Rage Against The Machine: Special Edition (Dan & Chloe Book 1)

by Flamank, Nathan L.

  Chloe stamped down hard with her right foot on the woman’s left hand; the woman let out a gurgled cry.

  ‘Don’t even think about it bitch or I’ll break your arm!’ Chloe hissed.

  The woman slumped back down and Chloe smiled down at her. Dan saw that it was a far cry from her usual cheerful smile; this look chilled Dan, he realised there was real steel within Chloe, a determination and he wouldn’t forget it. He had to admit that she scared him a little; God knew how the woman had to be feeling.

  ‘We’re going to ask you some questions and if you’re not forthcoming he’ll start snapping bones; okay?’

  The woman looked at them both and then nodded her head.

  ‘Good, what’s your name?’

  ‘Rebecca,’ the woman managed; her voice sounded hoarse and she coughed. ‘Could I have some of that coke please; my mouth is full of blood.’

  ‘Sure.’ Chloe said and handed the woman the remainders of the coke.

  Rebecca drank it down quickly; she finished and touched her jaw tentatively. Rebecca smiled at Chloe. ‘That’s one hell of a swing you have.’ She even managed to crack a smile.

  ‘Next question; who the fuck is after us? And don’t think about beating around the bush, I haven’t the time and I’m a very impatient person so just start talking.’

  Rebecca struggled to understand how it had all gone so wrong; twenty minutes she thought she’d had everything under control. She’d watched Dan and Chloe go into the boutique; she had been confident that they hadn’t made her and she had called Rufus. He’d answered on the second ring.

  ‘Tell me,’ he had simply stated.

  ‘They’re shopping for lingerie,’ Rebecca had calmly informed him.

  ‘What!’ Rufus had screamed, the sudden rage making her jump. ‘What the fuck does that whore think she is playing at? There are rules and she’s not playing fair!’

  There had been a minute of silence and then Rufus had said, ‘Why are they shopping?’

  Rebecca had shaken her head, ‘How should I know, but that’s what they’re doing; like they haven’t a care in the world.’ Rebecca then saw Chloe in the shop flashing her breasts at Dan. ‘Especially the woman; I get the impression she thinks this is all a big farce.’

  ‘Her name is Chloe.’ Rufus had stated and Rebecca had picked up on the longing in his voice.

  ‘Okay; Chloe, she’s acting like a highly sexed teen; she could be his daughter for God’s sake.’

  ‘She’s nineteen, I don’t know how old he is, yet; but that’s not your concern. Have they spotted you?’

  ‘Rufus baby, I wouldn’t be calling you if they had spotted me would I?’ Rebecca said. ‘Relax; where are you?’

  ‘I’m about thirty minutes out; stuck in traffic at the minute. Traffic, can you believe it? It shouldn’t be allowed, it shouldn’t be playing out like this.’

  Rebecca had been confused by Rufus’ phrases and cryptic-isms. He had made no sense to her. She’d known he was insane for a long time; it had only been her deep paralysing fear of him that had made her take this job in the first place. When he had called her earlier that morning and told her what he wanted her to do she had desperately wanted to tell him no, but she remembered what he was capable of and so she had quickly agreed.

  She’d worked for him in the past doing rolling surveillance on numerous men, his prey; and once she had lost one of her marks and when Rufus had finished his game he had come and paid her a visit. The things that he had done to her still made her feel sick and she couldn’t look at a milk bottle without fighting the overwhelming urge to vomit.

  ‘Keep following them Becky, and don’t lose them; you do remember what happened the last time you screwed up?’

  ‘Yes Rufus I remember; how could I forget. I try to but it’s always there.’ Rebecca had replied. She’d not taken her eyes off the boutique and she caught glimpses of Chloe at the changing rooms.

  Rufus, as if sensing her mood, had tried to placate her, ‘I’m sorry my love, but mistakes must be taken to hand, otherwise everyone would be living in sin and Father doesn’t like that.’

  She hadn’t known what he was talking about then. It had been the first time he had ever mentioned a father. Rebecca had turned her face up to the sun and realised she should have moved abroad years ago; escaped to sunnier climates where she could have hopefully forgotten about Rufus. She needed to get away from this madman, but she had accepted his money now so there was no way back.

