by J K Ellem
“Then this doesn’t concern me,” she replied looking around the room. “I’m leaving, going back to my cottage.”
“So, you’re going to run again?” Shaw stepped towards her. “Just like you did before? You can’t run and hide forever, Annie.”
“What’s going on here had nothing to do with me, and I’ve done a good job of hiding so far until you came along.”
Shaw frowned. “It was you who told me about your past, the money you had stolen. It was you who wanted to take a closer look at this house. You came up here on your own to take a look the other night.”
“Well, that was a mistake that I now regret.” Annie turned to leave again. “My own self-preservation is more important than looking for a man who doesn’t want to be found.” Annie walked out the door and back into the cellar.
Shaw watched her go, wondering if he should go after her. He wanted to help her but sometimes when confronted with fight or flight, most people chose flight, to run. It was much easier that way. He doubted that Annie would be at the cottage when he returned after this. She would have packed up her gear and fled, vanished for a second time. New name. New town. Same fears.
Shaw turned back to the room, determined to find Abby. He was sure the clues as to her whereabouts were in this strange, secretive house of hidden rooms and unanswered questions.
Behind the last row of shelves was a door. What lay beyond, he didn’t know, but wanted to find out. The door was unlocked, so he opened it gently and walked into the darkness beyond.
Annie made it up the cellar stairs and into the kitchen before powerful hands grabbed her. She lashed out but searing pain bloomed in her head. Her world turned brilliant white for a moment before turning completely black.
39
Dylan Cobb was only three months old when his father walked out on him and his mother. Not that it was an excuse for how he turned out. His mother, Margaret Billingham, was solely responsible for that.
Margaret, now single and penniless took a very harsh interpretation of parenting from that day onwards. Before she met and married Edward Brenner, and became Margaret Brenner, she was an ambitious and hungry young woman. Born into abject poverty herself, she understood what it was like to beg, to borrow, to steal. What it was like to go hungry. What it was like to dress in hand-me-down clothes. What it was like to wear someone else’s shoes that didn’t quite fit.
As a child, her predicament brought her a lifetime of pain, suffering and bullying at school. It filled her with a burning desire for a better adult life for herself and herself alone. They say poverty forces you to be resourceful, inventive and downright selfish just to survive. And for Margaret Billingham, she excelled in learning those harsh but necessary lessons.
She had never wanted children, found them abhorrent and counter-intuitive for her plans of attaining wealth and success by any means. So, she was shocked when she discovered she had gotten pregnant within the first few months of married life, despite the precautions she had secretly taken.
Her first husband, a travelling insurance salesman, wanted a child. He told her that he would settle down and give up the road, get a regular 9 to 5 job once they started a family. Turns out as soon as Dylan was born, his father decided very quickly that dirty diapers, sleepless nights and a screaming newborn were not for him. He abandoned fatherhood and ran back to his mistress in a town over a thousand miles away with whom he had been having a relationship as soon as Margaret became pregnant.
So, all of Margaret’s anger and bitterness with the world and the resentment she had with the hand she’d been dealt were taken out on her own son, Dylan.
When Dylan reached an age of understanding, he could not comprehend what he had done wrong. In his mother's eyes he represented the byproduct of a failed marriage that had spawned him and an anchor around her neck he had now become.
She made a vow to herself when her first husband walked out the door that she would never trust a man again. While other mothers would see their progeny as part of their own flesh and blood, Margaret Billingham saw her son Dylan as the reason why everything was so wrong with her own life. So she became an abusive and negligent mother, who would beat, starve and enthusiastically denigrate her son privately and publicly.
As a young boy, Dylan, with no father figure, turned to the only adult he could trust; his mother. And, for countless years, she abused that trust.
Dylan Cobb, ironically, and as is the case with most misogynists, became the reflection of his mother’s hatred of men. And thus the seed of subconscious hatred of women was planted by his mother during Dylan’s formative years which made him what he was today.
