‘Are you making my tea, love?’ Her mother stepped through the door, mostly hidden behind where Andy stood in the middle of the kitchen, arms by his side, his black shirt hung open to reveal the blood on his vest. His shirt had two bulging pockets and he pulled a dark cloth from one of them. He slid the blade of the knife through it and licked his lips. He kept facing her, away from her mother. She couldn’t see what Lisa was seeing. She wouldn’t be able to see Lisa’s wound either.
‘You’ve got to feed your addiction, Lisa. That’s what I say. You’ve got to be who you are.’ Andy’s voice was low but carried the same menace.
There was a knock at the front door. Andy half-turned, the stubby blade still in his right fist. Her mother tutted and turned towards the door. Andy started towards her. Andy would be quicker — he’d get to her before she even made it out of the kitchen. Lisa tried to shout a warning but she still didn’t have a voice; she could only take rasping breaths. She lunged forward, aiming for the arm that was holding the knife. She missed and her legs gave way but she grabbed his shirt on her way to the floor. Something gave and she heard a tearing sound — something heavy dropped to the floor. She managed to drag Andy down to his knees. His right hand flashed out, this time it was a solid fist, still gripped around the knife, which caught her with a stinging blow to the face. She felt a push to her chest and she rolled away. She still gripped a clump of torn material in her hand.
Lisa heard the door open and Andy ducked back into the kitchen. She heard her mother’s voice: ‘What do you want? You already broke my pot plant!’
From her position on the floor, Lisa’s eyes fixed on a black mobile phone. It must have been what had fallen from Andy’s shirt pocket. It was within reach and her hand shot out for it while he was still looking away. She pulled it back just as his movement became a blur in front of her. He grabbed her by the scruff of her neck and pulled her further into the kitchen. She had to be bleeding freely — she could see that from the crimson smear left on the floor as she slid backwards until her shoulders found the kitchen units. She pushed the mobile phone out of sight under her buttocks.
‘I forgot to give your daughter something is all. Is she there? I’ve still got her phone.’ Naomi’s voice – Naomi had come back! Lisa’s relief turned to fear in an instant. Andy was looking down at her, his face a sneer. He held the stained knife to his lips — an instruction to be quiet. She was frozen in panic anyway and if she managed to call out he would surely finish her off. And what then for her mother and her best friend? She held her breath.
‘Yes of course she’s here! She lives here, doesn’t she?’
‘Can I speak to her, Mrs Simpkiss? Just for a moment?’
‘A moment, eh? What are you going to do about this pot plant?’ Her mother scolded.
‘I’ll pay for it, sure. I’ll bring the money right over or I’ll go and pick you a new one. How about that?’
‘No, no! You’ll get one that’s all wrong. I know what you young people are like . . . you’ve got no idea. Don’t worry about it now. Is that all you wanted?’
‘I just wanted to speak to your daughter. Is she there?’
Lisa started to feel pain now. Maybe it was the way she was propped up against the units. Andy still had a handful of her top scrunched up in his fist. He lowered his face to within an inch of hers.
‘You call through,’ he said, through gritted teeth. ‘You tell her to piss off. You do it nice and easy or I start stabbing anything that moves. Do you understand?’ His breath smelt of stale cigarettes.
‘Yeah,’ she said. Her voice was low and gravelly but she had managed to get some air back in her lungs. He changed his grip. He stood up over her and yanked her up to her feet. Moving agitated her wound and it was all she could do to stop herself from crying out. He’d caught her by surprise, too; she hadn’t had time to pick the phone back up. She couldn’t stand completely straight. She was on her feet but bent double. She chanced a look to where the phone still lay, up against the kick board under the kitchen units. He dragged her a few steps closer to the door. She was still hidden from Naomi. Her t-shirt was sopping wet and stuck to her skin.
‘Hey!’ she called out, aware that her voice sounded weak. She needed to be stronger. She knew what it meant for all of them if Naomi stepped into the house. ‘Hey, Naomi!’ This time she sounded better.
‘Lisa, you okay?’ Naomi’s tone carried concern.