  ‘I do have total faith in you Becky, and perhaps, once this is all over we could go out together, somewhere nice, would you like that?’

  ‘Yes,’ she had replied. She had no intention of doing any such thing, right then she had made the decision that once this was all over she was running as far as she could to get away from him.

  ‘Finally the traffic is moving, I better go, and I’ll see you soon.’ Rufus had said.

  ‘Okay.’

  She’d cut the connection and waited. Dan and Chloe had come out of the store and she had followed them. Dan would cast quick furtive glances around; which she had expected. What she hadn’t been prepared for was when they suddenly made a sprint for it and she had been so shocked and surprised that she had been slow to react. She had wondered how they had made her. She was a professional but she hadn’t the time right then to ponder the question as her quarry disappeared through a mews of shops and she had given chase.

  With her cover blown she had given chase without fear of them, she wasn’t armed; the rail networks were too risky, too many armed officers but she was proficient in karate and she had no doubt that she could subdue them both quite easily. She’d been looking forward to slapping the bitch around and she’d followed them down the alley. She had been close behind them when they had turned into another alley and without thinking she had followed. She hadn’t thought about being ambushed.

  She hadn’t felt the bag connect; just the darkness that had taken her down into visions of milk bottles, blood and Rufus’ demonic grin.

  Looking up at Dan and Chloe Rebecca decided to tell them everything, there was nothing to gain by keeping silent and Chloe had surprised her with her cunning and aggression. Rebecca needed to get out of London as quickly as possible; she didn’t want to be here when Rufus arrived. She needed to escape and the quickest way to do that was to get out of her current predicament as speedily as possible which meant talking to them.

  Rebecca pushed herself up on to her elbows and looked at Dan and Chloe. Her suit jacket was torn open, her bra exposed but neither seemed to be taking any notice. Her skirt was rucked up and she had scratches down her legs and on her hands from her crash to the pavement. She ran her tongue around her mouth; she felt three loose teeth and a gap where another had been knocked out; she winced at the sudden sharp jab of pain.

  ‘His name’s Rufus Cartwright, at least that’s what I know him as; and I’m sorry to tell you this but you’re both dead, you just don’t realise it yet.’ Rebecca pointed up at Chloe. ‘Though death is preferable to what he’ll do to you.’

  Chloe’s face lost a little colour but she managed, with some conviction to say, ‘Yeah, well fuck him.’

  Rebecca laughed. ‘That’s exactly what he’ll do to you and trust me; you won’t enjoy it, in fact you’ll never recover from it.’

  ‘Shut up.’ Dan Said, ‘Just tell us about him, we haven’t got the time to fuck around here.’

  ‘I know,’ Rebecca said. ‘You’ve got about twenty minutes before he gets here.’

  ‘And how do you know that?’ Chloe asked.

  ‘Mobile phone, it’s in my front pocket.’

  ‘Okay, get it; but be real slow about it,’ Dan said.

  Rebecca retrieved her mobile from her pocket and held it up to Chloe. ‘Take it; I’m done with all this.’ She handed Chloe her Nokia. ‘His number’s in there, along with some other stuff; I mean it, I just want out of here before he turns up.’

  Chloe slipped the phone into her bag.

 
; Rebecca coughed. ‘I spoke with him only minutes ago, he’ll be here soon and he’s raging.’ Rebecca smiled at Chloe. ‘You’re very wily, all that shit with the lingerie shop, when I told him where you were he almost exploded with rage and he started to babble about shit. He thinks that you’re not taking him seriously. Having sex on the train, going shopping; he never suspected that sort of thing.’

  ‘Told you,’ Chloe said to Dan and smiled.

  Dan kissed her forehead. ‘Like I said, you’re a genius.’

  ‘I thought you weren’t taking this thing seriously too,’ Rebecca said, she rubbed her jaw and chuckled ruefully, ‘I know better now though.’

  ‘We’re taking it deadly serious.’ Dan said.

  ‘So you told him about our session on the train?’

  ‘Yes Chloe and he wasn’t happy about that.’

  Dan turned to Chloe. ‘Did you know she was watching us fuck?’

  Chloe shook her head. ‘No, only that she was nearby, I knew it would get back to Rufus and piss him off.’

