by Luca Veste
It didn’t stop the feeling, though, that something was in the increasingly small, short, constricting hallway with her. The lift far behind her now. The turn towards the roof door now only a couple of feet away.
She straightened up and turned the corner without thinking. There was a moment when she caught herself flinching, expecting something to be there waiting for her. Instead, it was a short walk and a grey metal door that led to the stairs up to the roof.
All she had to do now was walk towards the door, try to open it, then find out if this was going to work.
And it had to work.
It had to be enough for them.
She couldn’t go back now. She had to make it to the roof and perform the last act.
The feeling of being watched was still there. The feeling of not being entirely alone.
She wasn’t going to give up.
The last few yards stretched out in front of her, yet she crossed them in seconds.
The door opened.
She almost fell forward, flat to the ground in surprise. Behind the door was darkness, but she could feel the cold from outside. A stone step was the only visible thing in front of her.
She stepped over the threshold as the light slowly dimmed behind her. She almost slipped as the door slammed shut and plunged her into total darkness.
She was blind.
Light rushed into her eyes, blinding her and shifting the world around her. The noise and anger and love, all coming towards her at once, overwhelming her.
How could this happen? When she had done everything right. She had played his Game to save herself.
But playing hadn’t made any difference.
She saw it now. The Game wasn’t a way out.
It was an end.
PLAYER TWO
A game is supposed to be fun.
Something that you do to pass the time, laugh and be merry. A chance to be silly and foolish maybe.
Depends on the game you’re playing, of course.
The evening had become night had become early morning. All in the blink of a thought. She shivered at the cold wind as it whipped from the river hiding behind the buildings and swirled around her. Pulled her coat tighter around her body.
The yard she had reached seemed empty. She couldn’t see much in the black, but she listened for any noise. Any sign she wasn’t alone there.
All she could hear was her own laboured breathing.
This was a way to stop it all.
Play along and it’ll all be okay.
A way out.
A way to unfurl the knot that had grown in her stomach for months.
Years.
It had started with a phone call.
A low voice on the other end of the line. Almost a whisper. She had hung up on the private number four times in ten minutes, but answered the fifth call.
‘Don’t hang up. I need you to listen. For your own good.’
So she had, hearing the soft and soothing tone of it, intoxicating, even as it dripped with venom and horror.
‘We know what you’ve done. We’re going to play a game. You win, no one finds out what you did. You lose… and that’s it for you.’
They knew everything. Everyone she had hurt. Every lie she had told.
The voice gave her only one way out.
This night.
The Game.
She was standing with her back against a wall, waiting.
The traffic on the main road a few hundred yards away quietened momentarily. The black silence that followed began to smother her, amplifying her thoughts as they raced through her head.
Shadows began to take shape around her, dancing into being.
She was alone. Finally.
A noise made her pause.
A shift of weight, of breath that wasn’t hers.
She turned, expecting to see someone emerge from the shadows. For the reality of what she was doing to be revealed. She cocked her head, waiting to hear the noise again. Silence surrounded her, almost claustrophobic in its weight.
There was something about being alone that made you believe in the impossible. Your mind can play tricks on you. Make you believe in something you know not to be real.
This was one of those times.
She needed this to be over. This was the only way. Then she could move on, without the knowledge that she could be exposed. That was the deal.
Still.
She knew she was being watched.
Someone was following her every move.
She wasn’t sure where that thought came from, but now it was in her head, it was all she could think about. Unseen eyes, tracking her feet with each step she took. They had to be watching, she guessed, so they knew she was doing it right. Watching, as she stepped away from the wall and removed the knife she had taken from its block in the kitchen. Her mum would wonder where it had gone in days to come, but would never think it was her who had removed it. She shivered again as the temperature seemed to drop further.
She could feel her heart begin to crash against her chest.
‘Hello?’
Her voice sounded alien, as if it belonged to someone else. She wanted to laugh, nervously, at the sound of it as it hit the air and died there.
There was no answer.
It didn’t stop the feeling. That something was in the increasingly small, constricting, disused yard.
The feeling of being examined.
Another shift behind her, but she was only dimly aware of it now. The suffocating silence, trying to recall the correct patterns, feeling the tears well up, believing that she was going to fail.
Believing she was going to lose.
In the darkness and silence, her heart beating madly against her chest, her breath shortening, a sudden sound snapped into it all.
A ringing noise, coming from behind her. A few feet away. She held her breath as she turned, seeing a dull illumination on the ground. She stepped towards it, bending down to pick up the mobile phone, turning it over in her hand and staring at the screen. She knew the voice would be there as soon as she answered. Comforting and chilling in equal measure.
She answered.
‘It’s the end,’ the voice said. ‘You lose.’
Then, she could hear the breath behind her. On her exposed neck, as she dropped the phone to the ground. She opened her mouth to scream, but no sound escaped.
No sound could escape.
Game over.
Three
Mark flicked through the BBC Sport app on his phone as he waited for Natasha to get dressed, leaning against the bedroom door while she scanned the room looking for something.
