Kissing a Killer

by David Carter

  BANG!

  The first of the gas bottles blew up. He glanced back over his shoulder. The caravan was fully ablaze. Part of the roof was collapsing into the main inferno. Just the metal frame remained, melting and bending and twisting as if in agony, before falling in on itself. Red and yellow and blue flames leapt into the air like a funeral pyre for a Goddess.

  ‘The Goddess of pleasure,’ he muttered to himself, and smirked again, and already he was half way up that twisty lane on the way back to the main road and his car, and safety and freedom, and then en route back to his demanding day job.

  He didn’t see or hear a soul all the way back to the car and he wasn’t surprised at that, not even a late night dog walker, for he knew well enough that not many people used that lane.

  As he turned the corner onto the main road he saw his new silver and black Cayton Cerisa Sports parked up ahead, maybe three hundred yards to the lay-by. By the time he reached the car one vehicle had passed him coming head on, a large dark SUV. He casually looked away as it passed, while one vehicle had passed him from behind, a small scruffy box wagon, carrying God knows what to God knows where.

  Twenty yards from the car he took out his key fob and bleeped the car open. Orange lights flashed. A tiny bleep filled the heavy November air. He opened the nearside passenger door and reached inside and grabbed the old supermarket plastic bag that he’d placed on the seat. He sat on the seat with his feet out on the grass verge. He reached down and slipped off the black slip-on shoes. Glad to get them off for they were a size too big.

  He slipped them in the bag and added several large pebbles he’d set carefully in the footwell, and tied the bag tightly closed. He reached across to the driver’s seat where he’d left ready his favourite pair of grey and white trainers. Put them on and tied them up, and they sure felt good, like best quality gloves. Stood out of the car, closed the door, hurried round to the driver’s door, opened up, and jumped inside.

  Turned on the engine. The clock said 12.42am. November 18th, and a new Saturday was just beginning, and that was cool, for he always had plans aplenty on a Saturday.

  It took him less than twenty minutes to drive back to Chester city centre. The traffic was light and the car was fast and the rain was back, heavy and sustained, and that was cool too. As he approached the Grosvenor Bridge across the cold dark and deep river, he glanced in the rear mirror. Nothing behind. Nothing at all. Couldn’t be better.

  He buzzed down the passenger window. Some rain blew in, as he took hold of the heavy plastic bag, and with one confident swing he flung it out of the window like a discus thrower. Over the grey stone parapet it went, as he watched it out of sight, falling down fast, splashing and crashing into the swirling and rain-refreshed water, entering the darkness like an arrow-beaked seabird out hunting, where it sank to the bottom in seconds. Only a few dozing mallard ducks witnessed the missile from above. The wrong sized shoes would never see the light of day again.

  Three

  Fred Ross had opened his business in Chester ten years before and had called it the Cuppa Cha Café, a name his first wife suggested, and as he couldn’t think of anything better, he went along with it, though he’d often thought of changing it after that.

  He was tall and slim with neat black greasy hair that gave him something of an Italianate appearance, something that he would encourage when referring to himself as the Italian stallion. It would occasionally make his predominantly female clientele laugh, and that was good, though fact was, there wasn’t an Italianate cell in his entire body.

  The business had grown steadily, he’d moved to larger premises just the once, and though he would moan and groan that he was working long hours for the benefit of the taxman and the landlord, the business would pay him a decent wage, and show a reasonable return at the year end, profits he would plough into penny shares, a dangerous world full of sharks that would often bite his ankles, and drain his assets.

  The business had grown steadily for one solid reason. Attention to detail, and Fred Ross was as good an attention to detail man as you could find. All growing businesses need an attention to detail person, and Fred quickly realised that, and never once took his eye off the ball.

  So it wasn’t surprising that on Monday morning he noticed Dorothy Wright wasn’t quite on top of her game. She’d tried to make at least four calls from her mobile, and they were only the ones he was aware of. It annoyed him for two reasons. Firstly, calls from mobiles were not permitted during work hours, and two, when she was staring at that damned thing she was neglecting the customers, and neglected customers had a frequent habit of seeking pastures new.

