Still Bleeding

by Steve Mosby

  'No,' he said. 'Anyway. What do you think Ellis told her?'

  I thought about it.

  Then I picked up my knife and fork and started eating.

  'Tell me about Thomas Wells and Roger Timms.'

  It was a direct challenge: some way short of walking out on him, but not by much. I was curious to see what he would do. If he wanted to arrest me, he could get on with it. If he didn't, the information needed to flow both ways. So I gave Kearney the same top of the head treatment he'd given me, and waited while he came to a decision.

  Eventually, he leaned back in his seat.

  'All right.'

  He began with what I'd already seen on the news, but then went into greater detail. Thomas Wells had murdered the girls, while the artist, Roger Timms, had been helping him, and taking some of the girls' blood as payment.

  'Timms used the blood to seal a part of the victims into his canvases. So that people would be looking at a portrait of a dead girl painted with… part of her, I suppose.'

  He looked disgusted, and I didn't blame him. But the idea also chimed with me a little. It reminded me of what I'd thought when I'd seen Marie online.

  'It was like they were being watched,' I said quietly. 'Over and over again.'

  He looked confused.

  'What?'

  'OK,' I said, 'not "watched". But it's similar to… videos I saw online. When I looked at them, it almost felt like I was replaying the actual event. As though those people were stuck there in a loop, dying again every time someone pressed play.'

  Kearney stared at me, but I thought the confusion had shifted slightly. It was like something had just chimed in his head as well, only not as clearly as it had in mine.

  After a moment, he frowned and looked away.

  'Your turn,' he said. 'What was Ellis's secret?'

  I took a deep mental breath.

  'I think it was a kind of map.'

  'A map?'

  'To Emily Price's body.'

  I told him about the photograph Ellis had posted online and the symbols I'd found up at the Ridge. Kearney was as outraged as I expected him to be.

  He said, 'Why the hell didn't you call the police?'

  There was a flash of anger in his eyes - a brief glimpse of that old intensity - and a memory fluttered into my head. Talk to me, Alex. Then, just like that, it was gone again. But whatever it was, it had just started my heart thumping badly.

  'Alex?'

  'I didn't know what it meant back then.'

  'Jesus-'

  'Look,' I said quickly, 'what's important is where the symbols led. You never found Emily Price's body, did you?'

  'No. We never did.'

  'Well, someone did. They left that trail so other people could find her too. The body's gone now. The photo too.'

  Kearney looked away. He stared at the remains of his breakfast and didn't reply. Whether he was disgusted with me, or simply thinking everything over, I couldn't tell.

  Probably both.

  'Kearney?'

  'Let me think? He glared at me. 'Ellis bought something off Roger Timms earlier this year. We thought it was a painting - a private commission - but we never identified it.'

  I nodded to myself. That made sense. Forbidden knowledge wasn't something you just gave away, after all. Not when there were such risks attached. You'd need reassurance: something that gave you a hold over the other person, and a reason why they wouldn't tell the police.

  I said, 'Ellis was buying a map.'

  'No, Alex-'

  'I looked on one website, Kearney. There were thousands of users in that place alone, all of them wanting to see terrible things happening to other people. Some of them were really getting off on it.'

  And even the ones that weren't - they were still obviously drawn to that sort of material. I'd experienced it myself, and the effect had been much more powerful and pronounced on the Ridge. The place had a kind of dark electricity to it.

  I said, 'It's not a massive stretch to imagine a handful of those people might seek out more than just a photograph. Maybe a few of them are willing to pay enough to make it worth the risk for everyone involved.'

  Kearney remained silent.

  'So Timms takes the cash,' I said. 'And he gives people just enough information to find the scene.'

  'We found a fingerprint on the bodies. An index finger. The same one each time.'

  'Jesus,' I said. That was a macabre idea: that someone wouldn't just pay to look at a body, but actually touch it. 'Leaving a calling card. Like a signature to prove he was there. Make himself part of it.'

  Kearney started to say something, but then stopped. Instead, he just shook his head - you stupid fucker - and whispered something to himself under his breath.

  'What?' I said.

  'Art.' He shook his head again. 'It's never just the painting on the wall. The context is always part of it. That's what interests people.'

  I frowned. 'Listen—'

  'No, you listen.' Kearney stood up and leaned on the table. 'Have you still got all these research notes you mentioned?'

  'Not with me, but they're in a safe place.' 'That's good enough. I want you to call the police and ask for Detective Todd Dennis. You can trust him. Wait for him here, and then tell him everything you just told me.'

  'But—'

  'Just do as you're told.' Kearney headed for the door. 'He can help you, Alex. I can't.'

  I opened my mouth - but he was already outside, running off in the direction he'd left his car.

  'Fucking hell.'

  The situation had felt odd enough before; in a split second, it had just become completely surreal. I looked around the cafe to make sure that Kearney really had just got up and abandoned me here. Yes, he had.

  Detective Todd Dennis. You can trust him.

  I took out my mobile and held down the green button. It took a couple of seconds to turn itself on.

  The display lit up.

