by Luca Veste
Murphy looked towards the shadow where the voice was coming from. The unmoving figure blending into the walls.
‘This doesn’t work if you can’t speak to each other, so I’m going to remove the tape covering your mouth, David. Do you mind me calling you David?’
Murphy stared into the darkness, calculating his next move. His mind was still not firing correctly, thoughts colliding with each other. He shook his head slowly, expecting another wave of nausea to hit him. His body had settled a little, only his heart hammering against his chest gave him the sense something was happening inside.
‘If you shout or scream, David, I’m going to start slicing into your lovely wife. Do you understand that?’
Murphy nodded a little more forcefully, turning his gaze back to Sarah. Her head was down, her shoulders hitching every few seconds. His heart rate increased, every fibre within his body on alert, wanting to cross that room and hold her.
‘Good, I can do that then.’
The slight figure emerged from the shadows, crossing the short space between them and appearing in front of Murphy. The baby-faced form of Ben Flanagan, standing a foot away, looked down on him with an expression of interest. His face lit up by candlelight.
A hand gripped the side of his head, whilst the other tore away the tape covering his mouth. Murphy sucked in air, his breaths shallow and quick. He looked up to see Ben now standing close to Sarah, his empty hands now holding something against her face. It shimmered in the light and he saw the silver of a blade.
‘What do you want?’ Murphy said, coughing as he reached the last word.
‘I want to go back,’ Ben replied, smoothing down the hair on Sarah’s head as she continued to look down. ‘To not make the mistakes I made last time. It was the drug, wasn’t it?’
‘That’s something we can talk about later. You just have to let us go.’
‘I thought it was. I didn’t have a choice really. Once the drug had been decided on, I had to use it. I thought I’d given just enough so it wouldn’t show up afterwards. I guess I gave that last girl too much, didn’t I? Didn’t cover my tracks well enough, obviously.’
‘Why . . . why are you doing this?’
‘When you all turned up at the pub earlier, I was ready to hand myself in. End this whole thing. It’s been difficult this past week . . . but I can’t leave Number Four now. Not after everything we’ve been through. Then I remembered you. I know you, Detective. I’ve seen you. There was one last game I could play and stop you in the process. I can show Number Four that I was right.’
‘Number Four?’
‘She doesn’t understand. None of them did. They don’t listen to me. I only wanted to show them all that I was the better choice all along. That if they’d given me the chance, I could have shown them that.’
Murphy’s eyes were becoming more used to the darkness within the room, the outline of the room clearing. ‘This isn’t the way, Ben.’
‘Don’t use my name,’ Ben said, his voice echoing back from the walls. ‘That’s a trick. I’ve seen it on telly. I’m the one in control here.’
‘Of course you are, I’m sorry,’ Murphy replied, hoping his voice sounded sincere. He couldn’t take his eyes off the blade held against Sarah’s throat, pressing closer as Ben had shouted back at him. ‘You’re the Man in Black.’
Ben giggled, a high-pitched noise which made Sarah flinch. ‘Ridiculous, I know, but I didn’t know what to call myself. I needed something, though. I needed people to listen. I needed to show you all. Teach you about love. You’re not doing it right. You know that, I hope? All the mistakes you’ve been making. You’re corrupting it. Defiling it with your lies and your secrets. It’s wrong. You’re all wrong.’
‘What do you want?’
‘I’ve been following you, David. I wanted to see what you did when you weren’t trying to find me. I’ve seen what you’ve been doing. Your little journeys. You came close to finding me just from those. So close.’
‘What are you talking about?’ Murphy said, his hands beginning to shake behind his back. He felt the familiar weight against his lower back for an instant. A reminder.
‘Don’t you think it’s best you tell your wife about this? What you’ve been doing? What secrets you’ve been keeping?’
Murphy lowered his head. ‘There isn’t anything you know about. Nothing you would understand.’
‘It’s not for me to understand, is it? I’ve been here a few hours now, speaking to little Sarah here. She doesn’t know anything about what you’ve been keeping from her. She’s totally in the dark. Doesn’t that mean anything to you?’
