by Tania Carver
‘Slipped?’ Marina couldn’t believe what she was hearing. ‘She didn’t just slip, she may as well have fallen through a crack in the Earth.’
Franks looked up at her. ‘It’s too late to help that little girl that we should have saved,’ he said. ‘But at least we can stop what she’s become.’
Marina nodded and left the room.
On the way down the corridor, her phone rang. Anni. She took the call.
Stopped walking, listened. Almost on shock.
She ended the call, carried on walking.
A new sense of urgency in her stride.
59
‘Look at me, Phil.’
He opened his eyes. Slowly, like they were stuck together. Like he was living in a dream he couldn’t escape from. It took him several seconds, or even minutes, to realise that he was actually awake. His mind felt like it was lost in a mist; he waited for it to clear. It didn’t, not fully. He had to concentrate hard to make out his surroundings, to differentiate waking from sleeping. His head spun, his stomach too. He didn’t know where he was, barely who he was.
‘Look at me, Phil.’
He tried to follow the voice with his eyes. Couldn’t yet make anything out. Gradually things around him came into focus. His memory drip, drip, dripped back into him and he realised where he was, who he was with. Or thought he did. Everything had changed. The room he had been in – his childhood one? His home? – had disappeared. He was still in bed, that much was the same. But even the bed was different. Plain white metal, like an old hospital bed. And the linen had changed too. He blinked, looked round. The room was completely white, almost clinically so. The bed linen matched.
‘Look at me, Phil.’
He looked. There stood a naked woman. He didn’t recognise her. But the more he looked, the more he thought she seemed somehow familiar.
‘You see me?’
He nodded. Or thought he did, his head was swirling so much he wasn’t sure.
She smiled. ‘See me for who I am. For who I’ve always been.’
He looked again.
‘You know me, don’t you?’
‘Yes,’ he said, somehow believing her words. ‘Yes, I know you.’
‘Of course you do. You knew who I was when I spoke those two words to you. The Garden. You knew.’ She started to move towards him. Slowly and stately, so he could watch her, admire her, as she came. ‘I’m the other half of you.’
He frowned. Tried to process her words. Didn’t know what they meant. ‘What… I… what d’you mean? The other… what?’
She smiled at him. ‘I’m me. Just me.’
She was right in front of him now. He could have reached out and touched her. He raised his hand. He was no longer restrained on the bed.
‘You’re free,’ she told him. ‘I’ve freed you.’
‘Who… the other half?’
‘Of you. Come. Rise.’
She bent down, pulled back the bed linen. He was still naked. Slowly, at her bidding, he swung his legs out of the bed, placed them on the white floor. They were trembling, weak from disuse.
‘You can do it, come on.’
She put her arms round him, helped him to his feet. Eventually he stood there before the bed, in her arms.
This is a dream, he thought. A dream within a dream.
She held him close, head buried in his chest. Breathing him in. ‘You thought you’d lost me, didn’t you?’
‘Yes,’ he said, because it seemed like the right thing to say.
‘And I thought I’d lost you. Forever.’
She held him even tighter. He allowed her to. He would have collapsed back onto the bed otherwise.
He didn’t know how long they stood like that. Time had lost all meaning for him now.
‘Here we are…’ A whisper, a sigh. ‘Here we are…’
‘Yes…’
‘Together again. And this time, we’re not going to let anyone or anything pull us apart. This time we’re staying together forever.’
‘Forever,’ repeated Phil.
She clutched him tighter.
He closed his eyes.
60
Anni had left Malcolm at the house, waiting for the police. Crying and vomiting into the gutter. She wondered what the experience would do to his love of true-life crime now. She doubted it would put him off, though. It would just – eventually, once he had recovered – become the jewel in his walking tour crown. The place he had bravely discovered the bodies.
Print the legend, she thought bitterly.
She had phoned Marina, given her an update. But one thing she hadn’t told her was the location of the industrial unit on the farm. She felt slightly bad about doing that, especially since it was Marina’s husband who was most probably being kept there, but she told herself it had been the right thing to do. Because chances were that the woman she wanted was there. The woman who had killed her Mickey. And if that was the case, she wanted her all to herself.
Yes, Phil would be safe. She would ensure that. But it was the woman. She was the primary target.
She was back in her flat now, making a quick stop before going there. She went into the bedroom, opened the wardrobe, knelt down. She reached in, right to the back, knocking over a stack of boxed shoes as she did so. She found what she was looking for, brought it out. Looked at it.
A metal box. She opened it. A Beretta M9 9mm semi-automatic. Illegal, of course. But easy to get if you knew where to look.
She had bought it after Mickey’s death. At first, in the darkness that engulfed her, she was tempted to use it on herself. She had stood in the kitchen one day, over the sink, a photo of her and Mickey laughing and smiling propped up on the mixer tap in front of her. A near-empty bottle of vodka at her side. Her vision blurred with tears, bawling and crying her eyes out.
