Ready or Not

by Thomas, Rachel

  Inside the warehouse there was nothing but dust and rubble. The building was divided into two separate halves and there was a wall to the right of her, with a door in the middle. The door was slightly ajar, but not opened wide enough for Kate to see what was beyond. Above them there was a frantic flapping. She looked up to see a bird rise from its resting place on one of the steel girders in the roof. It escaped through one of the many huge gaps open to the sky and was lost, leaving nothing but grey steel and grey clouds behind it.

  The door banged loudly behind her. Kate spun around, expecting to find herself alone in the building, locked inside the warehouse with no means of escape, hands still cuffed behind her back and no mobile phone with which to try and call Chris.

  Matthew Curtis was still there, still had the gun pointing at her. Beside him, Neil raised a hand and pushed Matthew’s arm down, taking the gun from him and putting it on the ground behind them.

  ‘What happened to her face?’ he said.

  ‘I had to,’ Matthew said quickly, sounding more like the Matthew Kate knew and recognised. ‘She tried to grab the gun.’

  Neil glared at him and walked over to Kate. He stood in front of her and raised a hand to her face, placing a finger on her nose and pressing slightly. Kate winced, but she couldn’t be sure if it was the pain in her face or the sight of Neil that caused the reaction.

  ‘Looks broken,’ Neil said quietly.

  Kate felt the warmth of his breath on her face. She could feel tears building behind her eyes, but they were tears of anger now rather than fear.

  ‘Poor Katy,’ Neil crooned. He leaned towards her, bent and kissed her on the forehead. ‘But after what you tried to do to me today,’ he said, pulling away, ‘you probably deserved it.’

  Kate worked her wrists behind her back, but there was no way she was going to free them from the cuffs. She would have to try and talk him down; although knowing what she now did about Neil Davies, and Matthew Curtis, she imagined any efforts in that area would prove futile. She was now more certain than ever that Neil could have been responsible for all three murders; he was unlikely to stop at her, regardless of how he may have felt towards her.

  She cursed herself for her own naivety and stupidity, even now. He didn’t have feelings for you, Kate – he used you. She didn’t know how, or why, but he had used her. Even now, she couldn’t understand why he had tried so hard to get close to her.

  Why did he expose himself to the police in that way?

  What did she have that he wanted?

  ‘Why did you do it, Kate?’ Neil asked, circling her like a magician assessing his assistant. He had already noticed her trying to free her wrists from the cuffs and laughed at the pointlessness of her efforts.

  ‘I’d give up if I were you,’ he said quietly.

  Matthew Curtis had sunk onto the floor by the door. The struggle he’d had with Kate in the car seemed to have taken it out of him, but not quite enough to prevent him from admiring his handiwork on Kate’s face. Between his legs the gun still lay on the ground and he pushed it around aimlessly with his foot.

  ‘Matthew!’ Neil snapped suddenly, spinning towards him. ‘Keep doing that and you’ll blow your own balls off.’

  Neil turned back to Kate. ‘Sorry about that.’ He tutted and shook his head disapprovingly. ‘He’s still learning. Now, where was I? Oh, yes. You were just about to tell me why you were planning on setting me up today?’

  Kate looked to the ground and tried to avoid Neil’s eyes. They bored into her like some crazed snake charmer. The migraine that had threatened to paralyse her earlier was back with full force, burning behind her eyes, and she couldn’t be sure if it was that or Neil’s fixed stare that was threatening to hypnotise her.

  ‘What’s going on with you two?’ Kate asked, nodding to Matthew.

  ‘I’ll ask the questions,’ Neil said. ‘And didn’t your mother ever teach you not to answer a question with another question? Mine never did either. Now…why?

  ‘Did you kill Joseph Ryan?’ Kate asked quietly. She looked up slowly and his face was almost unrecognisable. Anger flared like torches within the blue of his eyes; his mouth was a thin strip, twisted into a leering sneer.

  ‘Sorry?’ Neil said, moving closer towards her, his face in hers. ‘I couldn’t quite hear you. I’m sure you answered another question with a question.’

  ‘Fuck you,’ Kate said between gritted teeth.

