And what did it matter about Raymond or Nick or Jake?
What did it matter about Flower or Jemima O’Connor?
Or whoever else they had on their list?
When he had unlimited pleasure, why would he care what kind of monster they’d made him?
Abruptly, both of his hands jerked forward and out. A fist smashed into Belinda, knocking her sideways. His knee found strength and rose sharply, hitting into Judy’s chin, thrusting her off the table onto the floor. In the same instant, his other hand grabbed Abigail’s hair. He pulled back on her scalp and wrenched her face away from him. She screamed and roared simultaneously, a high-pitched animal sound.
Still gripping her hair, he sat up and her face twisted towards his. Her eyes were wide and dark, filled with blood and delight; inhuman, they were without light, but for the first time since he’d known her, they showed delight.
She screamed again, her mouth wide, wider than it could possibly be. Her incisors were like fangs; it was as if he was peering in to a serpent’s mouth. He flinched at the sight and she lurched her head forward at him, a clump of her hair tearing out in his hand. Her mouth snapped at his throat, his jugular, trying to end him again. She’d clearly determined that if he wouldn’t be moulded in her hand, then it was better he ceased to exist.
Clay pulled back from her and swung his fist into the side of her face. Her cheek bone crumpled and she let out a deep bellow, a sound so low it was barely recognisable as human. She jerked her head towards him again and he sank his fist fully into her nose. He could feel the cartilage and bone push back into her skull and heard a squelch as it ruptured her brain.
Deadness quickly filled Abigail’s eyes – still dark, still bloody, but the delight forced out of them. She swayed, all vestiges of strength slipping from her. She fell dead to the carpet, upsetting the garden of candles. Suddenly, in a room full of incense and fire, Abigail burst into flame.
Judy came at him, her chin looking slightly crooked, her scowl lopsided. Her arms were on his shoulders, her misshapen face was at his and the two of them toppled off the table and landed next to Abigail’s burning body.
Judy looked so much older. Her face was wrinkled, hard grooves had dug into her cheeks and forehead, her pretty nose was wider and had sunk back into her skull. She looked like a pig coming at him, an angry sow determined to chew on his dead flesh.
Her weight was on his chest, and she was clawing and biting at him. He’d landed on his back, and he grappled with her, while trying to keep his shoulder away from Abigail’s flaming body. It was as if Judy was rabid, moving so fast and ferocious that it was impossible to get any firm hold on her.
Her teeth scraped against his cheek. He grabbed her broken jaw and yanked hard, forcing her back. She squealed, just like a pig, and then he flipped both of them over.
They crashed into the table legs and knocked it over, spilling more candles, many of them raining on their struggling nude bodies, fuelling the inferno.
He was on top of Judy now and her twisted, aged and wretched face snarled and spat at him. Her legs and arms flailed at him. The smoke was building up. They were both coughing and it was getting difficult to see her. He grabbed her head and smashed it back into the solid floor, again and again and again. He did it until she wasn’t moving, until her eyes were staring blankly to the ceiling.
Every one of the little candles seemed to be popping into a new fire, while the walls pumped out blood.
Clay hauled himself to his feet just as Belinda charged at him from behind with a knife. It sank into the soft flesh below his shoulder blade. Coldly and coolly, Clay recognised the feeling. He recognised the fucking knife. There was a frisson as it went in, an electric charge of recollection – it was the same knife she’d used to kill him the last time.
Belinda was screaming, one hand tearing at his hair. But he caught her hand before she could pull the knife out. The two of them crashed through the door and landed on the yellow carpet of the hallway.
He straddled her, holding her hands above her head. Once, a lifetime ago, they’d been in this position during lovemaking. Now there was no love, only death.
Belinda squirmed and wriggled and kneed his wounded back and spat and screamed at him: “You fucking bastard! You fucking low-life nothing piece of filth! I hate you, I’ve always fucking hated you. I hated you so much I made you love me, I made you love me, you fucking fool, but you were always fucking nothing. You know that? You were nothing to me, nothing at all – just something I could use! Nothing. I laughed so much when you died, Clay, I laughed so fucking much at the death of a nothing.”
He looked down at her, letting her words bounce off him. She barely resembled the girl he’d loved – if indeed that girl had ever existed. The passing years meant she was running to fat; she was jowly and it had blunted her prettiness. She looked round and brutal now. Life’s disappointments, those late nights spent drinking over missed opportunities, had tarnished her skin, wrinkled and coarsened it. Even her eyes – those incredible flirtatious green eyes – showed no sign of the girl he had loved. They were just full of hate now and looked like they’d never been any other way.
He held her wrists above her head with one hand and reached back to pull the knife from his shoulder. It slid out cold; obviously, his blood was not warm enough to affect it. He looked down at this stranger he had once loved so much, this real person behind the mask, who had done so many dreadful things – and then he pushed the knife in between her sagging breasts.
As the knife went in, she didn’t give him the satisfaction of screaming; she just glared at him with her vicious, snarling face.
“I loved you,” he said. “I loved you since I first saw you. I thought I’d have done anything for you – and you made me do this.”