Then everything changed when Margaret met Edward Brenner and began working at the head office of Brenner Industries. Margaret Billingham seized on the opportunity and suddenly saw a purpose for her young son, using Dylan to garner Edward’s affections towards her son and then, more importantly, towards herself, being a much younger woman.
It was a well-known fact around the office corridors and workshop floors of Brenner Industries that Edward Brenner desperately wanted a son despite already having a recent daughter, Abigail. He made it no secret that, while he loved his daughter, a son would be better suited to inherit his legacy and continue to run the family business.
In Margaret’s mind however, there could only be one “Mrs. Brenner” and that was to be her, not Alice, Edward’s wife at the time. So, Margaret hatched a plan to dispose of Alice, to make it look like suicide. It wasn’t difficult to force the sleeping pills down the woman’s throat. The woman was suffering from depression and anxiety as it was. Margaret, after all, was resourceful, inventive and downright selfish and just sped up the process.
The coroner accepted that it was suicide and Margaret Billingham soon became Mrs. Margaret Brenner. As with her first marriage, Margaret implemented birth control precautions once she had Edward Brenner locked in her sights. She didn’t want to spawn another child. This was her time to shine, her time to enjoy and prosper.
Despite Edward Brenner initially wanting Margaret’s son around, this all changed dramatically one day. Edward abruptly notified Margaret that he no longer wanted Dylan, her son, near the family home nor Abigail. It was a matter that Edward refused to elaborate on any further.
Dylan, at a very young age was sent packing from the family home, first to boarding school then to college. Ever since that day, Dylan Cobb had never set foot inside the grounds of the Brenner Estate. This suited Margaret just fine. Her son had served her purpose, and Dylan, upon Margaret’s insistence, was given a generous allowance and all his tuition was paid for by Edward Brenner.
With Dylan gone, Margaret could now focus on Edward’s fortune and his daughter, Abigail. But Abigail Brenner seemed to be on a path of self-destruction, hence she didn’t attract the attention of Margaret. For Margaret believed that given enough time and incentive, Abigail, her newly acquired stepdaughter, would one day end up like her own biological mother; dead on the bathroom floor from an overdose.
Out from under his mother’s influence and as an independent young man, Dylan Cobb flourished. He actively pursued women as a sport, to be hunted, lured, trapped and then physically and mentally destroyed by him. Even in his teenage years, he had numerous girlfriends and, like most misogynists, he was completely oblivious to his growing, festering hatred. He thought it was just a natural part of his behavior, the norm not the exception, that all women should be treated like this.
In a woman's eyes he would initially come across as confident, self-assured, supportive of women, of their ideology, their place in society. Openly, he criticized sexual predators and rapists. Secretly, he idolized them.
But as his relationships with women progressed, the once charming and charismatic mask of Dylan Cobb would peel away, and the true face of a devout woman-hater would be revealed. He would become controlling, condescending, rude and sexually dominating, seeing women as only objects for his own sexual gratification and abuse. He sodomi
zed a number of his girlfriends without their permission and continued to do so well into the relationship with scant regard for their objections nor their injuries. They were either too scared or too much under his manipulative control to tell the police.
Margaret Brenner had no idea of the life her son Dylan was living, even though it was she who had designed his blueprint when he was a mere child. She rarely saw him, Dylan preferring to live his own life in another city while he studied and worked a part-time job. He didn’t need the money, the Brenner allowance was more than enough. But the job behind the counter at a local gym franchise gave him unfettered access to an ever changing supply of victims.
Outside of work hours, he sculpted his physique in the gym, spending many hours lifting weights and pounding the treadmill. He became obsessed with his appearance, dressed the part, and studied hard. At night he would study, too, but a different curriculum. He would make a list of the women he’d befriended at the gym, their names, their physical traits, their habits, what music they liked, where they worked, and where they lived. Having access to their membership details was one of the perks of the job. He’d follow them on Facebook, live with them day-by-day on Instagram, share in their moments on Snapchat. All the while, he was refining, culling and adding to his list. Not friends and acquaintances, but women he wanted to destroy.
