Erika Foster 04 - Last Breath

by Robert Bryndza

  ‘Stop. Look.’

  ‘Shit. The plates are obscured,’ said Peterson.

  ‘Yeah. The car’s filthy, splattered in mud,’ said Crane.

  ‘Bloody hell,’ said Erika. ‘And no one stopped him?’

  ‘Hang on. Let’s keep watching,’ said Crane. He maximised another screen beside the car going into the tunnel. ‘Here we have a CCTV camera on the other side of the tunnel. I’ll run them both from 7.31 p.m…’

  On the left-hand screen Janelle biked into the tunnel, followed by the car. They looked to the right-hand screen. Crane forwarded both timestamps, moving on both screens by seventeen minutes to 7:48 p.m. The red car emerged from the tunnel. Alone.

  Erika stared at both screens, feeling a chill.

  ‘How long after this have you run the two camera views?’

  ‘Twenty-four hours, boss. No girl or bike emerges from either side of the tunnel,’ said Crane.

  ‘So the bastard had her in the back or in the boot of the car,’ said Erika.

  ‘Where does the car go?’ asked Peterson.

  ‘It avoids the Congestion Charge Zone camera. I’m going to see how far I can follow him through London. It’s going to take a bit of time. It might be that he was stopped by police for having his numberplates obscured.’

  ‘It was a Sunday night,’ said Erika.

  ‘It would be on record… He’d have a fixed penalty fine,’ said Crane.

  ‘It’s virtually impossible to avoid CCTV in Central London,’ said Erika.

  ‘But he’s managed to get in and out twice without us having his registration number?’ said Peterson.

  ‘He’s deliberately muddied his plates, hasn’t he?’ said Erika. ‘Risky.’

  ‘But he’s abducting women. The level of risk involved must get his adrenalin pumping. And he’s been lucky so far,’ said Peterson.

  ‘But luck runs outs eventually. And we have to be there waiting and ready when it does.’ Erika watched again as Crane played the video of Janelle biking into the tunnel closely followed by the red car. They’d never know exactly what happened to Janelle in those seventeen minutes.

  It was as if she vanished into thin air.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  Ella Wilkinson’s housemate, Maggie, woke late on Sunday morning. She’d gone to bed early and slept until mid-morning. When she emerged from her room onto the landing, all was quiet. This wasn’t unusual for a Sunday morning, but she didn’t have any missed calls or texts on her phone, and Ella’s bedroom door was open. Maggie passed the wooden bannister where their towels hung in a line, ready to be grabbed on the way to the shower. Ella’s room was next to the bathroom. Maggie knocked and peered her head around. The bed was made, and still strewn with the outfits she’d been trying on the night before. Their other housemate, Doug, was on holiday with his girlfriend, and his door was open too. Maggie stood at the top of the stairs, feeling uneasy. She shook it away and went down to the kitchen.

  As the morning and afternoon passed, she tried Ella’s phone several times, and when she still wasn’t picking up, her unease changed to panic. Ella was always glued to her phone. She would have texted to say she wouldn’t be coming back.

  * * *

  At five p.m, just as the light was starting to fade, Maggie pulled on her thick winter jacket and walked over to the bar. The door was locked, but she peered through the window and saw a woman, wearing yellow marigolds, mopping the floor, and a young guy unloading bottles into the fridge. She knocked on the window. At first, they ignored her, but then as she was more insistent the woman finally came and opened up.

  ‘What is it?’ she snapped.

  ‘Sorry to bother you. I live around the corner… My friend was here last night, and she hasn’t come home…’

  ‘How old is your friend?’ she asked. She had a wrinkly smoker’s face and a bristly bob of dark greying hair.

  ‘She’s twenty.’

  The woman smirked. ‘Well, she probably met some bloke. Now, I’ve got work to do.’

  She went to shut the door. Maggie held out her hand.

  ‘No. That’s not good enough. Can I ask your barman? I have a photo of my friend.’

  The woman eyed her suspiciously, then decided that a plump girl with a thick jacket and her tartan pyjamas sticking out of the bottom wasn’t much of a threat. She opened the door.

  It was a popular bar, but it looked sad in the fading light of day. The tables were stacked with chairs, and there was a strong smell of disinfectant.

