Who Dares Wins

by Vince Vogel

  Abigail took the shotgun and thanked her.

  “Here’s some cartridges,” the old woman said, dunking a hand into the pocket of her apron and holding a handful out to her.

  Again Abigail thanked her, filled her jacket pockets with them and took the Glock 17 from the waistband of her jeans.

  “You have this,” she said to Dorring.

  He took it and placed it in the waistband of his own jeans. The assault rifle he’d stolen off the man he’d shot in the alley was over his back. It would be his first port of call. The pistol would be a handy second.

  “So these men aim to kill you, then?” Patricia Johnston asked as she walked with them to the spot Dorring had decided to place the next trap.

  “Yes,” Dorring said, kneeling beside a tree, having decided to place number four there. “And I aim to kill as many of them before they get the chance.”

  “What you done to piss them off so bad?”

  “I came here,” he said bluntly.

  Patricia grinned. “You asked too many questions?”

  “I did and now they will do anything to get rid of me.”

  “What about you?” Patricia asked Abigail.

  “I’m investigating Lord Appleby.”

  “For McGuffin police?” the old woman asked whilst frowning.

  “No. For the National Crime Agency.”

  Dorring had figured as much. They practically hadn’t spoken since escaping from the police station, but that didn’t mean he hadn’t been thinking. He’d gathered that she was some kind of undercover agent.

  When they’d finished laying the eleven traps Dorring had found in the shed, he returned and spotted a stack of old cam-belts lying on a workbench. He grabbed them up and turned to Patricia, who had followed him there.

  “I need a knife,” he said. “One good for whittling wood.”

  “You wanna make some nice wood carvings?” the old woman asked with mirth.

  He smiled at her. “No. I want to make weapons.”

  She got him several knives perfect for the job. Then the three of them split up in the woods and collected together large branches, using bowsaws Patricia had found for them to cut them off the trees. “Fallen branches and sticks won’t do,” he’d said. “These need to be solid.”

  When they’d gathered a reasonable pile, they returned to the yard of the house. Outside the shed, they sat whittling the branches into points. On a large log that he’d found, Dorring began boring holes into it with a hand drill. Soon, it was lined on one side with two inch holes. Into these he hammered in several small branches so that they stuck out of it. Then he whittled their ends into points. Other spikes were tied together using string. These were then tied onto lengths of wood they’d found stacked behind the house.

  Into the woods they took the contraptions and spread them about places Dorring told them to. Then they used a spall of wire they’d found in the shed to set up devices in the trees. This was where the cambelts came in handy. He used them to build tension in the traps. The wire would take away a wedge, keeping the spikes back. The elasticity of the rubber bands would cause it to snap out suddenly.

  They began spreading the wire across trunks, as well as posts they hammered into the ground, so that the forest floor was covered in tripwires. In the middle of these taut wires, Dorring would saw away at the center, so that the wire was at its breakable thinnest.

  The sun was only a slither poking up out of the horizon by the time they finished. A giant sheet of angry gray cloud followed the fishing boats off the sea and bore down on the island with angry, flashing hatred. It was going to be a rough night, Dorring acknowledged as they made their way to the bunker at the back of the property.

  A very rough night.

  31

  Dorring and Abigail sat in the bunker listening to the first rumblings of thunder overhead and then the sudden clatter of pounding rain. There was an air vent in the corner and it rattled with the sound of raindrops hammering metal.

  They sat at a table in the center of the room, Craig Johnston’s wall of photographs, lines and faded letters on one side of them. Patricia Johnston and her two dogs were out. She was taking the risk of venturing into town in her car to see what was up, safe in the knowledge that it wouldn’t be seen as odd for a concerned citizen to arrive at a roadblock and ask some pertinent questions about their community. And even if they did follow her back, Dorring welcomed it. Welcomed their arrival with eager anticipation. Hopefully the killer would join them.

  “Cards on the table,” Dorring said as they gazed at each other across the table, the electric light illuminating their tired faces.

  “Cards on the table,” Abigail replied. “You first.”

  He explained. Three days ago, he went out to see where his mother had been living before she’d died. It was a derelict caravan in the middle of a field. Inside, he found a box of things that had been sent to her after he’d left the SAS.

  “Where did you go when you left the forces?” she keenly asked.

  “MI6,” he replied coolly. “But that’s a story for another time.”

  “Figures,” she said. “So what did you find in your old things?”

  He went on. He’d found his old mobile telephone from back then. He picked it up, switched it on and found a collection of voicemails left for him. It was like listening to the past. Then there was a final message. Not from fourteen years ago, but from one year ago. It was from someone he knew back then. A Royal Military Police detective. He explained to her about Helmand.

  “You ever suspect it was Conner?” she asked when he had.

  “It can’t have been. He was right by my side for at least two of the killings. I’ve already gone through it all in my head and it can’t have been him.”

  “But have you considered he was working alongside someone?”

  “Of course. I’m sure he’s working alongside the killer now. But back then, no. My guess is he found out later on and was offered a deal not to tell. See, we only got so far before the whole thing was called off. I ended up in a DCMH facility on a psych assessment and when I was returned to the unit, we were separated. I only ever saw him on odd occasions for the next two years and then both of us left.”