She had held that gun in her mouth, fingers on the handle, wrapped round the trigger. She could still taste cold metal when she thought about it. She had given a scream, willing herself to do it. But she couldn’t. Eventually she had passed out on the kitchen floor, drunk. The next day she tendered her resignation from the police force.
And the gun had been put back in the wardrobe. Never touched again.
Until now.
Maybe this was what I actually bought you for, she said to herself. For her. She smiled. Nodded. That made sense.
She clicked a full magazine into place, chambered a cartridge. Put the gun in the back of her waistband, covered it with her jacket. She was ready to leave the house.
Well, almost.
Before she reached the door she bent down, picked up the large photo of Mickey and herself that she kept on the coffee table. Both of them smiling and happy, both looking like they had all the time in the world to be together. The same photo she had propped up in the kitchen that night.
She brought it up to her lips, kissed him, closing her eyes as she did so. Took it away. As she did so, she caught her own reflection in it. Saw her own face. It shocked her.
Jesus, she thought, when did I get so hard?
When Mickey died, she answered herself.
She put the photo back in its place, left the flat.
61
‘So,’ said Marina re-entering the interview room, ‘did I miss anything?’
She looked between the two of them. Between Beresford’s broken appearance and Matthews’ angry one. She could tell immediately that the balance of power in the room had shifted dramatically. I don’t need to know the details, she thought. Not at the moment. Just use it, keep going.
‘Well,’ she said sitting down, ‘we’ve found your wife and son.’
Beresford looked up immediately. ‘You’ve…’
‘Yes. We’ve found your wife and son.’
A small light was lit behind his eyes. ‘Are they… are they…’
‘We’ll come to that in a moment. Where’s my husband?’
‘What?’ Beresford looked irritated to be asked the question. ‘What about my wife and
—’
‘All in good time, I said. Come on, quid pro quo. Where’s my husband?’
Beresford stared at her, suspecting a trick.
‘Just tell me. Then we can move on. Then we’ll talk about your wife and child.’
Beresford relented. He was running on empty, running on fumes. ‘A lock-up. An old farm out Elmstead Market way. She’s got a unit there. That’s where she’s been keeping him.’
‘Postcode? Directions?’
‘I don’t fucking know…’
Marina turned to Matthews who was already out of his seat.
‘On it,’ he said, and left the room.
Marina turned back to Beresford.
‘My wife and son,’ he repeated.
‘Yes,’ she said, voice as brusque and businesslike as she could manage. She thought it would have to be, considering what was to come. ‘We’ve found them. They’re both dead, I’m afraid.’
Beresford sat there, his jaw open in shock. Staring ahead. Marina said nothing, let the news sink in.
‘Dead…’ he said eventually.
‘Yes. And I’m sorry. Sorry for them. Sorry that they had to die. Just for you. So you could justify your own actions to yourself.’
His head fell forward then wrenched backwards. Marina kept talking.
‘They’d been dead for some time. Probably as soon as she took them. She had no intention of letting them live. And I think you must have known that, didn’t you?’
Beresford screamed like a dying animal.
Marina sat unmoving. And unmoved. ‘They say it’s the hope that kills you in the end. Is that what happened to all those people you murdered? Did you do that in the hope of seeing your wife and child alive again? Is that the lie you peddled to yourself? Or did you secretly know that they were dead, secretly hope, even? Then you could behave the way you wanted to, and grieve later, telling yourself you didn’t know when in fact you suspected it all the time. Is that it? Which one makes it easier for you to live with your actions? I don’t know. But you have plenty of time to find out.’
She stood up, made for the door.
‘We’re done here. I’m going to find my husband.’
62
‘Remember when you were a little boy?’
She held Phil tightly, wrapped him in her arms, enfolded him in her love. They had moved to the floor, sat in a corner of the room. The whiteness seemed to stretch away to infinity. Phil couldn’t make out where the walls ended and the ceiling began. All he could think of was her calm, soothing voice, pouring into his ear, his soul, telling him everything was going to be all right.
‘Can you? Can you remember that far back?’
He nodded, but it may have been because she was rocking his body slowly backwards and forwards.
‘Before Don and Eileen, before the foster homes, before all that…’
He said nothing, tried to cast his mind back that far. It was foggy. Too foggy. Nothing was working properly in there. He couldn’t even cast it back to before he had woken up. There was just that voice. That beautiful calm voice, pouring over him like liquid warmth, making everything all right again.
‘You remember you parents, right?’
Phil nodded, not knowing whether he did or not.
‘Your sister, even?’
‘My… sister?’
‘That’s right.’ She held him tighter, rocked him slightly harder. ‘Your sister.’
He frowned. The clouds were back again. He was struggling to see through them, to make any mental images from the past rise up and form themselves in front of him. In their absence he just had her beautiful voice to guide him. It was the voice of an angel. A wholly truthful voice. He listened, followed it.
