Corpse Road

by David J Gatward

  Harry placed the photos back in their bag and down on the table and moved on to what else was in front of him. The largest object caught his attention first and he pulled it towards him. The label simply described the contents as a tent, but it was so much more, wasn’t it? Harry thought. It was Kirsty’s last-ever home, a place she had escaped to perhaps in the hope of discovering a little bit of herself which had been crushed by her marriage. She’d eaten in it, slept in it, drunk wine in it, and then, eventually died just out of its reach. Not that it would have provided any protection.

  There was little need to remove the tent from its bag so Harry simply handled it, turning it over in front of him, which was when he noticed the darker stains on the fabric.

  ‘Stacy . . .’

  He muttered the name as though reading it for the first time as he had that awful night, seeing it written in blood on the tent. It was one of the things which were still niggling at him because it just didn’t fit with everything else. It wasn’t her name and yet there it had been, large and awful and almost proud, the letters smudged and running as their owner lay but a few metres away staring lifeless eyes into the endless heavens. So why was it there at all? And not just there, either, but carved into her forehead? Just what the hell did the name Stacy have to do with anything? Was it a deliberate red herring left by a killer with a sick sense of humour, or was it important? Was it saying more than he, at that moment, could discern?

  Harry returned the tent to the shelves then shuffled back over to what was left. He saw Kirsty’s rucksack and the clothing and other items she’d taken with her, including a novel and a little teddy bear which looked older than himself. The novel, he noticed, had a bookmark shoved in between the pages, and Harry thought how it was these little things that really brought the finality of death home. The unfinished book, the promised phone call that never comes, the meals uneaten. These were the pieces of life which death swept aside and the holes left behind by their absence echoed long and deep.

  Other things were there, too, from the stove Kirsty had used to cook her last meal, and the empty bottle of wine Harry was sure that she had enjoyed, to a folding toothbrush, a little first aid pouch, and a blue torch small enough to pop into a trouser pocket.

  Harry stared at the torch as though to do so would provide him with the answers as to what had happened. Then he picked it up and switched it on. The beam was faint as he shone it around the room, the weak circle of light gliding across the shelves, the remnants of Kirsty’s last moments like the reflection of the moon on water. He wondered at what point Kirsty had used it, whether she’d really thought that help would come. And there it was, so small a thing, so innocuous, and yet it carried with it an awful weight, because of the hope it had taken up on Kirsty’s behalf, and its failure, above all, to save her.

  The last two items Harry examined he already knew well. The plastic balls were the other thing that scratched at the back of his mind, refusing to let him rest. They had led them to the scrape they’d found near Kirsty’s camping spot, and had Harry thinking like a soldier again.

  Then, there was the purse. Harry took it out of its bag to shuffle through its contents. Not that there was much to be seen, just credit cards, a driving licence, some money, and some receipts, some of which were for the very items in front of him on the shelves. Harry took these out and read through them, imagining Kirsty buying her gear, how she must have felt, the excitement at what she was about to do. It read like a holiday shopping list, the tent and the stove and everything else all joining together with the promise of adventure which ultimately ended in tragedy.

  With a deep, sorrowful sigh, Harry placed the purse and the plastic balls back on the shelves with everything else. He had no idea how long he’d been in the room, no idea how the rest of the team were getting on, and was pretty sure that right then he’d learnt nothing from going through the evidence. And yet . . .

  Harry stared once again at the evidence and it seemed for a moment that something amongst it was screaming back at him, desperate to get his attention. But what the hell was it? he thought. He’d looked through everything and seen nothing new! Nothing! It was just a sad and depressing collection of a woman’s last moments, her dreams and God knew what else, all stuffed inside plastic bags and hidden away in the dark. So, what was there that he wasn’t seeing? What was it that he was missing?

  Harry, not one to give up, reached up to take out the evidence and have another look through when his phone rang.

  ‘Grimm . . .’ he answered.

  ‘Boss, it’s Jadyn,’ said the voice at the other end of the call. ‘You got a minute?’

