Bermuda shook his head, drawing his mouth into a thin line. ‘I don’t think so. Usually a killer would take a different trophy per person. This is more of a collection as if they have been requested. These women are not linked in any way, and both of them have been found in their bedrooms. What does that tell you?’
‘I’m sorry, my mind is not as fast as it used to be,’ Tobias offered in his posh, old charm.
Bermuda continued. ‘It tells you that they trusted the killer. Now both women are heterosexual, so to be found partially clothed but with no signs of sexual trauma would indicate that they wanted our killer in the room with them. My theory, he is seducing these women so he can get them to a place where they let their guard down and no one sees What’s about to happen.’ Bermuda looked at Tobias, who could only manage a strangely perfect smile. ‘It makes me think he looks human.’
‘It’s not uncommon for an Other to look human,’ Tobias replied. ‘I hear Argyle looks human.’
Bermuda shrugged. ‘Humanish. But he is too big, too powerful, and way too kind to be a human.’
‘I think it would be beneficial for me to meet with him as well.’
‘He’s kind of the brawn of the duo.’ Bermuda took a moment, tossing something over in his mind. ‘And probably the brain too.’
‘Either way, I would like to meet him. Soon.’
Bermuda nodded, scribbling ‘Argyle?’ into his book before flicking it shut.
‘So our suspect is a handsome, charming man? Won’t be too hard to find in this hellhole.’
Tobias chuckled, slowly easing himself back to his feet and waving away Bermuda’s offer of assistance. ‘Find him. Before more women die.’
He patted Bermuda on the back with a shocking amount of strength before slowly hobbling back into the depths of the tomb. Bermuda watched him, again surprised how age had really taken its toll. The crippled limp, the saggy skin. It was an unfortunate portrayal of the fool that time makes of us all. Bermuda went to step into the rain but stopped at the threshold, peering back as Tobias almost stepped into the dark.
‘Why bring the hearts here?’ Bermuda motioned to the tomb.
Tobias turned, flashing his pearly white grin one last time. ‘Because this is a chamber of death on the land of the dead. A heart is the human essence of life.’
‘So what, he’s offering it?’
‘Perhaps.’ Tobias stepped into the darkness.
‘Why?’ Bermuda called out. ‘What is he bargaining for?’
Silence for a few moments before the creaky voice cackled out one more time. ‘You’re the detective. You tell me.’
On that unhelpful note, Bermuda stepped back out into the crime scene. A few mourners stood by the cordon, watching with the usual fascination that the public have when they think CSI is happening live in front of them. A young policeman was ushering them on, his uniform soaked through. Bermuda trudged across the grass, slamming two Tic Tacs into his mouth as a furious McAllister approached him, her hair plastered to her head and her minimalistic makeup slightly smudged. He could smell the alcohol on her, mixed with cigarette smoke and Chanel perfume.
‘What did he say?’ she demanded, marching alongside him as he walked to her car.
‘Not much. But it’s clear that this won’t stop until we find him.’
‘So you DO think it’s a man that has done this.’ She smirked, triumphant.
Bermuda turned to her, the wind hurling rain into his eyes. ‘No.’ He offered her a smile. ‘I think it’s something that we should be worried about.’
‘Like what?’
‘Like you know when you’re a kid and you thought places like this were the scariest in the world? Yeah, that kind of scary, but with people dying.’
He patted her on the arm and stuffed his hands into the pockets of his new coat, the lining soft against his wet hands.
McAllister frowned, the lines across her forehead rising to the challenge. ‘Where the hell are you going?’ she called after him as she stood by the door of her car.
‘I gotta get to work,’ he yelled, marching onwards.
She tutted and dropped into the front seat of the car, the engine roaring to life as she pulled away. Bermuda trudged through the muddy ground, respectfully dipping between the graves instead of over them. The trees that lined the paths were derelict, their leaves long since committed to the earth. Their branches poked up towards the sky like jagged, naked fingers. As Bermuda stepped off the final step and out through the gate, he was met by Argyle who, for the first time since Bermuda could remember, didn’t look the picture of calm.