Meanwhile back at the Brenner Estate, the years dragged on and Abigail seemed to have no intention of leaving home and spreading her wings. In fact it seemed that with her mother gone, Edward and Abigail’s relationship had only strengthened.
This troubled Margaret until she decided to find a final solution. Not content in sharing the money that came with marrying a rich man, she wanted all the money for herself. She didn’t enjoy living in the shadow of someone else’s wealth. She wanted it all.
So, on one stormy, rainy night, as she stood looking out at the lightning and churning ocean, she hatched, not a plan, but a lifestyle by her own design. Margaret had one problem though: there was no one to carry out her plan for her. She certainly didn’t want blood on her hands and she much preferred someone else to do the heavy lifting this time. Alice Brenner had been easy. Abigail Brenner would pose a more difficult threat to remove. Margaret wasn’t a greedy woman. She just wanted all the money, Abigail’s as well.
Margaret became resigned to the fact that she would have to lure someone else into her machinations, someone else who the police could arrest if it all went wrong. First, she thought to take a young lover, someone she could mold and shape to do her bidding. There were any number of candidates working in and around the estate who could fit the bill.
Then her salvation came one day in the form of a phone call from the local police in the town where her son Dylan lived. Seems that Dylan had been a bit over enthusiastic with one of his girlfriends. The woman, a college sophomore, had called 911 after her son tried to strangle her during some weird sexual game. They had been dating for a few months and that fact didn’t help the young woman’s case. High-priced lawyers were hired secretly by Margaret, without Edward’s knowledge. She told him she needed the money for a sick relative in Nebraska who required surgery.
The college sophomore argued that it was assault. Dylan’s lawyers argued that it was asphyxiophilia; erotic asphyxiation and that she consented to the act during intercourse. Depositions were sealed, a plea was made, compensation was paid, and all charges were eventually dropped. The power money had to influence perception and the law only intoxicated Margaret further.
After proceedings had concluded, Margaret sat down with her son at a diner two blocks from the courthouse, a son she hadn’t seen in almost five years. And when she gazed deep into his eyes, she saw something that only a mother could see. She saw the seed that she had planted all those years ago. A seed that had grown into a strong and determined sapling, and finally into a manipulative predator that was now seated across from her.
She had the solution to her problems. Her son, Dylan was going be the instrument of her rise.
Dylan Cobb regarded Abby as she lay in the cage, his cage, one of many he had purchased, assembled and used. Cobb’s hatred had reached new heights in sophistication and urgency.
Abby looked at him, shock in her eyes. “Why?” she said. “Why are you doing this?”
Dylan twisted his neck one way then the other, loosening up his vertebrae for what was coming next as he considered Abby’s question. It was a question he had been asked many times before, usually by the countless women he had broken.
And the reply was always the same.
He leaned forward and whispered, “Because I can.”
40
The stairs seemed to go on forever, a spiral stairwell cut into the rock, black metal treads and railing, lights spaced at equal intervals, smooth rounded concrete walls like the insides of a grain silo.
He was descending through the cliffs, down through rock and stone, leaving the Ballard Mansion behind somewhere high above him.
Onwards he went, twisting like a corkscrew until finally the stairs ended. A narrow tunnel stretched away in front of him, bored straight through solid rock, a row of lights affixed to the ceiling, guiding the way, petering out into a circle of black in the distance. The ground sloped gently downwards. It was just one, long straight hollow that cored its way through the earth.
Shaw looked back up the spiral stairs, contemplating if he should turn back. Then the image of Abby sitting in the hospital bed came flooding back to him. How vulnerable she looked in her flimsy hospital gown, tubes in her arm, hollow eyes that burned with determination not to be beaten. Despite her hard, confident exterior, she was still a child who had been brought back to earth with a brutal, harsh thump.
