The Descent (Detective Louise Blackwell)

by Matt Brolly

Tracey looked hesitant as if weighing up how much she could tell her.

  ‘I feel fine now,’ said Louise. ‘The fumes must have knocked me out but I’ll be right as rain once I have some new clothes and these have been destroyed forever.’ It wasn’t a complete lie. She felt better than she had at the pier but the experience had taken its toll. Her mind was still jumbled and she asked Tracey again for verification.

  ‘Amy and the girl you pulled from the fire – Nicole – are both fine. Greg is getting some rest two beds down. Chappell is here. We have two officers by his door. He’s suffered minor burns to his face and he won’t be going anywhere soon,’ said Tracey.

  Louise squeezed her eyes shut. There was something she was missing. ‘The others?’

  ‘Three bodies have been recovered from the scene.’

  ‘Jesus, my phone,’ said Louise, in a panic. Somehow, in all the drama she’d forgotten about her earlier call with Joslyn and her aborted trip to Cornwall.

  ‘Simon still has it.’

  ‘Well, get it back. Have you heard from Cornwall?’

  Tracey shook her head.

  ‘Can you call them? I need to speak to Chappell.’

  ‘Do you think that’s wise?’

  ‘I told you, I’m fine,’ said Louise, with a little more vehemence than intended. ‘I need to speak to him now before he can put a story together.’

  ‘You’re the boss,’ said Tracey, shrugging and closing the curtain as Louise changed into the new clothes.

  Louise pulled the curtains open moments later, the blouse Tracey had found for her at least two sizes too big, and was surprised to see Thomas getting to his feet. ‘Tracey told me you were getting changed,’ he said.

  He moved forwards as if he wanted to embrace her and at that moment Louise wanted nothing more; despite which, she felt herself taking a step backwards.

  ‘I wanted to see you were okay?’ said Thomas, glancing at the floor as if rebuked.

  ‘Just some smoke inhalation. No different to smoking a thousand cigarettes in a few minutes.’

  ‘That’s fine then.’ He smiled at her and she regretted stepping back from him. ‘Seriously, though, you’re okay?’

  ‘I am. Thanks, Thomas. You managed to speak to Chappell’s mother?’

  ‘Yes. The second I left her house I found out about all this. You’re going to speak to him now?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Then there’s something you should know.’

  ‘Any news on my phone?’ Louise asked Tracey, outside Chappell’s door. He was sitting up, both wrists chained to his hospital bed. He looked through the door window at Louise and smiled at her as if she were a long-lost relative come to visit.

  ‘Simon is bringing it over now. You want me to come in with you?’

  ‘Thanks, Tracey. No, Thomas is coming in on this one.’

  The concern and trepidation was evident on Tracey’s face and Louise was grateful she didn’t say anything to stop her. Instead, she placed her hand on Louise’s arm and they exchanged a nod.

  Chappell didn’t react as she opened the door. He sat perfectly calm in his bed, only adjusting his position slightly as Louise took the lone chair next to him.

  ‘We meet again, Jay,’ said Louise.

  Chappell turned his head towards her and smiled, and this time there was no mask. She saw the malice in the grin, the obvious disdain he had for her. ‘Good to see you again, Louise,’ he said.

  ‘Shall I call you Jay or would you prefer Charlie?’

  A flicker of surprise came and faded in a split second. ‘Jay is fine.’

  Louise introduced Thomas and went through the preliminaries of explaining that Chappell was under arrest and entitled to legal representation. As she expected, he was too sure of himself to request a solicitor. Probably ascertaining, correctly, that his case was a lost cause. Two officers had witnessed him start the fire on the pier that had led to the deaths of three women. Now all they had to do was make sure he was also convicted for the murders of Victoria, Claire, Sally and Megan.

  ‘How are you feeling, Jay?’ asked Louise.

  ‘A bit better than you look.’

  ‘You know how we found you?’

  Chappell appeared disgruntled at the question and looked to Thomas, who was standing by the door, silent.

  ‘You were betrayed,’ said Louise, choosing her words carefully after what Thomas had told her.

  Chappell squinted. ‘If you say so.’