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Daryl opened his eyes only to immediately snap them shut as the world in front of him swam and he jolted forward to throw up. Except that, as his body threw itself forward, vomit rushing up his throat hot and acrid, Daryl was brought up sharp, his body straining against an as yet unseen barrier. But it didn’t stop the vomit, though, as it rocketed out of him, burning his throat, the stench of it filling his nose, his eyes watering with the awful strain, and the taste of it filling his mouth.

  Daryl coughed, spat, roared, but his stomach wasn’t finished with him. Another heave took control of his body, and still pushed forward by the violence of the first tsunami of nausea, he strained again, veins popping, sweat beading, bile charging out of him to splatter over whatever was in front of him. Because right at that moment, he couldn’t see, not just because of the bleariness of his eyes, but because of the darkness he’d found himself in.

  At last, Daryl’s body sagged, the ferocious storm of sickness which had dragged him so fiercely from his slumber abating just enough for his head to clear, and for his mind to grasp exactly where he was, and why it was so very, very wrong.

  From what Daryl could tell in the gloom, which cloaked him as thick as any wool blanket, he was strapped into the seat of his own car by black tape. He was clipped into his seatbelt, the tape wrapped around his torso, trapping his arms to his sides and the whole of his body to the back of his seat. The tape itself was so tight that it was preventing him from taking a proper deep breath and sensing panic taking over again, Daryl closed his eyes and forced himself to calm down. Whatever was going on, whatever this was, it had to be some sick prank, a joke by one of Kirsty’s friends, he thought. Revenge for what had happened to her, no doubt, because who else could have killed her, but him? Idiots!

  ‘Whoever you are, you are in massively deep shit!’ Daryl said, his vomit-spattered lips gibbering as the dashboard of his car now came into focus. ‘And if you’re doing this because you think I killed Kirsty, as some kind of revenge? Then you couldn’t be more wrong! And when I get out of this, there’s nothing I won’t do to make sure you’re ruined, you hear me?’

  The only answer Daryl got was silence, close and heavy and suffocating, like it was somehow aware of him, and listening.

  ‘I’m serious!’ Daryl snarled. ‘I don’t care who you are, what you think, anything! You’ve had your fun, proved your point, now let me go! Please!’

  Still nothing. Not a word. But someone had to be out there, Daryl thought, because why else would he be tied up?

  ‘Did you drug me, is that it?’ Daryl asked. ‘And how did you find me? Not even the police knew where I was.’

  ‘Yes, but I did, Chad.’

  The voice was thin and quiet and so close to Daryl’s right ear that he squealed, the sound not far off that of a scared pig, he thought, wondering how such a noise could ever be from him.

  ‘Who are you? Where are you? Show yourself, you coward! Come on! Show yourself!’

  All Daryl heard then was laughter, small and over quickly and yet so sinister that a chill hooked into him and ripped clean away whatever heat and hope he had left.

  ‘Wait a minute,’ Daryl said, his mind focused now on what the voice had just said. ‘Chad? I’m not Chad! That’s not me! You’ve got the wrong person!’

  More laughter.

&n
bsp; ‘I’m not Chad, I’m Daryl!’ Daryl said, sniffing through his words, trying not to just lose it and become hysterical. ‘I’m not Chad! I’m not! I can prove it! And then you can just let me go, right? And . . . and I won’t tell anyone. I promise!’

  A thin rubber-covered finger pressed against Daryl’s lips shushing him.

  ‘I know all about you,’ the voice said. ‘I know about your life, about how everything was just given to you, how you don’t even realise how lucky you are! Just like all the others, all the Chads and Stacys. No thought to the rest of us, of what we have to endure because of you, taking it all, taking everything, like it’s your birthright! Well, it isn’t, and you know what, Chad? You’re going to help me show people exactly that!’

  Daryl’s mind was racing so quickly that he couldn’t hold onto a single thought, a single idea, that would help him make sense of what was happening.

  ‘I don’t understand,’ he muttered. ‘Chad? Stacy? You’re not making any sense! Who are these people you’re talking about? Who?’