‘You okay, Big Guy?’ Bermuda asked, puffing his e-cig and smiling at his partner.
‘Yes.’ The response was stone-cold. Argyle’s eyes darted around the large Necropolis, almost sure that hooded figures were amongst the shadows. ‘I just feel that not everything is at it seems.’
‘Oh believe me, buddy…’ Bermuda started walking back towards the city centre. ‘I couldn’t agree more.’
As the two crossed the road and headed back towards town, the hooded figures watched from the Necropolis, calm and motionless. They watched as the two agents of the BTCO slowly disappeared from their eye line. Soon they were gone.
Silently, the watchers fell back into the shadows.
They were here.
Where they needed them to be.
CHAPTER TWELVE
It was becoming relentless.
They had told him that if he brought them the hearts, she would be returned. The only person or thing he had cared about in his life, a life he was certain had only existed on this earth. There were faded memories – dark skies and cold, stone floors. Bloodied corpses lying in rotten fields. Something scuttling across a broken, grey-bricked wall.
They came in flashes, horrible images flickering like a snapshot, as if cut into one tile on a roll of film.
All he could see beyond them was her.
Her smooth, dark skin. He remembered running his fingers down her arm, the tips gliding as if he was testing a varnished table top. The smell, fresh and sweet, and her smile a small line filled with white pearls.
The personification of perfection.
Kevin Parker tried to recall where he was. He had been to a young lady’s house, her name a sadly forgettable detail but her heart a crucial souvenir. He had removed it with his bare hand, the warmth of her bodily fluids washing over his fingers as they plunged through her muscles.
The shards of ribs ripped at his flesh, which soon stitched itself back together.
Life had left her quickly and painlessly.
He had delivered the heart.
She had not been returned.
‘Where are you, Kevin?’
He chanted over and over to himself, staring at the dark walls of the room he sat in. It took a few moments before the clarity arrived, the lines of the floorboards slowly forming in the darkness. He was where he sat during the day. An abandoned factory that sat dormant on the outskirts of the town.
He recalled it was called Glasgow.
There was no rhyme or reason to his being there, nothing that he could link to in the chasm of his mind. There were just empty pockets of knowledge as if he should know more than he did.
He only knew of her.
How they had taken her from him.
They would not release her until they had what they wanted. He could feel the dried blood of Katie Steingold under the nails he was sure were his own. The final beat of her heart against the dry palm of his hand. It was worth it. As long as it brought him closer to her, then he would rip every heart from every chest.
He sat in silence for an eternity.
It reminded him of another time, chained to the floor and unable to move. Unable to grieve.
That voice, tinged with a hatred that mocked him from the darkness, accusing him of her death.
That it was his fault.
That same voice which reached out to him recently, demanding he bring the hearts to the
stone house and then leave.
One a night.
Every heart until hers could be returned.
This was his life now. He existed purely to end existence. It was a cruel plight, but one which would enable him to see her again.
To be with her.
Be himself.
As the shadows of the room slowly disintegrated as the sun burst through the jagged holes that littered the ceiling, Kevin pulled his legs in close to his body, protecting himself. Rain dripped through, and he soon smelt the damp wood beneath him.
They would find her body.
They would find her heart.
But they would never know why.
He struggled into the darkest corner of the desolate room, curled into a small ball, and tried to rest his eyes.
All he could see was her.
Her, and the cavernous voids he had left in the chests of the innocent women.
He slept.
Bermuda and Argyle slithered through the busy streets of Glasgow, the locals all wrapped up in thick woollen hats. The rain was subsiding, replaced by a bitterly cold wind that ran rampant between the gothic buildings. The shops were busy, the usual hustle and bustle of a town centre. Argyle watched with a calm awe at the consumerist nature, with lines of people following each other into River Island while people marched out of Boots with bags hanging from their gloved hands.
Humanity was bizarre, he told himself.
Bermuda stopped walking, gazing down at his phone with a raised eyebrow. He whipped his head in different directions, clearly lost.