  “So you never caught the killer?” Jane asked.

  “No.”

  “But somehow Conner did?”

  “He must have,” Dorring said. “Otherwise, why’s he here? The night at the bar when Bishop was killed, he was talking about something. About how he suspected something wasn’t right with it all. I never got the opportunity to ask him again.”

  “Maybe he saw something you didn’t?”

  “He must have.”

  Only the sound of the raindrops filled their ears for the next few seconds. But then, as though both knew that they didn’t have much time, they began again.

  “So this Kevin left a message for you a year ago and you come here?” Abigail asked.

  “Yes. Then no sooner am I on the island than I bump into a guy in a hood that tries to kill me.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me this earlier?”

  “I wasn’t sure how you’d react,” he told her. “If you were with them, you’d use it against me. If you weren’t, you might think it confirms your suspicions that I’m nuts.”

  “I guess. So when did this happen?”

  “Like I said in my statement, I left the pub for a little while, then went to the cemetery. However, I never told you why.”

  “You said it was to admire the view,” she said.

  “It was in many ways,” he said, a slight grin emerging on his cheeks. “I went there because I’d spotted you earlier and decided to follow.”

  Abigail blushed crimson and he was suddenly cast back fourteen years. It was as though the two were trapped together in one body. Their combined jade eyes shining doubly bright at Dorring.

  He shook it off. Now wasn’t the time.

  “Now,” he went on, “I realize that it was you he was watching.�
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  “Who?”

  “The guy in the hood. He was watching you and stayed to keep an eye on me. I followed him into some alleyways and that’s when he attacked me with a knife. We had a short scuffle and I ran after him and nearly got hit by you.”

  “Okay,” Abigail said. “Have you seen him again since you’ve been here?”

  It was like a real police interview. The one they should have had earlier. She wasn’t the machine this time. Didn’t have to be. He was being completely open. The cards were on the table. No bluff and double bluff. No need for a machine to break through his poker face.

  “Yeah. Close to here,” Dorring said, before going on to explain about the shooting in the woods.

  “So you were shot,” she said. “I knew you were lying then. So what else were you holding back?”

  “Only that, the real reason I was here and the fact that it was more than a cup of tea that Patricia showed me.”

  “I gathered that. So what do you think happened to this Kevin guy when he came here?”

  “Maybe Mo Hamilton met him,” Dorring suggested. “Led them straight to him before he could figure anything. Maybe it was her mobile that he was calling from.”

  “Mo Hamilton has a mobile phone?”

  “Yes. It’s why I know she’s with them. I found a mobile amongst her things. I’m positive that it was her who called them to the body. She’s helping protect the killer. I was hoping she’d lead me to him, but then Conner and his pals showed up.”

  “You’re sure the killer’s with them?”

  “He has to be. Why would she call them to the body?’

  “But it makes no sense to have someone like that working with them. Appleby’s usually so careful. No offense, but they’re into things much bigger than simple murder and it makes no sense to complicate things.”

  They stared into one another’s eyes for a few seconds, the rain lashing the metal of the air vent and the sound filling the room.

  “Go on then,” Dorring said. “Your turn. Cards on the table.”

  “What do you know about Bruce Appleby?” she asked.

  “Not much. I did a little research before I came. Mostly internet. He was in the MOD intelligence for twenty years before returning to the island after the death of his father, Patrick Appleby, and starting his own pharmaceutical company here. In the military he was involved in weapons design, most notably in chemical systems. He has a PhD in chemical biology, so it figures that’s what he’d do for the MOD.”

  “Very correct,” she said. “But all information readily available. Now tell me what kind of a picture you make from all of those things?”

  “Well, you told Patricia earlier that you were with the National Crime Agency, so I’m guessing it could be something to do with him supplying things for criminal endeavor. Drugs?”

  “Not really. I suppose you’d come to that if you thought he was into pharmaceuticals. But think bigger. Think about his military career.”

  Dorring did. Then it came to him.

  “Chemical weapons,” he said.

  “Bingo,” she said back. “Lord Bruce Appleby is actually the U.K.’s biggest operator in UN banned chemical weapons. His lab underneath Appleby manor doesn’t just develop drugs for patients suffering nerve conditions, it also uses the Gordon’s Heather for a very powerful nerve agent that is very light and therefore can be spread over great distances. What do you know about the use of chemical weapons in Syria?”

  “I know that the Assad regime will do anything to keep their grip on power.”

  “They’ve been using developments of the Gordon’s Heather weapon for the past two years. NATO estimate that it’s already killed between fifty and a hundred thousand people. They say the aftereffects are impossible to estimate because it spreads so far depending on wind speed and direction. They say they’ve found dead bodies a hundred miles away from drop sites. You should see the photographs of them, Alex. Children foaming at the mouth, suffocating because they can’t move their lungs.”

  “And you wonder how a killer like that could be with them,” he said. “They’re monsters. All of them. Including Conner.”

