by John Macken
Reuben only half heard. He wondered whether Morgan had spoken to the other men he had killed. Incapacitated them and then explained in calm and rational tones exactly what he was doing to them and why. The doctor and his patient.
He thrust the saw through again. Reuben screamed. The pain just got worse. Shapes exploding behind his eyes. A roar in his chest trying to escape. Reuben counted under his breath. Telling himself if he could make it to a hundred without screaming again he would be coping. He didn’t get past seven. Morgan pushed all his weight down on the blade, ripped it back through the bone. As he paused, let go of the blade, examined his handiwork, Reuben noticed that the saw was now embedded. It didn’t fall over. It was inside him, a part of him, entrenched in his skeleton.
He flexed his right arm. There was some movement. Maybe more than before, but not enough. He clenched his fist as hard as he could, willing it back to life.
Morgan grinned down at him. Reuben could see it now. The face was what had confused him at the hospital. Benign, light-haired, slightly tapered ears. It wasn’t a psychopath’s face. But now Reuben realized it was all in the eyes. Dark green irises. The colour of bile. Small pricks of black for pupils. Sickening yellow streaks radiating out. Flecks of brown hiding in the green and yellow. Eyes that had absorbed an intensity of horror that was almost unimaginable.
‘A third of the way through your first three fingertips,’ Morgan said. His voice was slow and even, barely altering in tone as he spoke. ‘Soon be halfway through. But we’re just beginning. How you feel now is a pleasure compared with what’s to come when we hit the marrow.’
16
Reuben knew it was over. He was lost. He pictured Lucy. At some point she would be told that her ex-husband and her son were both dead. In the same room, at the hands of the same man. The physical pain was bearable for a second. The mental agony began to take over. He let his mind drift. The people he hoped would miss him. Judith. Sarah. Mina. Bernie. His old forensics team. His brother Aaron, whom he rarely saw. His ex-wife, with whom he could still only barely communicate.
And then Morgan bent closer. Ripped the saw back, tore into the bone again, attacked a fresh cluster of nerve endings. Reuben’s legs shook again, uncontrollable, his heels slamming into the floor, echoing around the gutted room. More feeling returned to his right arm. He beat it into the wooden boards. Morgan grabbed the hacksaw tight. Breathed deep, let the air spill out over Reuben. A sour smell of exertion and mania. Up close, surrounding him, consuming him. A deep growl in his throat. Something primal, something animal.
And then there was another noise. Something lurking in the banging of Reuben’s feet, the guttural noises Morgan was making.
Morgan hadn’t heard it. He continued to move the saw, and Reuben screamed, louder than before. So loud that his lungs, which had been useless and flattened, now felt they were going to explode. Morgan fed off the screams, enjoying the sound. His tiny pupils widened, swallowing up the dull green and the sickly yellow.
‘Now we’re really hitting some nerves,’ he said. ‘This is much more like it.’
‘Fuck you,’ Reuben managed.
‘As a paediatric haematologist, the marrow at the centre of human bones has always fascinated me. Blood cell production, what goes wrong in children with leukaemia like your son. But what I’ve learned recently is just how exquisitely painful it is.’
‘Do your worst, Morgan,’ Reuben grunted.
‘Oh I will. I really will.’
Suddenly, there was another voice in the room. ‘That’s enough.’
Reuben couldn’t see. It was not a voice he recognized. It was brutal and authoritative, not to be fucked with. Morgan froze. His knee pressed harder into Reuben’s ribcage. Reuben ground his teeth, blotting out the agony of his fingers, desperate to know who was in the room.
‘Get out of my house,’ Morgan answered. ‘Get out now.’
‘I’m staying the fuck where I am.’
All Reuben wanted to know was who was standing behind Morgan. But he couldn’t see. It wasn’t the police. The man hadn’t announced himself. The voice was calm, powerful, a frank statement of intent. Blunt words which promised action.
Morgan remained still. The other man didn’t say anything. Morgan silently pressed the blade into Reuben’s fingertips.
‘How did you find Amanda’s house?’ Morgan eventually asked.
‘Followed Maitland here.’
Reuben started at the mention of his name. So Morgan knew the man who was standing behind him, and the man knew Reuben. This was dangerous. Two people in the same room who could hurt him.
