by Jack Jordan
A car rushed past. They both turned to see the cop car’s red and blue lights pass in a flash.
‘You got me into this. You chased me down, dragged Shane’s name into it, and now you’re turning your back on him. On us. You’re just as bad as them.’
Rose turned away, biting her lip to keep her from saying any more.
‘Wait.’
Rose stopped.
‘The guy you were talking about, from the journal. I looked into it, and there was a report of similar abuse on the system, from about three years ago. I don’t know if it’s the same guy who harassed Finn, but it’s worth a shot. His name is Adam Morant. I remembered his name from years ago. You’ll find him in the Lakes.’
‘The Lakes,’ Rose said. ‘As in the mental-health facility?’
‘Yes.’ Anna stepped closer, her shoes scuffing against stones. ‘I asked around. It sounds like he’s still there.’
‘I’d never get in.’
‘I can set it up. But then I’m done.’
She wouldn’t thank her – one good deed wasn’t enough to make up for turning her back. Rose headed up the alleyway, but stopped with a thought.
‘It’s funny, isn’t it? You pretend not to care, but you still remember that man’s name.’
She left Anna there in the dark.
FINN’S JOURNAL
15th February 2018
The police have always instilled fear in me. Whenever I drive past a cop car, my hands tense on the wheel. If I see one in the street, my whole body becomes rigid; I try to prove my innocence in the way I walk, even though I’ve done nothing wrong. I have never been good around authority figures. It’s in my nature to go along with what I’m asked to do. A pushover, my father used to call me. A wet blanket, a pussy who needed to man up. He tried to make a man of me, but all he did was deepen the fear.
So when I was ushered into the interview room inside the police station, I couldn’t stop myself from shaking; every muscle in my body was tense. A uniformed officer sat me down, offered me tea, and left. I waited alone, watching the door for a detective to enter the room, to tell me everything was going to be all right.
It wasn’t like the films I’d seen; there was no two-way mirror, just a camera blinking in the corner. There was a simple desk, scuffed and scratched with stray swipes of ink, three plastic chairs, and a clock on the wall loudly ticking off the minutes. There was nothing to distract me from the beat of my heart, quickening with every thought, spiking with every new fear. What if they didn’t believe me? What if I didn’t have enough to give them?
When the door clicked opened, I flinched in my seat. A different uniformed officer entered the room, the first officer trailing behind him with a polystyrene cup of tea in hand. No detective – just uniforms. Both sat on the other side of the desk. I thanked the one who placed the cup before me. The new man, with a black beard trimmed close to his face and small, dark eyes, spoke first.
‘Mr Matthews, I’m Sergeant Martin Lycett, and this is my colleague, Officer Mark Byrne. I understand you’ve been having some trouble with a man called Michael King.’
‘Yes. I’ve brought everything with me. Printouts of the text messages, the call log, and the post he sent to my address.’
I splayed them out on the table in a nervous jumble, edging them towards their side. A sheet slipped to the floor. I reached down to pick it up, but Officer Byrne found it first and added it to the pile. I watched him bang the bottoms of the pages onto the table until they were neatly stacked, and begin to read, his eyes skirting across the words.
‘Could you tell us how it all transpired?’ Lycett asked.
‘Yes. . . well, I’m new in town. I’ve only been here a few weeks. I bumped into him on my first day at the new job, outside the coffee shop on Queen’s Street. I work for the local paper.’
Lycett nodded for me to continue. My throat seemed to swell, as though it refused to let me speak the words of my ordeal. If I said them aloud, it was really happening.
‘I was in a rush and bumped into him, spilt coffee down his shirt. As I went to leave, he asked for my number.’
It was small, but impossible not to notice. I was sure the sergeant flinched.
‘And is that normal?’ he asked. ‘For men to ask for your number brazenly like that on the street?’
‘Well, I. . . I suppose it’s the same as a man asking for a woman’s number. I thought no differently about it, in that respect.’
