by Ben Cheetham
A murmur of satisfaction passed through Angel as she realised that Deano thought she was hiding the gun for some other girl. It probably hadn’t even crossed his mind that she’d killed Castle. In his eyes, she was just another scared little lost girl who he could bend to his will. Well maybe she was lost in more ways than he even knew, but she wasn’t afraid. Not now. Not any more. A thin line of blood trickled from her mouth as her lips curled into a grin. ‘I’m leaving you, Deano.’
His heroin-ravaged features twitched as though the words had hit him physically. He’d thought he had her so far under his thumb that she would never dare try to get away from him. ‘You don’t leave me. You’re my girl.’ He spoke quietly, with a tremor in his voice.
Angel knew what that tremor meant. It meant she was going to pay in bruises and blood for wounding Deano’s pride. But she didn’t care. Her head was dizzy from being hit, but also from the elation of knowing Deano no longer had any power over her. ‘Where’s my money?’ Her voice was hoarse with pain, but steady.
‘Your money?’ Deano let out a small, choking laugh, looking at Angel as though he couldn’t believe his ears. ‘Your fucking money?’
Deano’s fist twitched, and Angel knew what was coming. ‘Don’t.’ There was a razor-sharp edge to her voice. Her eyes burnt a warning fire.
Deano hesitated, uncertainty flickering on his face. He blinked hard, as if it had suddenly occurred to him that maybe Angel wasn’t hiding the gun for someone else. Then he shook himself free of whatever he was thinking. ‘Or what?’ he shouted as his fist thundered into her face. ‘Or fucking what?’
Over and over again, Deano hit Angel, concentrating most of his punches on her body – after all, her face was worth a lot of money to him. At first, each blow was like an explosion, blinding Angel with searing pain. But after a while a merciful numbness stole over her. She felt as if she was falling, dropping further and further away to some dark place where Deano couldn’t reach her. She didn’t even realise he’d stopped beating her, until she heard his voice in her ear. ‘You’re my girl. My bitch,’ he rasped breathlessly. ‘Say it. Say you’re my bitch.’
‘No.’ A bloody bubble inflated from Angel’s lips as she spoke. Her body might be weak and battered, but inside she felt strong.
Deano’s voice came again, with a cockiness that stirred a spark of anxiety in Angel’s chest. ‘You’re forgetting that I know your name. All it would take is a phone call, and Grace Kirby would be in all sorts of trouble.’
The words were more painful to Angel than all of Deano’s blows combined. They reached inside her and tore a convulsive groan from her throat. They filled her with such hatred for Deano that in that instant, if she’d had the strength, she would have snatched the gun from him and put a bullet in his head.
‘Now say you’re my bitch.’ Deano’s voice was almost gleeful.
As if dredging the words from the bottom of a well, Angel said, ‘I’m your bitch.’
Deano patted her cheek. ‘Good girl. Now you just lie there and think about how you’ve made me feel. I know I act the tough guy, but I’ve got feelings too. And it hurts me right in here,’ he thumped his chest, ‘when you say you want to leave me.’
Angel closed her eyes. She didn’t want to think, but her inner voice sneered, Leave him, hah! What made you think you could leave him? And even if you did, what difference would it make? You’d still be you. You’d still be a cheap fucking whore. That’s all you’re good for.
The numbness was fading, leaving in its wake a trail of hot, throbbing pain. Her eyes snapped open at a soft sizzling sound. A familiar vinegary smell filled her nostrils, unleashing a sudden overwhelming craving. She glanced at the heroin bubbling on Deano’s spoon, then looked into his face with pathetic, pleading eyes. ‘Have you got one for me?’ she asked as he drew the solution into a hypodermic. He darted a frowning glance at her as she continued, ‘Come on, Deano, please. I…’ Her voice faltered as one final fragment of her shattered self-respect reared its head. But the heroin itch was too intense, too all-consuming to be denied. ‘I’ll do anything you want. Anything!’
Deano’s mouth spread into a smug smirk. ‘I know you will, baby, but you’ve got to learn. You’ve been a bad girl, and bad girls must be punished.’