  ‘Sam, this girl wants to ask you something,’ snapped the woman, picking up a plastic bucket and heading off through a door behind the bar.

  Sam was handsome, with a nose ring and a shock of dyed blond hair. He smiled warmly.

  ‘Who’s your friend?’ he asked. He had a soft Aussie accent.

  ‘This is her, Ella Wilkinson,’ said Maggie, holding up her phone, where Ella’s picture was displayed on Facebook. She felt foolish talking to the hot barman in her coat and pyjamas. ‘She was due to come here last night around eight. Was she here?’

  He looked at the photo and shook his head.

  ‘No. She’s a pretty girl; I’d have remembered her.’

  ‘You’re positive she didn’t come in here last night?’

  ‘Yeah…’ He saw her worried face. Her hair on end. ‘The bouncer who was on last night has just rocked up. Let me give him a shout.’

  Sam went to the door where the cleaner had left, and shouted for a man called Roman. Moments later a large beefy guy with a monobrow and a shaved head appeared, holding a steaming Pot Noodle.

  ‘Vat?’ he said with a thick Russian accent.

  Sam explained the situation, and brought him over to Maggie. Roman took her phone in a large hairy hand and studied Ella’s photo.

  ‘Yes, she vas vaiting outside last night,’ he said.

  ‘She didn’t come in?’ asked Maggie.

  He shook his head. ‘No. She vas there and then she vasn’t.’

  ‘Where did she go?’ asked Maggie.

  ‘I don’t bloody know. I vas working.’ He stuffed a forkful of Pot Noodle into his mouth and walked off.

  Sam smiled apologetically.

  * * *

  Maggie came back out of the bar. It was now getting dark. She looked up and down the street, and felt hopeless. She tried Ella’s phone again but it went straight to voicemail. She saw that the road running next to the bar was a cul-de-sac. She set off down it and came up to the dead end, where there was a row of lock-up garages. They were all closed, and it was empty. She walked towards a row of evergreens by the last garage. She pulled the neck of her coat up against the wind.

  ‘This is stupid. She’s probably been having sex all day,’ muttered Maggie. She turned to leave, then spied a flash of white and brown in the small passage between the last garage and the line of evergreens.

  She pushed her way down, stepping over old bricks and rubbish and saw a handbag. Ella’s handbag. It had a streak of blood on the front. When she opened it she found Ella’s wallet, keys and phone.

  She hugged it to her chest and started to cry.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  Darryl woke early on Monday morning and took Grendel for a walk. It was dark, and the wind blew softly over the fields, pushing the powder-dry snow into undulating drifts. When he reached the Oast House, he undid the padlock on the door and pulled it back. Grendel went in first, sniffing the frigid air and around the door in the furnace. The wind screamed across the top of the cowl.

  He switched on the light, and opened the door to the furnace. Ella shifted in the cage and blinked, and began to wail in concert with the wind. She shivered, bound at the neck and wrists to the cage. One of her eyes was swollen shut. Grendel moved round the cage, sniffing at the back of her head. Ella tried to pull her head away from the bars, and Grendel gave a low rumbling growl.

  ‘Please, please…’ she started.

  ‘It’s alright. She can’t hurt you,’ said Darryl. Ella kept h
er eyes on him, shifting her head painfully when he crossed behind her to pat Grendel’s head.

  ‘Put your hands up,’ he said.

  ‘No, no, no, no more, please…’

  ‘I’m not going to hurt you. Put your hands up. Now.’

  She lifted up bloody hands with dirty fingernails, and jumped as he slid a small bottle of water through the bars.

  ‘Take it, and drink,’ he said. She took it between her bound hands. He watched as she checked it, and seeing it was still sealed she put it between her bare knees and winced as she opened it with a clink of the chains, then lifted her hands to her mouth and drank.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said breathlessly. Darryl moved back around the cage to face her. ‘My parents have money,’ she said. ‘They’ll pay.’

  He crouched down on his haunches, and looked at her. Noticing how the light from outside the furnace chamber threw the squares of the bars over her face.

  ‘I don’t want money… Your friend is worried about you.’

