by Michael Kerr
“We’ll have to go to my place first,” Mark said. “I need to get my passport, and pack.”
“Fine. Let’s go to bed, and get an early start in the morning.”
“Why? Are you tired?”
“No, I’m feeling randy. I want your body, Ross, if your side is up to it.”
“Your wish is my command,” Mark said, putting his hand to where spots of blood were seeping through the dressing under his shirt. “Just be gentle with me.”
They were still laughing at that remark as they snuggled up together, naked in the darkness, though the mood quickly changed to one of concentrated passion. They kissed and touched; the tactile feast arousing them both to a state of urgent need.
The lovemaking relaxed Amy in both body and mind. She nestled her cheek on Mark’s chest and allowed herself the luxury of contemplating waking up next to him every morning for the rest of their lives. Maybe they could adopt, she thought, fingering the scar, immediately dispirited. She had lost Darren, and then the ability to function as a normal woman and bear another child. A lowlife’s bullet had effectively ended her bloodline for the rest of time. Don’t go there. Make the best of what is. Bemoaning your lot is a lost cause. You’ve got to work with what you’ve got. Minutes later, within the safety of Mark’s arms, Amy fell asleep.
Many miles away, in Bristol, Caroline lay in the strange bed of a friend’s house. She had not even told Simon where she was going, and her life still felt on hold. She was running scared. The monster had intimidated her to such a degree that she could not function properly. He had raped her mind as well as her body. The memory of her abduction and the time kept in captivity on the boat obsessed her. Each terror-filled second replayed endlessly, looping around continuously in her brain. Even with her eyes closed, it was as if the inside of her eyelids were screens that showed continual repeat performances of the atrocities. The anger, fear and sense of total subjugation had melded and fused a part of her mind. Her suffering remained vivid, and even when exhausted and able to sleep, her nightmares were of Cain, his hideous eyes, and the abhorrent sensation of him holding, touching, kissing, and invading her on every level.
Tucking her legs up tight to her chest, Caroline cried quietly into the pillow. She wanted to be strong, clear her mind of the incident and get her life back on track. But she knew that he was out there, fixated on her, determined to possess and kill her. She had escaped him once, thanks to the doctor, Mark Ross, and Amy Egan, who had arrived in the nick of time to save her life. Unfortunately, while Cain was still on the loose and unaccounted for, every minute was potentially her last. There was no alleviation from the unseen threat. He had effectively stolen her life. It was impossible for her to believe that he had drowned. Something about him was inhuman, and therefore indestructible.
He parked almost half a mile away, leaving the Audi between two other nondescript cars on a quiet avenue. He then walked in, wishing that he had a dog on a leash to give him an even lower profile. At the house, once satisfied that there were no police sitting in unmarked vehicles close by, he made his way around to the rear, climbed the fence and took stock of his surroundings. There was only the harsh whisper and scrape of a cold vociferous breeze whipping up dead leaves; chasing and herding them into swirling, restless drifts in damp corners. The windows were blank and black, and he had no sensation of being watched from behind them. Nothing but sounds that belonged to the night could be heard. He approached the newly hung kitchen door, smiling in anticipation, removing a reel of tape from his bag, to bite strips of it off and stick them to one of the six small windows in the top half, before quickly etching a circle around it with a cutter he had found in the garage at Esher and taken, along with a steel jemmy; a short crowbar that could be innocuously employed to open the tops of nailed wooden crates or pry up floorboards, or be carried by a burglar to force open a window or door. Holding a loose edge of the tape, he tapped the glass once, firmly, and pulled the circle free. The window was double-glazed, and so he had to repeat the operation on the inner pane, before reaching inside, only to find that there was no key in the lock. The smile died on his face. But no matter, he would have to risk making a little noise. After inserting the curved chisel end of the jemmy in the small gap next to the lock, he pulled it back with a quick and powerful jerk, and the door burst open.
He remained still for a long time, listening to the house as his eyes adjusted to the darkness. The only sounds were a low humming and occasional liquid gurgle from the fridge and freezer. When satisfied that his entry had not been overheard, he moved silently out into the hall, entered the lounge to take a cushion from the settee, and then went to the stairs and ascended into the gloomier reaches of the first-floor landing.
Holding the sawn-off shotgun one-handed, heavy and comforting in his grip, he felt himself harden like a steel rod. The imbeciles obviously thought that he was rotting in mud at the bottom of the Thames, with fish and fresh water shrimps picking the flesh off his bones, and his eyes from their sockets. They were in for the biggest surprise of their pathetic lives. Death had come-a-calling.
Dr Mark’s Cherokee had been parked outside the front of the house. The couple had been foolhardy enough to deem it safe to return to whatever they considered as being normality. It was a mistake that only one of them would live to regret. He was now totally relaxed, focused, and ready to deal with them. There would be no more cock-ups on his part. He’d fucked up by using Payne’s houseboat, and had then compounded the mistake by being far too arrogant, underestimating the enemy. Perhaps he was his own worst enemy. Overconfidence was a weakness that he would have to somehow come to terms with.