My attention swayed towards Officer Byrne as he took the newspaper clipping from the envelope and fought to hide a smirk.
He thought it was funny.
‘And you gave him your number?’
‘I. . . well, I was in a rush. I needed to get back to the office, and I felt bad for spilling coffee on him.’
When I said it out loud, it sounded as though I had made it easy for my stalker to get the wrong idea. But I hadn’t, I was simply too polite for my own good, said yes when I really wished to say no. But by the look of them, I knew they wouldn’t have understood.
‘Then what happened?’ Lycett asked.
‘Later that week, I went for drinks with my new work colleagues, and. . .’
Lycett turned to Byrne.
‘Is there a gay bar in town?’
‘How would I know?’ he replied defensively.
‘No, we didn’t go to a gay bar. We went to the pub on Linchfield Road. The Fox and Pheasant?’
‘Oh, right.’
‘He was there, and spoke to me. I’m sure he was alone. I can’t remember all of it – I’d had quite a bit to drink – but he ended up walking me home.’
I noticed Lycett arch his eyebrow.
‘I didn’t want him to, but he made it difficult to say no.’
‘I’m surprised,’ he said. ‘A tall, strapping guy like yourself, I’m sure you could get someone to leave you alone if you wanted to.’
I didn’t know how to react. Had they never met a man being stalked before? Or male victims of domestic violence? It was like I was sitting in front of my father.
Man up, you pussy. Be a man.
‘Well, we got to my home and he. . .’
I stopped suddenly. If they had struggled with everything I had told and shown them so far, I couldn’t help but worry about how they would react when I told them that he kissed me. I laced my fingers together in my lap and clenched as hard as I could. I had to be strong.
‘He what?’ Lycett asked.
‘He kissed me.’
‘Right,’ he replied, looking away.
Byrne cleared his throat.
‘I pulled away and let myself inside. I thought that was the end of it. But the next day I woke up to the messages –’ I nodded to the paperwork in Officer Byrne’s hands. ‘I replied that evening, after all of the calls and messages I’d received that day, and made it clear that I didn’t want to pursue a relationship of any kind with him. Then a week later, I spotted him outside my office. I received the newspaper cutting later that evening.’
My eyes flashed to Byrne, the man who thought the disturbing image, my fear, the defiling of my face, were funny.
‘He had texted me, asking if I’d liked my post. Then he called me. I asked him what he wanted and he said. . . me. He wants me.’
Lycett nodded. Byrne placed the paperwork down and looked my way.
I had come to the police because I’d thought they would help. I thought they would understand my experiences, and put actions into place to make it stop. But as I sat before them, I felt the need to make them believe me, to talk and talk until the reality of my situation sank in. It wasn’t funny – I was terrified.
‘I’m being stalked,’ I said aloud.
‘We will have a word with Mr King and issue a warning. There are some ways around this. From now on you need to ignore all attempts at communication from him: calls, texts, face to face. Keep a diary and record the time and place of every attempt at contact or any sightings of him, noting car registrations if this appl
ies. If you feel it’s necessary, there are safety measures you can take. Obviously, make sure your home is secure. You can carry a panic alarm device on your person.’
He turned to his colleague.
‘I think we have one. Go and get it, would you?’
Byrne left the room, leaving the door ajar.
‘If you receive any further mail from him, please deliver it straight to us, and avoid leaving fingerprints.’
‘And this will make him stop? He’ll leave me alone?’
‘We’ll talk to him.’
An awkward silence grew between us as we waited for Officer Byrne to return. I had not even considered that my attraction to men, or my gender, might be an issue. I’d thought they would help, not because of particular factors, but because I was a victim of a crime. But as I sat opposite the police officer, I felt like a joke.
