Last Breath

by Robert Bryndza

  Joe’s face came alive, and he opened his mouth.

  ‘Bed wetter, filthy little bed wetter!’ he hissed, the grin widening.

  * * *

  Darryl woke with a jolt, and sat up. It was dark in his bedroom, and there was banging on his door. He stumbled up through the darkness and opened it.

  His parents were out on the landing.

  ‘It’s half one in the fucking afternoon,’ said John. ‘What the hell are you doing in bed?’

  ‘I called in sick for work,’ said Darryl, rubbing his eyes.

  ‘You didn’t,’ said his mother. ‘I’ve just had some woman on the phone called Bryony, says she’s your boss and she wanted to know where you are…’

  ‘Work is what defines us,’ said John, jabbing his finger at Darryl for emphasis. ‘A job is a job, and there’s millions out there who can’t find work.’

  ‘I’ll sort it, Dad,’ said Darryl.

  John looked down at Darryl’s crotch, and back up at his face. ‘You’ve pissed yourself,’ he said.

  Darryl looked down and saw to his horror that the front of his boxer shorts were soaked.

  ‘Oh, oh, no…’

  ‘How old are you? Jesus Christ!’ said John, shaking his head, and he walked off to the stairs.

  ‘Mum… I didn’t… I…’ Darryl started blubbing, the nightmare still clinging to him.

  Mary looked at him with concern, and then bent and pulled down his boxers.

  ‘No!’ cried Darryl, trying to step back, but she held on tight to the waistband.

  ‘Come on, I need to get these in the wash…’

  ‘Mum! Please!’

  In the tussle, the wet boxer shorts tangled around his knees and he went crashing backwards into the bedroom.

  Mary advanced on him. ‘It’s nothing I haven’t seen before. I’ll put them through the wash,’ she said, reaching down and pulling them off his thrashing legs.

  Darryl writhed around and covered his nakedness with his hands. She moved past him into the bedroom, holding his dripping boxers, and opened the curtains.

  ‘Mum, leave me alone,’ said Darryl, mortified.

  She surveyed the room: his two computers on the desk, the huge laminated map of Greater London on the wall, and then she looked at the large yellow wet patch covering the bedsheet. Her eyes came back to him lying on the floor, with his hands covering his privates. ‘Get yourself cleaned up. Looks like we’re back to the plastic sheet again,’ she said, walking out, swinging the wet boxers in her hand.

  When she was gone, Darryl got up and grabbed for his towel on the back of the chair, feeling shame and embarrassment. He looked back at the wardrobe. He hadn’t wet the bed since he was sixteen, when Joe had hung himself.

  Chapter Fifty-One

  The door-to-door on Copers Cope Road in Beckenham had been extensive, but came up with nothing. No one, it seemed, had been taking in their surroundings or seen anything. The CCTV outside the gym and the train station further down the road didn’t have a direct view of the road. Again, he’d been and gone, managing to stay in the shadows and leaving without a trace.

  Erika returned home late on Tuesday afternoon and slumped onto the sofa, attempting to grab a few hours’ sleep. She dozed fitfully: her dreams were filled with the battered faces of Janelle, Lacey and Ella, and then she found herself in a high-walled car park. It was night, and the car park was empty apart from a black dumpster in its far corner. A small man in a baseball cap was hunched over it. She ran at him, her feet slipping on the snow, and grabbed his shoulder, spinning him around, yanking off his baseball cap…

  But he had no face. Where his face should have been was a blur of shadows. She stepped back and looked into the dumpster. She saw herself, lying battered and bloody amongst the bags and the eggshells and rotting food.

  * * *

  She woke with her phone ringing. It was dark, and she fumbled for it in her pocket. It was Isaac.

  ‘I’ve finished the post-mortem on Ella Wilkinson,’ he said.

  ‘I’ll be right there,’ she replied.