  Then, from the very furthest, darkest corner of Daryl’s mind, something crept forward. A visit from the police. Two men, one young, neat and tidy, the other older and with some kind of horribly messed up face. Rude, too, Daryl remembered. They’d come to visit, to tell him about Kirsty’s unfortunate death, hadn’t they? But as they’d been leaving, the older uglier one had asked him another question, hadn’t he? Something about whether or not he knew a Stacy or something.

  Daryl’s mind put two and two together and came to a truly terrifying answer.

  ‘Oh, dear God . . .’

  ‘What is it, Chad?’

  ‘It’s you, isn’t it? You killed Kirsty! It was you!’

  ‘I was going to tell you anyway,’ the voice said, ‘but yes, it was me. You both had it coming. A Stacy and a Chad all wrapped up in their own perfect little world, a world I have destroyed.’

  Daryl was weeping now. Tears rushed from him as though trying to escape. ‘You’re not making any sense! What is this about? Why did you kill Kirsty? What do you want with me? Let me go! Please!’

  ‘I’m nice, you know?’ the voice said, as Daryl felt something cold splash over him. ‘Okay, so I haven’t got your pecs, your perfectly shaped head, and I’m not six foot, but why should any of that mean that I’m denied what you have?’

  ‘What? What does any of that mean? My head? What are you talking about?’

  A smell was now creeping up Daryl’s nose, rich and sweet and powerful enough to overcome the reek of puke.

  ‘You’re all the same,’ the voice said, and Daryl heard the anger sparking in it. ‘You can’t even see how lucky you are and how everything about you has denied people like me what is rightfully ours!’

  Daryl’s head was yanked back and tape wrapped around it, pinning it in place against the headrest.

  ‘Try not to struggle now,’ the voice said. ‘But this will hurt a little, I’m afraid.’

  Pain lanced through Daryl’s body as something cut deep into his forehead. He could hear the bone underneath his flesh being chipped and scratched as the blade cut deep, slicing and carving, carving and slicing. He opened his mouth to scream but no sound came out, the pain so bright, so vivid, that it took over his whole world, his whole being, until that’s all that he was.

  The cutting stopped.

  Daryl, aware then that his face was wet and warm with his own blood, yelled out in primal horror at what was being done to him.

  ‘What have you done to me?’ Daryl asked, his voice barely a whimper. Then, the smell was back to him again, cutting through the vomit, pushing through the sweet iron tang of his blood. ‘Petrol . . . You’ve covered me in petrol! Oh fuck! Oh God! Oh shit! What? Why! Why are you doing this? Please let me go! LET ME GO!’

  ‘Shush . . .’ the voice cooed.

  A light flashed.

  ‘What? Why are you taking a photo of me? What do you want?’

  Another flash.

  ‘Please, let me go,’ Daryl wept. ‘Please . . . please . . .’

  When the voice spoke again, it was as though it had been poisoned, the edges of it curled with thorns.

  ‘People like you are denying people like me the sex and the companionship which is as rightfully ours as it is yours!’

  The voice was a snarling thing, vicious and cruel.

  ‘Do you think it’s easy for us, seeing the likes of you, your wife, every day, strutting around, rubbing our faces in it? Do you?’

  ‘I don’t understand!’ Daryl cried. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about. Please don’t kill me! Please!’

  ‘I didn’t choose to be celibate, you know that, right? I mean, who does? Why would anyone? But I’ve no choice, because of you, Chad! Because of all the Chads and all the Stacys! All of them! Forcing us to be involuntary celibates! It has to stop! It has to stop now and I’m going to be the one to make sure it does! Because I am the ultimate gentleman, you hear? That’s me! The Ultimate Gentleman!’

  Daryl saw a light then, but it wasn’t a cold light, the steady beam of a torch or a lamp. No. It was a flickering thing of warmth and heat.

  ‘Please, God no . . .’

  ‘And you had the audacity to throw it away! Both of you! So wrapped up in your perfect Chad and Stacy world that you let it crumble! How dare you!’