Byrne returned with a small device. He showed me how to use it, and I nodded, my cheeks burning as the lesson went on. They made me feel cowardly. By the glint in Byrne’s eye, I could tell he found the whole thing amusing, as if only women had been given the alarms until me. I took it from him and buried it in my pocket.
‘We’ll be in touch,’ Lycett said.
I nodded and rose from my seat, eyeing the paperwork I had brought with me. I had prepared it all with the idea that the police were going to fix everything, that they were going to be on my side, but as I was escorted out of the building, I wondered how long they would spend reading it.
I left feeling defeated, but forced myself to believe in them. It was their job to help me; they couldn’t let me down.
I had no idea then how wrong I was.
TWENTY-FOUR
It was four in the morning by the time Rose got home. She had crept through the door with her keys in a tight fist to keep them from jangling, and premeditated each step so the floorboards wouldn’t creek. For the first time, she was disappointed by the sight of Christian’s car in the driveway. She didn’t want to have to justify why she had been out all night. She practically shared the house with strangers who went in and out as they pleased, but when it came to her, they held the right to know where she was, judge her for breaking from the norm.
She sat in her chair and tried to doze, only to give up at dawn, and read through the journal from front to back, to remind her of why she was doing this. Jay. Finn. Shane. The two men in the park. There were so many victims out there, waiting for justice, and no one but her gave a damn.
It wasn’t long before she heard them wake above her head: the creak of floorboards, the rumble of the hot water in the tank. She kept to her study as Christian and Lily moved about the kitchen and raced up and down the stairs, even though her bladder was fit to burst. Just like Shane’s had the night of the attack. She thought of Detective Clark straddling the young man’s back as he rolled around beneath him, the ember from the cigarette scorching his gums, ash coating his tongue and teeth.
She had known there was something dangerous about him the moment she met him; it was something in his eyes, a permanent fury flickering like a flame. She wondered if Montgomery knew of the monster that lurked within the man.
When the front door shut and the house rang empty, she stood from her chair and winced. Her feet were raw; blisters had popped between her toes. She hobbled to the door and stepped out into the kitchen, relishing the chill of the tiles beneath her feet.
‘Where were you last night?’
‘Jesus!’ She clapped her hand against her chest.
Christian was sitting at the breakfast bar, his hands clasped on the counter. He was dressed in one of his navy suits, tailored so perfectly to his body that she wondered how he managed to move without thread pulling from the seams. His briefcase was waiting in the hallway beside the front door, the buckle of it gleaming in the morning light. She checked the clock on the wall; if he didn’t leave now, he would be late for work. But he continued to sit, waiting for her to answer.
‘Do you really think you have the right to ask me that?’ She took a glass from the cupboard and went to the sink. ‘I never know where you are.’
‘I’m worried about you,’ he said. ‘I heard you come in last night. It was gone four.’
‘Don’t you stay out all night when it pleases you?’
‘You don’t have to tell me where you go, just. . .’ He slicked back his hair. She noticed how tired he looked around the eyes, the new streaks of grey hair at his temples. He sighed heavily. ‘You don’t have to tell me anything.’
He got up and headed for the door.
‘How’s Lily?’ The question burst from her. She craved her the way she craved sleep. But seeing her was almost worse. At least from a distance, Rose could pretend her own daughter didn’t hate her.
‘She’s fine,’ he said without stopping and snatched up his briefcase from beside the door. He took his keys from the sideboard and shut the door firmly behind him.
She sighed and sat at the breakfast bar where he had been, feeling the warmth of his body on the seat, the closest she had come to touching him for months. She couldn’t understand him. Everything he did told her that he couldn’t stand the sight of her, a quiet loathing that simmered with every look and word, and yet he had waited for her to emerge from the study to ask where she’d been. A part of her hoped it meant he still cared, that somewhere deep inside, he still had her in his heart. But he seemed to think he had more of a right to know details about her than she did him. Suddenly, she didn’t feel like the woman he might love, but property he wanted to keep in his sight.
Her phone vibrated in her pocket.