  But instead of calling anyone, I sat there, thinking it over. Was this the right thing to do? Even if I trusted Kearney, I wasn't sure how much confidence I had in his judgement right now. Not to mention the fact I still had no real idea what was going on. If Timms had been selling the information, who the fuck were the men in suits? And how did James know about the bag with the note and the bottle of blood? And…

  Talk to me, Alex.

  The memory surfaced again. It was Kearney saying those words, staring right into my eyes. And it hadn't been at the hospital, either. His eyes hadn't been as kind or understanding as they had back then.

  Tell me where you really were.

  I swallowed.

  When he'd told me the article on Sarah Pepper had made the connection for him, it hadn't been James's name that had brought him to me. It had been hers.

  Don't make her lie for you.

  For a moment, there was only my heartbeat.

  And then the mobile started ringing.

  I picked it up slowly. The display said [number withheld], the same as last night. The man from last night.

  I accepted the call. 'Yes.'

  But it wasn't him. It was a girl that came on the line.

  'Hello?' she said. 'Who's there?'

  The voice drifted to me, sounding lost and far away. My hairs stood on end. It was the sound I imagined a ghost would make, and after all this time I still recognised it without even having to think. It was speaking I had to concentrate on now.

  'Sarah,' I said.

  * * *

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Confidentiality.

  The first sign the organisation had a problem in Whitrow was a newspaper report written earlier in the year. It claimed a photograph of Jane Slater's body had appeared online, and that police were unable to substantiate the rumour. Garland had investigated the matter himself, with the same result. However, he was less inclined to leave the matter there. From a distance, he'd ordered surveillance to be increased.

  After a while, he almost began to relax.r />
  But then, towards the end of May, he was told that someone had been spotted at Whitrow Ridge. Banyard was the caretaker for that particular exhibit, and he'd seen a woman returning to the area on several occasions. Once, she'd been close enough to Emily Price's body to indicate she knew about it. Most of the time, she simply stood at the top of the embankment, looking out, as though trying to decide what to do with the information.

  Garland had the girl followed - carefully - and discovered who she was. Two days later, he and his team arrived in the UK. By the time their small plane touched down, he knew almost everything there was to know about Sarah Pepper.

  He knew she was the journalist who had written the original article. The only explanation he could think of was that she'd investigated the matter, and had more success than either he or the police had. It also meant the breach of confidentiality was a serious one. This woman had gone looking for Jane Slater, but someone had told her about Emily Price.

  Garland needed to know who.

  Time had therefore been spent following Sarah Pepper's movements and trying to work out how she knew. Ideally, Garland would have simply acquired her and asked, but he considered that too risky. While his police source insisted Pepper had not contacted them regarding the whereabouts of Price's body, Garland remained cautious - in his experience, sources only knew what they were told. Sarah Pepper might be working with the police. Or another journalist. And he was reluctant to show his hand until he fully understood what was happening.

  He was also curious about her intentions.

  From his research, he knew about the murder of her mother, then the father's suicide and the child's subsequent finding of his body. And as an adult, she worked as a crime correspondent at the newspaper. Now, she appeared to know at least a little about the organisation, and yet hadn't reported her suspicions to the police. Instead, she kept going back to the Ridge.

  Garland wasn't remotely interested in the objects his company dealt in, but he was familiar enough with the customers to recognise their mindset. Taken all together, the information he had about Sarah Pepper was suggestive. For either personal or professional reasons, she was drawn to them. From experience, he suspected the former motivation. Justified by the latter.

  He was observing the situation carefully when three things happened that forced his hand. The first was that Sarah Pepper, with the help of her boyfriend, made her intentions completely clear.

  Attempting to draw them out with scraps of information - the gate, the bottles of vodka - was smarter than she probably realised, and under other circumstances it might have worked. Any experience would have needed to be arranged swiftly, but it had certainly been done before. Pepper might have been able to photograph or even approach a few key-players.

  The mistake she'd made was imagining they didn't already know. Garland had, briefly, felt sorry for her. He'd even toyed with the idea of leaving her wild to see what she would do. He couldn't imagine what she thought was going to happen, even if her plan had been successful. He suspected that she didn't know either. She was just compelled. To try to see.

  But then two other events occurred and he'd been left with no choice. The first was that Roger Timms contacted them to let them know a new victim had been taken. And then the photo of Emily Price appeared online. At that point, there was too much attention. Too many unknown variables. Too much risk.

  When the chess board becomes crowded and awkward, you clear away pieces. So the first thing Garland had done was grant Sarah Pepper her wish.

  He took the phone off her now and moved back out of the small cell. He had two men with him in case she attempted to fight, but she didn't even move: just stood in the centre of the small, dark room, watching them go. It was what he'd expected. She had been this way since they picked her up, as though she knew that questioning gaze of hers would unnerve him far more than flailing hands.

  One of the men closed and locked the heavy steel door. Finally, Garland turned his attention to the phone. The reception was poor because he was underground. He hadn't wanted to take Pepper up to the warehouse floor.

