by Michael Kerr
He was a reasonable man. He knew that fear could be a catalyst for unpredictable and unacceptable behaviour. He remembered being awe-struck by the news of people throwing themselves from windows high up in the twin towers, having somehow made the decision to die by sudden impact with concrete, rather than choke on smoke, or be flame-grilled in the ensuing conflagration. He had tried to put himself in their position, but found it impossible to imagine being faced with such a fateful choice. He wondered what their last pained thoughts must have been. Some had even telephoned home. How do you say: ‘Sorry, hon, but I won’t be coming home tonight. I love you and the kids. Say good-bye to them for me. Gotta go. I’ve decided to jump out of an eighty-sixth floor window’. Decisions like that were beyond even his ability to comprehend.
All Dawn had done was fight to survive a life-threatening situation. He would have, on reflection, thought less of her if she had shown no grit. The challenge of winning her affection was an incentive to keep her alive. Anything worth having was worth fighting for, and you had to speculate to accumulate. It was important to gain her trust, then he would be master of her mind and spirit. She would learn to love him. Maybe he could take her to the cottage in Cornwall and keep her hidden from the world until he was positive that she could be trusted. The problem was, he trusted no one. No matter, he would tread softly taking one small step at a time.
He leaned over and kissed her tenderly on the forehead. “I would have done exactly the same in your circumstances, my angel,” he whispered. “You don’t know me, yet. I’m not the monster they would have you believe I am. If you behave, I promise you will come to no harm. I love you, and given time you will come to love me. I have a cliff top cottage near Padstow in Cornwall. I now that you’ll like it there.”
He dried her mouth, chin and cheeks, holding the penlight torch between his teeth as he used fresh tape to gag her.
“I’ll be back later,” he said, removing the torch from his mouth. “And we’ll leave here and start a new life together. You need to do a lot of thinking, Dawn. You have to come to terms with the fact that any future you have will be with me. You would never find anyone else who could love you so much.”
She knew that he was totally out of his tree. A mad dog. But her only hope was to use the power of his professed love as a tool to buy time and stay alive. His obvious infatuation with her was the only weapon at her disposal. The power of love could bring down empires and cause kings to abdicate. She believed it to be an emotional state that defied logic and commonsense; an irrational force with inconceivable potential. A cold, hard kernel in her brain determined to cultivate the madman’s passion for her, pick the right second, and then kill him. She would play his game, until he was convinced that she had succumbed to his will.
“Do you want me to switch the light on?” he said.
She grunted and nodded.
He went to the front of the unit, switched on the light, bent and grasped the door handle and pulled it up to waist height, ducking his head out to check that no one was in a position to see inside before he stepped out.
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
MIKE had followed Eddie. He entered the shabby office and walked up to the counter. The veneer-covered top was marked with coffee rings, and the edge farthest from him was lined with dark brown lozenge-shaped burns, where forgotten cigarettes had left indelible marks. A young guy with lank hair in a ponytail was sitting in front of a computer, playing some game on it. He looked round at Mike and sighed with open annoyance at being disturbed.
“Yeah?”
Mike showed him his ID. “Police business. The last guy who came in here. Who is he?”
Barry Sumner didn’t want any trouble. He had a string of convictions for TDA – taking and driving away – and could do without the Bill on his back. He gave Mike a pained smile that disclosed teeth as brown as the burns in the counter. He got up, opened a dog-eared book and ran a dirt-rimmed fingernail down a list of scrawled names.
“A. Dexter. What’s he done?”
“Maybe nothing. What’s your name, son?”
“Barry Sumner.”
“Okay, Barry. I wasn’t here. Understand?”
Barry was a little slow in many areas, but sharp as a tack in others. It wasn’t his business, and he didn’t plan on becoming involved. He nodded.
“Good. What connection does Dexter have with this company?”
“He’s just a customer. He rents a storage unit out back. Number fourteen in row C.”
“For what purpose?”