  There was a fine drizzle when she parked her car outside the mortuary in Penge, and she made a dash inside. The weather had warmed a little and rain was mingling with the melting snow. Isaac met her at the door and they went straight through to the mortuary. His team was just finishing up; a DI and a CSI, plus a photographer and an exhibits officer. They left, nodding at Erika on their way past. Ella Wilkinson’s body lay on the steel mortuary table, covered in a clean white sheet to her neck.

  Erika didn’t know if she could do this again. She knew what was coming, knew that this girl had been tortured in the most gruesome fashion.

  ‘I’ll make this as swift as I can,’ said Isaac softly, seeming to read her thoughts. He moved to the body and peeled back the sheet. ‘As with Lacey Greene and Janelle Robinson, she suffered multiple incisions, some of which had started to heal. There are also tears to the left nipple which are consistent with her being bitten.’

  ‘Bitten? He didn’t bite the other victims?’

  ‘No. Unfortunately there is not a clear impression to examine. The left cheekbone, cranium and the wrist in the right arm are broken, and she has three broken ribs to the left side of her body… There is an incision in the right upper thigh, which severed the femoral artery. As with the other victims, this would have been fatal.’

  Erika closed her eyes and placed her hand to her forehead. When she opened them again, she looked at the y-shaped incision sewn neatly but crudely up the victim’s sternum. She suddenly felt light-headed, and gripped hold of the edge of the mortuary table; her knees gave way a little and Isaac rushed around to support her.

  ‘It’s okay,’ he said, hooking his hands under her arms. His two assistants looked up at her curiously.

  ‘I’m fine,’ she said. But as he let go, her knees buckled again.

  ‘Come on, come to the office and let me get you a glass of water,’ he said.

  * * *

  Isaac’s office was warm and inviting in comparison to the cold mortuary, and Erika sat down on one of the cosy armchairs. He went to a small fridge and pulled out a bottle of water, handing it to her. She took a long gulp and sat back.

  ‘You look pale.’

  ‘I always look pale,’ she joked.

  He took her wrist and felt her pulse. ‘What’s your resting heart rate?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Do you exercise?’

  ‘I rush about,’ she said.

  ‘When was your last health check?’

  ‘Um, couple of years ago. Do you remember when that kid bit me at Lewisham Row? I had to have a screen, bloods, the works.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘And it was all clear.’

  Isaac came and sat in the armchair opposite.

  ‘Have you been sleeping?’

  ‘A little, but with this case, sleep isn’t something I have the luxury of doing.’

  ‘That’s no way to live.’

  ‘That is how I live,’ she snapped and took another swig of water. ‘Sorry,’ she added. To her horror she started to cry.

  Isaac reached out and took her hand, and she let him hold it softly.

  ‘As I said, this is no way to live, Erika.’

  ‘I don’t know how to live anymore. When I met Mark, I resisted him. Not that I didn’t want to be with him, but I felt how easily we became a unit. There was always someone to come home to. Someone to go out with, to share things… I need it, but even then I could see it was a weakness, if that makes sense?’

  ‘You thought being in love was a weakness?’ said Isaac, raising one of his thin eyebrows.

  Erika nodded. ‘Isn’t it easier in the long run to be alone? It’s just you, there’s no vulnerabilities, nothing can be taken from you.’

  ‘That’s a deeply depressing way of looking at life, Erika.’

  ‘You know what it’s like to lose someone. When Stephen died last year? Don’t you feel vulnerable?’

&nbs
p; Isaac straightened up a little; he looked as if he was feeling uncomfortable. ‘I loved Stephen, but we were only together for a couple of years, and as you remember it was… tumultuous.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter how long you loved someone. It doesn’t mean you miss them any less when they’re gone.’

  He nodded. Erika wiped a tear away.

  ‘It’s one of the reasons I resisted having kids with Mark. I kept putting it off… He wanted them.’

  Isaac sat very still and just listened.