A text from Anna.
Meeting with Adam Morant at 5pm.
Blunt. Cool. Rose hoped that Anna’s conscience kept her awake as insomnia did her. If Anna wouldn’t help her, she was aiding Detective Clark, whether she meant to or not. Her silence gave the men their power. All it would take to regain control was a collection of strong voices that refused to be silenced.
But if Anna wouldn’t help her, she would do it alone.
ADAM
2nd May 2016
Adam drove along in silence, watching the mirrors for signs of someone tailing him. The road was dark but for the red glare of his rear lights.
But he could feel someone watching him, had done for months.
He was forgetting things at work. Missing appointments. Ignoring calls and texts from friends because each time he heard the phone he thought of him and the panic rose, clamping down on his windpipe.
He turned off the road and down the country lane that cut past the woods to the north of town. He would be home in twenty minutes if he put his foot down.
The road narrowed where the woodland encroached the tarmac. Twigs snapped and popped beneath the wheels. He looked in the rear-view mirror and saw nothing but the shadows of the woods behind him. He tightened his hold on the wheel.
The lights on the dashboard flickered. He put his foot down. The headlights seemed dimmer than before. The car began to slow. He put his foot down again, but the car continued its slow decline.
He just saw the fuel dial on empty before the dashboard went dark and the headlights vanished. The car rolled to a stop in the middle of the lane, swallowed by darkness.
‘No, no, no, no, no!’
He turned the key in the ignition. Nothing. Not even a splutter of life from the engine. He tried again, and again, and again, the panic rising until tears scratched at the whites of his eyes.
There was no way the car had run out of fuel. He had filled up the petrol tank on his way to work. He felt the passenger seat in the dark for his bag, whipped out his wallet and phone and used the light on the screen to inspect his receipts. There it was, proof that he wasn’t going mad. He had spent £40 on petrol at 8.49 that morning.
It was him. It had to be. Could he have drained the tank? The car park didn’t have CCTV. He could have planned this, knowing he would take the shortcut home because he had been following him for months.
It’s a trap.
He froze the moment he saw them: two balls of light in the rear-view mirror, growing in size as they neared and lit up the inside of the car.
A car was heading up the lane.
Adam instinctively locked the doors and clenched his eyes shut.
He heard it pull up behind him, its brakes whistling as it stopped.
He had nowhere to hide. He shook in his seat, silent tears slipping down his cheeks.
A door opened and shut.
Footsteps crept up to the driver’s side, crunching on nature’s debris.
A knock on the window.
Adam opened his eyes, knowing who would be on the other side of the glass. ‘Open the door, Adam,’ he said.
Adam shook his head roughly. Tears plummeted to his jaw.
He knocked louder. Harder.
‘Adam, open the door.’
‘Leave me alone!’
He tried the door handle. Adam jolted and held the door and finally looked at him on the other side.
Even in the dark, Adam could see that his face was set with rage: tense jaw, creased brow, eyes that pierced through the glass and into his.
‘Please. . . please, just leave me alone.’
He pulled harder on the handle, so hard Adam was sure it would snap clean off.
‘Please!’
He covered his face and sobbed into his hands until his palms were wet with tears, warmed by his frantic breaths.
I’m going to die. He’s going to kill me here and no one will ever know.
He stayed there, hidden behind his hands, until he finally found the courage to lower them again and look out.
He was gone.
Adam whipped around, looking through each of the windows, both of the windscreens. The other car’s door was open on the driver’s side. He could hear the distant sound of an alert beeping into the night, but otherwise there was nothing around him but trees, shadows that bled into the darkness.
The window smashed beside him. Glass ricocheted against his face, littered his hair, and hands were on him and dragging him out of the car before he even had the chance to scream. He punched and kicked blind, the struggle echoing between the trees. Glass sliced his back from his shoulders to his waist as he was yanked out of the window and thrown to the ground.
