Saturday 12 July 2014

2.40 a.m.

Police Constable Dean Harris was sitting in his usual uncomfortable armchair beside the window in the grand but unwelcoming living room. He was reading by the light of an expensive-looking table lamp that he had balanced precariously on the windowsill and was ignoring the muted television altogether. He had only put it on to provide himself with a bit of company to help him through another lonely night in the unfamiliar house.

The other constables in his unit had all been incredibly jealous to learn of his involvement in the Ragdoll case. They were still at a stage in their careers where they kept count of the number of dead bodies that they had seen, and ‘Welshie’ was their hero, being the only member of the group to have actually tasered someone.

Dean acted aloof about his posting but had been secretly proud. He told his family, of course, knowing that the news would spread like a virus, embellishing the importance of his role and inventing a job title for himself that he could no longer remember. What he had not anticipated was spending two lonely weeks guarding a little girl who just so happened to share a name with the killer’s actual target.

The Lochlan family had all but ignored him as they carried on with their inconvenienced lives. They had tolerated his presence in their home and were naturally on edge, refusing to let little Ashley even go to the bathroom alone, though they knew, just as he did, that their nine-year-old daughter had no attachment whatsoever to this serial killer or anybody else involved. But at least he was not the only one. There were probably dozens of Ashley Danielle Lochlans all over the country reluctantly sharing their homes with equally reluctant police officers.

Dean was distracted from his book when there was a loud creak from upstairs followed by a whirring sound. He returned to his page but had lost his place. Over the past fortnight he had come to recognise all of the large old house’s idiosyncrasies. That particular sound had been the heating kicking in automatically as the temperature dropped in the dead of night.

He yawned loudly and checked his watch. The graveyard shifts were always the hardest. Although he had adjusted to the pattern and managed seven hours of sleep during the day, he could feel himself getting tired. Six o’clock in the morning felt a long way away.

He removed his glasses and rubbed his sore eyes. When he opened them again, the room looked much brighter, throwing ominous shadows across the walls that flickered and changed position in time with the erratic television programme. It took him a moment to realise that something had triggered the powerful security light in the front garden.

Dean got up and peered out through the tall window. The timed sprinkler system had clearly tripped the motion sensor as the spinning jets performed their synchronised routine for their one-person audience. The beautifully landscaped garden was otherwise empty, so he sat back down to stare at the silent screen, watching the nonsensical pictures cut back and forth enthusiastically, as if anybody cared at that time in the morning.

Twenty seconds after the sprinklers shut off, the bright light went out and the room seemed darker than ever. Dean relaxed into the hard chair and rested his eyes, which stung when he closed them. Suddenly his eyelids were glowing fleshy orange, and he opened his eyes to be blinded by a white light that was flooding the room from outside. He stumbled across to the next window and looked out to discover that the security light was now pointed back at the house, casting the rest of the garden into darkness.

There was a violent bang at the back door. With his heart racing, Dean grabbed his tactical vest off the back of the chair. Slowly, he stepped out into the hallway, which was filled with the eerie light, and shuffled towards the door, distracted by the spots flashing before his dazzled eyes. He remembered too late that he’d removed his own pristine taser hours earlier to get comfortable and had left it against the chair leg in the other room. He pulled on his vest as he passed between the rows of despondent-looking portraits, gripping his extendable baton above his head, ready to strike.

The security light went out behind him.

Dean was plunged into darkness. He held his breath. He could hear something approaching along the corridor and swung wildly in panic, hitting nothing but air and the wood-panelled wall. Before he could strike again, something solid connected with his forehead, and he fell in the blackness.

He had no idea whether he had been unconscious or not when he reached for his Airwaves radio and pushed the panic button, which would transmit everything he said over an open channel. The green glow emitting from the tiny screen reflected off the shiny walls, guiding Dean as he staggered back to his feet and towards the light switch.

‘Met control, send more units,’ he slurred before losing balance and dropping the radio onto the floor.

He slumped against the light switch. Above his head, the mini-chandelier came to life, revealing a set of muddy footprints leading down the hallway and ascending the stairs towards Ashley’s bedroom. Dean snatched the baton off the floor and stumbled up the staircase to the landing, where the rapidly fading boot prints turned sharply towards the girl’s elaborately decorated door.