  Erika went on: ‘When Mark died… I tried to be practical. I thought that if I could get past one day, one week, month, a year, it would get easier, but it doesn’t. And not only is there the loss to deal with, which threatens to crush you every single day, you’re left with all this life left to lead. Alone. No one really talks about that, do they?’

  Isaac nodded.

  She went on: ‘Getting over the loss, that bit people can sympathise with and understand, but moving on, trying to fill the gap the loss has left, is impossible… You know I’ve been seeing Peterson – James – since before Christmas.’

  Isaac nodded. ‘You like him, don’t you?’

  Erika nodded and got up, grabbing the box of tissues from the desk opposite.

  ‘He just wants to be with me, and I keep pushing him away. He’s such a good guy… Like Mark, he was the one everyone loved. I just don’t know why Mark had to die and I’m still here. He was a great guy. I’m just a bitch.’

  Isaac laughed.

  ‘I am, it’s not funny.’

  ‘You’re not a bitch, but you have to act like one sometimes. It helps you get the job done.’

  ‘Isaac, this case, it’s going to be the one that gets away. I know it. I have nothing. And I have to bring Ella Wilkinson’s parents here later to formally identify her body… And I have to go to Sparks’s funeral tomorrow… He’s left behind two small kids.’

  ‘Erika, you need to get a grip on all this. Do you want to come and stay at mine for a few days? You can come and go as you please, and it helps to have someone to come home to… I promise to keep my hands to myself.’

  Erika laughed. ‘No, thank you, but I just want to be alone.’

  ‘No, you don’t… Every day I have to do post-mortems on people, and so many of them had their whole lives ahead of them. They probably died wishing they could have done things differently, wishing they had been nicer, loved more, not stressed so much. Go and see James. You could be dead tomorrow, and lying on that slab in there.’

  ‘Brutal, but true,’ said Erika. ‘You should give advice more.’

  ‘I do, but most of the people I see at work can’t do anything with it. They’re dead.’

  Erika held on to him again and gave him a long hug.

  Chapter Fifty-Two

  Peterson was at home watching television when the doorbell rang. He checked the time and saw it was just before eight; he muted the sound and went to the front door. He was surprised to see Erika when he opened the door; she was completely drenched from the rain. Her hair flat against her head. They stood there in silence for a moment, just the sound of the rain drumming on the windows.

  ‘Is it raining?’ he asked.

  ‘Just spitting,’ she replied. They both burst out laughing.

  ‘Come in, woman, before you freeze to death,’ he said, standing to one side.

  ‘I’m sorry about the other night,’ she said, going inside.

  He closed the door, and she took his face in her hands and kissed him urgently. He hesitated, and then responded. They staggered to the bedroom, pulling at each other’s clothes until they sank down onto the bed.

  * * *

  ‘You’ve got so much food in your cupboards,’ said Erika, when they had dragged themselves out of bed a couple of hours later, now hungry.

  They each had a beer; Erika was wearing one of his huge sleeping T-shirts with a faded picture of Scooby-Doo on the front.

  ‘Have I?’ he said, sitting on the countertop opposite her, wearing just a pair of boxer shorts.

  ‘You have Kaffir Lime leaves… What the hell can you cook with those?’

  ‘Curry. Noodle dishes. Loads.’ He grinned, taking a sip of his beer.

  ‘Seems a shame that we’ve ordered pizza.’

  ‘I’ll cook for you some other time,’ he said, getting down and wrapping his hands around her waist.

  She ran her hands down his smooth muscular back and felt the warmth of his skin pressed against hers.

  ‘I’d like that,’ she said, resting her chin on his shoulder. ‘I wish I was shorter, there’s something about resting your head on a guy’s chest… It’s comforting.’

  ‘You want me to rest my head on yours instead?’

  ‘Ha ha, very funny…’

  They stood hugging in silence for a minute. Erika looked around his flat. It was a classic man pad with black leather furniture, and a giant television with a games console on the carpet in front. There was a picture of him, taken when he was a teenager with his parents and grandparents, and his sister. She remembered the story he’d told her, how his sister had killed herself when she was a teenager. She realised she wasn’t the only person in the world who had lost someone.