  It simply wouldn’t do. Competition in the small café world in Chester, just like every developed city on the planet in the twenty-first century, was fierce.

  He cornered his manageress, a tall slim well made-up woman named Shirley, who just happened to be his second wife.

  ‘What the hell’s wrong with Dot today?’

  Shirley glanced across at Dot who was serving and gossiping with a regular, and back at Fred. Shirley possessed many talents, but attention to detail was not one of them, a skill lack that occasionally annoyed Fred.

  ‘Nowt that I know of, why?’

  ‘She’s been fiddling with that bloody mobile all morning.’

  Shirley giggled and said, ‘Maybe she’s got a new boyfriend,’ for Shirley was well aware that Dot was in the market for one.

  Fred glanced at Dot’s ample figure and somehow doubted that.

  ‘Have a word with her, will you. She’s doing my head in!’

  Shirley realised that Fred was annoyed about something major and muttered, ‘Okay love, leave it with me.’

  Fred disappeared into the back rooms to see if the next batch of steak pies were ready, as Shirley moved close to Dot and in a quiet moment whispered, ‘Is everything all right, Dot?’

  Dorothy pursed her lips and glanced into Shirley’s blue eyes.

  ‘Tell you the truth, Shirl, no.’

  ‘What’s the matter?’

  ‘It’s my Eleanor.’

  ‘What about her?’

  ‘She’s fallen in with a bad crowd.’

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘I’d be too embarrassed to tell you, but it’s not looking good.’

  ‘Have you spoken to her?’

  ‘I’ve been trying since Saturday morning. There’s no answer, and that’s not like our Ellie at all. She always leaves her mobile on for the clients.... her customers, like.’

  ‘Where does she live now?’

  ‘She has a small caravan down by the river. Horrible it is, old and smelly; I’ve been trying to get her into a decent flat. I can’t help thinking she might have fallen over.... or something.’

  ‘Well, you are no good to us like this, Fred’s noticed something’s wrong. Do you want to go and check?’

  ‘Oh, could I? That would be great! You’re fab, Shirl, anyone ever tell you that?’ and not waiting a second in case Shirley changed her mind, or Fred came back, she took off her overall, grabbed her grubby raincoat from the hooks, and headed for the door, calling out over her shoulder, ‘I’ll be back just as soon as I can.’

  A minute later Fred returned and immediately saw that Dorothy was missing.

  ‘Where is she?’

  ‘She has a problem with her daughter. I told her to go and sort it out and get back as soon as she can.’

  ‘Brilliant! Just as the lunchtime rush is about to start!’

  ‘Don’t fret so. We can manage, Fred!’

  ‘We’ll bloody well have to now! I’m stopping her wages!’

  ‘Oh, stop being an old grumblebum, Freddy.’

  ‘I’ll grumblebum you in a minute!’

  Shirley smirked at Fred and rippled her eyes and muttered, ‘Promises promises!’ Just as six new customers came in together, and began inspecting the day’s food offerings in the Cuppa Cha Café.

  Dorothy Wright owned the same small modern Ford hatchback car as he
r daughter, except hers was red and Eleanor’s blue. They’d bought them in a BOGOF deal from the local Ford dealer, buy one get one free, who couldn’t believe his luck when he shifted two old part exchange jalopies in one afternoon.

  Dorothy was gunning hers round the Chester inner ring road, though in truth the little car was not really a gunning kind of car. It was almost half an hour later when Dot pulled off the main road and onto the unmade up twisty lane that led down to the river. It must have been at least a mile from the turnoff to the caravan down by the water, but that last mile seemed like ten.

  Horrendous thoughts crashed through Dot’s head. Had Ellie been attacked and injured? Or maybe fallen into the deep river after one vodka cocktail too many. The last twist in the lane revealed Ellie’s little car, parked away to the right on a small piece of hard standing, so at least she must be in, and that was something.

  Earlier, Dot had had a premonition that Ellie might have simply packed her few precious belongings into that car, and headed off to Cornwall or Oban or Wells-next-the-Sea, wherever that is, as she often talked of doing, after a particularly hard week, as far away as possible, she said, as if running away could ever really solve deep-seated problems.