At the partly open door of the first bedroom he came to, he folded the cushion over the muzzles of the Browning’s shortened barrels, which would hopefully dampen the sound to an acceptable level.
The new plan was simple. There was no way that he was going to take any more chances with these two. He would initially disable both of them, and then shoot Amy in the face while the Yank looked on. Leaving Ross wounded but alive, and with the image of his slut’s head exploding like a melon, would be mind-blowing for them all, especially the split-arse ex-cop.
Entering the bedroom, he could see the shapes of the couple lying as close to each other as two peas in a pod. Moonlight penetrating through thin curtains at the large window was all the illumination he needed.
He took aim near the foot of the bed, deciding to shoot them both in the lower legs or feet. That would be an attention-getter.
The first blast brought Mark and Amy wide awake. Sitting bolt upright, and without pause, Mark rolled out of bed and grasped the World War Two bayonet – which he had purchased on impulse in a militaria shop three days earlier – from where he had leant it up in the corner behind the bedside cabinet. He rushed out of the small spare room that they had moved into just in case precisely what was happening now should transpire. Paranoia has its place, especially when someone really is out to get you.
Bobby giggled as he aimed at where the other feet should be and triggered the second barrel. He then frowned when his only reward was an unnatural stillness. No one reared up screaming in agony. The realisation that the bed had been padded to appear occupied, and that he had been expected, hit hard as a voice came from the open doorway behind him.
“Glad to see you could make it, Cain,” Mark said.
Bobby spun around, lashed out blindly with the spent shotgun, but teetered off balance as he connected with no more than thin air.
Mark lunged at the spinning figure, felt the rusted, pitted blade of the old bayonet sink into the killer’s body, and thrust deeper.
Bobby howled in surprise and pain as he released the shotgun, pulled back to disengage himself from the blade, and without hesitation attacked, throwing a punch that caught Mark on the cheek, knocking him backwards. Bobby followed up, got in close and gripped Mark around the waist in a bear hug, simultaneously biting into his chest like a crazed, rabid dog.
The air was forced from Mark’s lungs as the man’s powerful arms crushed his ribcage. Christ, he’s strong, Mark thought. He had to react instantly, or his initial advantage would have been for nothing. At some point he had dropped the bayonet. Both of his hands were free. He scrabbled at Cain’s bald head, which was attached to him like a leech, by his teeth, and Mark’s fingers found the nose with one hand and an eye with the other. He dug his thumb into the man’s left eye, hooked the first two fingers of his other hand into the wide nostrils, and jerked back with all his might.
The result was instantaneous. Bobby released his grip with arms and teeth, screamed out and put his hands up to the two fresh seats of pain.
Mark drew his fist back and struck Cain a tremendous blow to the chin.
Blink.
Bobby’s senses deserted him. He tottered backwards on his heels, eyes rolled up to show the whites, his momentum taking him across to the window, which he crashed through, to tumble out into the night amid a shower of glass.
The ornamental fleur-de-lis-shaped points that tipped the palisade posts of the steel fencing below, broke his fall. One sank into his right buttock, another into his back.
Mark looked out and down through the shattered window to see Cain fixed like a marshmallow on a toasting fork. His shoulders slumped as relief swept through him.
“Is it over?” Amy said, standing naked at the open bedroom door, her arms folded across her breasts, fists clenched.
“Yeah,” Mark said, going to her and holding her close. “He’s finished. Call Barney.”
Amy went across to the window to look down and see for herself, while Mark unhurriedly went back to the bedroom at the rear of the house for his robe and slippers, not knowing that Cain was not dead.
Mark went downstairs and out of the house to approach Cain, the soles of his moccasin-style slippers crunching on shards of broken glass. He was unashamedly pleased to see the dying man’s lips drawn back in a rictus grimace, and his black eyes still animated, aware, and full of pain, fear and hatred.
Bobby had been snapped out of his fugue as the pointed tips of the railing posts punched into his body. Red, frothy blood bubbled from his lips, and he began to make small, wet, whimpering sounds as he arched his back in an agonising and futile attempt to free himself.
Mark could feel no measure of compassion. This man was a creature who personified death, and who, without conscience, fed off the terror and agony that he had visited upon others. Standing just a yard away, Mark was a witness, waiting patiently and expectantly for nature to take its course.
“Fuck you, Ross,” Bobby managed to say; his voice a liquid slur, as blood leaked up into his throat and mouth from a skewered lung.
“No, Cain, fuck you,” Mark said, as with a final shudder that ran the length of his broken body, the homicidal psychopath’s hands clawed at the air, and with a whistling last breath he drowned in his own escaping lifeblood and ceased to be a danger to anyone.
After phoning Barney, Amy pulled on a sweater and jeans as Mark lingered outside and watched as blood seeped out of the body before him and ran down the iron railings to pool on the concrete and fan out in small streams to follow the camber of the pavement and flow into the gutter. He felt weak, on the verge of being overwhelmed by a melange of emotions; the most powerful being that of incredible relief. This was the closure that they had needed.