Barry hiked his shoulders. “Dunno. Nobody tells us what they keep in ’em.”
“All right, Barry. Let me through. And remember―”
“You weren’t here. I’ve never seen you.”
Mike gave him a hard look, as if to say you better remember that, son, before walking across to a door that opened onto the weed-riddled concrete yard beyond. He wanted to be wrong. But this just made him even more suspicious of Eddie. His logic followed the path that if the killer was a cop close to the case, then his DC’s injuries, combined with the unfathomable smile he had raised at the sight of the CCTV footage, and now the discovery that he rented a garage-size storage unit, all pointed to guilt. Why would he have a secret lockup? And if it was to store anything innocuous, why the false name? With Dawn Turner missing it was hard not to come to the conclusion that she might be inside it.
He unfastened his jacket and placed his right hand across his chest underneath it, so that he could hold the butt of his gun. He should call Jack. But what if he was wrong? How could he be wrong? He had watched Eddie stop and put a baseball cap and glasses on in his car before reaching the facility. That was too much of a coincidence. All that was missing was the moustache and long-haired wig.
He waited at the corner of row C. He could see the large numbers stencilled in white at the sides of the units’ doors. Farther down from fourteen, an old man was grappling with a large sideboard, trying to walk...shove...manhandle it into a unit.
After a few minutes, Mike walked slowly towards where he knew Eddie was. A part of his mind would not accept that Eddie could be the Mimic. Surely there had to be a simple explanation.
When the door began to rise with a rattling sound, he almost panicked. Felt like a kid about to be caught with his hand in the cookie jar. The doors of the units were recessed. He pressed himself into one and held his breath. If Eddie saw him, then he would have to come clean, tell him that his injury and suspicious actions had made him a suspect. But if Eddie left without spotting him, then with a master key from the kid in the office he would see just what his colleague had that was so precious he needed to keep it in a secure unit that he rented under an alias.
It turned out that plan A would have to be employed. Eddie locked the door and then walked past him heading for his car, but came to a sudden stop and turned back and said, “What the fuck are you doing here, Mike?”
Mike’s bowels churned. He almost drew his gun, but didn’t. Eddie’s arms were hung loosely at his sides. He didn’t move, just stood still with a look of bewilderment on his face.
“I want to know what you’re doing here, Eddie, and why you rent a place like this under a false name. And why you’re wearing the cap and glasses. What have you got to hide?”
“Nothing Mike. It’s personal. We all have secrets. This is mine,” Eddie said.
“I need for you to open the door, Eddie. And before you do, take your gun out with just thumb and finger and drop it on the ground.”
For the first time in his career, Mike drew his weapon and levelled it at a fellow officer.
“Have you gone fucking mad?” Eddie said, removing the pistol from his shoulder rig, to not drop it, but bend down and place it gently on the furrowed concrete.
“I hope so, Eddie, I really do,” Mike said. “Now, real slowly, go and open the door.”
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
THEY sat side by side on high stools, shoulder to shoulder, knee touching knee, looking out
through the glass and down to the few people and vehicles that found reason to be on the streets, hurrying to and fro. Life in progress on a cold, grey Christmas Day.
Lisa sipped the too-strong brew out of a white pot mug.
Jack liked the police canteen. It gave him a feeling of continuity; like motel and hotel chains. You could be staying at a Best Western in London or Los Angeles, and apart from the framed prints on the walls, there would be little else to denote where you were. Funny how familiarity was supposed to breed contempt. He found it comforting. What you knew, was usually what you stuck with. Maybe that came with age. The unknown was not as appealing to him these days. Not the way it had been in his teens or twenties. Change could become stressful and unsettling.
“What?” Lisa said as she became conscious of his pensiveness.
“Just how everything moves on,” he said. “I don’t like it. You get used to things, and they break, or wear out, or die. We’re slipping into history with every breath we take. For some reason I find that depressing.”
“It’s all there is, Ryder. And I thought you were a one-day-at-a-time sort of guy who took it as it was served up.”