  Louise took her phone out and played part of the recording from the pier. Chappell’s reactions were subtle but she saw the roll of the eyes as he worked out what had happened. ‘Amy?’

  ‘Yes. Your friend Amy led us to you.’

  Jay frowned, and Louise saw the genuine disappointment in his features. ‘You knew she contacted us after you killed Megan?’

  Chappell shrugged. ‘What is it you want? You want me to confess? I’m not going to confess as I’ve done nothing wrong.’

  ‘Nothing wrong? You’ve killed seven women,’ said Louise, believing the number was probably higher.

  ‘That’s where you’re wrong, Inspector. They chose to take their own lives.’

  It took every ounce of Louise’s strength not to react. Losing her temper would only lead to Chappell not speaking and for now she wanted him to talk. ‘You think you’re some sort of messiah, is that what it is, Jay? Some type of shaman like your Maestro Bianchi.’

  Chappell frowned again, clearly rattled that she knew about Portugal.

  ‘You’ve been busy, I’ll give you that. You killed Bianchi in Portugal, along with those two poor women, Greta and Sandra, then you—’

  ‘No,’ screamed Chappell.

  Thomas approached, his eyes darting to the chains rattling against the metallic frame of Chappell’s bed. Louise held her hand out. ‘No?’ she asked.

  ‘No. That was a mistake.’

  ‘You didn’t mean to kill them, didn’t mean to murder your mentor?’

  Chappell’s front teeth bit down on his lower lip.

  ‘Because he was a man? You meant to kill the others though?’

  ‘You don’t understand. You never could.’

  ‘Try me.’

  ‘I could explain everything to you but you would dismiss it.’

  ‘What have you got to lose?’ said Thomas. ‘It’s not as if you’re going anywhere.’

  ‘Fine. We were helping them.’

  ‘Helping who? Greta and Sandra?’

  ‘Yes. They had seen the other side. Maestro Bianchi and I planned to help them move to the next level, and then things got out of hand. We took too much Ayahuasca. I guess you know what happened.’

  ‘All three died from hanging and you survived.’

  ‘That was an accident too.’

  ‘You wanted to kill yourself?’

  Chappell was incredulous. ‘No, but I came close, didn’t I?’ he said, lifting his head up to reveal the scarring on his neck.

  ‘What do you mean by the next level, Jay?’ asked Thomas.

  ‘That I can’t tell you about. I could show you but—’

  ‘Oh yes, we know all about your love of DMT. Traces were also found in samples taken from Victoria, Claire, and Megan.’

  Chappell looked confused. ‘What did Amy tell you?’

  It was Louise’s turn to smile. ‘Back to the betrayal. Amy told us what we already knew. You drugged those poor women and then killed them.’

  ‘I didn’t kill them. They took their own lives. I was helping them. You clearly don’t understand. I said you wouldn’t.’

  Chappell was rattled and Louise wanted to push him as hard as she could. ‘I’ve read your book. I understand more than you think.’

  ‘Have you taken it?’ he said.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Then you don’t know anything about it.’

  ‘I know that it’s like dying. That users often believe they have travelled to other worlds or dimensions.’

  A half-smile formed on Chappell’s
lips. ‘You read a book and a few articles on the Internet?’ he said, chuckling. ‘You can’t describe what happens, you fucking idiot. You can only experience it.’

  Thomas moved towards the prisoner again, stopping short as Louise shook her head. ‘You don’t really believe it though, do you? You know it’s just a drug. Your mind playing tricks on you.’

  Chappell’s face contorted with rage and he spat at her.

  ‘What the fuck do you think you’re doing?’ said Thomas, grabbing Chappell by his throat.

  Louise wiped her face. ‘So you do believe it. That does surprise me. So how did it work? You give those poor women the drug then coerce them to take their own lives?’ she said, signalling to Thomas to let go of Chappell.

  ‘I told you, you can’t understand. All of them – Victoria, Claire, Sally, Megan, Beatrice, Rachael, Lisa, Nicole, and Amy – especially Amy – wanted it. They wanted to move on. I showed them something special. It was their choice.’

  ‘Their choice to jump from a cliff, to be suffocated to death, to be burned alive, you sick fuck?’ said Thomas.