  Neil put a hand on her shoulder and Kate felt her whole body tense. He pressed his lips to her ear, his top lip brushing her skin. ‘You would have,’ he whispered.

  Kate wanted to raise her knee and cause him some permanent damage, but she was aware of the gun and had the reminder of what had happened the last time she’d tried to pull a move like that still searing through her face.

  ‘In answer to your question,’ Neil continued, pulling away again, ‘Yes. I confess.’ He raised his arms dramatically, his fingers spreading in a warped ‘jazz hands’ motion.

  ‘It was me,’ he continued. ‘Joseph Ryan was scum. He was a total shit – cheated on his wife every chance he got, bastard to his kids, ignored them, they might as well have not been there. Have you met his wife?’ He leaned towards Kate again and gave out a long, high whistle. ‘Now, I usually wouldn’t like to say in present company, but I think the rules have changed today.’ He moved to the side of Kate and pressed his mouth over her ear. ‘She. Is. Hot.’

  He pulled away sharply. ‘In conclusion,’ Neil said, as though delivering some sick sermon, ‘he had it great and he shit all over it. Called himself a husband. Called himself a father. Didn’t really deserve either of those titles, I think you’d agree. He deserved what he got. I was just doing my bit to cleanse the environment. Call it community service. You should be pleased, Detective.’

  ‘You can’t keep me here,’ Kate said, hearing the desperation in her own voice. ‘There’ll be police all over here before long.’

  ‘Maybe her boyfriend will come and rescue her,’ Matthew laughed, looking up from the floor. He raised the gun and pointed it at nothing, cocking it and aiming at an imaginary target.

  ‘Oh yeah,’ said Neil. ‘Chris Jones.’ He spoke the name as though it was a nasty taste in his mouth he wanted to spit out. ‘Detective Chief Inspector Chris Jones. You know, Kate, for someone so sad and desperate I’d have thought you’d have pounced on him by now.’

  Kate’s face burned. The colour rushed like a red flood to her skin and she stepped backwards, knocked off balance by the comment. It shamed her that for an embarrassing, vain moment she had been more affected by his calling her ‘desperate’ than she had by discovering Neil had indeed murdered Joseph Ryan. Perhaps it was because she had already known, in her bones, that he had committed the crime; she had never, however, thought of herself as ‘desperate’. She had known Neil for just a week, and this was what he thought of her.

  Christ, she must have been transparent.

  They heard a sudden noise from the other half of the warehouse, like something heavy being knocked over. Matthew rose quickly, took the gun and hurried to the door between the two rooms. He passed through it and pulled it shut behind him, fumbling with locks and bolts on the other side.

  Kate looked Neil in the eye, holding his stare to conceal the wave of nausea that had knocked her sideways at the sound. ‘Who’s in there?

  Fifty

  Neil drummed a fist on the inside door and Matthew unlocked it. Neil made no attempt to stop Kate as she followed him into the other room. He was like an actor on a stage, or a child, preening, performing, saying, ‘Look at me’. He basked in the attentions of his audience, feeding off the energy generated by their watchful, expectant eyes.

  Kate noted the swagger in his step. No fear of retribution; no fear of being caught. ‘Lost his mind,’ was what Mrs Evans had told her when she had visited Sophie. Maybe that had been true. Maybe he’d had nothing much to lose; it didn’t seem as though he had ever been in full possession of his senses at all.
Sophie, Claire…they hadn’t been wrong: they’d been warning her.

  Kate caught her breath when she stepped into the other half of the warehouse. She stopped in her tracks.

  Matthew was lifting a battered wooden chair from the floor; the same chair that had toppled and caused the noise that had interrupted Neil just moments earlier. He pulled it upright, kicking the back of it as he stepped away.

  Tied to the chair was Sophie Davies. Beside her, a young woman and Sophie’s brother were also tied to identical seats that must have served as office chairs when the factory was still running. There were the remains of partitioning that could have once been an office, rotting in the corner of the room.

  All three were gagged. Dried blood stained the right hand side of the woman’s face, her head hung low and her eyes were heavy and drowsy. She was only half conscious and looked in real trouble.