Dean burst inside, wielding the weapon over his head, only to find the cluttered room empty. The final traces of mud on the cream carpet led to the open balcony doors. He looked out over the deserted garden and then sat down against the metal railings, having lost the adrenaline that had been distracting him from the giddiness. He took out his phone and while he waited for backup to arrive, texted the number that had been given to him earlier that evening.

Edmunds had fallen asleep underneath his jacket. He had now spent more nights on his sofa over the past couple of weeks than he had in his bed. Baxter, however, was wide awake at the kitchen table, reading the text that she had just received. Quietly, she climbed the uncarpeted stairs to check on the entire Lochlan family who were holed up and sound asleep in Edmunds and Tia’s bedroom.

Wolf had been right. He had warned her that the killer would come for the girl if he could not reach Ashley. He had already demonstrated his willingness to murder at random. The three dead, fussy eaters, collateral damage of Khalid’s poisoning, were testament to that. It should have come as no surprise at all that he was prepared to murder an innocent child in preservation of his ego.

Vanita had hesitantly agreed to let Baxter move the family, believing it to be a complete waste of time for everyone involved. Baxter had offered to put them up at her apartment. At least, that was what she told the team.

She still had not ruled out the possibility that Wolf was being set up. After all, this was the second Ashley Lochlan that he had tried to save in a day. She had decided to phone the only person that she utterly trusted, despite still being furious with him.

With Tia staying at her mother’s, Edmunds had graciously agreed to accommodate Baxter and her aristocratic refugees. After showing them in, and despite his exhaustion, he had rushed out to the convenience store to buy some essentials that he could ill afford. Baxter was thankful that he had – it meant he was not there to see the wealthy family’s appalled faces as they explored the measly confines of their temporary home.

‘He should fire his maid,’ Baxter heard Mrs Lochlan murmur to her haughty husband when she stepped in a pile of cat biscuits on the kitchen floor.

Edmunds had crashed out on the sofa during dinner, meaning that he had neither eaten his beans on toast nor had the chance to speak to Baxter in private. It was probably for the best, she thought. Nothing had changed. He believed that Wolf was guilty, and there was nothing she could say to change his mind. He did not know him like she did.

As Baxter constructed her argument in defence of Wolf to use against Edmunds in the morning, she picked her phone back up and wrote out a short text:

GIRL SAFE. NEED TO TALK. CALL ME. X

She knew that Wolf would have disposed of his phone to prevent them from tracking him but she pressed the send button anyway, needing to feel in some way still connected to the most important person in her life, unable to even contemplate the very real possibility that she might never see him again.

Andrea silently climbed out of bed so as not to wake Geoffrey. She wrapped her dressing gown around her and then crept downstairs to the kitchen. She could see the sun beginning to rise into the ink-blue sky through the glass roof that was to blame for the room’s wildly fluctuating temperature. Even in winter, the showroom-perfect space would become unbearable while the sun passed overhead on a clear day and yet, before daybreak on a summer’s morning, her toes had gone numb just from walking across the freezing tiles.

She had closed the door behind her, needing privacy, and sat at the breakfast bar with a glass of orange juice as she held her phone to her ear. It was strange that, even after years apart, she felt completely comfortable phoning Wolf at 5 a.m. She could not say the same for anybody else in her life, not even Geoffrey.

She had grown so accustomed to her ex-husband’s irregular working patterns over the years that she knew he was just as likely to be awake in the middle of the night as he was in the middle of the day. But truthfully, it went deeper than that. She knew that he was there for her, never more than a phone call away, prepared to listen whenever she needed to talk, whether he had been asleep or not. It was something that she had always taken for granted, until now.

For the sixth time in twelve hours she was diverted to his voicemail and chose to end the call rather than leave another garbled message. She would try again on her way to work. Elijah was expecting her answer regarding the promotion by the end of the day and she had reached the stage where she had given up even thinking about it, hoping to miraculously channel the correct response when required.

Geoffrey got up at 6 a.m. as usual and Andrea made a conscious effort not to bring up the well-worn subject over breakfast. He must have been as sick of the topic as she was and there was nothing that he could say to help her anyway. He had wished her luck before heading up for his shower, just to let her know he had not forgotten, and then he disappeared upstairs.