‘Yeah. Yeah, of course I’m okay.’
‘I’ve still got your phone. I never gave it back.’
‘Ah, yeah! Nice one. Keep hold of it, yeah? I’ll get it later.’
Naomi was quiet for a brief moment. ‘You don’t want it? Where are you?’
A pang of excruciating pain shot through Lisa. It seemed to course through her whole body from top to bottom. It was all she could do to stay on her feet. She sucked in a deep breath, making every effort to keep the distress from her voice.
‘In the kitchen, mate. Just trying not to confuse anyone, if you know what I mean? I’ll come and see you later.’ Her last few words had been an effort; she knew they sounded forced.
‘Okay then.’ Naomi didn’t sound sure. It wasn’t unusual for Lisa to act different around her mother but she knew she was pushing it. She prayed Naomi would accept that. A few seconds passed and Naomi still hadn’t answered. Lisa was still stooped forward and could still feel Andy’s grip on her collar. She let her eyes fall closed and focussed on blocking out the pain. She muttered silently for Naomi to go. Just leave!
‘I’m sorry to bother you, Mrs Simpkiss,’ she heard Naomi say, and then the door clicked shut.
‘How are you getting on with that dinner in there, Cathy?’ her mother called out. ‘You need anything?’
‘No . . . thanks, Mum,’ Lisa managed. The television must have been paused because its sound now came roaring back. It was like a signal to Andy. He pulled her roughly across the kitchen floor to the back door. The key was in it and Andy unlocked it and tugged it open. He reached down for her. Once again she was wrenched to her feet. She felt her legs wobble, every part of her wanted to collapse, to curl up in a ball, to assess her wound. She knew she was seriously hurt, she could tell from the kitchen floor how much blood she was losing.
Rough hands pushed her out of the back door and she fell to her knees. The pain shot through her again as she tried to steady herself and she leaked more blood onto the concrete path that led along the side of the house to the little garden shed. He used his weight and one arm to pin her against the shed while he pulled the door open. Then he pushed her in amidst the clutter of garden implements and furniture and shut the door.
‘Move or make the slightest noise and your mum comes with us. Do you understand?’
‘Yes,’ she managed. She heard him move away. She sucked in a breath, trying to quell her panic. She pushed herself against the wooden slats, trying to see out where the light leaked through. She couldn’t. She gave up and lifted her top. She had been pressing the wound instinctively with her left hand. She moved it away. Blood was still seeping out. Her waistband and the tops of her jeans were soaked in it too. She looked around for something that might help — a weapon, something that could make a noise. There was nothing.
She heard the sound of an engine. It moved close enough for her to guess that it had been pulled up to the back gate just a metre away from where she was lying. They were going somewhere. Andy reappeared within a few seconds. She was angled so she could look up at him, she could see the look in his eyes. The excitement was unmistakeable now. She knew that feeling well. For her it had been the walk home from the shop with bottles in her bag. The anticipation. It was the look of an addict lost in the moment, getting his fix.
He wrenched his sleeves up and Lisa saw flashes of white scar tissue on his forearms as he reached and grabbed her again. She knew what was coming. She was already rocking to try and get up. She gritted her teeth to overcome the pain and could feel droplets of cold sweat running down her fo
rehead. She stooped back out onto the path and through the open gate. The front passenger door was already open. She assumed it was for her but he pushed her roughly towards the lifted boot and she bumped into the protruding lip, causing her to bend and her abdomen shot with pain. She turned to remonstrate. She saw that excitement in his eyes again and had a moment of clarity. All her focus had been on getting him out of her house, away from her mother. Now her mind pounded out with a simple message: if he gets you in there you’re as good as dead.
She opened her mouth to cry out, to shout for help. The words never came. She felt a blow to her face, a flashing pain in her nose and a blurring of her vision. She felt her back scraping, as if something sharp was raking down it. Her vision blurred further until there was only darkness.