  ‘Shit,’ Kate said. ‘What the hell is this? – are you fucking crazy?’ she spat at Neil.

  ‘Temper, temper,’ he taunted, grabbing her by the arm. ‘You can join them if you like. I’d prefer it if you didn’t though. We have lots to talk about.’

  Ben Davies was crying. The sounds of his sobs were muffled by whatever had been shoved into his mouth, but the sobs were loud enough and fat tears rolled down his cheeks. He was almost unrecognisable from the smiling, happy boy that Kate still had pinned to her office wall; the photograph his foster parents had brought with them to the station.

  Sophie Davies, as fiery as ever, looked angry rather than scared. She watched her father with an intense fury that burned in her eyes like flares. All the spirit that Kate had seen in her during their two meetings – all the anger, the bitterness and resentment – were directed at her father’s face as though she might be able to render him unconscious with palpable waves of hatred.

  She stared at him from beneath her dark lashes, not once looking away. Kate admired her spirit, but at the same time feared the consequences her stubborn streak could lead to. She had already angered Neil by trying to escape from the chair she was tied to and Kate was almost grateful the girl was gagged and unable to speak and enrage him further.

  ‘I told them you were coming,’ Neil said, still holding Kate by the arm. ‘They’ve been waiting for you.’ He gestured to his daughter. ‘You’ve already met Sophie.’

  The girl looked at Kate and her expression didn’t change. The contempt she felt towards her father obviously spilled over to Kate and, at that moment, Kate didn’t blame her. She was a detective inspector. She was supposed to protect children like Sophie, not lead them straight into danger. For all the good she had done, it may as well have been her hands that had tied the poor girl to that chair.

  The girl had trusted her, and Kate had let her down.

  Kate mouthed the word ‘sorry’, though she knew it could never possibly be enough. Sophie rolled her eyes derisively and looked away. Next to her, the woman was struggling to keep her head upright. Her chin kept lolling onto her chest and she was straining to keep her eyes open and keep herself awake.

  ‘Is that Claire?’ Kate asked, struggling to free herself and get to the woman. ‘Christ, what have you done to her?’

  Neil tightened his grip on Kate. ‘She should have kept her mouth shut,’ he sneered.

  ‘She needs help,’ Kate said, pleading with any sense of pity Neil may have had left. ‘Please. Let me get her help.’

  Neil let go of her arm, thrusting her away from him. ‘Let you go, you mean? We’ve only known each other a week, Kate, but I’m sure you realise I’m not that stupid.’

  ‘You do it then,’ she said desperately. ‘Look at her. Please!’

  Neil crossed the room and crouched down in front of his sister-in-law. He held Claire’s face in his hands. Claire winced at his touch, in exactly the way Kate had reacted. This woman that Kate had felt so much contempt towards just yesterday had suddenly far more in common with her than she could ever have imagined. They had both been taken in by this man; both lured and fooled and made to pay the consequences.

  Neil put a finger to the cut on Claire’s face and pushed her head upright, making her grimace in pain.

  ‘She’ll live,’ he said, dropping her head callously. ‘Just needs to sleep it off.’

  Kate looked quickly to Matthew. Matthew shrugged nonchalantly, but there was a glimmer of something behind his eyes; something that looked distinctly uneasy. It was clear who was pulling his strings. That scene back in the car was bravado and panic, Kate was sure of it. He’d been put up to it, goaded into it; for whatever reason, he had something to prove. But what could he possibly have to prove to this man, this monster? Surely if he’d felt he had something to prove it would have been to Chris, and to her, Kate thought?

  Perhaps with a bit of persuasion, Matthew could be steered away from Neil’s control. He was just a puppet; just the same gangly, clumsy boy she’d watched battling with the broken coffee machine days earlier.

  ‘Matthew,’ Kate said, trying to keep her voice even and calm. ‘Don’t do this. You don’t have to do this. Claire needs help. If anything happens to her, you’ll be implicated. You’ll be an accomplice, Matthew. You understand what that means don’t you? It doesn’t have to be like this.’