‘Do you need a hand?’ Mark said, glancing over at her, wishing they didn’t have jobs to go to. That they could just stay there all day – watching TV and eating food that would be classed as ‘bad for them’.
‘No, it’s okay,’ Natasha replied, her tone betraying nothing. ‘It’s here somewhere.’
Mark nodded, even as her head disappeared fully.
Natasha. He really liked that name. It had been a couple of months now, but he still enjoyed saying it out loud. They’d met through Tinder, of all places. After a few one-night stands and fizzled-out-after-a-week-or-less relationships, he’d almost given up on it.
He’d prepared a meal the previous night, but he needn’t have bothered. Roast chicken and sweet potato mash. By the time they’d emerged from his bedroom, the chicken was black and the potatoes had ruined his good pan. They’d ordered takeaway and eaten greasy pizza and garlic bread in the living room instead.
That had happened a fair few times. A couple of months of dates, nights spent together here and there.
He wasn’t sure if she was as serious as he was, but he hoped so. It was yet another thing they hadn’t really discussed.
‘I’m busy later, by the way,’ Natasha said, grabbing her remaining shoe and slipping it on. ‘But I’ll let you know if I can get round after. Never mind if you don’t want to,’ she sai
d, standing up, a mobile phone disappearing into the side pocket of a small backpack. ‘Just thought why spend days apart at this point? It’s not like we’re having a bad time together, right?’
‘Of course,’ Mark said, a little too quickly. He took a breath before it slipped away. ‘I mean, you’re welcome to come round any time you like.’
Natasha smiled at him and he suddenly felt his stomach lurch a little.
‘I bet you say that to all the girls.’
‘No… I mean, there isn’t… no.’
‘Of course not,’ she replied, but she rolled her eyes at him and shook her head. She looked away and he stepped back as she slipped past him. He followed her downstairs, trying to think of a good closing line, but was distracted by an insistent buzzing from the phone in his pocket.
‘I’ll call you,’ Mark said, holding the front door open for her, as she stopped and waited there.
‘You best had,’ Natasha replied, then kissed him for a fleeting few seconds before skipping away up the path. She didn’t turn round to wave. He watched her walk away until she was out of sight.
His phone buzzed again as he closed the door finally. He took it out, checking the screen and swearing silently under his breath. ‘Mark Flynn,’ he answered.
‘Mark, got something for you. Have you got a pen?’
His shoulders slumped a little, as reality came back inch by inch.
The job.
‘Go ahead,’ he said, already placing his feet into the polished brown shoes left by the door the night before. A clean jacket was hanging close by and he slipped it over his shirt and tie, even as Detective Inspector Angela Bennett continued to talk into his ear.
‘Blood discovered.’
‘What?’ he replied, wishing he hadn’t answered the phone. That he’d missed the call again and she could have handed it to someone else. Like that would have made a difference. ‘I’m not following you.’
‘This missing teenager. Everything points to a death, but we have no body yet. Only thing we have is her blood. And not much of that.’
‘The Emily Burns case,’ Mark replied, remembering it from the briefing the previous day. It had been a minor annoyance then – something that uniforms were handling. The blood hadn’t been mentioned. ‘Was wondering what was going on with that one.’
‘Yeah, well, nothing good, that much I can tell you. We’ve got everything but a body at this point and we’re hoping that’s not too far away. Or, you know, that she turns up safe and sound.’
‘Blood, you say?’
‘Found by uniforms earlier on. One of the abandoned work yards down on the front, past the docks. They tracked the girl there on CCTV and went to check it out. Found a pool of blood. That’s it.’
‘What’s the story on the family?’
‘The usual for the estate they’re from,’ Bennett said. Mark closed his eyes briefly, wishing he could just go back to bed.
‘Hoping one of them doesn’t go rogue and tell the media we’re sitting on our backsides doing nothing,’ Bennett continued, a curl of annoyance in her tone. ‘Emily has been missing two days now.’
‘Not that long really…’
‘Apparently it’s massively out of character, blah, blah, blah. Now with this, well, starts to look suspicious, you know? So, it’s no longer for uniforms to deal with. DCI has asked Major Crimes to look into it, with this discovery. So, it’s now on you.’
‘What’s the address?’ Mark said, locating his car keys and looking back into the house, trying to think of anything else he might need.
‘Sefton Street, by the trampoline and Go Karts place. There’s a big patch of land just behind it that hasn’t been built on yet. You know what it’s like around there. Seems strange that the only place with nothing on it is the last place she’s seen.’
‘Not that strange; probably intentional. It’s not like CCTV is well hidden in this city. If someone wants to try and avoid it, they only have to look around for the best places.’
‘Of course, ace detective,’ DI Bennett said, a playfulness to her voice now. He could almost picture the knowing smile playing across her face. ‘Good to know you’re not a total imbecile.’
‘That was up for debate?’
Bennett didn’t respond and Mark realised it probably was.