‘Now what, Francis?’ Morgan asked. He dragged the name out, pronounced it through a sneer.
Francis. Francis Randle. Reuben’s mind raced. Did Francis Randle know Dion Morgan? Could they have met at the inquiry, spent time together at the court case? Morgan and Riefield had obviously known each other, so why not Morgan and Randle? Either way, Francis Randle was dangerous. The man CID had been hunting for days. Ex-services, some sort of breakdown after his son’s death, now armed and highly unstable. Did Randle have something to do with Joshua’s death? Had he helped? Had he carried out some of the murders? Reuben’s brain sped through scenarios, trying to put it all together. Not one killer but two. Both with ample motive. An uneasy alliance. Maybe Randle supplying the rats. Morgan the paediatrician snatching Joshua.
‘Stand up, nice and slowly, and let’s sort this thing out between us.’
Morgan didn’t budge. He just maintained the pressure on Reuben’s chest, pushing his knee down, crushing Reuben into the floor.
‘Why don’t you just go, leave me to do what you know needs to be done. Walk away, forget the whole thing.’
‘I can’t forget, Dion. I can’t forget at all. Now, I’m in charge, and I take things from here.’
‘Don’t make me fucking laugh. This isn’t the army. You’re not in charge of anything. You’re in my house, now get the fuck out.’
Randle’s voice remained calm. ‘I’m going to ask you one more time.’
Reuben watched Morgan rotate his head and keep it there, staring up at Randle. ‘OK,’ he said, sighing so deeply that Reuben felt it through the knee that was pressing down on him. ‘We’ll do it your way.’
Morgan began to straighten. Reuben suddenly got a clear view of the other man in the room. Close-cropped hair, bony cheekbones, damaged ear, broad chin with a deep cleft, the stub of a nose, dark brown eyes, irises like holes. Francis Randle. He looked wild. He gripped a pistol in front of him, arms rigid, straight at Morgan, who was now standing over Reuben.
‘I still don’t see what this has to do with you,’ Morgan said, flexing his neck, loosening his shoulders.
Randle made no attempt to acknowledge Reuben. Reuben worked his right arm, feeling more strength return. His left continued to bleed into the floorboards, pulsing over the saw.
‘This has everything to do with me,’ Randle answered.
‘How?’
‘You know why. Enough is enough.’
There was a lull for a couple of seconds. Morgan’s bulk rocked slowly back and forth. Randle remained motionless, arms out front, clenching the gun so hard his knuckles were like bones.
And then Morgan launched himself at Randle. An instant charge, letting loose his momentum, taking off through the air, like he had done to Reuben.
The amphetamine fractured time into tiny chunks. Flashes of movement. Enormous volumes of detail. Separate packets of information. Morgan tipping forward. Headlong motion. Feet leaving the floor. A neck-breaking rugby tackle. Randle barely moving. Intense and unblinking. One of Morgan’s feet brushing Reuben’s head. Cold air following it. Echoes crashing off the bloody walls. Morgan slamming into Randle. Loud cracks in quick succession. Both bodies hitting the ground. Two well-built men thumping into the floor a couple of metres away. Feeling the impact through the floorboards. A hollow pop as Randle’s head hit hard. A scrape of clothing. Splinters embedding. The gun flying
loose. Metal skidding across wood. A moment of stillness. Reuben reaching his right arm out. Stretching for the object. Arcing his body. Walking his numb fingertips across the rough surface. Touching. Clumsily sliding the pistol closer. Grabbing it by the metal handle. Feeling the warmth. Feeling the weight. Aiming it along the floor. Trying to focus. Not knowing who to aim at. A cough, a hollow breath. The men moving. A tangle of arms and legs. A man crouching, getting to his feet. The other up. Staggering across the room. Towards Reuben. Swaying but focused. Reuben lifting the pistol. His fingers barely gripping it. Roughly aiming. Brain scrambling about. Trying to work out the last two seconds. Knowing suddenly that the man is Morgan. Feeling him get close. Intent in his eyes. The pain in Reuben’s other hand. The loss of blood. The death of his son. Behind Morgan, Randle holding his head. Still crouching. Winded, concussed. Reuben knowing he only has one option. Squeezing against the trigger. The pistol feeling heavy. His arm weak and flaccid. Aiming up at Morgan. Morgan almost on top of him. Squeezing harder. The trigger tough. Made