by DC Brockwell
No Way Out
“Pray you’re not chosen!”
DC Brockwell
Copyright © 2020 DC Brockwell
The right of DC Brockwell to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by him in
accordance to the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
First published in 2020 by Bloodhound Books
Apart from any use permitted under UK copyright law, this publication may only be
reproduced, stored, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, with prior permission in
writing of the publisher or, in the case of reprographic production, in accordance with the
terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency.
All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living
or dead, is purely coincidental.
www.bloodhoundbooks.com
978-1-913419-64-6
I would like to thank my wife, Beks for all her hard work listening to my ideas, proofreading the manuscript and encouraging me to go for it. Thank you for all you do for me. Xxxxx
Contents
Love crime, thriller and mystery books?
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Chapter 60
Chapter 61
Chapter 62
Chapter 63
Chapter 64
Chapter 65
Chapter 66
Chapter 67
Acknowledgments
A note from the publisher
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1
Day 2 Friday, 12th January
Detective Constable Nasreen Maqsood sat down next to her supervisor, Detective Sergeant Terrence Johnson. Having successfully secured a confession out of a serial rapist who’d been stalking their streets and parks, she’d been asked to join Terrence for a briefing on their next investigation.
The rapist had managed to elude them for over three months, but by using every resource they had at their disposal, they’d managed to identify the suspect before he’d struck for a sixth time; Nasreen only wished they’d been able to identify him sooner.
Sitting across from her and her supervisor was Detective Chief Superintendent Clive Adams. She’d heard a lot about Adams throughout her career, but as of a year earlier – when she’d been selected as detective constable – he was now her boss’s boss’s boss. It was unusual for such a senior officer to be giving them their investigation dossiers. Due to budgetary constraints, illness and other factors beyond the department’s control, their inspectors and chief inspector were out of action; now it was up to DCS Adams to perform three officers’ roles.
While he had a reputation as a harsh but fair man, so far, fortunately, she’d only seen the fair side of him – except for her very first day as a detective, that was, when he’d expressed his concern over her selection; he’d been honest enough to tell her that she’d been chosen, not because she was the most qualified, or had scored highest in her exam, but rather because her ethnicity was desirable. In the past year, she’d worked hard to allay those concerns, had proven her worth, and had consequently become an integral part of the team.
Nasreen listened patiently to the usual niceties, remaining quiet while Johnson and Adams spoke briefly about their families.
Adams was a well-built man in his late fifties, with a head full of grey hair. Not for the first time, as Nasreen stared at him, she noticed how big his ears were in comparison with the rest of his head – long, rather than big. He wasn’t an unattractive man, but she wouldn’t say he was exactly attractive either.
Her supervisor, on the other hand, was a strapping black man with a booming voice and a contagious laugh. Now, he was a good-looking man, one who could charm anyone into anything. In fact, about six months earlier, Terrence had charmed a female suspect into confessing to a double murder; she’d not been the brightest spark, it was true, however it had been Terrence’s charm that had won her over and brought out the unexpected confession.
Once the civilities were over, Adams picked up two A4 folders, handing one each to her and Terrence before leaning back in his chair. “I’ve had to juggle things about a bit. You’ll be running with this for the next couple of days; I’ve had to pull Watts and O’Hara off it because they’re testifying in the Hamilton trial.”
“That’s okay, sir,” Terrence replied in his deep voice.
“All the preliminary work’s in there,” Adams continued, nodding at the folders. “It’s already a day old, so you’ll be picking up where they left off.”
Nasreen opened the folder and skimmed over the top sheet of paper, a form giving the details of the missing person: Daniel Rose. She gasped, then hoped they hadn’t heard. It couldn’t be her Danny, could it? It had to be another poor soul with the same name.
She could hear Adams and Terrence talking about the case, but she wasn’t listening. She looked at the address details: they neither confirmed nor denied her worst fears; she no longer knew where he lived anyway.
Glancing through the personal section of the form, she noticed the date of birth was a match! Shit! She flipped over to the next page, and there it was: a picture of her Danny.