  Chappell shrugged and Louise could see Thomas was seconds away from attacking him. ‘See, the thing is, Jay, I know you want us to believe that you were helping these women. That you have some higher purpose. But maybe you could help me out with one question.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Did you sleep with them?’

  ‘What?’ said Chappell, colour spreading across his scarred neck and up to his face like a rash.

  ‘We know about your ex-girlfriend – Mabel.’

  ‘I don’t want to talk about that.’

  ‘I spoke to your mother tonight, Chappell,’ said Thomas, with unhidden glee.

  ‘What? What the fuck is going on?’

  ‘Was she your first, Jay?’ asked Louise.

  ‘It wasn’t—’

  ‘Do you know what your mum told me? About her precious boy? She said you were in love with Mabel,’ said Thomas.

  ‘Look, I don’t want to—’

  ‘And she broke your heart, didn’t she, Jay?’ said Louise.

  ‘Of course, none of this was known during the investigation,’ said Thomas. ‘You lied and told everyone that she was depressed, taking drugs, but your mum knew and she kept quiet all this time. Until now.’

  ‘So why did you do it, Jay?’ asked Louise. ‘Was your heart broken that much that you needed revenge?’

  Jay breathed through his nose, the fight ebbing away from him. ‘We made a pact,’ he said.

  ‘A pact?’

  ‘We’d taken some DMT and we agreed that something else, something better was waiting for us. I promised to help her and then to follow.’

  ‘What happened, Jay? You chickened out?’ said Thomas.

  ‘When I saw her die I knew she’d gone to a better place. I decided to help others—’

  ‘Did you sleep with her, Jay?’ said Louise, interrupting.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Did you sleep with Mabel before you killed her?’

  Chappell leant back in his bed, his cuffs clinking. ‘You don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘Did she know that you knew about her cheating?’

  The colour on Chappell’s face returned and Louise went for broke. After Thomas told her what Chappell’s mother had said, a theory had come to her. If she didn’t push him now they might never find out the truth.

  ‘No, but what—’

  ‘Did you sleep with Victoria? Claire? Sally? Megan? I know you slept with Amy last night, Jay. Is that how it works? Is it, Jay?’ She was inches away from his face now, could taste the sourness of his breath, the smoke still on his skin.

  ‘Yes,’ he screamed into her face. ‘I slept with them. I slept with them all. Of course you wouldn’t understand. I slept with Mabel before she left and she carried me with her. I could see it on her face the second she departed. I saw it on all their faces.’

  ‘You sick fuck,’ said Thomas.

  Louise pulled her chair back. ‘I don’t think you’re delusional, Jay. You knew what you were doing. I don’t think Mabel really hurt you. You were probably pissed off she cheated on you but it gave you an opportunity. You slept with her to get that back and then made sure she could never cheat on you again.’

  ‘Isn’t that it, Jay? You’re not some kind of messiah. You’re an overgrown adolescent who never got over his first girlfriend fucking someone else. That’s all you are. Sad and pathetic,’ said Thomas.

  ‘You believe whatever you want,’ said Chappell.

  ‘But he’s not quite right, is he, Jay? It was nothing to do with revenge or sending them to another plane of existence. You used and destroyed these women before killing them. What for? The sport of it?’

  Chappell smirked, confirming what Louise had long suspected: that all of it – the DMT ceremonies and the talk of other worlds – had been a fantasy conceived to fit Chappell’s twisted desire. They would probably never fully understand his motives beyond the fact that he liked to control and kill young women. No doubt he would stick to his messiah story, but it would be a tale he told for the rest of his life from inside a jail cell. ‘Now, if you don’t mind, I am a bit sleepy,’ he said, turning away.

  Louise ran her fingers through her hair, exhaustion rippling through her. She opened the hospital door to see Coulson running down the hallway towards her.

  His hand was outstretched. In it, was her phone.

  Chapter Sixty-Four

  Tracey drove, Thomas in the passenger seat. Louise sat in the back, experiencing the journey in a daze. She’d collapsed to the ground after speaking on the phone, the air knocked so completely from her that she thought she’d never breathe again.