She spat at him and laughed. She laughed until the blood rushed to her mouth and she was stopped with choking. Still straddling her, he let go. She tried with flailing arms to hit a goodbye slap at him, but she was already too weak.
Clay put a bloody hand in front of his face and stood up. On unsteady feet, he returned to the dining room. Everything was red – burning, bleeding. Abigail lay on the carpet, the flames charring her skin, her hair almost burned away. Judy’s face and body were dyed crimson, her eyes staring red and insensible.
Unflinching, he reached into the flames and pulled out the wooden box, its corners slightly singed.
He lurched away from the burning room then crouched in the hall corner opposite Belinda.
She watched him, her breath wheezing, her hand digging into her wound.
He opened the box and stared at the remainder of his heart. There was a static charge as he touched it, and then there was peace – two complementary forms of electricity brought together. He held it in his palm; still beating, still healthy, still his soul. He raised it to his mouth and swallowed it.
“No!” choked Belinda.
It slipped down his gullet and he felt calm. Despite the burning, despite the wound in his back, despite all the blood, inside he felt only goodness.
He dialled 999 and told them who he was and left the phone’s handset dangling.
Belinda and Clay stared untouching right until her last breath, not a word of forgiveness spoken, not a sound of love uttered.
The police arrived two minutes later.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
Detective Inspector Llewellyn was a smart, image-conscious man. His hair was pristine, as if styled by professionals each morning, his jaw line, although tough, was diamond-razor smooth and his fingernails were manicured. Clay was also surely not the first person to wonder how he managed to afford such nice suits on a policeman’s salary.
The contrast to Clay was striking, particularly as Clay was only dressed in a pair of shorts for decency’s sake, with a blanket thrown over him. They had stitched his wound, but he was still all blood- and smoke-stains.
“Now listen here!” Llewellyn slammed his hand to the table. He'd already proved himse
lf one for the dramatic. “You listen to me! Don’t tell me you don’t know why you did it. Of course you know why you did it. Of course you do! It sounds to me like you’re trying to plead insanity, diminished fucking responsibility! Well, I won’t allow it, you hear me? I won’t bloody allow it!”
Llewelyn’s voice was a rich Welsh baritone, the sort of timbre designed for reading poetry. When he yelled, however, it was high-pitched and coarse, spittle flying everywhere.
The interview room was white and sterile. A big burly uniformed officer stood at the door, on guard for such a dangerous prisoner as Clay.
Clay had waived the right to a lawyer – what would the point be, really?
Llewellyn paced the room.
Clay sat one side of the white table, while opposite him was a moon-faced sergeant named Harris, who, if he was playing good cop in this, had clearly forgotten his lines.
“Why did you do it?” yelled Llewellyn. “And don’t tell me you don’t know, as I won’t fucking listen!” His hand sailed into the table again. “You’re just as sane as me, just as fucking sane. So tell me – in your calm and sane way – why the fuck did you do it?”
Clay just stared at him. He'd already told Llewellyn once and his story – with all those gaps and holes, so it fitted normal reality – was not going to get any better.
“Six of your friends! Why did you kill six of your friends? Why did you come to London to do that? Why? Did you hate them? Did their success make you feel foolish? Inadequate? Did you want revenge on them? Did you?”
Clay looked at the sergeant, who tried to snarl back – but a snarl is not something a perfectly round face allows.
“Look at me!” yelled Llewellyn. “Where’ve you been? Where’ve you been these last two years? Who died there? How many other victims are there? Come on, you may as well tell me. There’s no psychiatrist riding in to help you, there’s no social worker going to hold your fucking hand. It’s just you and me, like in a few months time there’ll just be you and a jury and a life stretch. Saving your grand moment until then? Are you? When you bring out all the sickness in your mind and justify it like you vicious bastards always try to do." He turned away in disgust and paced across the room. "What is it? Broken home? Neglected childhood? Small dick? No. I'll tell you what it is. You're an evil fucking bastard, aren’t you? You got no fucking heart!”
Clay smiled at that.
“This isn’t funny!” Llewellyn had turned just in time to catch the curl of Clay’s lips. “This is not something to joke and laugh about. No one else finds it funny! I don’t, Sergeant Harris doesn’t, your cellmates won’t. Your cellmates will take three glances at those women you killed tonight and they’ll hate you for taking such special skirt from the world. Special – you hear me? They’ll hate you!”
He smiled again.
“Why’d you do it?” Llewellyn screamed. “Why the fuck did you do it? Come on, tell me! What was your reason?”
Clay felt the pain from his wound, the tickle of smoke still in his lungs. He coughed.
Llewellyn waited, his face red above his nice collar.
“All I can tell you,” said Clay, “is that it’s over.”
Llewellyn’s hand hit the table again.
CHAPTER FORTY
At dawn two days later Toby Coops was woken up by angry policemen and taken away for questioning.
It seemed that John Clay – or 'The Bright Lights Butcher' as the press had already dubbed him – had at some point in the night disappeared from his cell. It was the most incredible escape, as he seemed to do it without touching the doors or windows, or showing up on any security camera footage. It was the perfect getaway, and the police were quite obviously upset and embarrassed about it.