  Matthew hesitated and looked at the gun in his hands. For an awful moment time stood still. Kate thought he was going to lift it to point at her yet again, but instead he simply stared at the cold piece of metal in his hand.

  He doesn’t know what he’s doing, Kate thought.

  ‘For fucks sake.’ Neil crossed the room to Matthew and impatiently snatched the gun from his accomplice’s hand. ‘Whose side are you on, Matthew?’ he asked angrily, squaring up to him, although Matthew was a good few inches taller.

  Matthew cleared his throat uneasily. ‘Yours,’ he said quietly.

  Neil held his stare. ‘Remember it then,’ he warned him.

  Claire’s head was resting on her chest now, her loose hair cascading around her shoulders and obscuring her face. Sophie, despite her contempt for her aunt, watched her with concern. She wriggled in her chair and tried to push herself closer to Claire.

  ‘Right!’ Neil said suddenly. ‘Let’s get this party started.’

  He grabbed the back of Sophie’s chair and dragged it across the warehouse floor, pulling her away from Claire as though his daughter was weightless.

  ‘She was always the problem child,’ he said, giving his daughter a wink. ‘Weren’t you, Soph?’

  Sophie twisted her neck around to glare again at her father. The thick black make up around her eyes made her look even more furious and, if she was frightened, she was doing a good job at hiding it.

  Certain that she was too far away from Claire to make any further attempts to get close to her, Neil returned to Kate, stood beside her and looked at his children: one petrified; the other, furious.

  ‘How rude of me,’ Neil said, placing a hand on the small of Kate’s back. She squirmed at his touch, arching her back to try and escape his fingers. ‘I haven’t told you how lovely you look. Well, besides the blood on your top,’ he said, gesturing to her chest. ‘We are, after all, on a date. I hope you don’t mind, but I thought I’d combine it with a little family reunion.’

  He moved his arm around her waist and pulled her closer to him. Kate cringed, biting her lower lip to keep herself from an outburst. ‘You were going to have to meet my kids at some point,’ he said. ‘No time like the present.’

  Neil stepped away from Kate, theatrically waving the gun in his right hand.

  ‘Ben,’ he said, walking to his son and putting a hand on the boy’s hunched, terrified shoulder. ‘You were looking for him I believe, Detective, but it would seem I have saved you the trouble. Sophie,’ he continued, waving to his daughter, who now refused to meet his eye. ‘I’d like you to meet Kate. Sorry, silly me…you two have already met, haven’t you?’

  He moved from behind Ben’s chair and walked back to Kate, smiling madly. He stood behind her and r
eturned his hand to her back. She felt his fingers slip beneath her coat, turning her skin cold.

  ‘Kate,’ he said, leaning in towards her. ‘I hope you didn’t have any plans for the rest of the day. We’ve all got so much to catch up on. I’d like you to meet your niece and nephew. Now. Isn’t this cosy?’

  Fifty One

  Chris returned to the station with Superintendent Clayton, still with no idea where his own car was. He had tried Matthew’s mobile but, like Kate’s, it had been turned off. It only confirmed what Chris had feared: that they were both in danger and both cut off from calling for back up. Without communication between them, and with no track on the car, they had little chance of finding out where either Kate or Matthew was.

  Time meant everything now, and with every half hour that slipped away Chris’ fear became more prominent.

  ‘What the hell do you think has happened?’ Clayton asked, tightening his grip on the steering wheel. He shook his greying head angrily; frustrated that events hadn’t gone to plan and worried about Kate Kelly. She was headstrong and impulsive at times, he knew, but she was also a bloody good detective. She wouldn’t have done anything to sabotage what had been planned.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Chris admitted. ‘It was all worked out, it was simple. They should have been there.’

  Clayton’s moustache wriggled furiously as though trying to make a break from his face. ‘What happened between those two?’ he asked quietly.

  Chris had been waiting for the question, but had still not prepared anything that came close to an answer that wouldn’t incriminate her. He was Kate’s friend, but he was also her boss and she had put him in a very difficult position by getting involved with Neil Davies. Hours ago his sympathy for her hadn’t stretched too far, but now… He shook himself and tried not to think the worst.