  ‘How did you know that?’ Dan asked.

  ‘Just something he said on the phone to me.’ Chloe turned back to Rebecca and said, ‘Are there others like you out there?’

  Rebecca shrugged, ‘I don’t know, and that’s the truth. He rang me from your flat and told me to get to the train station; he knew I lived in your neck of the woods, an unfortunate fact as far as you two are concerned. He thought you may go that way. I only just made it in time.’ Rebecca coughed again; she was in considerable pain now, her mouth was on fire, ‘I don’t know about any others, I do know that he’s used other people in the past to help him on his hunts.’

  ‘Hunts, the past; what are you on about, make sense?’ Dan demanded.

  ‘You’re not the first that he’s hunted. He’s been doing it for years, he picks a target and tells them they have seventy two hours to survive and then the game starts.’

  ‘Game?’ Dan shouted. ‘This is no fucking game!’

  Rebecca shook her head, ‘It is to him. He’s very rich, very connected and totally insane; this is a hobby to him. There others like him too.’

  Dan and Chloe both looked at each other in concern.

  ‘Where?’ Chloe asked.

  ‘Here, in America, Africa, Australia, the orient; it’s a network. They have a website where they post pictures and messages to one another.’

  ‘Jesus.’ Dan said. ‘What about the authorities? Someone must know something.’

  Rebecca laughed again. ‘Why would they? People are murdered every day; yours would just go down as another unexplained murder. Even if someone did piece it all together Rufus and his friends would just make them disappear; you’re both way out of your depth.’

  ‘Maybe,’ Chloe said.’ Where does he live? What are his habits?’

  Rebecca shook her head, ‘I really don’t know, I’ve met him a few times; for surveillance.’

  Chloe nodded and then brought her foot down hard on Rebecca’s left hand and they all heard the bones break. Rebecca screamed out.

  ‘Shut the fuck up! Bullshit, you know nothing; how did you meet him?’ Chloe screamed.

  ‘Okay. Okay,’ Rebecca said. She held her broken hand close to her breasts and sighed. ‘I run a private detection firm. He approached me four years ago.’

  Dan interrupted her, ‘He’s been doing this that long?’

  ‘Let her talk baby.’ Chloe said.

  ‘At first I thought it was a one off, the money was more than I’d normally make in a month; I didn’t know then what I know now. I only found out later about the hunts and his network of like-minded psychos.’

  ‘Why didn’t you go to the authorities when you did realise what he was up to?’ Dan asked.

  ‘Money; that’s right isn’t it Rebecca?’ Chloe said.

  Rebecca’s eyes teared up. ‘But I only watched them; I never got involved in the kills. When he killed them he didn’t want anyone else there. I was purely eyes only.’

  ‘You could have warned the victims, helped them to escape, you could have done a hundred different things; the fact that you didn’t makes you as complicit in their deaths as Rufus, their blood is on your hands.’ Chloe said with real venom in her voice.

  ‘I know I know; but you don’t know Rufus; what he is capable off, he scares me.’

  ‘Right now worry about us, tell us everything and spare us the bullshit,’ Dan said. He shivered as a gust of wind blew down the alley sending old scraps of newspaper into the air where they whirled by like leaves caught in a breeze.

  Rebecca asked if she could smoke, Dan nodded and she got her cigarettes out and lit one. Rebecca slipped it between her lips and inhaled deeply; she blew the smoke out through her nostrils.

  ‘Like I said he contacted me for a surveillance job. He said it was a one off but he came back again and again. Always the same amount of money but different men and different cities, I think I made myself not think about it too much as I liked him.’ Rebecca laughed bitterly. ‘Can you believe that? We began to date; he could be very charming, sophisticated and he was always very generous, but that was back in the early days.’ She inhaled deeply on the cigarette and held the poisonous smoke in her lungs for several seconds before exhaling. ‘The sex soon became rough; sadistic, but he always knew just when to stop, eventually he told me all about the hunts, that’s how he explained what he did, you’d think he was talking about shooting pheasant. I decided then to cut free, to get away from him but.’ Rebecca looked off into space, her thoughts tumbling back in time and she trembled with disgust.