Shaw pressed on and began to follow the tunnel downwards. Twenty minutes later the ground bottomed out and he walked for another few hundred feet on the flat ground before the gradient pitched upwards. The going was harder, the air cold making his skin prickle. In some places water leached from the walls, puddles forming on the ground.
The floor leveled off. He was standing at the bottom of another cylindrical shaft. No stairs this time, just a metal ladder bolted to the wall, light bulbs in wire cages, laced with dust and cobwebs to guide his ascent. The entire place had the feel of an abandoned military installation, like a bunker or Cold War missile silo.
Grabbing the bottom rung, Shaw began to climb. He paused every few minutes to catch his breath and to look down, to gauge his progress. He could see the bottom of the ladder far below.
Looking up, the rungs of the ladder seemed to stretch to infinity. There was no way Abby had come this way. Maybe he had missed something back at the mansion, in the cellar? Maybe another hidden room? He kept climbing for what seemed like an eternity until the space closed in over his head and the ladder ended at a heavy circular hatch with a turning wheel. The wheel was well lubricated and turned easily. Shaw put his shoulder against it and pushed. The hatch swung up then locked back on thick hinges.
Shaw climbed out.
It was dark outside. A forest of trees rose on all sides, the clear night sky above prickled with stars. He was standing on Moors Island. The journey from the cellar, through the food storage room, down the spiral stairs, along the tunnel and up the ladder had brought him under the ground, across the channel and out to the island.
Shaw gently closed the hatch, got his bearings. In the distance he could hear the crash of the ocean, the sky above was pierced by the regular sweep of the beam of the lighthouse. He was standing in a small clearing, a place that he and Annie hadn’t seen when they were on the island. With flashlight in hand, Shaw set off in the direction of where he judged the lighthouse to be, memorizing the terrain so he could return to the same spot where the hatch was.
He pushed through vines and heavy foliage before emerging on a wet, rocky ledge overlooking the ocean. The moon, a huge reflecting ball of radiant light scarred and pock marked, glowed above the ocean. It was another dead end. The island was
taunting him, a puzzle that he couldn’t solve. He backtracked into the forest again and went off in another direction, only to be met by the same rocky ledge with the waves crashing on the jagged rocks below. He was on a part of the island that couldn’t be accessed from where he and Annie were before. It was an isolated spot, a raised peninsula of rock that extended out on the ocean side of the island. The lighthouse sat a few hundred yards behind and to his left but there was no direct route to reach it. There had to be a way out, without having to go back through the hatch and the tunnel again.
Shaw walked back to the clearing, past the hatch again and veered left this time. In front of him was a thick wall of seemingly impenetrable vegetation. He pushed his way into it with determined resolve. Branches and vines clawed at him, invisible hands holding him back.
He pushed on.
Something grazed his face, he felt the warm trickle of blood down his cheek. His shins bashed against fallen logs and hidden rocks. Sharp pain radiated up his legs but he fought on through the twisted mess.
He suddenly stopped just before walking headlong into a wall of rock. There was no way to climb over it. He swore then traversed sideways, his hands working over the flat surface, his flashlight in his teeth, searching for an opening, a split in the rock, anything he could squeeze through. Then his hands found a narrow fracture, maybe no more than twenty inches wide. Shining the flashlight in he could see an opening on the other side, thirty feet away he guessed.
Shaw turned sideways and pushed into the narrow gap. Working hard he slid along, his knees and thighs splayed outwards, trying to flatten himself as much as possible. He emerged on the other side into another clearing and waited a moment. His fingers were raw, his knees and elbows battered and bruised.
Then came a sound from above, like a swarm of angry wasps. Shaw looked up. The sky was a fabric of black but something rippled across it then paused. Instinctively he flipped off his flashlight and retreated partly into the fracture in the wall, his eyes fixed skywards, trying to pinpoint the sound.