Putting two fingers to Cain’s neck – half expecting the half-closed eyes to snap wide open and stare at him – he confirmed that the man was dead. Whatever evil was, it had left this now limp, untenanted vessel. A line from Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar came to mind: ‘The evil that men do lives after them; the good is oft interred with their bones’. The iniquitous and vicious force that had driven the man was now loose, without a physical body to work like a marionette. Did evil exist as a separate entity? Could it survive the death of the host it dwelt within, to move on, perhaps to invade and inhabit a newly born infant? These were considerations that Mark had pondered for most of his adult life, and was still no nearer to having the answers to.
He went back inside the house to the kitchen, where Amy was just racking the phone.
“You want a cup of coffee?” Mark said.
“Hug first,” she said.
He held her until the distant sound of sirens drew nearer, louder, and then he left her and once more walked down the hallway to the still open front door. Amy switched on the coffeemaker and let the sense of anxiety dissipate, as if it had been a physical, oppressive weight. The death of Cain was her salvation. It was as if she had been set free to walk out into bright sunlight after being confined in a dark, stinking dungeon. It was both an uplifting and meaningful moment.
EPILOGUE
Two weeks later.
The sky appeared as a conflagration; the sun a massive golden globe rushing down to the western horizon, signalling an end to another day with a breathtaking display of orange, crimson and purple that gladdened, warmed and inspired the spirit.
Mark and Amy wandered hand in hand along the sugar-white sand. They had decided on having a break in the Sunshine State, so had flown to Tampa from Heathrow, rented a car and driven south on I-75 to a small key north of Sarasota on the Gulf of Mexico.
Mark had made a call to an old ‘Agency’ friend in D.C., and had accepted the offer to use his beach house in Florida for three weeks.
“Look,” Amy said, pointing out beyond the surf to where dorsal fins knifed the surface just fifteen or twenty yards away from them, as several dolphins indolently slipped by, in no hurry to reach their destination, should they have one.
“You like it here?” Mark said.
“I love it here,” Amy said, stopping to face him and search out his lips with hers. “I can’t think of a better place to be.”
The almost unbearable tension had melted away with Cain’s last breath, and life had suddenly returned to some semblance of normality, whatever the hell that was. In the immediate aftermath, Caroline Sellars had resumed her career with the BBC, and was back in her London flat. Barney Bowen had accumulated his leave, and would not return to duty before his official retirement date in March. He and Anna had gone out to Spain for a couple of months, but only for an extended holiday. They had decided that their home and Barney’s beloved pond and Koi carp outweighed a permanent move abroad.
The body of DC Gary Shields was found by a Forestry Commission work crew in Epping Forest, which at least afforded his family the solace of being able to give him a proper burial. The police turned out in force for the funeral; he was one of their own.
Mark had cleared his desk at Cranbrook, and had resigned a week after the incident at Amy’s house, pre-empting the hospital’s governors’ intention to let him go, due to his high-profile involvement in the Park Killer case. The media had made him out to be some kind of super hero; the definitive manhunter. He saw the writing on the wall and beat the board to the mark. He didn’t condemn or resent their attitude. He had brought unwelcome publicity to their door. An upside, he supposed, was that his book had been given a new lease of life. The publishers were quick to cash in on his unsolicited fame.
The tormented and strangely gifted Billy Hicks found peace. A few hours after enjoying a lakeside walk with Mark, he had packed up his meagre belongings in a cardboard carton, lay down on his bed, and died. The cause of death was officially recorded as being due to heart failure. Mark doubted it was that simple. The discovery of a dead, jet-black barn owl on the ground outside, below the window of Billy’s room, was as inexplicable as the young man’s demise. To Mark’s knowledge, there were no black owls, apart from the Visitor whom Billy had talked about. For the sake of his own sanity, Mark consigned the episode into his mental filing cabinet labelled ‘crazy shit’, and closed the drawer.
To put things into perspective, or to gather in the corn, as his father had always said, Mark decided that he would write a second book. It would be entitled: The Park Killer, and would document the case from his persona
l viewpoint. He also made the decision to be involved with Amy’s security company, and to take on a limited amount of consult work for the police. All in all, he should be kept fully and gainfully employed.
The shimmering sun turned the now placid, plate-glass smooth surface of the Gulf of Mexico to burnished copper, before it appeared to slip into the ocean and be extinguished, leaving the rising, glowing moon on night watch.
Amy thought of her present situation as a happy ending, and then her dark side reminded her that the only happy endings were in books and movies. This was just the start of another chapter in her life, which held a fragile promise of being better than the last one.
The abomination that had been Cain affected her deeply. She could not factor-in and embrace the view of psychologists like Mark. In her mind, Cain had been a malformed item that had somehow gained a stamp of acceptable quality and found its way into the marketplace. Either that, or Mark was right and pure evil was an ever-present force that raised its ugly head whenever it found a suitable host. They had been pitted against something truly maleficent that masqueraded as Bobby Cain. It struck her that without morality, a person like Cain did not have the capacity to weigh a conflict of principles and make balanced, ethical decisions. The absence of an ability to empathise with others’ feelings made it impossible to contemplate such qualities as kindness, love, or mercy. Maybe evil was just a total absence of compassion.