‘I was going to tell her,’ Murphy said, looking across at Sarah who was now staring at him. He couldn’t tell what she was thinking, which scared him. ‘It’s nothing that deserves this.’
‘Why hide it at all then? Why not tell her what you’ve been doing? You were supposed to be concentrating on me and my work, but instead you’re driving round the city talking to people left, right, and centre.’
‘You want me to tell Sarah? I’ll tell her. No problem at all . . .’
‘No, that’s not the way . . .’
‘I don’t need to be tortured,’ Murphy said, looking at Ben now. ‘I can tell her anything. I know she’ll understand. That’s what love is, Ben. You have it wrong. You mistake it for power, when it’s nothing like that.’
‘You have no clue, do you?’ Ben said, the knife in his hand pressing further into Sarah’s throat. ‘You don’t know what real love is.’
‘I know it better than you. You’ve never experienced it in return, have you? You don’t know what it’s like to have someone love you back. How can you do this, not knowing that feeling? How can you take that away from people?’
Ben’s hands began to shake, the knife in his hand slipping away from Sarah’s neck, before being pushed back against. Murphy strained at the bonds tying him to the chair as he heard Sarah moan against the tape across her mouth.
‘No. You’re wrong.’
‘Okay, okay. Don’t hurt her. Just keep talking to me.’
‘You need to tell her now. The truth. Or I start cutting her.’
Murphy breathed in, his mind now almost as clear as it had been when he’d first entered the room. He shifted in the chair, just a little further forward. ‘There’s a girl I used to know,’ he began, looking at Sarah, who was fitfully blinking as he held her stare. ‘Back where I grew up. She lived round the corner from me. She got in touch recently, as her daughter has gone missing. Amy Maguire. Just about to turn nineteen. You know who I mean?’
There was a slight nod from Sarah.
‘The case was with Liverpool South, but it got shunted across to us. When it did, I met with Stacey, Amy’s mum. She told me something . . .’
Murphy hesitated, unsure how to continue.
‘Keep talking,’ Ben said, his childish tone sounding odd in that room. ‘Tell her everything.’
‘When we were about seventeen, eighteen, we slept together. One night, that’s all it was. She thinks Amy might be the result of that one time. I don’t believe it’s true. Stacey’s desperate to find her daughter, but with her being missing, I can’t be absolutely certain. When the bodies of Chloe Morrison and Joe Hooper were discovered, the case went back to Liverpool South. I was keeping an eye on it, speaking to people and that.’
‘I was keeping an eye on it,’ Ben said, mocking Murphy’s voice. ‘You kept the possibility that you had a daughter from your wife. That’s not good, David. Who’s saying that’s all that happened? Maybe old flames were rekindled when this mother came back on the scene.’
‘There was nothing like that going on,’ Murphy said, his jaw clenched, teeth grinding against one another.
‘We’ll never know, will we? That’s the problem with keeping secrets and lying. How can we ever really know the truth. What do you think about that, Sarah? Do you still trust him? How could you? He’s lied to you. Kept things from you. Is that the sign of so
meone committed to the relationship?’
‘Look at her. Look in her eyes. She still loves me. I can see that, because we have history. You don’t know us. You’ve got what you wanted from me. Let’s talk about this.’
‘No,’ Ben replied, moving towards Murphy, the knife held up in front of him. ‘I haven’t got what I wanted yet. It doesn’t work like that. You’re not giving me what I need . . .’
‘What do you need?’
‘You’ll find out.’
‘What are you going to do? You need to work with me here. I can help you.’
‘You can do nothing but listen,’ Ben said, moving directly in front of him, blocking his view of Sarah. He replaced the duct tape across Murphy’s mouth.
‘You’re not the only one who has been lying.’
Chapter Thirty-Seven
His voice was cut off, his words silenced. All he had was the vision of his wife sitting a few feet away, her eyes locked with his. He tried to communicate with her, not knowing if his unspoken message was getting through.
We’re going to be okay. We’re going to get out of this.