* * *
Olive Simpkiss heard the car pull away. Cathy had to be going to the shops? She didn’t know if they needed anything. She paused what she was watching on television. It was a show about doctors. She liked it most of the time but recently there had been a lot going on. Too much for her to keep up with. Why couldn’t they just keep it simple? She stood up and her knee twinged with pain. It was getting worse. She couldn’t remember if she had taken her medication that morning. She was supposed to rest it as much as she could, otherwise it would swell up and she could end up bed-bound. She hadn’t been resting it. She had gone for a long walk. She couldn’t remember why, but she had talked to a very nice policeman while she was out.
‘They just keep getting younger!’ Olive chuckled to herself. ‘Cathy!’ she called out. She stood still, waiting for the reply. It didn’t come. Yes, she must have gone to the shops. She felt suddenly confused, a little unsure of why she had stood up. She looked around and tried to think back to what she had been doing. She remembered talking to Cathy — it was about dinner. Cathy was making her something to eat. No, that wasn’t quite right. There was something else? It wasn’t Cathy! Lisa was here! She remembered now. Lisa was making her dinner. Her friend had come round too. That had to be what the noises were.
‘Lisa!’ Again there was no reply. Olive tested her knee. She put one leg forward and shifted her weight. It held and she shuffled across the floor. Each step seemed a little easier as it loosened up and she walked through to the kitchen. The units were to her left, the table to her right. But no Lisa.
‘Lisa!’ She moved to look up the stairs from the hallway. ‘LISA!’
Nothing. Strange.
Back in the kitchen, she couldn’t hear the oven. No smells. No sign of activity at all save for the washing machine rolling lazily through its cycle. Her foot skidded. She tensed and steadied herself and the strain of it aggravated the pain in her leg. She reached out to steady herself on a kitchen worktop. The floor was wet. She looked down for the source but she didn’t have her glasses on. There were two blurred, dark-coloured shapes on the floor. She reached down for one. It was a damp piece of cloth — cotton, she guessed. The second item stuck out from between the units. It felt wet too, but was more solid in her hand. She huffed as she straightened up for a better look. It was a mobile phone. A big one that she hadn’t seen before. The screen lit up as she tilted it towards her face. She used to have one of these. Maybe this was it? She couldn’t remember much about it. She tried to wipe the dampness off. Some of it came off in her hands. It was bright red and thick. Blood? It couldn’t be. She wasn’t bleeding. She checked her hands and arms. Nothing. Her knee ached all of a sudden. She slipped the mobile phone into her cardigan pocket so she wouldn’t lose it again. She needed to sit back down, but in her comfortable chair where she could elevate her leg. She made her way slowly back into the living room.
When she got to her chair she almost fell into it. She was overdoing it; she knew that. Best to stay here until Cathy finished making her dinner. Her doctor programme was paused on the television. She liked this one. It had gotten a bit too complicated recently — she wasn’t entirely sure who was who anymore. But she liked it all the same. Her glasses were on the arm of her chair. Sometimes they hurt her nose. She put them back on gently. The television was a little clearer. She pointed the remote and started it playing again.
Chapter 39
‘Harry Blaker!’ Harry barked into his phone with such ferocity it made Maddie jump. His phone had been going off almost non-stop since he had turned it back on. They had moved away from where Vamp was working, to sit back in Harry’s car. He had moved his car across the entrance on the off-chance that a member of public tried to drive their own car in there. They were waiting for more resources to arrive. Harry had vented his spleen about how there was nothing more important than uniform officers manning the cordon, something he said should have been done hours ago. He’d since found out that the patrol sergeant — pleading a lack of resources — had decided that the murder scene was remote enough that he needn’t send backup there straight away. The DI had taken just a few seconds to put an alternative opinion across. It had been such a loud opinion that Maddie had considered stepping out of the car. The volume was increasing again.
‘When?’ Harry lifted his eyes to Maddie. ‘Okay, who’s going? How far out?’ He leaned forward to where the car keys hung from the ignition. ‘Send the log through. Keep the response team running but we’ll head over there now. I’m with DS Ives. Mark us up as attending and show me making progress.’ He finished the call and started the engine. ‘We need to go!’
Maddie struggled with her seatbelt as Harry pulled away with a squeal in the tyres. ‘My car’s back there!’