It was funny how she had two very conflicting histories with Danny. On the one hand, she had stacks of memories of her primary and secondary school years, years Danny spent bullying her, calling her and her friends the P-word and giving her the general verbal abuse she’d become accustomed to. Then, on the flip side, she had lovely memories of him as her boyfriend, when he’d been loving, kind, and generous.
When she was twenty – going through a rebellious phase against her parents – Nasreen and Danny bumped into one another in the high street of their hometown and he’d apologised for his behaviou
r in the past. They’d popped into a pub nearby and had spent the rest of the afternoon and evening catching up. When they were saying their goodbyes, they’d arranged to go out on a real date.
She looked at the picture of Danny for what felt like hours. He was such a good-looking man, with a full head of dark hair that rested slightly over his face. She remembered his smile, the smile that had made her knees tremble. She’d always wondered why such a great-looking guy had been interested in her; she wasn’t ugly, but she’d never considered herself to be pretty either. Still, there she’d been for a little over a year, in a great relationship with a gorgeous man.
All these memories kept flashing through her mind while her bosses continued discussing the investigation, oblivious to her distress.
Glancing through Danny’s employment history, she found that he’d worked for a company called Nagel and Nagel – a male escort agency – which had gone bust two years earlier; since then he’d taken his services private. A sudden rush of anger enveloped her as she thought of all those women paying to have sex with him.
Not wanting her bosses to know how angry she was, Nasreen breathed in and out until she felt a little calmer. She just couldn’t understand how Danny could have sold his body for money, though there was no denying he’d have made a lot doing it; he had a great body and he really knew how to treat women. But to actually go and sell sex for money? What was he thinking!
Before they’d broken up – the hardest break-up Nasreen had ever experienced – he’d shown her his paintings, which were amazing. Danny had always wanted to be an artist, and to make money by selling his art in galleries was his dream. He had such talent, and such promise; he wasn’t supposed to be a prostitute. What had gone wrong in his life to make him decide that selling his body was the best course of action?
Poor Danny, she thought. Something really bad must have happened to him.
Tuning into her bosses’ conversation again, Nasreen heard Terrence and Adams talking about Danny’s family.
He didn’t have any to speak of. His mum and dad had both died when he was sixteen, and thanks to his older sister agreeing to house him, he’d just managed to avoid being taken into care. Then, when Danny was twenty, his sister had moved to Ottawa, Canada, with her new husband. There was no one else.
“Nasreen, is everything all right?”
At Terrence’s voice she looked up from her file to find him and Adams both looking at her, waiting for a response. A quiet “Huh?” was all she could muster.
“Are you okay?” Adams asked, sounding concerned. “You look pale; are you feeling all right?”
“I’m fine. Sorry, what were you saying? I was just reading through the file and must’ve got distracted.” As Nasreen stared at her superiors, she noticed their looks of concern disappear, quickly turning to expressions of confusion.
“Are you sure?” asked Adams.
She tried to keep her voice level. “Honestly, I’m fine.”
Still not looking entirely convinced, Adams and Terrence went back to discussing the investigation.
Nasreen had to decide whether she should come clean and inform her superiors that she’d had a relationship with the victim; it was force protocol to inform them, so she was professionally obligated to do so. There was something holding her back though.
She knew of a fellow officer, back when she’d been a uniformed constable, whose boyfriend had disappeared, and he had not been allowed to have anything to do with the case. She wanted – needed – to help find Danny.
“I suggest you go right back to the beginning, see if a fresh pair of eyes – or two – will help. Watts and O’Hara interviewed…” Adams looked down at his copy of the file, “Rita Abbott yesterday; she initiated the missing persons report and we think she was the last person to see him. I’d start there.”
“We’re on it,” Nasreen replied, closing the file and standing up. Terrence followed suit.
As she and her supervisor walked out of the office, she thought about telling Terrence privately – letting him know about her relationship to the missing person – and seeing if he thought she should tell Adams. There really was no question that she should have told them both from the beginning. There was no way she was going to let them reassign her to a different case…
2
Day 5 Monday, 15th January
Daniel Rose stirred.