  Ten more yards and reality hit home.

  Dot slammed on the brakes, almost banged her forehead on the hard steering wheel. Ellie’s caravan was no more. Just a blackened heap of wreckage sitting on the red brick base that was designed to keep the caravan above the winter floods that the Dee produced most years.

  Dot’s hand went to her mouth and she exhaled loudly.

  ‘Oh, Christ!’

  ‘Oh, fucking hell!’

  ‘No!’

  The one sided conversation came to an abrupt close, as Dot booted the car onward and round the last bend and up to the heap of twisted and burnt metal and cinders and ash.

  ‘Kids!’ she said, slowly getting out of the car, for she wasn’t sure she wanted to see what there was to see.

  ‘Bloody kids!’ she said again. ‘Kids get up to all sorts these days. You’d be surprised,’ and then Dot thought that maybe Ellie had an outside client, one who preferred “entertaining” in their own home. It happened more and more, so Ellie had said one afternoon in one of the local pubs, when she had treated her mother to a Sunday carvery luncheon, a meal that ended up in a row after all the obvious awkwardness. Two gents, who clearly knew Ellie’s trade, had taken to winking and leering at both Ellie, and worse still, her mother too, across the bar, and Dot couldn’t wait to get out of there after that.

  That was probably it, thought Dot, as she walked slowly before the face of the wreckage. She’ll be working off site. Dot thought the bricks were still hot, though she may have been wrong. She thought she could smell petrol, though that might simply have been a leak from the old Ford.

  Thinking of which, she went over to Ellie’s car and peered through the dirty windows. No one about, no one sleeping inside due to recent loss of quarters. She tried the door. It opened. Ellie rarely locked it, especially right down there where few people other than Ellie’s clients, ever ventured.

  She took out her mobile and rang Ellie’s number again, praying for it to ring, praying to hear some simple explanation. Straight to voicemail – We cannot take your call at this time.

  ‘Shit!’ she said aloud, as she wandered back toward to the charred remains of Ellie’s former home.

  The sun came out. A watery weak November sun, though surprisingly bright for all that, and for a second Dot shielded her eyes, so much of a surprise was it. When she took her hand away she spotted something, glinting in the sunlight, within the wreckage.

  ‘What the hell?’

  She stood up uncomfortably on the brick base, set one foot within the charred remains, feeling crunching burnt wreckage giving way beneath her feet, and yes, it was still warm too. She bent down and retrieved the sparkle. It was a large diamond, like the one set in Ellie’s silver and diamond ring. Her daughter’s most prized possession, given to her by her father four years earlier, before he had one afternoon simply abandoned them, walking out never to return.

  Ellie never took that ring off. She’d put on a few pounds since then, and couldn’t take it off. It was always stuck fast on Ellie’s finger, until now.

  ‘Fuck!’ said Dot aloud, thinking terrible thoughts, as she took out her mobile again, and slapped in triple nine.

  Four

  Inspector Walter Darriteau was in a great mood. He had a new girlfriend. He’d met her on the Internet. Everyone was doing it, they said, and Walter was no spring chicken, or spring cockerel, to be more precise, and you only live once, and he’d lived alone for years and years, discounting a few brief dalliances along the way, and now when not far from retirement, he’d decided to take the bull by the horns, so to speak. It would be quite nice to find someone a little more permanent, he imagined.

  Sergeant Karen Greenwood had steered him toward the site. She admitted she’d used it in the past, and that surprised him for Karen Greenwood was young, blonde, slim, blue-eyed, very desirable, and, if it wasn’t politically incorrect to think, or say so in the twenty-first century, very pretty too.

  ‘Everyone’s doing it,’ she’d said, giggling, and she told him the web address, and that was how he’d met the busty Carlene Henderson. Walter began thinking of her, of her large heaving bosoms to be more accurate, and then the phone rang.

  DC Darren Gibbons grabbed it and barked, ‘C.I.D’

  Dorothy Wright had been passed through from central control.