So they sat Toby Coops down and grilled him for a few hours. He was Clay's friend, after all. He must have some idea where Clay had gone, some idea where he'd run to. And what about those missing two years? Did Clay never mention where he was all that time? Did Toby never demand an answer?
Toby sat there, nervous, sweating, missing cigarettes and coffee – and tried to be as helpful as possible. But what could he really tell them? He didn't know where Clay had gone. “Somewhere into the ether” was not going to count as a sensible answer. So what could he really say? He just answered their questions as best he could, until they ran out of questions or time, or got bored, or realised that – despite all their hopes – he really didn’t know anything.
Afterwards, not wanting to be alone, Toby thought about ringing Flower to get her to pick him up. But, after a quick chat with the duty sergeant, he realised she was in the same police station answering exactly the same questions. A classy move, he felt, to do that to someone so recently bereaved.
He waited for her. They left with arms around each other, and spent the rest of the day lying together. Both were emotionally spent and tired, and needed someone to lie with.
A great manhunt was launched for Clay, his face plastered across every newspaper and television broadcast. He was a monster and a suitable panic built up. Photos of his victims were used – especially glamorous shots of the last three – and he was portrayed as a cruel fiend, an inhuman creature without an ounce of decency, feeling or guilt.
But despite the hype and hysteria, John Clay was never seen again. He was never glimpsed by a reliable eye-witness, he was never caught on CCTV. His name and image were brought out yearly at the anniversary of his disappearance, one of the country’s great mysteries. His fame was more enduring than that of anybody he’d ever met.
Toby, who knew the truth, missed his friend. At first, it irritated him to see Abigail, Belinda and Judy portrayed as helpless victims, women on the edge of fame before it was all cruelly snatched away. After awhile, though, he just found it funny. They’d wanted to be famous more than anything else, and he enjoyed the fact that Clay’s pictures were always bigger than theirs.
He was able to talk about the real Clay, the good Clay, with Flower. They talked a lot. They were together from then on, a development that surprised both as neither had seen romance in the other before. Somehow, in those months following Clay’s return, hand-holding became natural, kissing became natural, and love sprang up. They were happy with each other.
Flower never actually played her part in the Covent Garden Coven TV adaptation, dropping out as there were too many bad memories. She quit acting and instead became a writer. She wrote books about an ex-actress who was now a detective and always saved the character’s lives in the nick of time. She was moderately successful, but she disappointed her agent and publisher by never overtly writing about the events surrounding Clay’s return.
Bunny, however, did stage a play about it. Toby saw him afterwards and Bunny was apologetic, saying that the financier had insisted they make the Clay character a sexually angry monster always on the verge of homicide. He said he was never happy with it. But he was clearly very happy with the money that rolled in. He never produced another play, though.
As for Charles, he did a Sunday newspaper interview the following weekend, where he highlighted his anger against Clay and his grief at the death of Abigail, Belinda and Judy. He also clearly tried to highlight his thespian credentials, but that was hidden in a paragraph towards the end. He was the only one to appear in the gruesome TV documentary made about the case. He rolled his eyes and articulated his words and used the phrase "As an actor" more than he really needed to. Strangely, the follow-up work wasn't forthcoming. The last Toby and Flower heard, Charles was heading for Australia to try to make his name there.
Flower and Toby never talked to the media about the events; they barely even mentioned it to their new friends. It would require too much explanation. But they kept a photo of Clay, and each year they quietly laid a bouquet of roses outside The Murdered Bastard.
At the end of the Covent Garden Coven, Carl Chainsaw had written:
“And at every premiere they attended, their dainty slippers trod on his broken body. With every curtain call they t
ook, they bowed in front of his mangled and chewed corpse. For every award they received, they trampled over his startled look, his torn-open chest, his ripped-out heart. They smiled and the cameras loved them. Three angels with perfect teeth, perfect faces, perfect bodies. And he lay in some unknown piece of dirt, the husk they’d used to make it big. Nobody remembered him. Even his friends only brought him up as a question mark: ‘I wonder where he got to.’ Nobody knew, nobody guessed and nobody mourned him. Somewhere out there he lay, his heart torn out, his soul at places unknown – with not even those closest to him realising they had to give a thought of fond remembrance. The camera lenses kissed and lingered on the actresses’ faces, but he was alone and uncared for in some covered-up woodland ditch. A man with too big a heart who had used it too unwisely.”
It was unfashionable to think good thoughts of John Clay, but there were three people in the world – three, as Lizzie soon figured out the truth – who would say a quiet prayer on his behalf. They wondered where he was now, whether he was being punished, or if whatever Maker there was knew the truth and had shown him mercy. They hoped He had and always remembered to say their prayers.
And John Clay – in whichever piece of dirt he’d returned to – now had three good and generous souls watching over him. More than he’d ever had before.
ALSO AVAILABLE....
His bones have been broken, and his insides bruised and mashed, but still he doesn't regret meeting Diana Christmas!
In 1959, Diana Christmas – the beautiful, vivacious redhead – was a major star in Britain. It was her moment. She was on the cusp of making it big in Hollywood. Then, she simply walked away from the limelight. Vanished from an industry that adored her.
The Wannabes Page 26