  'Mr Connor,' he said.

  There was a pause before the response came.

  'Detective Kearney.'

  Garland almost smiled at that.

  'Listen to me,' he said. 'I'm going to give you an address.'

  'Put her back on.'

  'No. Shut up and pay attention. Rose Avenue is on the edge of the Balders Estate. You'll go to number seventeen. You'll understand what to do when you get there. Take the footpath.'

  'What—'

  'You will be there in an hour, and you'll bring everything with you. Her research, her files. Everything. If you're not there, the letter that was in her possession will be sent anonymously to the police.'

  'But—'

  And then Connor shut up.

  'You remember what you wrote in that, don't you?' Garland said. 'About what you did?'

  There was silence on the other end of the line. But he was still there, Garland could tell.

  'One hour's time,' he repeated. 'Or she's dead. And I'll have to come looking for you myself.'

  Then he cancelled the call. The encoded, untraceable connection crackled away into nothing as he slipped the phone back into his suit pocket.

  That was that.

  Garland stepped across the thin corridor and looked through the grille on the door of Sarah Pepper's cell. It was dark both inside the room and out here in the corridor, but she was just about visible through the mesh. As he'd anticipated, she had remained standing in the centre, arms down by her side. Looking out at him, her face totally blank.

  From the beginning, he had been reluctant to hurt her. Not because she was a woman, but because he had sensed it wouldn't work: that some part of her was missing. Despite everything that had happened, she did not appear to be afraid.

  Fortunately, he hadn't needed to resort to persuasion. She had answered every question he put to her - only lying once, as far as he knew, when she claimed not to know the real identity behind the username 'Hell_is'. And she often responded with questions of her own. It was those that made him uncomfortable. Even when she didn't ask them out loud, he could see them there in her eyes.

  It's about money, he wanted to tell her. That's all.

  It always came down to business.

  The organisation he worked for had been able to flourish precisely because it took confidentiality seriously. In order for the transactions to take place, both the clients and suppliers needed to be assured of absolute discretion. The buyers had to know the experience they paid for was safe, while the sellers needed to know their freedom would not be compromised. Everyone involved had something to lose. If either side lost confidence in the company's high standards of privacy, the business would collapse.

  And so the organisation had only one rule: all transactions were conducted through it. Roger Timms had been very well rewarded for providing them with access to his victims; in return, he was expected to be loyal. The company could then sell that information on with confidence to interested parties. To ensure Timms's own safety, clients were vetted to ensure eligibility. Having money, by itself, was not enough. It was when people forgot that and became greedy that problems arose.

  Problems like Christopher Ellis.

  Problems like photos appearing online.

  Timms hadn't proved quite as forthcoming as Sarah Pepper. Fortunately, Garland hadn't had the same qualms about persuading him to talk.

  Now, his work here was almost done. Timms and Ellis were dead. James Connor had been silenced. The final stage of the salvage operation was to be completed within the next few hours, and then this branch of the organisation would be closed for ever. He would be gone by nightfall.

  In the cell, Sarah Pepper remained standing where she was, looking out at him.

  Garland stared back.

  He had been right about her, but not completely. The letter had confirmed some of it. Death is contagious, Alex Conno
r had written. You have to face up to it. And the way he wrote that suggested the sentiment had been the driving force behind her whole life.

  Yet she was different from the regular clients.

  When he was younger, Garland had worked at an illegal game reserve. There, he'd watched fat tourists pay to gun down the antelope that were kept in a small pen. All they had to do was point and pull. Afterwards, they went away flushed and nervous from the experience, imagining that they were hunters. It was laughable. But it was also good business, and Garland had become adept at hiding the contempt he felt.

  His current work was similar.

  But Sarah Pepper was not like that. It seemed like she had gone out hunting in the wild with nothing at all to protect her; she had snuck into the pen to stare back into the eyes of such people. There had been no safety net there.

  Alex Connor, too. Not afraid to get his hands dirty.

  Which reminded him.

  Garland shifted slightly, intending to leave. But the movement must have been noticeable from within, because something changed in Sarah Pepper's expression. It was almost imperceptible, and her face was blank again now, but he hadn't imagined it. For a brief second, the mask had slipped.

  She was afraid, he realised. In fact, she was so scared that if she allowed herself to feel it she might tremble and collapse. But at the same time, whatever was left inside her was absolutely determined.

  You have to face up to it.

  Garland looked back at her for a second longer, and then he closed the grille and walked away.

  * * *

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  After the man hung up on me, I sat there in the cafe for a while, staring into space. And then I rested my elbows on the table, put my face in my hands. My body was trembling.

  If you're not there, the letter that was in her possession will be sent anonymously to the police.

  You remember what you wrote in that, don't you?

  About what you did?

  Yes. I remembered now.

  Back in Venice, I'd thought that running had never allowed me to escape the bad memories. But that wasn't true. There was something I really had managed to forget. Just pretending doesn't work, so my mind had been clever and gone one better than that. Rather than trying to erase this thing, it had hidden it. And the best place to hide something black is always in the darkness.