  The doctors had told her she couldn’t leave the hospital but she’d only had to tell Tracey once that wasn’t going to happen. ‘I’ll drive you,’ her friend had said, and here they were slicing through the countryside, the blue lights and wailing siren guiding them to a scene that Louise wasn’t ready for.

  She could still smell the smoke. It clung to her flesh like a second skin, emanated from the sweat beneath her lips, drifted on her breath as she opened her mouth. A distant part of her was still at the pier, watching the flames spread with terrible alacrity, waking those poor sleeping women for a final few seconds of agonising torment.

  Yes, they’d caught Chappell and she’d managed to save Amy and her friend Nicole. But at what cost, thought Louise as Tracey took the corner into the caravan park at breakneck speed.

  Louise’s head snapped against the side of the door and Tracey apologised, slowing the car as the sight of the crime-scene tent – a perfect white to the backdrop of flashing blue lights – got nearer and nearer.

  ‘You don’t need to do this,’ said Thomas, as Tracey stopped the car, but Louise had already opened the door. She stumbled from the car, her shoes sliding on the dew-covered grass. Her ears were ringing, like she’d just left a particularly loud pop concert. A uniformed officer put his hand out to stop her and Louise looked at him as if she couldn’t believe his barefaced cheek.

  ‘She’s with me,’ came a voice.

  ‘Yes, Sarge,’ said the uniformed officer.

  ‘Louise, are you okay? You don’t look stable,’ said Sergeant Joslyn Merrick, who was dressed in a SOCO uniform.

  The woman wrapped her arms around her and Louise closed her eyes, the smell of smoke intensifying. ‘I need to see him,’ she said.

  ‘I understand,’ said Joslyn. ‘I’ll take her through,’ she said to Thomas and Tracey who’d appeared behind her like guardian angels.

  ‘You’ll need to change, I’m afraid,’ said Joslyn. ‘We’re not through processing.’

  The three of them helped Louise put on the SOCO uniform like parents dressing a child. Her body felt insubstantial like she was elsewhere, as if viewing the scene from another set of eyes.

  ‘Are you sure?’ said Joslyn, resigned.

  Louise ignored her and stepped through the tent
opening, the smell of linoleum mixing with the smoke in her nostrils. The SOCOs moved aside, the photographer letting the camera hang to one side as if he’d been primed that Louise was coming.

  ‘You stupid bastard,’ she mouthed, bending – almost falling – to her haunches. Joslyn had hold of her. Even in her mild delirium, Louise knew she couldn’t touch her brother. She was glad his eyes were closed. The incisions in his chest and stomach looked too insubstantial to have killed him and she thought maybe this was all a dream. The scene had a dream-like quality to it. She didn’t feel like she was here and maybe any second, someone would wake her and she would be back at the hospital in Weston.

  Joslyn lifted her to her feet and a wave of blood rushed to Louise’s head. She stood that way for a time, trying her best to control her nausea. All she wanted to do was lie down, to block everything from her mind.

  ‘Let’s get you some air,’ said Joslyn.

  ‘Where is she?’ said Louise, tripping through the tent’s entrance.

  ‘She’s safe, Louise. She’s at the hospital with my best officers. I think you need to go there anyway. Come on now,’ said Joslyn, leading her to the back of a waiting ambulance.

  Epilogue

  Three months later

  Louise’s grief over Paul’s death came and went, but the guilt never faded. It didn’t matter how many times she was told it wasn’t her fault, that it wouldn’t have made any difference if she’d continued down to Cornwall instead of heading back to Weston; that Paul had been stabbed earlier that evening, around the same time Louise had helped save Amy and Nicole on the pier.

  That she couldn’t have reached Paul in time wasn’t what bothered her the most. It was the fact that she’d let it reach that stage in the first place. The very first day he’d taken Emily away, all her focus should have been on finding him and getting him back to Bristol. She felt as much to blame as the person – still unknown – who’d sunk the knife seventeen times into her brother’s body.

  It was the weekend and her parents had brought Emily to see her. It wasn’t even lunchtime and her mother was already drinking. She’d never been much of a drinker in the past and seemed to be making up for lost time. Her father looked at Louise as her mother filled her glass with white wine, as if to say, ‘Well, what can I do?’