  ‘I’ve just discovered my daughter’s caravan burnt to the ground. Can you send someone quick? I’m really worried she might have been in there.’

  ‘Okay, let’s start at the beginning. Your name is?’

  Walter stopped thinking of Carlene’s assets and glanced across at Gibbons, as did Karen, for there was something immediate in his voice, something that alerted experienced officers like Walter and Karen.

  Gibbons was talking again, loudly, as was his style.

  ‘Where is the caravan, where was the caravan?’

  ‘By the river.’

  ‘Yes, but where by the river, a postal address.’

  ‘I don’t know! She never gets post here, it’s too remote. Can you come quick?’

  ‘But where to? We need an address.’

  Dot tried hard to remember the name of the twisty lane that led down from the main road, but could not.

  ‘I don’t know!’ she said again, suddenly close to tears.

  ‘Keep calm. Which district?’ asked Gibbons, maintaining his cool.

  ‘Off the Farndon road.’

  ‘Ah, I get you, hold on a sec,’ and he jumped up and ran over to the massive big scale local map that covered half of one wall.

  ‘What’s happening?’ asked Walter.

  ‘Not sure, Guv, lady says her daughter’s caravan has burnt down and she’s worried her daughter was inside.’

  ‘Where?’ asked Karen, jumping up and joining Gibbons at the wall.

  ‘She says by the river, a twisty lane, off the Farndon road.’

  ‘Don’t think there are many lanes off that road,’ said Karen, pointing to a possible candidate.

  ‘Yeah, that could be the one,’ said Gibbons, hurrying back to the landline.

  ‘Are you still there?’

  ‘Course I’m still here, and twice as bloody worried. I’ve found a diamond in the wreckage, I think it’s from her ring, and she never takes it off, never could take it off. Please hurry!’

  ‘Is it at the bottom of Marigold Lane?’

  ‘It is!! How did you know that?’

  ‘Detective work,’ said Gibbons, smirking at Karen. ‘Someone will be with you in about twenty minutes.’

  ‘Thank the Lord! See you soon. Don’t forget me!’

  ‘We’ll not forget, we’ll be there as soon as we can,’ said Gibbons, hanging up. ‘Do you want me to go, Guv?’

  ‘No. You hang on here. I want you and Hector to keep going thro
ugh that CCTV stuff looking for any leads on the drug running op. I’ll go. Karen, organise a car, and an unmarked one at that.’

  ‘On my way,’ said Karen, jumping up, grabbing her bottle of lemon and lime still water, and light waterproof jacket and heading for the lift.

  Walter reached under the desk and put his heavy black shoes back on and tied them up. Stood up, limped across the office and tapped on his boss’s door.

  ‘Could be something ma’am,’ he muttered. ‘Woman reporting her daughter’s caravan has burnt down, and she’s worried her daughter might have been inside it.’

  ‘Where?’ said Mrs West, glancing up and over the top of her new pink spectacles.

  ‘By the river, somewhere down off the Farndon road.’

  ‘Okey-doke. Go and sort it, Walter.’

  Walter pursed his lips and nodded and headed back across the office, grabbed his raincoat from the hooks, and headed towards the lift.

  ‘Hope all goes well,’ said Gibbons. ‘She sounded mighty agitated.’

  ‘Wouldn’t we all be agitated at that news?’ said Walter, heaving open the double doors.

  ‘Yeah, I guess.’

  Karen had heard they were due for a delivery of a new Volvo V40 that day, and lo and behold there it was, a beautiful silver-grey hatchback with just seventy-two miles on the clock. She looked like a kid with the best new present on Christmas morning.

  ‘Fab car,’ she said.

  ‘Indeed, and an expensive one. Try not to prang it.’

  ‘Me, Guv? When did I ever prang a car?’

  Walter thought about that. She was a very quick driver, and a very good one too, and often drove at way above the speed limit, when on operations, but it was true, he could never remember her actually pranging one of the force’s best high-powered beasts.

  ‘There’s always a first time.’

  ‘Hope not,’ said Karen, grinning across at him, as they sped south from Chester, heading for Farndon.