks.com
ISBN 978-0-9956212-1-3
Books by Rob Sinclair
Dark Fragments
The Enemy series:
Dance with the Enemy
Rise of the Enemy
Hunt for the Enemy
For my mum and dad. Thank you for all of your support and advice (even the times you were wrong).
PROLOGUE
‘Were you ever happy?’ she asked.
‘Of course,’ I said.
‘And what made you happy?’
‘Lots of things. It depends what point in my life you’re asking about. I was a happy kid, certainly – my upbringing wasn’t particularly hard or painful.’
‘And what about in your adult life?’
‘Alice made me happy.’
‘Always?’
‘No, not always. We were together for twelve years; we had ups and downs like everyone else. But in the early days, before marriage and mortgages and children and … complications, our relationship was perfect.’
‘And since Alice?’
‘Since Alice? Since Alice I’ve never been the same.’
‘You mean you’ve never been that happy again?’
‘No. Not like I was back then.’
‘What would that person, the old you, think of you now? What would he say if he were to meet you?’
‘He wouldn’t recognise me. We’re such different people. But then I could never have foreseen that my life would turn out like this. I could never have imagined that one day in our home, in our bed, I would find Alice murdered.’
CHAPTER 1
‘What’s two plus two plus two plus two?’ Harry said.
‘Two!’ Chloe blurted out.
‘No, idiot.’
‘Harry, be nice,’ I said. Chloe gave her brother a withering look.
‘Come on, Dad, what is it?’ Harry said as he skipped a few steps in front of me. Chloe was by my side, her tiny hand snug inside mine.
‘Eight,’ I said.
It took Harry a few moments to determine whether I was indeed correct.
‘Yes!’ he finally said. ‘Okay. So what’s a million and a million billion thousand?’
‘A lot,’ I said.
‘No!’
‘Yes, it is,’ I said.
‘Is,’ echoed Chloe.
‘A lot isn’t a number, Dad. Play properly.’
‘Okay, what was the question again?’
‘I can’t remember.’
‘Two!’ Chloe blurted out again.
‘Chloe!’ Harry said in disgust.
‘My turn then,’ I said. ‘If I have three pounds and an ice-cream costs one pound, how many ice-creams will each of us have?’
‘Ice-cream!’ Chloe said.
Harry snorted. ‘That’s too easy.’
‘What is it then?’
‘One.’
‘No. You’ll have none. ’Cos I’m eating them all! Unless you beat me to the ice-cream van.’
With that, Harry and Chloe both screamed in delight. Harry burst off at pace through the park gates and toward the van a couple of hundred yards ahead. Chloe let go of my hand and started running – more like shimmying really – after her big brother. After a few paces, though, she stopped and pouted.
‘He beat me,’ she said sulkily.
‘Keep going – you only have to beat me!’
With renewed impetus she set off again. I couldn’t help but beam as I watched my kids dashing away, not a care in the world except for making sure they got an ice-cream. The innocence of youth truly is wonderfully blinkered. It’s infectious too. Spending time with my children, especially impromptu time, was like a drug, making me forget – at least temporarily – the many troubles in my life. And I really needed the respite.
Usually our childminder, Mary, who I thought was a sweet and caring woman but who the kids thought was old and boring, would pick the children up after school on a Monday. Not today, though. It might have been October, but the weather was balmy and sunny (though to be honest, even if it had been minus ten out the kids wouldn’t have said no to ice-cream in the park). And I’d had a crappy week … scratch that, I’d had a shitty month, and Harry and Chloe were as ever the perfect pick-me-up.
Not that they were a breeze to look after – what kids are? At eight going on eighteen, Harry was far too smart for his own good, and had little patience for his three-year-old sister. Put them together for more than a few minutes and there was bound to be an incident of some sort. Harry, being the eldest and the biggest, tormented his sister like crazy, but she was slowly starting to show her own cunning too. Within a few years she’d be able to give him a run for his money, for sure.
With me in a blinkered state of relaxation, the three of us sat down on a bench to tuck into our treats. Needless to say, Chloe somehow managed to smear sticky ice-cream all over her pretty pink dress – not that she batted an eyelid. Harry chose a hideous blue ice-lolly that, he showed us proudly, turned his tongue, teeth and lips a vibrant blue. Simple pleasures.
And then they were off again, hurtling around the grass emitting spates of giggles and the occasional disgruntled shout, Chloe chasing but never quite catching
her brother.