Setting the gun aside, Deano slid his tracksuit bottoms down and felt for the artery in his groin. He hit himself up, then lay back on the bed, mouth hanging open, eyelids drooping half shut. Like a lover being teased to the point of madness, Angel was racked by shudders of desperate yearning. She tried to sit up, but her body seemed glued to the floor. She closed her eyes. The flowers of swollen flesh and the itch of craving vied with each other as to which hurt most, wringing low moans from her dust-dry throat. Slowly, ever so slowly, she took out her mobile phone and keyed in a number. The phone rang in her ear. One, two, three rings. Oh God, please pick up, she thought. Four, five, six rings.
She bit back a sob as a weary-sounding woman’s voice came down the line. ‘Hello?’
Angel made no reply, but she pressed the phone closer to her ear.
‘Hello, who is this?’ continued the woman. ‘Hello?’
A moment of silence passed. Then the woman’s voice came again, full of a trembling, tentative excitement that might have been fear or hope. ‘Grace, is that you?’
Tears pushed at Angel’s eyes. Her lips trembled with the effort of holding them at bay.
‘It is you isn’t it, Grace? Please don’t hang up. You don’t have to say anything, I know it’s you. I know you’re alive and that one day you’ll come back to me. A mother knows these things.’
Angel couldn’t hold back her tears any longer. As they burst forth, she hung up and curled into a foetal ball. An image of her mum as she’d looked the last time they’d seen each other filled her mind: worn, angular features, dark, permed hair, eyes like a sad old cat, prematurely lined smoker’s mouth. The image was fainter than it had once been, like a time-faded photo, but it still evoked a confusion of emotions in her. Uppermost amongst these was a heart-squeezing love, but there was also a toxic undercurrent of anger, resentment and even hate. A mother knows these things. The words rang in her mind, and her inner voice retorted bitterly, A mother knows what she wants to know, and is ignorant of what she wants to be ignorant of.
6
When Jim arrived at the Northern General’s main entrance, Scott Greenwood was waiting for him. DI Greenwood’s rugged, steely eyed face marked him out as exactly what he was: a hard-working, no-bullshit cop. The sight of him always reminded Jim of himself – or rather, it reminded him of the way he’d been a few years ago, before his life turned to shit. The force was full of people like Scott Greenwood. Lately, Jim had found himself avoiding them. There was nothing he used to love more than a pub busy with cops drinking away the stresses of the day. Nowadays he preferred to drink alone, with only a picture of his ex-wife for company. He kept imagining Margaret turning up at the house, begging him to take her back. He wouldn’t give her an answer straight away, not after everything she’d put him through. He’d make her sweat a little before saying yes. Then he’d kiss her, and she’d promise never to leave him again, and everything would go back to the way it was before. Jim shook his head. Pathetic.
‘What’s the prognosis?’ he asked.
‘It’s not good,’ said Scott, turning to go into the building. ‘The girl’s still in surgery. She’s got several shotgun pellets embedded in her brain. The surgeon reckons she has about a two per cent chance of surviving the operation to remove them, and even if she does she may well be brain-damaged.’
Jim shook his head again. ‘Fifteen years old. What a fucking waste,’ he sighed. ‘How about her brother?’
‘He’s stable. He came out of surgery half an hour ago, but he hasn’t come round from the anaesthetic yet.’
They caught a lift up to the Critical Care Department, where a constable was standing guard outside one of the rooms. Jim peered through an observation window. Mark Ba
xley was lying in bed, hooked up to oxygen, a heart-scanner and an IV bag. His right shoulder was heavily bandaged. His waxy grey face was stitched and swollen where it had been lacerated by splinters of wood and glass.
‘How long before he wakes up?’ Jim asked the duty nurse.
‘Normally you’d expect a young, healthy patient to start showing signs of responsiveness an hour or so after general surgery,’ she replied. ‘But that doesn’t mean he’ll be fit to talk to you.’
Jim turned to his colleagues. ‘You head over to the crime scene, Scott. I’ll stay here.’ As Scott turned to leave, Jim said to the constable standing guard, ‘Go get yourself a cuppa.’
When he was alone, Jim sat down and expelled a breath that seemed to come from his shoes. Somewhere nearby, someone let out an agonised wail. The sound gave him a sinking feeling in his stomach. How many times, he mused, have you sat in this place, surrounded by pain and death? But of course the answer was obvious – too many. He just didn’t have the stomach for it any more.
