The Fighter

by Robert White

  He handed me his pistol and I shoved it into my jacket along with my own. Striding to the door of the bedroom, I shouted down. “Up here officer, quickly, and get some help, there’s a woman been murdered.”

  Rick Fuller’s Story:

  Des did all the talking, and as the young officer inspected the scene, he quietly opened the landing window and threw both our pistols out into the grounds. I have no idea how he managed to keep thinking straight. I was broken beyond repair and so full of hate, I could hardly walk. My body twitched uncontrollably, and I had to run to the toilet to be sick.

  There were dozens of questions that I hardly recall. I was put into the back of a police car and driven to the main holding station in the city. Des, taken to a separate location. Once I’d been booked in, my clothes were taken from me and I was asked if I wanted a solicitor present whilst I made my statement. Standard procedure of course, but I was made to feel like the villain of the piece which only fuelled my anger and hatred further.

  I’d given a uniformed officer the rundown of what I knew, then I sat in an interview room wearing a paper suit, nursing an over-brewed sweet tea.

  After what seemed like an eternity, a wizened old detective opened the door and sat opposite me.

  “I’m Dave Cousins,” he said quietly. “You must be feeling pretty bad right now, Mr Fuller.”

  “Rick,” I said. “Call me Rick.”

  “Okay, are you sure you don’t want a solicitor present, Rick?”

  “Positive.”

  He nodded, turned on the recorder and began to ask me the same questions I’d been asked twice already.

  “Why did you move Ms North’s body, Rick?”

  I could see my hands shaking as I clasped them together in front of me. I wanted them to stop, but they wouldn’t.

  That, and a tremor in my voice that I couldn’t control. “First… well, first I went to see if she was alive.”

  “And how did you know she was dead?”

  I looked into the detective’s face.

  “I was in the military. I’ve seen a lot of dead people, Detective. It was obvious her neck was broken, her eyes were open, she wasn’t breathing, no pulse.”

  He nodded.

  “Okay, so I’ll ask again, Rick. Why did you move her?”

  “You got a wife, Dave?”

  “I have.”

  “Daughters?”

  “Two, as a matter of fact.”

  I took the deepest breath.

  “Well, if you went home tonight, Dave, and found your wife or one of your daughters with their clothes torn from them. Saw that they’d been assaulted in the worst possible way, and that you knew that people were going to come and take photographs of them, what would you do? I mean, I’m not stupid. I know that by dressing her, lying her on her bed, making her decent, I may have made things harder for your forensics guys, but I’ll be honest with you, right here on this tape, I had no intention of calling you, because I knew who had done this terrible thing, and I was going to kill him myself. I was going to snap his neck and spit on him as he drew his last breath.”

  “Are you capable of such a thing, Rick? Could you kill a man with your bare hands?”

  I looked into his eyes.

  “More than capable, Dave.”

  He nodded again.

  “And just who do you believe killed Ms North, Rick?”

  “Larry Simpson,” I said. “Detective Chief Inspector Larry Simpson.”

  Des Cogan’s Story:

  We were both released that same day and Larry Simpson was arrested for the murder of Lauren North. Two days later he was charged and remanded in custody. As Rick suspected, his legal team recommended that he undergo psychological testing and that the findings be reported to the court prior to his trial.

  I’d moved into Rick’s place and did my best to get some food in him between bottles of JD. It was history repeating itself. It was Cathy all over again, except this time, there was no need to search for the perpetrators. I think that actually made him worse.

  When Cathy was murdered, the search for her killers gave him something to focus on between bouts of depression and near alcoholism. Now, he had nothing.

  He spent half the day flicking through the news channels or scrolling the local online papers for any information on the upcoming trial, and the other half drinking himself into a stupor.

  It was a full two weeks before Lauren’s body was released for burial. The detective that had interviewed Rick on the day of the murder came to his flat to tell him where the funeral was to take place.

  At first, I didnea think it was a good idea to go, but Rick couldn’t be persuaded otherwise.

  In all the time we’d known her, Lauren had hardly ever mentioned her family. I mean, from that day when she jumped in the back of that stolen campervan outside Leeds General Hospital, she had left everything and everyone behind. That must have been hard for her, and for her folks, although I got the impression that there had been bad blood between them after her divorce.

  Families eh?

  Even so, she had taken the plunge and become one of us. She had shown bravery, loyalty and love and I couldnea speak any higher of her. I did my best to keep things together for the big man’s sake, but I was dying inside, too. So, despite my misgivings, I considered that maybe seeing the lassie put to rest would do us both good.

  Just seventeen days after her murder, we went the see Lauren North buried.

  The service took place in a small chapel in Headingly, just by the cricket ground. Rick and I sat at the back of the church, listened to the eulogies, the hymns, the prayers and then followed the priest and the mourners to the graveside to see our Lauren laid to rest.

  As was the Lord’s want, the heavens opened, and the wind blew. The small solemn crowd shed tears as the coffin was lowered into the grave. I looked into Rick’s rain splattered face and he showed no emotion. He looked simply empty.

  As the final words were spoken, the family began to shuffle away. Hands were shaken, tears wiped, condolences offered. The wind picked up further and blew the rain in sheets across the graveside. Standing opposite me was a stout woman. She didn’t seem to notice that she was soaked to the skin. She stared at me; her eyes boring into mine.

  Finally, she walked around the grave and stood in front of me, hands on hips, her face full of anger and I recognised her. It was Lauren’s friend from the hospital, Jane.

  “It’s you, isn’t it?” she said. “You, the guy… the fake, the fraud. The one who pretended to be a doctor that day, the day of the Manchester bomb.”

  I didn’t answer.

  She sneered and turned to Rick.

  “And you’re the man in the bandages, I’ll bet.” She bent down and lifted Rick’s trouser leg to reveal the scars left by Stephan Goldsmith. “I thought as much,” she said, her hair stuck to her grimacing face by the rain. “The mystery gangster. It is you, both of you. How dare you come here today.”

  She pointed in Rick’s face.

  “You are the reason she left us. You…” Jane began to break down. “You… took her away and filled her head with nonsense. Took her from me, her best friend, her family, her job, and for what? Just so she could end up with a broken neck. You are to blame, you and only you are the reason she is dead. This is all your fault. Shame on you… Shame on you both.”

  And with that she strode away.

  Rick didn’t speak. He walked to the grave, peered down into it, picked up a handful of soil and dropped it onto the top of the coffin. Then he turned and strode off.

  “Rick,” I called. “Come on, you cannea blame yourself. The woman was just upset.”

  He didn’t stop, didn’t turn around, just held up a hand that told me not to follow him.

  As I watched him disappear through the cemetery gates, I wondered if I’d ever see him
again.

  END