Andrea left the house at 6.20 a.m. to get a head start on what was sure to be another exhausting ‘Death Clock’ day of news. Once she arrived at the newsroom, the reason for Wolf’s lack of response became apparent. She found her inbox full of emails and photographs from people expecting some form of financial recompense for their sightings of Wolf and Ashley Lochlan. The unreliable list of widely spread locations reminded her of a story that she had covered years ago about an escaped snow leopard: there were sightings at two different service stations, Glasgow Airport, riding on the back of a cart – and a blurred photograph sent only minutes earlier from Dubai.

Unsure what to make of any of it, Andrea sent Baxter a text to check that everything was all right then she went down to make-up early to ensure that she avoided Elijah when he walked in. She did not need reminding of the enormous decision that lay before her or need him pressuring her for an answer.

She still had ten hours in which to decide.

Baxter was still sat at the kitchen table when she heard Edmunds beginning to stir. She quickly shoved the Glock 22 that she had borrowed from evidence back into her bag. She had had no intention of leaving herself or the Lochlan family unprotected and had no difficulty in accessing the evidence from her own investigation. It had then only taken a quarter of an hour of rummaging through drawers and other evidence boxes to gather a handful of the .40 S&W bullets that fitted the magazine.

Edmunds staggered, bleary-eyed, into the kitchen and groaned when he saw the pile of mess waiting for him in the sink. Apparently the Lochlans had never been faced with the prospect of washing up after themselves and had made it through another night without having to learn.

‘Morning,’ he yawned.

He shuffled over to the kettle.

‘Thank you for putting us up,’ said Baxter.

Edmunds was still half-asleep and could not tell whether she was being sincere or not.

‘The killer came for her, just like Wolf said,’ Baxter told him.

Edmunds abandoned his coffee and sat down at the table.

‘He got away,’ she told him when he looked hopeful. ‘The kid watching the house is being treated for a concussion, but he’ll be fine.’

Baxter paused as she prepared to deliver her well-rehearsed argument.

‘Look, I don’t blame you for yesterday or for looking into the possibility of Wolf’s involvement. Considering the evidence you found, you wouldn’t be doing your job if you didn’t.’

‘The tech guys said he’d been Googling Madeline Ayers the day after we found the Ragdoll,’ started Edmunds, but Baxter talked over him:

‘You don’t know him like I do. Wolf has a code. He is probably the most moral person I have ever known, even if that sometimes leads him to do illegal and horrible things.’

‘Isn’t that a bit of a contradiction?’ asked Edmunds as carefully as he could.

‘We all know there are times when the law and the right thing don’t line up like we’d like them to. Wolf would never do any of these things you—’

Baxter paused mid-sentence as Edmunds got up and pulled a file out of his workbag. He dropped it onto the table in front of her.

‘What’s this?’ she asked warily.

She showed no intention of picking it up.

‘I took a trip down to the coast this afternoon, to St Ann’s Hospital.’

Baxter’s expression darkened. It was obvious that she thought he had crossed a line.

‘What makes you think you’ve got the right—’

‘I found something,’ said Edmunds, raising his voice over hers. ‘In Wolf’s room.’

Baxter looked furious. She snatched the folder off the kitchen table and opened it up. The first photograph depicted a small whitewashed room with most of the furniture displaced. She looked up at Edmunds impatiently.

‘Go on,’ he prompted.

The second photograph showed what looked to be a dirty mark on the back wall.

‘Riveting,’ said Baxter, shuffling the photograph to the back of the pile before glancing down at the third and final picture. She stared at it in silence for over a minute before her face scrunched up and she had to hide her tearful eyes from Edmunds.

The photograph in her lap had captured the familiar names etched deep into the rough surface, those that Wolf considered responsible, the dark lettering like shapes obscured by smoke, black and burnt forever into the fabric of the old building.

‘I’m sorry,’ Edmunds said softly.

Baxter shook her head and tossed the file back across the table.

‘You’re wrong. He was sick back then! He couldn’t have … He …’

She knew that she was lying to herself. She felt as though everything she had ever known was wrong; after all, if she had been naive enough to believe in Wolf, what other delusions had she been living her life by? The man that she had tried to live up to, had attempted to emulate, had wanted to be with, was the monster that Edmunds had warned her he was.

She could hear Garland’s death screams. She could smell the stench of the mayor’s charred remains, could remember embracing Chambers when nobody was watching, wishing him a happy holiday.

‘It’s him, Baxter. There’s no doubt. I’m sorry.’

Slowly, she met Edmunds’ eye and nodded.

There was no doubt.

Отправить