As the time edged toward six I decided we should head back to the house. My wife, Gemma, would be home and wondering where we all were. We set off side by side, all three of us seemingly content. And yet, as we walked toward the park exit, I felt like I was walking from one life into another. Back to reality.
That gloomy feeling was further cemented when I saw the black Range Rover pulled up outside the park gates. As we approached, its engine thundered to life. By that point I could feel my heart heaving in my chest.
They wouldn’t have come here, would they? When I’m with my kids?
A mixture of fear and disgust filled me. I stared at the blackened windows, unable to see anything of who sat inside – although I knew full well to whom the car belonged.
We were almost adjacent when the Range Rover began crawling away. Then, after a few seconds, the driver put his foot down and the engine roared as it propelled the heavy vehicle away at pace. I watched as the car sped down the road … toward the turn for our street.
I held my breath. The car slowed. Its brake lights blinked once. Twice.
No, please, don’t, I willed. Not my home.
But at the last moment the car revved again and shot off into the distance. Soon it was out of sight. I felt my body loosen as a wave of tension was suddenly released.
‘Dad?’ Harry said.
I turned to face him, trying to regain my composure, but he must have seen the look on my face. He indicated to Chloe, and I looked down. Her face was creased and upset. I was grasping her hand, I realised, squeezing it as tightly as I could. I hadn’t even noticed, hadn’t heard her murmurs. I’d been too consumed by my own world. My own problems.
I let go and saw the mangled form of Chloe’s hand quickly regain its normal shape.
‘Honey, I’m so sorry,’ I said to her. ‘Did I hurt your hand?’
Chloe, bottom lip protruding, just nodded.
‘Dad, is everything okay?’ Harry said.
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Everything’s fine. Let’s get home and see Mum.’
I hated lying. I especially hated lying to my children. But what else was I supposed to say? I had to shield them from harm. That’s what a father does. And if that meant shielding them from the truth, then so be it.
Sooner or later, though, I knew something would have to give. And as we headed for home, my instincts whispered that it was going to be sooner.
CHAPTER 2
I didn’t get the nightmare often, not anymore, just once every few months. In the past, in the early days, it had come every night. People say that time is a great healer. I’m not sure I felt healed through the passage of time, but it at least created a certain detachment and distance that grew as the days, weeks, months and years went by. Yet when the nightmare came, it was still as powerful and real as the very first time, still able to shake every bit of confidence and resolve from my battered mind.
The nightmare was a single frame, a moment frozen in time – a memory I’d tried over the years to bury deep in my mind but that still tormented me. Nothing could ever have prepared me for seeing Alice – my wife, the love of my life – like that. Her lithe, naked body draped over the sheets of our king-sized bed. The rings of red on her neck from the killer’s hands scorched onto her delicate skin. Her wide open eyes, all life drained from them, staring up at me, pleading for my help.
In the nightmare I couldn’t speak, couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe. I was entirely frozen, powerless, just as she was. Just as I had been in the moment seven years ago when I’d first looked down at Alice’s lifeless body.
My eyes shot wide open and my head jumped up off the pillow as I escaped the horror of the flashback. After a few seconds, I realised where I was and a sense of relief washed over me. I looked over at the bedside clock: seven twenty-five a.m. The alarm would be going off in five minutes.
A groan from the other side of the bed.
‘Ben? What time is it?’ Gemma murmured.
‘Almost time to get up,’ I said, looking over at her.
Her light-brown hair was crumpled and messy and strewn over her face. She gave a half-smile. Not a warm, happy smile. More a grimace at having been disturbed.
‘I’d best get ready,’ she mumbled, then got up from the bed and headed to the en-suite bathroom.
She slipped off her nightie as she walked and I watched her, the way her hips rocked gently, sexily, remembering how that teasing saunter had first drawn me to her. I was still hugely attracted to Gemma – how could I not be? Staring at her toned, naked body, I felt arousal bubbling every time. But our relationship was far from rosy. In my late thirties, I certainly wasn’t over the hill, not by a long stretch, yet lust and passion were becoming forgotten. It wasn’t that I still expected Gemma to be tearing my clothes off every night, but her interest in me was cooling by the day.
Cooling? No, it was damn near frozen already. Not that Gemma was entirely to blame for that.
‘Daddy?’ came the tiniest of voices from the bedroom doorway. Chloe. ‘Is it up time?’
Chloe was the most kind and caring little person, in many ways a true mirror image of her mother. Whatever my struggles to keep the fires of passion burning with Gemma, one thing I knew for sure was that she was a great mother.