‘Your sister,’ she said again. ‘Before your mother and father were killed, remember? There was you. And your sister.’
He nodded along with her words once more, not truly understanding their meaning but enjoying them all the same.
‘You’ve worked out who I am by now, haven’t you, Phil?’
He knew it was a question and questions usually demanded answers. Unless they were those other questions. He knew the word for that but it wouldn’t come to him. What kind of question was that?
‘Phil?’
‘What?’
‘You’ve worked out who I am by now?’ she said again.
There was that question again. He didn’t know the answer but he knew she wanted an answer and he didn’t want to disappoint her so he gave her one. ‘Yes.’
She hugged him tighter. It seemed to be the right answer. And that made him feel good.
‘The day our mother and father were killed it was cold, remember?’
He nodded.
‘And you and me were in the garden. And there was snow everywhere.’
‘Snow…’
‘And you taught me how to make snow angels in the snowdrifts.’ She giggled. ‘It was a happy day, that. Well, it started out happy anyway. And now we can continue. We can be happy again.’
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Happy again…’
She pulled away from him slightly, looking at him. Eyes to eyes. ‘You do know who I am, Phil, don’t you? You really do?’
Again there was that question. Maybe he’d said the wrong thing last time. He didn’t answer this time.
‘I’m your sister, Phil. Your sister. And you thought you’d lost me forever, didn’t you? Well, you haven’t. I’m here. And we’re together again.’
She held him tighter once more.
‘My sister…’
‘That’s right. I survived. And I found you. Oh, it’s taken me years, but I’ve found you.’
She took her hand away from him, opened her palm, showed him what she had been holding. The two small capsules from the side of the bed.
She smiled at him.
‘You’re ready for this now. And now we’re going to be together. Forever.’
63
Anni pulled up in the car, as quietly as she could, killed the engine.
The roadway onto the old farmland was cracked concrete coming off a gravel road. The land was flat, open. Both things acting as an early warning system should anyone turn up unannounced.
She sat in the car, unmoving, listening. All she could hear was the ticking and cooling of the engine. She looked up and around, checked the door once more. She was confident that she hadn’t been heard. If she had, there’d have been some movement by now, some noise.
She got out of the car, closed the door as silently as possible. The building looked old, run-down. Brick walls and a corrugated metal roof. Blacked-out windows set into a perishing wooden frame. A once black door beside them. The rest of the buildings around it looked like they weren’t in use. They were in various states of disrepair, some with temporary repair jobs that over time had become permanent ones.
She checked once more that the gun was still there and made her way to the building.
Night was falling. There were no lights outside the building. Or anywhere around. She stood for a moment, letting her eyes become accustomed to the gloom. She looked down the side of the building. Saw the outline of a car parked there. That was her car. She knew it. Must be.
And that meant she was inside now.
She walked all the way round the building. The woman’s car was parked in front of two huge double doors. The main entrance, thought Anni. Probably not the best way to enter. She went back to where she had parked, tried the small black door.
Unlocked.
She smiled, holding the handle. Then pushed it slowly forward a few centimetres, ready to close it again quickly if it made a noise.
But there was no noise. And despite the door being and looking old, there was no resistance from it. Must be used often, she thought. Carefully, she pushed it all the way inwards until it was fully open. Then, with one last look around, stepped inside.
64
The circus was on its way.
Marina had heard that phrase once used by Phil and now
always thought of it whenever the police rolled out in force on an operation.
She sat in the car with Gary Franks, the atmosphere tense.
‘You did good work in there, by the way.’ Franks looked out of the window as he said it.
‘Thank you.’ Marina smiled. ‘Maybe I’m not so bad after all.’
‘I never said you weren’t good at your job. Let’s just hope he gives his statement without any trouble and normal service can be resumed.’
‘Yet here we are on the way to a potential crime scene. And you’ve let me tag along.’
Franks allowed himself a rare smile. ‘You’re cheaper than a hostage negotiator.’
Marina smiled at the backhanded compliment. ‘Thanks very much.’
They left the single track road, hit the gravel one then made it onto the broken concrete road, the car rocking backwards and forwards as it negotiated potholes.
It had been a process of elimination to find the place. A simple Google search of the area provided them with the correct location. Simple, thought Marina, if you knew where to look and what you were looking for.
It was fully dark by the time they arrived, killing the lights as they did so. Marina looked at the car parked there.
‘That’s Anni’s car,’ she said.
‘Anni Hepburn?’
‘Yeah. What’s she doing here? Let’s hope she hasn’t been taken as well.’
They exited their vehicles as quietly as possible. The armed response unit had parked down the road so as not to arouse suspicion. The backup team were similarly located and were getting into position.
Franks turned to Marina. ‘You stay here,’ he said, fastening up his stab vest.
‘What? No. I’m coming in as well. That’s my husband in there.’
‘Exactly. And you can be the first to greet him when he comes out.’