  ‘Friend?’

  ‘One of the blonde skanks you work with at the café. With the trampy wrist tattoos.’

  ‘Cerys? How do you know Cerys?’ she said.

  ‘I know Cerys, because I know you. You think I just grabbed you for the fun of it? You really don’t remember me, do you?’

  Her one good eye darted about, trying to conjure up where she’d seen him.

  ‘I came into the café so many times, so many lunchtimes; you always had a smile for me, asked me how I was…’

  ‘Oh, yes. Yes, I remember.’

  ‘What’s my name?’

  ‘I, I…’ She shook her head, and fresh tears appeared in her swollen eyes.

  ‘Come on, Ella. You wrote it on my coffee cup, so many times…’

  ‘I know it; I’m just tired and hungry…’

  ‘LIAR!’ he shouted, slamming his hand down on top of the cage. ‘You fucking LIAR! You don’t know me. You don’t care.’

  Grendel started to bark and circle the cage, agitated.

  ‘I do care, I could get to know you and care, if you give me the chance. I could, I’m sure…’

  Darryl got up and paced around the cage, mirroring Grendel. ‘We talked about stuff, Ella. I told you that I lived on a farm, and that our milk was organic… I told you about my dog… You’re just like them all.’

  ‘No. I promise, I’m not!’

  ‘You are. Another pretty bitch. A bitch who plays with men; you make us think you like us but you don’t. You just want to play with us. Use us!’ He was screaming at her now, his piggy eyes wide. Grendel joined in with a volley of barks. Darryl stopped and composed himself. He crouched back down beside the cage. Calm. He leaned into her. ‘Ella. If you could have at least remembered my name, I would have let you go. But no. You’re going to die, Ella.’

  She spat at him, and it landed on his face.

  ‘You’re a creepy little freak. No woman would ever go near you!’ she screamed.

  He crossed behind her and he grabbed the chain, yanking it back so that her neck was pressed against the bars and she began to choke. She scrabbled with her hands, but the chain binding her wrists stopped them inches from her chest. Finally, when her face was turning blue, he let go, and she fell forward, coughing and gagging. He opened the door and Grendel trotted out.

  ‘No one is looking for you; no one cares,’ he said. Darryl left the furnace chamber and turned out the light.

  He heaved the large sliding door closed, padlocked it and followed after Grendel, down towards the lake.

  * * *

  Darryl returned to the farm house at seven, had his breakfast then caught the eight a.m. train to London.

  At lunchtime he went to the Bay Organic Café. It was busy with office workers picking at the salad bar. He dawdled over the baskets of bread, listening to Ella’s colleague, Cerys, who was working behind the checkout, talking to a man who he presumed was the manager.

  ‘It doesn’t take much to pick up the phone, does it?’ she was saying. She looked a little like Ella, although not quite as pretty. The manager was handsome with floppy dark hair, and he was struggling to change the till roll. He muttered something non-committal as Cerys went on: ‘Ella’s not committed. Students live in a fantasy land of parties and booze. I even heard her talk about drugs.’

  She had her hand on one hip, and was twirling a strand of her long blonde hair as she spoke. Her only priority is to get into the manager’s trousers, thought Darryl. He approached the checkout counter. The manager was now finished with the till roll.

  ‘I was recommended Ella by a friend of her mum and dad,’ he said. ‘She’s reliable. I don’t understand why she hasn’t called. I’m going to give them a buzz.’

  Cerys turned to Darryl, but her eyes were on the manager as he retreated through a door at the back of the shop.

  ‘Can I have a small cappuccino?’ he said.

  ‘What’s the name?’ she asked, picking up a paper cup and a black marker.

  ‘Skank.’

  She scribbled it down and then hesitated, looking up at him. ‘Sorry, what’s your name?’

  ‘Surname is Skank, first name Cerys…’ She looked confused, finally noticing him, the marker still poised above the cup. Darryl went on, ‘My mistake, that’s your name. Cerys Skank. Your manager is married, Cerys. With two small kids… Think about it.’

  He left her with her mouth open, and went out onto Borough High Street. He knew what he’d just done was idiotic, but it was worth it to see the look on her face. All women were bitches, and you had to know how to treat them.