“I am. But it doesn’t stop me from looking over my shoulder now and then. I seem to be rushing through life, leaving it behind me. What I lived through and thought was relevant is as out of date as half the junk in most people’s medicine cabinets.”
“You’re too young to be having senior moments.”
“Must be premature senility. I get to thinking about significant events, good and bad, and realise that they’re just part of a past that you can’t hold on to. You end up with blurry images that might only be an approximation of how things really were. It all slips through your fingers.”
“What do you mean?”
“That it’s easy to embellish things. That’s why witnesses to crimes are so unreliable. Their minds fill in the blanks to make a whole picture that in some instances is completely inaccurate. Seems the brain needs to bridge gaps, and is able to trick itself.”
“I thought that I was the shrink?”
“I’m starting to believe that we’re all shrinks, Lisa. You understand the mechanics of the mind better, because you’ve been trained to recognise the symptoms of certain disorders. You’re focused, because it’s what you do for a living. But laymen know more than they think they do. Just living in a city and having to be interactive and cope with so many people every day builds awareness as to what makes an individual tick.”
“So what do you suppose makes a man who on the surface is a good officer do the things that the Mimic has done? Do you understand what triggers him?”
“I don’t need to. All I need to do is identify him.”
“You need to remember that he cannot control his urges. It would be like expecting a dog not to chase a stick. Killers like him only stop when they’re too old and infirm to carry on, or are apprehended…or dead.”
Jack sighed and said, “Do you ever find any of the patients you deal with showing remorse? Do they reach a stage when they mellow and have regrets for the pain and suffering they’ve caused?”
Lisa put her empty cup down and shook her head. “No. The only regrets they have are that they were caught and incarcerated. And they only feel sorry for themselves. Keep in mind that your rogue cop is more dangerous than any wild animal. He can think, plan, and present a personality that he has manufactured to hide behind. He knows exactly what you’re doing, and can keep one step ahead of you. He really is your worst nightmare, Ryder.”
“And a merry Christmas to you, too,” he said, leaning over and kissing her on the mouth. They heard a giggle. Molly, one of the only two canteen staff on duty for a few hours’ that day, was watching them. She was making sandwiches, but paused when she saw the handsome plainclothes detective kiss his attractive companion.
“There ain’t no mistletoe ’ung up in ’ere,” Molly shouted.
“Then we’ll just have to manage without,” Jack said, breaking off to answer her, before kissing Lisa again, unfazed at having an audience of one.
When Eddie stepped back, Mike picked up the pistol and stuffed it in the waistband of his jeans.
“What do you think I’ve got in there, Mike?” Eddie said, slowly taking a key attached to a large yellow plastic fob from his pocket and bending down to unlock the padlock that was secured through a hasp at the bottom of the door.
“Just open it, Eddie,” Mike said. “If I’m wrong about this, I’ll apologise. But I’ve got the feeling we both know I’m right.”
Eddie heaved the door open, stepped a couple of paces inside and turned to face him. Mike stopped. Looking past Eddie he could see the rear view of a woman bound to a chair. Jesus! He had been right.
The next second was a blur. He fell for the oldest trick in the book.
Eddie looked past him, over his shoulder, and nodded to a nonexistent accomplice.
Mike took only an instant to jerk his head round and see that no one was there, but it was an instant he could ill afford.
The fist crashed into his jaw. He staggered sideways, hit the wall and slid down it. Tried to raise his gun, only to find that his hand was empty. The Glock was four feet away from him on the concrete floor.
Eddie snatched the gun up, and then quickly closed the door. His knuckles ached from the punch he had thrown. The shock at impact had travelled up his arm to his shoulder. That Mike was still conscious was a surprise, for he had never delivered a better or heavier punch in his life.
He used Mike’s own cuffs to secure his wrists behind his back. This was a bonus as much as a complication. He didn’t like Hewson. The sergeant was half of the double act comprising him and Ryder. They were like Batman and fucking Robin. Well, the partnership of the dynamic duo was now well and truly over.