‘Yes, sweetie,’ I said. ‘Go and wake your brother.’
I waited for Gemma to finish in the bathroom. She came out looking fresher and brighter – awake. She gave me the faintest of smiles as we silently walked past each other. I took my time in the shower, then dressed in a pair of jeans and a blue hooded sweatshirt. By the time I got downstairs, Gemma and the kids were sitting around the kitchen table munching cereal.
‘Are you going to work today at all?’ Gemma asked, her tone unsympathetic.
‘Probably not.’
Gemma tried her best to hide her eye roll. Or at least I gave her the benefit of the doubt on that; maybe she’d intended for me to see it.
‘You’re not taking Harry out of school again, are you?’ she queried.
‘Again? It’s only a couple of times a year.’
‘You think?’
‘You know it is.’
‘Well, sure, the trips down to that wretched place may be a couple of times a year, but what about the rest of it? This moping around of yours is getting worse, and dragging the kids into it with you isn’t helping anyone.’
‘This isn’t the time or the place,’ I said, scowling and looking over at the kids, who were busy pretending not to be there.
Gemma blushed, ashamed. She was right, though. Gemma and I had had various ups and downs over the years and I knew she’d been a lifeline to me after Alice’s death. But recently the weight of the world was bearing down on me once more. I loved them, all three of them, I really did. Whatever problems I had, the last thing I wanted was to bring Gemma and the kids down with me. I needed them.
‘It’ll get better again,’ I said, reaching out and putting my hand on Gemma’s. ‘I promise.’
I wanted my words to be true, not just a desperate hope. Gemma smiled at me, but the look she gave told me she saw the doubt in my eyes. She whipped her hand away.
‘He’s not going with you,’ Gemma said. ‘Come on, Ben, he’s eight years old. He needs to be at school with his friends. The cemetery is no place for kids, you know that.’
I looked over at Harry, who was staring sheepishly at Gemma. He turned toward me.
‘Sorry, Dad,’ he said. ‘I should go to school.’
I felt my heart sink, not necessarily at his words or their meaning, but at knowing that Gemma had swayed my own son against me.
Really, though, was Harry wanting to go to school rather than accompany me to a cemetery the worst thing in the world? Probably not. I wanted the best for the kids. I wanted them to grow up in a stable and happy home. I’d worked hard over the years to make sure that was the case. We weren’t the perfect family but then what family is? I was doing the best I could under the circumstances.
Still, I felt a duty to do right by Alice too. I owed it to her. And it wasn’t that much to ask of Harry, or Gemma.
I could feel my anger building. I wanted to retort and remind Gemma that Harry was my son, not hers … but I wouldn’t. I couldn’t. Doing so wouldn’t change either of their decisions. And there was no need to stick a dagger in Gemma’s heart like that. Alice may have been Harry’s biological mother, but it was Gemma who’d looked after him for the last six, nearly seven years, who’d washed him, fed him. She was there when he learned to walk, when he spoke his first word. She helped to teach him to read and write. She was Harry’s mother.
I stared at Gemma for a good while but said nothing. Her expression remained hard and defiant.
I looked over at Harry. His head was bowed.
‘You can come if you want,’ I said to him. ‘I’ll make sure school understands.’
‘He’s not going with you!’ Gemma said.
Harry just gently shook his head.
I got up from the table and gave both of the kids a kiss on their forehead. Then I moved up to Gemma and kissed her softly on the cheek.
‘I love you,’ I said.
Gemma said nothing in return. Without another word spoken, I turned and headed for the door.
CHAPTER 3
Fitting for the occasion, the weather was best described as utter shit. It was October. It was dark, gloomy, windy. It wasn’t pelting down with rain but the air was filled with dampness. And misery.
I’d ridden around aimlessly for hours – it just didn’t feel right, Harry not being with me. It was nearly midday by the time I built up the courage to head to the cemetery on the outskirts of Sutton Coldfield, the town where we lived, just a few miles north of Birmingham.
I parked my motorbike in one of the few spaces near the central chapel, took off my helmet, and then forced my way against the biting wind over to where Alice’s remains were buried. By the time I reached the plot water was dripping from my hair, and even though my leathers were keeping the heavy drizzle off my body, I was shivering vigorously. I took off my backpack and pulled out the bunch of fresh flowers I’d picked up from a local florist on the way. Next I took out a picture of Harry, taken on our recent holiday to Spain.