  He thought of Ella back at the farm, and he knew tonight would be the night.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  Erika had been assigned a small room at the end of the communal office at West End Central. It barely fitted a desk, chair and a filing cabinet, and it had a thin window looking out over the rear of the building. She hadn’t used it much, preferring to stay with the team in their glass-partitioned section, but this afternoon, with the press appeal looming, she needed some time and space to go through what she was going to say. She cared deeply about the victims, and like so many of the cases she had worked on over the years, it was not only the terrible circumstances of the victims’ deaths which haunted her, it was the lives that had been snuffed out prematurely. Young women with so much life left to live: careers, babies, holidays, and all those joys now denied them.

  There was a knock at the door and Peterson came in. He saw her face, and the desk strewn with paperwork.

  ‘Hey, I’ve just had Colleen, the police media liaison, on the phone. There should be a good turnout from the press, so she wants to use the larger conference room at the Thistle Hotel in Marylebone.’

  ‘Thanks,’ she said. Peterson closed the door, moved behind her chair, and started to massage her neck.

  ‘That’s good, but not now,’ she said, pushing his hands away.

  ‘Erika. You’re tense.’

  ‘And you’re at work. We’re at work.’ She ducked out from under his hands, and twisted the chair to face him.

  His soft brown eyes narrowed. ‘We’re in your office, with the door closed.’

  He twisted her chair back round, and started to work on her shoulders again.

  ‘It’s your bed… I’m not used to sleeping on such a soft bed,’ she said, tipping her head back and enjoying the release on her tense shoulders.

  ‘Erika, that’s a really expensive memory foam mattress.’

  There was a knock at the door and Moss entered, just as Erika said: ‘Well, it’s not hard enough for me…’

  ‘Sorry, is this a bad time?’ said Moss, looking between them. Peterson dropped his hands.

  ‘No, we were… It’s fine,’ said Erika, sifting through the papers in front of her.

  ‘And we were talking about my mattress, my mattress not being hard…’ said Peterson, moving back around the desk.

  ‘It’s memory foam. The mattress. Very soft,’ added Erika. Ther
e was an awkward pause.

  ‘Thank God for that,’ grinned Moss. ‘Although I do have a friend who’s tried Viagra, and he says it’s changed his life… Another friend thinks laughter is the best medicine, but I suppose that’s not very helpful when it’s things going soft.’

  ‘A soft mattress is very good for you,’ said Peterson, a little defensively. Erika and Moss started to laugh. ‘It is!’

  ‘Come on, I’m only teasing,’ said Moss, giving Peterson a nudge.

  ‘Idiot.’ He grinned. Erika was pleased they’d had the opportunity to laugh, even for a moment. It had broken the tension.

  ‘Okay, okay, we’re at work. Let’s act like it,’ she said.

  ‘Of course, sorry,’ said Moss. ‘Right. I came in here to ask if Sada Pence from the YMCA, Janelle Robinson’s friend, is taking part in the press appeal?’

  ‘When I spoke to her, I got the impression she was the closest thing Janelle had to family,’ said Peterson.

  ‘Colleen has just found out that Sada has another job, working as a lap dancer at one of the seedier clubs in Soho,’ said Moss.

  ‘Shit,’ said Erika.‘If we put her in front of the cameras, the press could dig around and use that as their angle…’

  ‘Seedy double life of murder victim’s best friend,’ agreed Peterson.

  ‘We’ve already got concerns about Lacey’s past relationship with Geraldine Corn,’ added Moss. ‘You know how it works. If she was a lesbian, then it wouldn’t matter as much, but the fact that she dated both men and women, well, that’s just too much for the press who suddenly find themselves all moral and judgemental.’

  ‘Okay. I can add something in, so I can appeal on behalf of Janelle,’ said Erika. ‘Tell Colleen that I can email something over to her in the next twenty minutes.’

  ‘Yes, boss,’ said Moss and she left the office.

  Erika turned and stared out of the tiny window looking down to the small square of the concrete courtyard below.

  ‘She had no one, Janelle. No one in life and no one in death,’ said Erika. ‘How does that happen? Some people’s lives are so full of family and friends, and others walk through life alone.’