of stone. Inert and unyielding. Every ounce of concentration into his sedated arm. Useless fingers refusing to cooperate. Morgan looming. A look of intense purpose in his face. Reddened cheeks, his mouth set wide, a scream that hasn’t arrived, teeth bared, pink gums showing. Reuben squeezing and squeezing. Trying to shift the aim. His arm dropping. Lifting and aiming again. Fighting the weight, fighting the drug. Years spent on ranges coming down to this. Firing a pistol with dead fingers. Forcing the trigger. Crying out. A loud crack. An instant recoil. The gun jolting. Slipping out of his fingers. Morgan still moving. Stepping over Reuben. Past him. Reaching forward. A desperate lunge for the only piece of furniture in the room. The table. Grabbing at a vase on it with both hands. Knocking packets of drugs and syringes and needles on to the floor. Time still fractured into tiny pieces. Morgan falling down. The container spilling open. Dark black powder cascading out. A fine spray of ash hanging in the air. Reuben finally understanding what the room is. A shrine, a monument to a dead fiancée. Morgan on his back. Groaning, saying something Reuben doesn’t catch. Blood thickening and pooling through his shirt. Rasping for breath, a sick wheeze. Punctured lung, Reuben guesses, the hole gaping open. Randle shaking himself round. Coming over. Picking the gun up. Looking down at Reuben for the first time. An intense look. An assessment, a judgement. Staring over at Morgan, at the gun, back at Reuben. The adrenalin still spilling out. Rushing through Reuben’s veins, making his breathing fast. Blood seeping out of his fingertips, quick pulses around the blade, running along, dripping off the end. Not knowing about Randle. Suddenly feeling vulnerable again. Nail-gunned to the floor, incapacitated. Morgan getting quieter, the rasps empty and thin. Randle glancing at the cot. Back at Reuben. At his fingertips, at the blood. Bending down. Placing the gun near Reuben’s head. Dark eyes with black pupils. Peering into Reuben’s face. A bony hardness to him. Unreadable, somewhere else, lost in something. Reuben twitching. Adrenalin and amphetamine overload. Randle taking the pistol and running it across Reuben’s face, along his arm. Jabbing it against his left wrist. Pushing it hard. Reuben’s understanding coming late. Forcing the barrel into the floor. Lifting it back. Popping the plastic bag tie. Freeing Reuben’s arm. Helping him up.
17
Reuben held on to Francis Randle, sensing a muscular stiffness, a harsh solidity. He stared into the cot at Joshua. Still no movement. Nothing. Reuben stepped forward, yanked the saw from his fingers, blood starting to come fast. He touched his son’s face. It was as cold as the room, maybe even colder.
And then there was a twitch. A flicker, an eyelid making an almost imperceptible movement. He shook his son gently. No response.
Reuben glanced down at the floor. Packets of drugs and hypodermics. He looked more closely. Pentobarbital. A barbiturate.
Reuben fumbled for his phone. He pulled it out and passed it to Randle. ‘Dial nine nine nine,’ he said. ‘Then press the middle button at the top.’ Randle silently did as he was told, then passed the mobile back. Reuben asked for an ambulance and gave them the address. He confirmed his name and the name of the patient. Morgan convulsed on the floor, a silent spasm shuddering through him. ‘Better make it two ambulances,’ Reuben said.
He dropped his phone into the cot and turned back to Randle. ‘Help me lift my son up. I can’t do it with one useless arm and one half butchered.’ Reuben no longer cared about his fingertips. The pain was acute, but something stronger was washing through him. Hope.
Randle tucked the pistol into the belt of his trousers. He helped Reuben lift Joshua up out of the cot. Joshua was rigid in Reuben’s arms, not moving. His lips were blue, his skin so pale the veins showed through. His tiny fingers were curled up, his fingernails transparent, the flesh below purple. Reuben just had enough strength in his right arm to cradle him close.
The room was freezing. He started to shiver, shock catching up with him. Being attacked, and shooting a man. He willed the ambulances to come, for medics to take his son and try to pull him back from the brink. He felt like running into the road and waving his arms, stopping cars, speeding things up. But he couldn’t. He was in danger of sliding into shock. He needed to talk, needed to stay conscious, needed to be there for Joshua.