Jim found himself wondering whether it would have been better for Mark Baxley if he hadn’t survived. After all, what sort of life did he have to look forward to? A life without trust, that’s what. A nightmare of loneliness and paranoia. Jim had seen it many times before in people who’d survived an attempt on their life by friends, spouses and the like. He’d watched as they withdrew from the world and locked themselves in the worst kind of prison – a prison of their own minds. Over the years, he’d built barriers of a different kind around himself – barriers to keep his emotions at bay so that he could view cases dispassionately and from every angle. In the past some people – people who didn’t understand him – had called him cold and cynical. Margaret understood him better than anyone, but that hadn’t lessened her need for a love that at some point he’d lost the capacity to give. He knew that was why she’d left him, even if he couldn’t admit it to himself. The job had ripped out his heart. Losing Margaret had taken everything else.
Suddenly, Jim knew he had to leave, not just the hospital, but the city, the job, everything. He had to get away before it was too late, before the last vital spark in him was extinguished. His head spinning with a confused mixture of excitement and anxiety, he stood and took a few hesitant steps towards the exit. He paused at the sound of a moan from Mark Baxley’s room.
The nurse moved from behind her desk and entered Mark’s room. Pinching the fingers of Mark’s left hand, she called his name. He moaned again, feebly trying to pull his hand away. His eyelids flickered open. First the whites, then the pupils rolled into view. A hoarse voice slurred, ‘Cha… Charl… Charlotte.’
‘Your sister’s in a coma, Mark, but she’s alive.’
Mark gave out a whimper and a light that seemed to hold both relief and triumph came into his heavy-lidded eyes.
‘Have you got any pain anywhere?’ asked the nurse.
Mark slowly shook his head. ‘I’m thir… thirsty.’
The nurse poured water from a jug into a cup and held it to Mark’s lips. He took a sip, dribbling most of it down his chin. The nurse dabbed him dry with a paper towel. ‘That’s all for now. I don’t want you to choke.’
The nurse checked Mark’s vital signs, compared them to readings on the heart monitor, then made a notation on his chart. ‘I know it’s hard, Mark, but try to relax. A doctor will be by to see you soon.’
As the nurse left the room, Jim asked, ‘Is that true about his sister?’
The nurse nodded. ‘The doctors say it’s a miracle. There was about a one in a hundred chance she’d survive the operation.’ Her voice dropped. ‘Mind you, there’s still a long way to go before she’s out of the woods.’
The word miracle sparked a little fire of contempt inside Jim. As far as he was concerned, there were no such things as miracles. There were only things that happened. Some of those things were beyond human control, but that didn’t mean God had anything to do with them. ‘Can I speak to Mark?’ The question came automatically, even though it was the last thing he wanted to do.
‘Yes, but only for a few minutes. And don’t press him too hard. He’s very weak.’
Jim drew a chair up to Mark’s bedside. As Mark’s head lolled towards him, Jim resisted the urge to turn away from the mute pain shining out of his eyes. ‘Hello, Mark, I’m Detective Inspector Jim Monahan of the South Yorkshire Police Homicide and Major Incident Team,’ he began, his tone businesslike. ‘I realise this is a difficult time, but I need to ask you some questions. Someone will take a full statement later when you’re feeling stronger. For now, I just want to hear what happened.’
‘Da—’ Mark winced on the word as though it tasted bitter. He licked his scorched lips, before continuing in a strengthening voice, ‘Dad shot Mum and Charlotte. Then he tried to kill me.’
‘Did you see him shoot your mum and sister?’
‘No. He—’ A choke came into Mark’s voice. Whether from pain or emotion, Jim couldn’t tell.
Jim picked up the glass of water. ‘Here,’ he said, putting it to Mark’s lips.
Mark swallowed a mouthful. ‘Thanks.’
‘Now take you time and tell me exactly what happened.’
Starting with the phone call, Mark gave Jim the full story. Jim jotted down the main points, pausing occasionally to give Mark another sip of water. He glanced up, frowning, when Mark got to the part about the strange sobbing he’d heard on entering the house. ‘Do you think it was your dad?’