Four
Things changed so quickly. An hour earlier, in bed with Natasha and her laughter, her eyes. The way he had become lost in them so often, as if he were staring at waves crashing onto the shore. Now, he was plain old Detective Constable Mark Flynn, loitering near a pool of blood.
It was the quiet moments he looked forward to now. None of the horror of his job.
It hadn’t taken him long to find the place, a short drive along the city’s waterfront, down The Strand and past the old buildings which made the skyline iconic. He barely registered them now, even though when he’d been a kid, he’d stood in awe of the giant structures. The Liver Birds had been his favourite part of the whole lot.
Now, they were just normal. Nothing special. Just part of everyday life.
A couple of uniformed officers had obviously been awaiting his arrival – elbowing each other as he stepped closer to the scene. Mark slowed as they approached from the other side of the yard, taking everything in. There were a few people in the distance, stopping for a quick look at what was happening and then moving on when they didn’t see anything of interest. He didn’t think it would be long before the Liverpool Echo had rolling news coverage on their website.
It was quieter here, far away from the bustling to and fro of the more touristy parts of the Albert Dock and town. Only a few minutes further from there, towards the south, there was less foot traffic. Only the main A road which ran along to Otterspool and up to Aigburth and beyond. Here it was still technically the city centre, he supposed, but it was stuck in the beginnings of transformation. The area, once forgotten, was now seeing new developments daily. The yard he was standing in was one of the last to be looked at, he thought. Surrounded by giant warehouses, now housing trampoline parks and go-kart circuits. More places for tired parents to entertain bored children. Behind him, further down the waterfront, new houses and a tall building overlooked him – new student accommodation, which seemed to be what every new tower block was for now.
‘Sir?’ one of the uniforms said, bringing his attention back to the scene. ‘You our DC?’
‘Yes, Mark Flynn,’ he replied, almost reaching out a hand and then thinking better of it. ‘What’s the situation?’
‘PCs Robertson and Banks,’ the female uniform said. She was young, brown hair tied back in a tight ponytail. Dark lines hung under her eyes, but they still contained a little life. ‘Forensics are just finishing up now.’
‘What are we looking at then?’
‘We received a call from a Julie Burns, a few days ago,’ PC Robertson said, both hands finding her hips as she began talking. She was shorter than him by a few inches, but broad with it. Stocky didn’t seem the right word, but it was the only one that came to mind. ‘Her daughter – Emily– was last seen late Saturday night. Nineteen years old, no history of taking off or anything like that. She didn’t say where she was going and nothing was missing from her bedroom, apart from her mobile phone. It seems she got on a bus into town, then walked from the London Road area to here. We had a look at CCTV yesterday and this morning, tracking her along The Strand to here. Wasn’t exactly difficult, but that’s where the trail finished.’
‘No cameras in here then?’ Mark said, looking around for any familiar technology on the walls but seeing only bare brick.
‘Nothing here or on the promenade over there,’ PC Robertson replied, gesturing towards the end of the yard in the distance. ‘We came down just for a look while we were quiet. Found what looked like blood spots leading to a bigger pool. Dried up now, but unmistakeable if you’ve seen it before, like. Thankfully it hasn’t rained since then, otherwise we’d probably have missed it.’
‘Take
me over.’
Mark followed the two uniforms to where a forensic tech officer was on his haunches packing up kit. He stopped a few feet away, cocking his head and taking it in. ‘Not a huge amount.’
‘Enough to be worrying,’ PC Robertson said, crossing her arms across her chest. ‘We’ve looked around the place to see if we could find anything else, but there’s nothing to suggest any violence of any kind. Apart from the blood, of course.’
Mark followed her eyes to the steel railings that bordered the end of the yard from the waterfront, understanding what she might be thinking. ‘If it is blood, maybe she tried to do something here and eventually ended up in the river?’
‘That’d be my guess,’ PC Robertson replied, her voice softer now as she looked out across the water. ‘Someone’s gone to see the family again. I guess that’s your job now though. They haven’t mentioned suffering from depression, but doesn’t mean she wasn’t and they just didn’t realise it. Only thing is, we can see most of the waterfront from a camera further down. Nothing clear enough to be sure, but there was nothing that looked like a body going into the river.’
‘Late at night though, so not the best light. Could have happened in a split second for all we know.’
‘Maybe,’ PC Robertson replied, but Mark could tell by her tone she didn’t quite buy into his theory. ‘The family say Emily showed no signs of being in distress, mentally or physically; it was a normal evening by all accounts. No outward signs that she might harm herself, or that she was worried about something. She just disappeared overnight. No note, no nothing. Everything points to something else going on. Not just a… you know.’
Mark could see she didn’t want to say the word suicide, which meant she’d probably had a bad one recently. He was beginning to recognise these small signs, which made him feel better about himself. Like he wasn’t wasting his time with the career choice he’d made. Like he might even be good at it. ‘At the moment though, we have no evidence that anything has happened to her from an outside force.’
‘I suppose not,’ PC Robertson replied, barely above a whisper now. ‘Nothing ruling that out either, though.’