Ben Flanagan glanced Murphy’s way before stepping forward and placing a hand on Sarah’s face.
‘Remember,’ Ben said, holding the knife up to Sarah’s face making her flinch back. ‘I’ll slit his throat if you scream. Okay?’
Sarah nodded, then closed her eyes as Ben tore away the tape covering her mouth. She gulped in breaths; Murphy remembered how she hated things covering her mouth.
‘Please don’t put that back on me,’ Sarah said, looking up at Ben. ‘I can’t breathe properly with it on.’
‘Don’t you have more important things to think about, Sarah?’
Sarah went silent, looking across at Murphy as he slowly inched forward once more.
‘While we were waiting for you to come back, I had a bit of a look round your house. You don’t mind, do you?’
Murphy stopped moving and shook his head.
‘That’s good,’ Ben replied, standing closer to Murphy now. ‘Anyway, Sarah here was safe and sound, so I took the chance to search a real-life copper’s house. Bit boring really. Couldn’t find anything of interest at all. You must have a really dull life, outside of the big cases you always seem to find yourself involved with that is.’
Murphy continued to stare at Sarah, listening to Ben’s words but not reacting.
‘I started digging round a little more. I knew you would be back late, given what happened earlier . . . by the way, is Laura doing okay? She seems nice. Her and Darren may have a future, as long as they don’t lie to each other.’
Murphy didn’t respond; instead he raised his hands up a little more, resting them on the waistband of his trousers.
‘I only gave her a little scratch,’ Ben continued, as if Murphy had replied to him. ‘Just enough to make you go towards her rather than me. Almost didn’t get away either. But it’s amazing how quickly you can blend in when you’re in the city centre. All the rat-runs, the alleyways. Almost too easy to disappear. Anyway, I’m getting away from the point. I had a bit of a snoop, but didn’t find anything. That was until I persuaded Sarah to help me out and I found this.’
Ben moved something into Murphy’s line of sight. An envelope, with Sarah’s name and their address scrawled across the front. Ben turned the envelope round, displaying the return address.
HMP Manchester.
Murphy frowned for a second. Sarah was looking away from him now.
‘Don’t . . .’ Sarah said, her voice barely travelling across the room to Murphy.
‘I thought, we’re in the house of a copper,’ Ben said, ignoring Sarah’s interruption. ‘What’s a letter from a prison doing here? It’s not right. It doesn’t make sense. And it wasn’t even addressed to you, it was to her. So, I asked her about it.’
Sarah looked up towards Murphy, tears now falling down her face. ‘I’m sorry—’
‘That’s not the way we do it,’ Ben said, crossing the space to Sarah and grabbing her by the hair and pushing her head backwards. Murphy bucked in the chair, but couldn’t move any further. ‘Wait until I’ve finished.’
Murphy gripped the waistband of his trousers and moved his shirt tail aside.
‘I asked if I could read it, but she didn’t want me to. Said it was private. I came here because I thought you had the secret. I thought it was you who was lying, but it wasn’t. It was her, David. She’s been lying to you. Tell him. Now.’
There was silence for a few seconds. Murphy kept his eyes on Sarah, the effort to remain still causing him to perspire a little more.
‘I didn’t really want to go,’ Sarah said, normality gone. Her voice somehow different from how Murphy remembered it. ‘Not at first. He writes to me sometimes, but I always throw them away. I didn’t think you’d want to know, so I don’t tell you about them.’
Murphy thought about the only person he and Sarah knew in prison in Manchester. The man who had almost destroyed his life.
‘He said he had things to tell me. Things that I needed to know. I thought it was just another game to him. Another way to get back at me. But I wanted to know. Needed to know—’
‘I hope you’re listening to this, David,’ Ben said, cutting over Sarah’s words. ‘She’s been lying to you.’
‘Please, let me speak.’
‘Of course,’ Ben replied, his boyish features turning into a sick grin. ‘Your turn.’
‘He put my name down for visiting and I spent a couple of months thinking about it . . .’