‘No. I never saw Dad cry in all my life. It sounded more like a child.’
Jim’s eyebrows drew closer together as he wondered whether there was another body waiting to be discovered. ‘Could there have been someone else in the house other than your parents and sister?’
‘There could have been, but I don’t think there was. The telly was on in my parents’ bedroom. That’s probably what I heard.’
‘Probably,’ agreed Jim, thinking, Christ, I hope that’s all it was.
His voice cracking, Mark recounted the fight with his father, and the discovery of his mother and sister. By the time the tragic, horrific tale was finished, tears were streaming down his cheeks. Again, the rawness of the emotion in his eyes almost made Jim flinch from his gaze. He reached to give Mark’s wrist a squeeze, but stopped himself. He’d spent his entire working life learning how to separate truth from lies. The fact that Mark’s story tallied so closely with his own reconstruction of events, coupled with Mark’s obvious relief at hearing his sister was alive, was enough to convince him that what he’d heard was the truth. But technically Mark was still a suspect, and sympathy for a suspect would only serve to cloud his judgement.
‘Can you think of any reason your father might have had to do what he did?’
‘No.’
‘Are you sure? Think carefully. Did he ever mention troubles with money or his relationship with your mother?’
‘He never mentioned anything about anything to me. We barely spoke.’
‘Why? Had you fallen out?’
Mark shook his head. ‘That’s just the way it was, the way it’s always been between—’ His tears suddenly overwhelmed his speech.
‘OK, Mark, we’re done for now.’ Jim’s tone was still businesslike, but despite himself, a gentle note had crept into it. You’re going soft in your old age, he thought, making to stand.
Mark lifted a hand to touch Jim’s arm. ‘Stay with me. Please. I… I don’t want to be alone.’ His voice was awkward, almost as if there was something shameful in his words.
Jim stared uncertainly at Mark. He knew he should get back to the crime scene. Garrett would be there by now, and no doubt severely pissed at his absence. More importantly, Mark’s story had opened up several lines of enquiry that urgently needed to be followed. But he couldn’t bring himself to deny the request of this man who was only just a man, this man who’d gone through, and was still going through, a hell that made Jim’s problems seem as nothing.
‘OK, but I’ve got to make a pho
ne call.’
Jim left the room and dialled Amy Sheridan. ‘I was just about to call you,’ she said. ‘The DCI’s going to brief the team and he wants you here for it.’
Jim glanced through the observation window at Mark. The sense of duty instilled into him by decades of loyal service urged him to say he’d be there as soon as possible, but the desperation in Mark’s eyes caused him to bite the words back. ‘Tell him I won’t be able to make it.’
‘He’s not going to be best pleased.’
‘Yeah, well he’ll just have to lump it.’ It felt good, liberating even, to go against his superior’s orders, especially when that superior was a smarmy careerist like Garrett. ‘Listen, Amy, I’ve spoken to Mark Baxley, and he had some interesting things to say.’
Jim relayed the details of his conversation with Mark. When he got to the part about Mark hearing what sounded like a child crying in the house, Amy hauled in a breath and said, ‘Bloody hell.’
‘My thoughts exactly. Any developments at your end?’
‘The background check brought up some info on Stephen Baxley that’s almost as interesting as what his son had to say.’
‘Such as?’
‘I’ll fill you in when I see you. Right now, I’d better look into what you’ve told me. Mind you, the firemen still aren’t letting us upstairs. Apparently the damage is worse than was first thought.’
Jim told Amy he’d see her soon, then returned to Mark’s bedside. Mark gave him a glance that was part gratitude, part relief. Neither of them spoke. For the moment, there was nothing else to say. As he sat watching Mark’s eyelids grow heavier, Jim asked himself whether he’d been serious about walking out on the job. Or had it just been a crazy moment? He wasn’t sure. All he knew was that he had a duty to at least follow up on the leads he’d been given. After that… well, he would just have to see. Maybe it really was time to call it a day, time to try and salvage something from life, some small fragment of happiness. But even if it was, he was still left facing the same old question: if he was no longer a policeman, what the hell would he do with himself? It made his head pound to think about it. So stop thinking about it, he told himself. Just concentrate on getting through the night.