‘Are you lost?’ Argyle stated the obvious.
‘I’m afraid I am, Big Guy.’ Bermuda turned to the left, approaching a derelict building, the doors boarded up, papered with faded fliers and keep out signs. He frowned. ‘This is meant to be it.’
Argyle stepped forward. The wooden panels were soggy, drenched by the elements. To the side of the building was a metal post box, overstuffed with pizza fliers from poor delivery drivers who never got the message. ‘This is the BTCO office.’
‘It was.’ Bermuda gestured to the rotten boards. ‘Seems they closed more than just the gate.’
Argyle looked at his disappointed partner before extending one of his powerful arms. He spread his hand and placed it on the face of the mailbox, a small red light flashing underneath Farmhouse Pizzas smiling mascot. Bermuda watched, his jaw dropping as once the light finished, a thin black line filtered down from the top of the board in front of him, carving a small cut through the wood. It filtered down and then split, following a predetermined line that began to slice a doorway into the panel. Slowly it came to a finish and Argyle, without a word, pushed it open, beckoning his partner through in one of his usual acts of chivalry.
‘I really need to stop letting myself be surprised,’ Bermuda muttered as he stepped through. Once Argyle followed, the board healed up, removing the entrance and shunning the world from one that existed in secret.
The Otherside.
Bermuda ascended down a flight of stone steps; old, broken concrete lined the walls of the tunnel. Behind him, Argyle stooped low, his seven-foot frame encased by the darkness. Suddenly, a blue light burst momentarily, followed by the sweet smell of Bermuda’s e-cig.
‘So they can afford a fancy handprint thingy-ma-jig for a doorbell, but they can’t get a goddamn lamp for the hallway?’ Bermuda muttered.
‘The darkness has no bearing on our eyes.’
‘Your eyes, maybe,’ Bermuda continued, taking each step carefully as the large, double metal door loomed ahead. ‘But we are not the same, are we?’
‘That is true. Yet we have loyalty.’ Argyle stated. ‘That means we are equal.’
Bermuda stopped and peered into the darkness at Argyle, who proudly stood to attention. Bermuda cracked a smile.
‘Can I have a hug?’ He opened his arms.
‘We do not require a physical interaction.’ Argyle stepped past Bermuda, who was smirking.
‘Just a quick one.’ He followed his partner down the final remaining steps. ‘Like a quick squeeze.’
‘We have a murderer to find,’ Argyle stated, ignoring his partner’s attempts at irritation. He stomped towards the metal doors, stopping a few feet from the handle.
‘So let me get this straight,’ Bermuda began, following his partner through the darkness. ‘You can say things about how our loyalty makes us equal. You would willingly lay your life on the line for me, yet you won’t give me a hug?’
Bermuda arrived next to his partner, smirking as he gazed up to his stern face. Instantly he regretted it as, like on so many occasions, Argyle was showing emotion that didn’t exist on the Otherside.
Emotion that barely existed on our side.
After a few awkward moments, Argyle’s calm, authoritative voice sliced through the tension. ‘Why don’t you request one from McAllister? You have already laid with her.’
‘Not going to happen.’ Bermuda shook his head, patting his pocket for Tic Tacs. ‘I’ve disappointed her professionally and sexually within the space of twenty-four hours. Even for me that’s bad.’
‘You lack respect.’
‘For her? No. She is just very volatile,’ Bermuda said, waiting for Argyle to open the door.
‘For yourself.’
‘Ouch.’ Bermuda chuckled to himself. Argyle shocked him at times, with an insightful view on the world – and him personally – which would probably cost thousands in therapy bills. ‘Let’s just crack on, shall we? This crazed, murderous, heart-stealing creature isn’t going to stop itself.’
Argyle reached out and grasped the metal handle with his mighty fist, the golden bracelet that held the Retriever glistening as light escaped through the crack in the door. He hauled it back, opening the secret BTCO Glasgow Office to Bermuda. Compared to the Shard, it was incredibly small, with old, wooden desks pressed against each other, separated by flimsy plastic dividers. A few basic, lifeless PCs sat atop them, a thin layer of dust over everything. A few neon lights hummed above, one of them flickering intermittently.