Murphy’s hand rested on the case attached to the top of his trousers.
‘I’m so sorry. I should have told you . . .’
‘She went to see him,’ Ben said, almost jumping round the room. ‘She told me all about it. How this man had beaten her half to death while they were together. How she found the courage to get away from him and then find love with you. Then, the revenge he took on you both. Killing your parents in their own homes. He ruined your life, I remember it. I read about you back then, years ago. I was working away at the time, but used to read about stuff that happened in Liverpool. Sarah told me you spent almost a year apart, before getting back together. You forgave her, and now she does this to you?’
‘It wasn’t like that—’
‘Can you believe anything she has to say now? She’s a liar. Who knows what really happened. Maybe she put him up to it. Thought that killing your parents would be enough to make you disappear. Didn’t want to kill a copper, so went for the next best thing. His only mistake was in going too far and he got caught. But they still love each other, so she agrees to wait for him. It’s almost like a fairy tale romance . . .’
‘It wasn’t like that, you sick bastard.’
Ben turned on Sarah, as if he were shocked she was still there. ‘How would we ever know? You brought lies here. You kept secrets. You don’t love this man, how could you?’
‘You don’t know anything about love,’ Sarah said with an edge to her voice. ‘David knows how I feel.’
Sarah looked across at him, her breathing wavering. Murphy stared back, thinking about nothing other than the fact that his wife had recently sat opposite the man who had killed his parents. The man who had also destroyed his marriage.
‘Love isn’t this,’ Ben said, stepping between Murphy and Sarah. ‘It’s not sneaking around behind each other’s backs. It’s not hurting each other with lies and secrets. You need to understand it shouldn’t be this way. It’s supposed to be about being truthful and loyal. Becoming one person, together.’
‘I walked out, David,’ Sarah said, Murphy not looking at her now. ‘It was just a game to him. He had nothing to say. I thought I could find out a reason for it, something, but he didn’t have anything. He disgusts me. I told him that. Please believe me.’
‘Now she begs to be believed. It’s not right. What you have here is not right. You don’t deserve this of each other. It has to be stopped.’
Ben crossed the r
oom towards Murphy, ripping off the duct tape from his mouth. ‘Speak to me, Detective. Tell me how hurt you are, how much she disgusts you.’
‘I understand,’ Murphy said, staring at Ben whilst he spoke to Sarah. ‘I know why you did it. You don’t need to explain yourself to me.’ He turned towards Sarah.
‘I love you.’
‘No. This isn’t right,’ Ben said, beginning to pace up and down between them. ‘She betrayed you. I need to stop this . . .’
‘Ben, we’re stronger than you think we are. We love each other, more than you could ever know.’
‘That’s right,’ Sarah said, her voice stronger now.
‘No. I can’t have this,’ Ben said, coming towards Murphy again. He replaced the duct tape across his mouth. ‘You’re lying. Both of you.’
Murphy stiffened in the chair as Ben walked back towards Sarah.
‘I can stop all this now. I can make it all better. You want me to hurt her, don’t you, David? I can see it in your eyes. No matter what you say, you’re broken now. Both of you. Nothing will repair this relationship. I have to stop it. You need me to hurt her.’
Murphy strained violently against the tape binding his hands and feet and shook his head.
‘You want to do it yourself. I see that. Don’t worry, David, I can do it for you.’
Murphy straightened up and sat back into the chair. He snapped open the case tucked in the waistband of his trousers and, with shaking fingertips, removed the short-handled knife within.
Ben moved closer to Sarah, looked down at her and then replaced the tape across her mouth as she screamed.
‘This is it. The best way, the only way. I’m helping you get out of this. I can show her what real love is. I can do this and then she’ll know. Number Four will know. So much better than the other three. She’ll know why I took her away from that place. Working where she was, no future, only dirty old men leering over her as she served them. It’s better this way. You’ll see. You’ll understand. You will, won’t you? She’ll love me. She will.’
Murphy held the knife behind his back. He pictured the duct tape binding his hands together and knew he would only get one shot.