‘We’ll get it later.’
‘What’s up?’ Maddie said. The car accelerated hard. It was a short distance to Stone Street, the main road linking Langthorne with Canterbury. He pulled the car left towards Langthorne and handed his phone over to her.
‘There should be an email coming through. We’ve had someone call in. My team have been monitoring the call logs for reports relating to AA meetings, groups of drinkers — anything like that really. A girl has called in and said that she dropped her mate back to her mum’s house and she was with a guy she met at an AA meeting. She hadn’t seen him before. She had to go back later to drop something off and she felt like there was something wrong. It bothered her and as she was walking back to the house, she saw the man leaving alone — she said he was in a white truck.’
‘A white truck?’
‘With a back on it, she said. She couldn’t describe it any better, but I bet we could.’
‘Like a McCall’s truck.’
‘Exactly that.’
‘So where are we going?’
‘That call was ten minutes ago. It’s graded as a medium, which means uniform won’t go out there for days. The informant’s gone back home — she said she doesn’t want to go in there on her own as the mum has dementia and she’s taken a dislike to her. We’re going round to check on the girl. Lisa someone.’
‘Lisa Simpkiss,’ Maddie said. The log had come through to her phone. It was written near the top. ‘Born in eighty-five. She’s a similar age to Lorraine.’
‘She is.’
‘I’m just reading through . . . there’s no description for the male.’ Maddie scanned down as quickly as she could. ‘Harry!’ she exclaimed. ‘The girl who called in . . . she said this bloke’s name was Andy!’
* * *
It took Harry nine minutes to reach the address. A few of the overtakes he did to get there were enough to make Maddie catch her breath — one in particular had her slamming her eyes shut completely — but they arrived in one piece.
Maddie hammered on the door. This time Harry was a few paces back, studying windows on the various floors and access points. The rear gate was pushed open, it banged against its own surround as the breeze moved down the side of the house. She didn’t wait long until she hammered the door again. Suddenly she could see movement through the frosted glass. An outline of someone in dark clothing.
‘Harry, someone’s in!’ she said.
The door pulled open. Just a
bit. Enough for Maddie to see a pair of terrified eyes sunk into an elderly face. Maddie had her badge ready.
‘Ma’am, so sorry to bother you. I’m a police officer and I need to speak with your daughter urgently. Is she in?’
‘My daughter?’ the woman said. She didn’t budge and her expression didn’t change. Her eyes settled on Harry.
‘Yes, ma’am. Lisa. Lisa Simpkiss — she lives here, right?’
‘She . . . no. It’s just me and Cathy. I’ll go and get her.’ She pushed the door shut. Maddie shifted her foot just in time to stop it from closing. The elderly woman had already turned away. She was walking towards the kitchen and didn’t seem to realise that the door had bounced back open.
Maddie looked back at Harry. ‘She’s got something on her hands. It looks like blood to me.’ She moved into the house and called out. ‘Sorry, ma’am?’
The old lady reappeared at the entrance to the kitchen. ‘What are you doing in here? You can’t come in here! I’ll call the police. Get out!’
Maddie held her arms out to show she meant no harm. She let her badge fall back open in her right hand. ‘I am the police, okay? We both are. We just need to speak to your daughter.’
‘Well, you can’t. I think she went out to the shops.’
‘Okay. What is your name? So I know who I’m talking to.’
‘Olive!’
‘Olive . . . great. Are you okay, Olive? Did you cut your hand?’
‘My hand? No!’ She lifted her hands to inspect them. She seemed confused by the staining.
‘Is that blood? Are you hurt?’
‘No! I don’t think so.’ Her anger dropped away, it was confusion now. She raised watery eyes. ‘I don’t know!’
Maddie stepped towards her. She smiled, doing her best to be reassuring. ‘Shall we sit you down? We just need to speak to you about Lisa, is all. I want to be sure you’re both okay and then we will leave you alone.’
‘Lisa? She’s not here. What’s that?’ Her eyes were looking beyond where Maddie was standing. Maddie turned to see what she was indicating.
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