It took a few minutes for Mike’s head to clear. Then the pain kicked in. His vision was blurred, and the side of his face felt like someone had worked on it with a steak hammer.
“You with the programme, Hewson?” Eddie said. “I need for you to answer some questions.”
“Go fuc―”
The hard blow to his cheek with the gun’s barrel made him cry out. As a kid he had suffered an abscess under a tooth. His face had swollen up like a balloon, and the pain had nearly driven him insane. This was comparable. He could feel fractured bone moving in the raw flesh, and hear the crepitus sound of his now fractured jaw as the ends grated together.
“Wise up, Mikey. You know that I’m going to kill you. Your only concern should be whether I do it quickly and painlessly, or make a meal of it. You’ve seen my wet work. I don’t think you want to suffer having your face removed, do you?”
“Jack knows where I am,” Mike lied.
The cold steel barrel struck again, this time harder, breaking his two front teeth in half.
“No, he doesn’t, Hewson. You were following a hunch. Why did you suspect me?”
Mike spat out fragments of tooth. “I’ve always thought you were crazy as a shithouse rat, McBride,” he said with difficulty. “But I didn’t realise you were a sick pervert, until I saw you smiling at the CCTV footage.”
The flashing blade seemed to appear by magic, and the pain in his right eye nullified all other hurt. He knew that the sharp point had skewered his eyeball. He was too shocked to scream.
“You’ve got a bad mouth,” Eddie said. “You need to remind yourself that I enjoy doing this. It’s up there with sex. Get it through that thick head of yours that to me you’re just meat that can experience pain.”
“Y...you were a good copper, Eddie. Why―”
“I’m many things. I’m the guy that let Gant’s people know where Kelly Davis was being kept under wraps. I’ve used the job to operate from behind. Being on the inside gives me the edge. Now, tell me where Ryder’s ex-wife and son are. And be aware that I know you stashed them for him, so don’t plead ignorance. You’ve still got one eye left. Do you really want to lose it?”
Everyone h
as a limit. Eddie knew that more than most. He had to take Mike’s other eye, though, before he talked...and talked.
Mike shuddered violently as the blade was slid into his belly and worked backwards and forwards.
Eddie was shaking with the rush. He experienced what he could only imagine a shot of heroin would provide. That’s what killing gave him. The sensation was almost paralysing in its intensity. He wiped the blade on Mike’s jeans and re-evaluated. Time seemed to be pressing in, crowding him. He rolled up the door part way again and ducked out. The rust-flecked van was still outside the unit at the end of the row. He walked towards it, cradling his arm as he drew near.
The old man appeared. Saw Eddie, and the blood on his clothes, which was Mike’s.
Sidney Cohen was a sprightly eighty-three year old. He had sold his antique business ten years ago, but still liked to dabble, visit auctions, and pick up bargains to sell on at a decent profit. As he unloaded the van and carefully placed his latest acquisitions in the unit, he had no idea that he only had minutes left to live. Things would have turned out so differently for him if he’d listened to Judith, his wife of fifty-two years. She had wanted them to fly out to Miami, to spend a few weeks with her widowed sister, Carole, who owned a third-floor condo just across the road from the beach in Bal Harbour. But Sidney hated flying. And in this day and age, with no smoking on all flights, he’d rather stay home. Being nervous of hurtling through the blue yonder over the Atlantic Ocean was doubly arse-puckering with the added torment of not being able to soothe his frayed nerves with a steady supply of nicotine. He’d tried patches. They hadn’t worked. And if Judith had not been griping incessantly about how they could be soaking up the sun, then he wouldn’t have driven down to the unit to get away from her for an hour or two.
Sidney had dallied, and rested his weary old bones on a Georgian dining room chair and enjoyed what was to be his last cigarette. Had he not, then he would have been gone, and not had the extreme, fatal displeasure of meeting Detective Constable Eddie McBride.