‘Did you know Morgan, then?’ Reuben asked.
‘Only by name, from the trial that killed my son.’
‘How did you find him?’
‘I’ve been hunting you. Following you. Keeping an eye on you.’
Reuben suddenly remembered. The Audi A6 with the broken headlight. ‘Why?’
‘As soon as I read that Ian Gillick and Carl Everitt had been killed, I twigged. Something is going on here. Then I see you in the paper, the man in charge of finding the killer. I rang the police, but they weren’t interested. Told them this was all about drugs, about testing, about justice. Snotty little copper cut me off.’
‘So you tracked me down?’
‘Easy.’ Randle stroked the butt of the gun. ‘Knew you’d lead me to whoever was killing the people from the trial.’
Reuben hugged Joshua tight, scared he would drop him. He leaned against the cot, waiting, yearning for the sweet sound of sirens, still not sure about Randle.
‘But your son died. The men that Morgan killed were the ones responsible, the ones who instigated the trial.’
‘My son died. Yours might still be alive.’
‘I still don’t—’
‘Enough is enough. Like I said to Morgan before I shot him. I did a lot of thinking after the trial. Then the drug company finally made an offer a few months ago. Compensation. Eight grand for the life of a twenty-one-year-old boy. Eight grand. I turned it down flat. Fucking insult.’
‘So why did you come after me?’
‘I didn’t come after you. I was keeping an eye on you. A drug trial went wrong. But that’s what happens. I can see that now. I got my head around it. Accepted it. Told myself that Martin didn’t die in vain. He was a hero. Taking on an enemy he could never see. And then some sick fuck starts killing. Just as I’ve learned to forgive, someone begins to inflict more misery.’ Randle pulled the sleeve of his coat up. Reuben tried to focus on his arm, but couldn’t. A bluey green shield of some sort. ‘My old regiment had a motto. One in, all in. So I went out there to hunt the man who was defiling the life of my son, who was murdering in his name.’
Reuben saw another twitch in Joshua’s eyelid. An overdose of Pentobarbital. He slid down the bars of the cot, picked one of the packets off the floor, struggled to put it into his pocket. Something to show the medics.
‘What now?’ he asked Randle.
‘My mission is over. I phone the cops.’
‘So you just wait for them to turn up?’
‘I don’t really care any more. Now that sick fuck is out of the way.’
Reuben scanned the room, tried to see it like a copper would coming in for the first time. A dead doctor on the floor. An uninjured man with a gun, forensics all over the place. ‘But you’ll be charged
.’
‘Prison, whatever. It’s all the same to me. Different set of rules, different enemy.’
‘Pass me your gun,’ Reuben said.
‘What?’
‘Place it in my hand.’
‘Why?’
‘You said you shot Morgan.’
‘A couple of times, maybe, when he jumped me.’
‘Well, I shot him as well.’
‘So?’
‘There’s a big difference between you and me.’
‘What?’
Reuben picked up the faint prick of a siren. ‘I’m licensed to carry a firearm. I was being attacked. My son was in mortal danger.’
Randle hesitated.
‘Go on, get the fuck out. Wait a few weeks, then find me. We’ll talk about your son, sort out what everything means. But unless you want the next twenty years in jail, give me the gun and walk the fuck away.’
Slowly, reluctantly, Randle walked forward. He glanced at the blood on the walls, the dying man on the floor, the unconscious boy being held by his father. He stared long and hard into Reuben’s eyes. As he did so, he slid the pistol into Reuben’s jacket pocket. The noise of the siren was getting louder. Randle stared a second longer, taking it all in through his black irises. Then he turned and walked out.
Reuben counted to ten, propped himself upright, then stumbled out of the freezing shrine to Amanda Skeen, with its blood-coated walls and its floor spattered with ashes. He made it through the living room and through the open front door. Outside, there was a sudden scream of rubber on tarmac. A car screeching to a halt in the middle of the street. A silver Mondeo, two aerials, extended wing mirrors. Reuben spun round. Detective Veno was jumping out, the car still moving. He sprinted forward, tearing his pepper spray from its holder.
‘Put your child on the floor and step away from him!’ he shouted.