  Daryl heard the insanity in the voice, knew he was without hope, but still cried to be spared.

  ‘Please . . . just let me go . . . Please . . .’

  ‘Goodbye Chad,’ the voice said. ‘Say hello to Stacy for me, won’t you?’

  Daryl saw the warm light flicker and soar and fall. It landed in his lap, innocent and small. Then his world burst into heat and pain, and the last thing he heard, as the flames embraced him, was the sound of his own scream ripping out through his throat as he was consumed by fire.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  The call from Jadyn had raised more questions than provided answers, and Harry, now back at his flat for the evening, was getting a headache.

  Firstly, this friend of Kirsty had informed Jadyn that there was no way Daryl would have known about his wife’s camping trip. So, to Harry’s mind, the only reason the man had turned up in Keld and left the message on her car was because of the tracking device. He didn’t know she was going camping, just that she had gone somewhere, and he was clearly a controlling headcase who didn’t like the idea of her doing stuff without his permission. That he had done a runner was still a problem, but Harry didn’t think it was enough to make the man the prime suspect. He was just a panicked idiot who needed to be found, nothing more. Not that Swift would be persuaded of that yet, Harry mused.

  Then there was what she had said about Kirsty getting the idea for the camping trip in the first place from Facebook. This had supported Liz’s line of enquiry and Harry was pleased that they weren’t just hanging around waiting for permission from the gods of social media. Which was why, right now, Harry was staring at his phone, baffled and terrified in equal measure, by something he’d never used in his life—Facebook.

  After the chat with Jadyn, Harry had shared the constable’s findings with Liz. She had then gone through what she’d found on Facebook and, to Harry’s delight, it had been rather easy for her to at least find the place where Kirsty had gotten the wild camping bug. Then, Jen had headed off down dale to deal with something else that had come up.

  ‘Continuing with your whole “become the prey” thing,’ Liz said, ‘This is a group on Facebook, which is, as we’ve discussed, how we think Kirsty got the idea in the first place to not just go camping, but to head to Swaledale.’

  ‘Hmm, yes,’ Harry nodded, not exactly sure what Liz was talking about.

  ‘Basically, what it is, right, is you can have groups about anything, okay?’ Liz said. ‘You just have a shared interest and there you go!’

  ‘And this group is all about wild camping?’

  ‘Yep,’ Liz replied.

  ‘And that’s different to norma
l camping how?’

  ‘It’s wild,’ Liz said. ‘You don’t camp on a site, with loos and showers and a bar. You head off into the wilds, simple as that.’

  ‘So, who set it up?’

  ‘The administrators,’ Liz explained. ‘Basically, if you’ve got a hobby or an interest or whatever, you can set up a group on Facebook, and then you get to share your interest with like-minded people, chat about it, share ideas, photos, stories, that kind of thing.’

  ‘Why?’ Harry asked, trying to get his head around the whole social media thing. ‘I mean, why not just meet people for real?’

  ‘It’s not that easy,’ Liz said. ‘And this allows you to meet more people than you would if, for example, you had a monthly meeting in the local village hall. And it’s cheaper, more convenient.’

  ‘Hmmm,’ Harry said, not really able to offer much else. ‘So, what have you found out?’

  Liz said, ‘Well, I’ve set up an account in another name, with a different email to my own, used some free images to give the impression that I’m real. Then, all I had to do was find Kirsty, which was easy to be honest, because her profile is still live. And from that, I then found the groups she had commented on, and, well, here we are. Look . . .’

  Liz had then shown Harry the wild camping Facebook group.

  ‘How do you know she was looking at this?’

  ‘Took a while,’ Liz replied. ‘Lots of scrolling through her posts, until I found one where she’d commented about camping, and then after a bit more digging, I was in! I had to join the group, but that was easy.’

  ‘So now what?’ Harry had asked.

  This was where Liz’s face had lost its excitement at what she’d discovered.

  ‘The group has over ten thousand members,’ she said, her shoulders sagging a little. ‘We can’t exactly get all of their phone numbers and call them.’