  ‘But what?’ Chloe asked softly; she could see that Rebecca’s attitude had changed, maybe she had been wrong about her, and perhaps she was just petrified of Rufus and used to doing what he instructed her to do.

  ‘But something went wrong on the surveillance job that I was doing for him, I’d intended it to be my last, to use the money to get as far away from Rufus as I could but I lost the prey and Rufus made me pay for it. I don’t want to talk about what he did to me, I won’t, and I can’t.’

  Rebecca finished her cigarette and lit a fresh one from the butt of the one she’d just finished smoking. She turned her attention fully on Chloe, her eyes locked on Chloe’s and she said, ‘If he gets you Chloe, or gets close to it, if Dan is gone or everything turns wrong and it’ll be just you and Rufus then my advice is throw yourself in front of a train, jump off a building, shoot yourself if you have to; just don’t let him take you.’

  Dan felt physically ill, and he could see that the words had affected Chloe too; her face betrayed the first flash of fear; maybe for the first time she was regretting walking down to that motorway.

  ‘He’s sick and twisted and evil; it flows through his veins like blood. After what he did to me I was too afraid to say no to him, I’m sorry.’ Rebecca said and a tear ran down the left side of her nose.

  ‘Before today when was the last time he contacted you for surveillance?’ Dan asked.

  ‘About four weeks ago, he hunts on average once a month or so, you’re this month’s pheasant.’

  ‘But he wasn’t supposed to be,’ Chloe said. ‘Dan was a last minute alternative.’

  Rebecca looked surprised, ‘Really?’

  ‘Yes,’ Dan said.

  Rebecca nodded, ‘Then you stand a chance, not much of one, but a chance nonetheless. Rufus normally researches his prey, monitors them for weeks, and looks for their weaknesses. He won’t have had the opportunity to do that with you, you’re an unknown quantity.’

  ‘So we have something going for us,’ Chloe said.

  ‘Yes, if he doesn’t know where you live, what you do, where you normally go, then you’ve a chance.’

  ‘But he tracked your car Dan, how do we explain that?’ Chloe asked.

  ‘I’ve been thinking about that all morning, I lent it to George two days ago.’

  ‘Who’s George?’ Rebecca asked.

  ‘That’s not your concern. Tell us about this website he uses,�
�� Chloe demanded. She was beginning to sweat; it was sweltering down here in the stuffy confines of the darkened doorway. Chloe untied the shirt’s knot under her breasts, she flapped the blouse; fanning her skin, cooling herself and Dan stared at her.

  He was briefly entranced by the sight; her full breasts (dam they were so big), the nipples poking through, her blemish-free skin, the sweat, it was too much and he averted his eyes.

  Jesus I’m fucking going nuts, I have to be.

  Rebecca filled them in on the website, ‘It’s called “Big Game” dot net, if you type it in on a computer remember that the B and G are uppercase, if you type it all in lowercase it won’t come up; it’s all on there, people, places, dates; everything you need to know.’

  ‘You dated him, so where did he take you; where does he live?’ Dan wanted to know.

  ‘I don’t know where he lives; really I don’t,’ she flicked her cigarette away. ‘He uses hotels a lot, whenever we met up he always took me back to a hotel. There’s one in Edinburgh called The Majestic, we went there several times and we always had the same suite and the staff knew him very well. He was on first name basis with most of them too.’

  ‘That’s a start,’ Chloe said. ‘We may as well head there; they may have an address for him.’

  ‘What about Hertford?’ Dan asked.

  Chloe shrugged, ‘Up to you but we have a name now and a known haunt, I’d say we’ll have more luck up there than in Hertford but it’s your call.’

  Dan nodded; he couldn’t take his eyes of her breasts and Chloe pushed her arms together; squeezing her breasts together.

  Dan met her eyes and smiled, ‘Sorry.’

  ‘No need to be.’

  ‘We’ll go to Edinburgh.’

  Dan and Chloe stepped out in to the alley and looked in both directions; ready to leave.

  ‘What about me?’ Rebecca asked.

  ‘Run far away, like you wanted to,’ Dan said.

  ‘My phone?’

  ‘We’ll keep it,’ said Chloe.

  ‘He’ll ring soon.’

  ‘Let us worry about that Rebecca.’ Chloe said as she held a hand down to Rebecca. ‘Come on; get up.’