Bermuda let out a whistle.
‘You sure this place is open?’ Bermuda asked as his partner strode between the desks.
Right on cue, a PC chair whizzed by, the wheels screaming for WD40. Atop it sat a plump, middle-aged lady with a ginger bob, thick-rimmed glasses, and teeth a little too big for her mouth. Her eyes were wide with adoration.
Her accent was more Scottish than a bagpipe-playing haggis.
‘Bermuda Jones! This is such an honour.’ She rose from her chair, her stumpy legs poking out beneath her neatly ironed skirt. She wore a green, knitted jumper with a floral shirt beneath it. ‘Welcome to our office.’
‘Thanks … err …’
‘Kelly. Kelly McDonald.’ She curtseyed in front of the uncomfortable agent.
‘Thanks. I’m Bermuda …’
‘Jones. The legendary agent who has been to the Otherside, stopped Barnaby from unleashing hell on earth, and is widely considered the best agent in the organisation.’ She beamed as she sat back down. ‘Your legend precedes you.’
‘Right.’ Bermuda looked over to Argyle, who was carefully studying pictures that symmetrically lined the walls, all of them of pompous-looking men – undoubtedly former agents. ‘Do you have a lab here?’
‘We do,’ Kelly squealed, zipping off on her chair behind a stack of files that lined a desk hidden behind a filing cabinet.
Bermuda waited for a few moments for her return, but nothing. Gently massaging his temples, he stepped across, peering over the cabinet. ‘Could I use it?’
‘Malcolm is out at the moment. But you are welcome to stay.’ She flashed him a grin, one that he was sure greeted a plethora of cats when she got home at night.
‘Malcolm is the techie?’ he asked, studying the mountains of paperwork on her desk, oblivious to the red tape that surrounded his work. Being out in the field, he realised he took it all for granted. Someone probably had to process the countless
bills he had racked up. No wonder Montgomery Black hated him. Still, as Kelly clattered her fingers aggressively on the keyboard, he wondered which form was the annual leave request of the agent who should have been there.
‘Malcolm does all the Other-worldly stuff,’ she explained, slurping a large mouthful from her coffee cup. Her glasses wobbled on the end of her button nose, littered with freckles. ‘His Knack is stronger than mine.’
‘You have the Knack?’ Bermuda asked with genuine intrigue.
‘Barely. I mean, I can see your partner but I don’t really know what he looks like.’ She wildly motioned in Argyle’s general direction, beyond the cabinet. ‘No, my strength lays in looking after the office and keeping things in order around here.’
Bermuda glanced to the shelving unit above her, with a hazardous pile of folders stacked worryingly, all of them with protruding sheets. The dust was thick and in blatant contrary to her claims.
‘So when will Malcolm be back?’ he asked politely.
Kelly stopped her vigorous tapping and clicked into a calendar on her screen. Bermuda scanned over the office, noting Argyle had ventured beyond his vision. Before he could look any further, Kelly’s disappointed tutting brought him back to her.
‘I’m afraid he is out at a conference today.’ She snorted to herself. ‘I did think it was pretty lonely today.’
‘Today?’ Bermuda mocked, scolding himself for letting her irritate him. ‘Could I possibly leave something with for him? It’s important.’
‘Oooo … is it case work?’ she clenched her fists, shaking with excitement like a toddler being handed the keys to a toy store.
‘I would love to be here purely socially, but yes, Argyle and I are working a case and I need Malcolm to run a print on this.’ He handed her the envelope which housed the mundra print he had obtained at Nicole Miller’s flat. At that moment he took stock. He was stood in a secret office of an organisation dealing with paranormal crime while handing over evidence printed on a material that couldn’t be seen by normal humans.
This was why he couldn’t be at his daughter’s birthday.
Slowly, the usual anger and resentment began to seep in over the corners of his mind. The booming voice of Argyle shook him back to reality.
Bermuda Jones Casefiles Box Set Page 44