  “Oh,” she said raising her eyebrows. “Don’t get me started on Conner Jones. He’s practically Appleby’s second in command. Helps organize the transportation of the nerve agent to nefarious regimes.”

  “Tell me everything you know about him.”

  She explained that Conner had been working for Appleby for thirteen years, ever since he’d left the British Armed Forces. He was a very wealthy man in his own regard and a major shareholder in Appleby Pharmaceuticals.

  That was the payoff, Dorring acknowledged.

  It was believed that Conner had been back and forth to Moscow over the last year to secure a major deal with the Russians. To supply them with Gordon’s Heather so they too could manipulate it into CA191: the nerve gas it made. That way they could shut the illegal lab down on McGuffin and protect themselves while making huge sums farming Gordon’s Heather and shipping it out to Russia completely legally. They would claim that it was so the Russians could develop nerve medication.

  “It’s the type of salt air, you see,” she said on the subject of the plants. “It comes down from the Arctic and they say there’s something in the salt that helps germinate the plants. Then there’s the climate.”

  “I know,” Dorring said. “I did actually read an article about it. They tried to grow it in other parts of the world, but it failed. Even with artificial growth tanks.”

  “Yes. It’s the Devil’s weed, and Appleby and Conner are going to make billions selling it for mass murder.”

  Dorring sat back in his chair. He realized something and wanted to talk about it.

  “The first night I was here,” he said, “I saw two ships signaling each other with Morse code using their lights. In the morning I found the body.”

  “That was the Russians and Appleby’s men. They were meeting via boats. A little further out, you would have found a Russian submarine waiting their boat’s return. The man you found floating in the water was an agent of the NCA working undercover with the Russian Navy. I guess Appleby or the Russians found out and made an example of him.”

  “Then it really does confirm that the killer is with them.”

  “I guess it does. In everything that’s happened in the last hours, I didn’t think too much about it.”

  Once more the rain enveloped them, seeming to get fiercer when their voices stopped. They gazed across the table at one another and both welcomed the brief pause. The chance to think. To look at each other. To admire.

  “So how far along is your investigation?” Dorring asked.

  “Not far at all,” she replied. “I’ve been here six months and acted the local cop. Tried to fit in. Tried to get in with the right people. I wanted to infiltrate Appleby’s men. Become one of his go to people. But the whole island suspected me from the start. Not because they were sure I was undercover, but because I’m an outsider.”

  “But you’re not,” Dorring quickly interjected.

  “No,” she said, gazing at him with narrowed eyes.

  A sadness hung from her face then and the longer they sat silently staring at each other, the more it hung.

  “We can talk about that a little later,” he said. “Tell me how far you’ve got.”

  “Like I was saying, not far. Everyone suspects me.”

  “But surely one person has talked to you?”

  “Yes. One. And he died yesterday for it.”

  “That’s how they found you out?” he asked.

  “Yes. They tortured him. He must have told them.”

  “John Chalmers?”

  “Yes. John.”

  “What did he tell you?”

  “Nothing,” she said in a despondent tone. “It wasn’t about Appleby that I went to see him. I’m sure they thought it was, but it wasn’t. It was something else.”

  “Your father?” Dorring said.

  She
dropped her eyes from his for the first time.

  “I was born Kate Mclaughlin,” she said. “What I’m about to tell you is hazy. Most of it comes from nightmares I had as a child, but John Chalmers confirmed most of it the other night.”

  Dorring stretched a hand across the table and took hers. She glanced up and smiled at him, a little of the sadness going away. With the rain drumming hard, he said, “Tell it any way you want to.”

  She nodded and began.

  When Abigail was five, she was discovered on a fishing boat that came into the port of Hull. She was found shivering underneath some netting on the life raft. She had pneumonia and was rushed to hospital, where she spent several days in a fever. When she recovered, she’d lost her memory. They said some trauma followed by the terrible illness must have done it. It was like she’d been wiped clean. All she had in her clothing was a photograph of herself and a man suspected to be her father. The photo was sent out to news agencies, but no one came forward.

  After that, she was adopted. Good parents. They moved to Edinburgh. She was clever. Did well at school. That was good. She got nightmares. That was bad. She saw terrible things. Her parents took her to a psychologist. They pieced together that she had seen a terrible crime. As she got older, the dream became clearer and she realized that it was the murder of two people she was seeing. Instinctively, she knew it was her parents.

  Nevertheless, over the years, investigations by herself and her parents brought nothing. Then the nightmares faded a little when she reached university and she put it behind her.

  She had a natural inclination to join the police force. She was always interested in crime. She gathered that because the earliest part of her life was such a mystery and she craved the ability to solve it, she would devote her life to solving other people’s mysteries. She did well at Edinburgh University studying criminal psychology and procedure. She left and got a job in the Edinburgh Police Force. Did very well. At twenty-seven she got a job with the NCA.

  Then the nightmares came back.

  From them, she gathered that she was born on an island with lots of fishermen. Her father was a police officer. Sometimes she would sit with him in his office while he finished up. He would let her use his stationery to draw pictures. She loved her mother. “She had a very kind face and voice,” Abigail said. She was a school teacher at the local primary.