  ‘Mark was a little shorter than me. It really used to get to him. He hated me wearing heels, not that I did all that often, but sometimes I wanted to.’

  ‘I’m not trying to replace him,’ said Peterson, pulling back and looking her in the eyes. ‘I know I could never do that.’

  ‘I know you’re not, but I need to move forward, and I like you, a lot. And I think Mark would have liked you.’

  Peterson leaned in and gave her a kiss. The doorbell rang. ‘That’ll be the pizza,’ he said.

  * * *

  They settled down in front of the late news with the hot pizza and a fresh beer each. The national news didn’t mention the death of Ella Wilkinson, but the local London news ran it as their first story. They had footage of the crime scene in Beckenham; luckily the news reporters had arrived at the crime scene after the pathologist’s work was complete, so all that they had to show was the police cordon across the car park entrance, and a lone police car. They did show a couple of short clips, interviews with concerned locals; a young woman with two small children and an old man in a flat cap.

  ‘Makes me worry about letting the kids go out to play,’ said the woman, holding on to her fidgeting young son and daughter.

  ‘It’s not the kind of thing you expect in these parts, terrible business,’ said the old man, squinting at the camera through his thick glasses.

  Then they cut to a woman outside a set of iron gates, with a house in the distance down a long driveway. The road was dark and windy, and she was bathed in the glare of a spotlight. Her hair whipped across her face, and she brushed it away with a gloved hand.

  ‘Police last night raided this farm, just twenty miles away from the capital,’ she intoned. ‘No arrests were made, but concerned locals are asking if the death of Ella Wilkinson is linked to the deaths of Lacey Greene, a young woman from North London, and Janelle Robinson, a homeless woman whose body was found last summer. All victims were found in similar circumstances, dumped in refuse bins. We contacted the Met Police for further comment, but no one was available…’

  The news report cut back to the studio, and the next story, about the lack of cycle paths in the borough of Islington.

  ‘I hate local news,’ said Erika. ‘They always manage to sound clueless, but end up scaring the shit out of people.’

  ‘Perhaps they should be scared,’ said Peterson.

  ‘And Melanie is inconsistent… We’re talking as friends now, okay,’ Erika added. Peterson nodded. ‘She really stepped up, authorising the raid the other night, but then she goes AWOL, and I can’t get hold of her.’

  On cue Erika’s phone began to ring. She wiped her hands and went to her coat. ‘Speak of the devil,’ she said holding up the handset. She answered.

  ‘Erika, have you
seen the news?’ snapped Melanie.

  ‘I’m watching it.’

  ‘Why did it say no one at the Met was available to comment?’

  ‘Because no one was. I’ve tried to call you. Colleen is still working on follow-ups from the appeal, and Ella Wilkinson’s parents only identified her body a couple of hours ago.’

  Melanie huffed and puffed on the end of the phone. ‘Well, we’ve been called into a meeting with the Assistant Commissioner tomorrow morning at nine. We need to be prepared.’

  ‘I am prepared. You’re the one who’s been incommunicado for the last couple of days,’ said Erika. She saw Peterson’s face wincing as she said this.

  ‘I am Acting Superintendent, Erika, and until you know what that entails keep your opinions to yourself. I will see you tomorrow at New Scotland Yard.’

  With that she hung up the phone. Peterson was still shaking his head.

  ‘Why did you just go off on her like that?’

  ‘I’m pissed off!’

  ‘And how did it help, having a go at your boss?’

  ‘Hang on. I’m YOUR boss.’

  ‘Not right now. You’re just a fit bird eating pizza in my flat.’ He smiled.

  ‘Fit bird?’

  ‘What? You’re not fit?’

  ‘Well. I’m certainly not a bird.’

  ‘So you’re my girlfriend?’