His head hurt, he felt nauseous, and when he tried to rub his face, something prevented his arms from moving. He was bound by something.
Gradually, he opened his eyes.
The first thing he saw was a white ceiling, worrying considering his bedroom’s was an off-white, beige. It was then he realised he wasn’t at home.
Looking to his right he saw a bare white wall; to his left, the same. He could feel something around his neck, and he could smell the strong scent of leather.
Raising his head as far as the leather neck cuff would allow, he looked forwards. He was naked atop white sheets, his ankles and wrists chained and bound by leather restraints. He tried to move again, but the restraints were too tight.
Where the fuck was he? Was this one of his clients’ bedrooms? It wasn’t a room he’d seen before; maybe it was one of their spare rooms he hadn’t been in yet?
He continued scanning the room, his head throbbing. There was a door in front of him, set to the right, and it looked heavy – made of metal maybe, painted red. There was a letterbox in the door, about five feet up; it couldn’t have been a letterbox at all. It could have been a peephole, but it certainly wasn’t a normal one; it looked like something you would see in a prison door.
Danny winced at his pounding head.
This wasn’t funny, whatever it was. Wherever he was.
Just what the hell was going on?
In the middle of the front wall, to the left of the red door and slightly higher up, was what appeared to be an air conditioning unit. The flaps were open and the machine was making a strange whirring sound. At least it was comfortable, temperature-wise.
Danny suddenly realised that on his scan of the room he hadn’t seen any windows. He looked to the left and right again. Nope. A windowless room meant he was either in the middle of a big complex, or underground. A basement, perhaps? None of his clients had basements – at least, not to his knowledge. He looked more closely at the walls, seeing two vents near the top of both the left and right walls.
He had to get out of here, he thought as he pulled on the wrist restraints.
“Help!” he shouted, panicked, as he continued to pull as tight as he could on his wrists, all the while wrenching his neck against the tough leather. “Anybody? Please?”
The letterbox hatch slid sideways from the outside.
As Danny found himself staring at a pair of eyes peering at him through the slot, he stopped tugging at his wrists. Who was it? If it was one of his clients, he was going to go straight to the police.
The hatch closed.
“Please! Untie me and let me go!” he shouted, yet again tugging at his wrist restraints. “I haven’t done anything wrong! I just want to go home, please!”
Nothing.
He listened for any noises: nothing. Either there was nothing happening outside the room, or the walls and doors were really thick – soundproofed, perhaps?
Glancing to his right, he saw there was a chest of drawers next to the bed. There was nothing on the top, but what about inside the drawers? His clothes could be in there, and maybe his mobile phone too.
He needed to get the phone and call for help; all he had to do was get out of these restraints, find his, or another, phone and call the police.
“Mr Rose, you’ll tire yourself out,” said a female voice. “Please relax, and don’t be alarmed. I’ll be with you shortly to debrief you on your situation.”
Unable to work out where the voice had come from, Danny scanned the room again, hoping to see something he’d missed before. He thought the voice had come from above. Looking closer, he couldn�
��t see any technology capable of…
Oh wait, there it was: above the air conditioning unit there was a glass ball, a camera. Someone was watching him.
How long had he been here, being watched? The thought made his head hurt.
He took the voice’s advice and lay still, trying to think back to the last thing he could remember, although that was easier said than done with his head being so fuzzy; it felt like someone had stuffed it with cotton wool.
The last thing he remembered was leaving Rita Abbott – his client – asleep in her bed, and then he’d walked through the park, back to his townhouse. He remembered walking past some bloke in the dark. A big stocky guy in a bomber jacket.
So that was how he’d ended up here! That bloke must’ve smashed him over the head with something, probably a baton or maybe something smaller that he hadn’t seen until it was too late.
But why would he want to knock him unconscious and bring him here? And where was here? And whose voice was that earlier? None of it made any sense.
