(2012) Say You're Sorry

by Michael Robotham

  Behind her, I notice a deserted bus stop and I remember Natasha and Piper. They were supposed to meet Emily that Sunday morning, but disappeared somewhere between Natasha’s house and Radley Station, a distance of half a mile, mostly along the edge of fields and on footpaths.

  I try to picture the scene again, but I can’t get a fix on the girls. I have been to their houses, I have learned about their personalities, but I cannot picture them making that journey.

  Almost in the same breath, I taste something different in my mouth.

  “They were never there,” I say out loud.

  “What?”

  “The girls were never there.”

  “Are you all right?”

  “No. There’s someone I need to see.”

  “It’s three in the morning.”

  “I know.”

  We walk quickly back to the car. Reversing and doing a U-turn, I head towards Abingdon, following the white lines, floating over humps. The hedgerows turn to tarnished silver in the headlights and the countryside rushes to meet us. Twenty minutes later we pull up outside the familiar pebble-creted house. There are three police cars parked on the street. The doors are open. Lights flashing. Two detectives escort Hayden McBain from the house. He is handcuffed and smiling, his teeth bleached white by the spotlights.

  Alice McBain is yelling at them. “Get your hands off my boy! He’s done nothing wrong!” Her eyes are smeared and splintery with tears.

  Drury steps in front of her. “Bag his clothes. Search the house.”

  Elsewhere in the street, porch lights have blinked on and curtains are twitching.

  DS Casey is standing at the open car door. He pushes at the top of Hayden’s head. The door closes. Locks.

  Crossing the lawn, emerging through a gap in the hedge, I feel as though I’m stepping onto a brightly lit stage. Mrs. McBain doesn’t recognize me at first. She tries to step around me.

  “Did you see the girls that morning?” I ask her. It sounds like an accusation.

  Alice flashes me a look and goes back to worrying about Hayden, who is being driven away.

  I try again. “You said you talked to Piper and Natasha on that Sunday morning. You knocked on Natasha’s door and told them to get out of bed.”

  “So what?”

  “Did you see them?”

  “Of course I did,” she says, less sure this time.

  “Did you open the bedroom door?”

  Alice frowns, trying to remember.

  “How do you know they were in the bedroom?”

  “I knocked. They answered.”

  “Who answered?”

  “I don’t remember,” she says, annoyed with herself.

  I can almost see her mind working, the nerves fizzing and popping under her skin.

  “What did you hear?” I ask.

  “They were playing music.”

  “Did Natasha have a radio alarm?”

  “Yes.”

  “What time did she set the alarm for?”

  “Seven-thirty.”

  “You knocked on the door at seven-forty, but you didn’t open it. What if you heard the radio and not the girls?”

  Alice squints at me, unsure if I’m trying to trap her. She wants to argue. She tries to think. She comes back empty.

  Drury is next to her. “What’s this about?”

  “It changes everything,” I say. “What if the girls weren’t at the house on Sunday morning? Alice didn’t see them. She heard the radio alarm.”

  “You’re saying they didn’t go home.”

  “They went missing the night before.”

  He pulls me close to him,

  his unshaven cheek brushing against my forehead.

  “You’re like an ice block. Let’s warm you up.”

  One hand takes hold of my hair like it’s a piece of rope and his other hand slides down to the bottom of my spine.

  “Mmmm,” he says. “You’re a lovely one for hugging.”

  He wraps a blanket around me and points me towards the open door. My bare feet make little slapping sounds on the floor as I walk. I know he’s a step behind me. I still haven’t looked at his face, his eyes.

  A bath has been drawn. Water steaming. Clothes set out.

  I taste copper in my mouth and wonder if I’ve bitten my tongue.

  “I’m hungry.”

  “This time you eat afterwards.”

  He’s humming to himself, fussing over the towels. I undress and slip beneath the water, leaning my head against the bath. I can feel his gaze drifting over me, dismantling my body as though dissecting it with a knife. Cutting me into little pieces.

  I am going to be nice to him. I am going to moan and tell him how good he makes me feel. If I’m nice to him, he’ll let me see Tash. We’ll be together again and I’ll look after her. If I’m nice to him, he’ll let his guard slip and I’ll find a way of getting out of here.

  He calls me his “poor defective monkey” as he washes me. I don’t feel his hands.

  After the bath I let him rape me. Is it even rape if I let him do it?

  He breaks my hymen. I bleed. I look at his face when he ejaculates and he doesn’t look human. It twists and grimaces and looks like a rubber mask.

  Afterwards, he lets me eat. Satay sticks of chicken and beef. This time I eat more slowly, sore between my legs. My cup of tea is on the table with a swollen brown bag submerged in it, growing cold.

  How calm he seems. How little difference it makes. He sits there, staring at me, sipping his tea as though nothing has happened.

  “Can I see Tash now?”

  “No.”

  “You told me I could see her.”

  “Not yet.”

  I feel like crying. “You lied to me.”

  “She needs a few more days.”

  “I did what you asked.”

  He laughs sarcastically and I stare at him with narrowed eyes. This is a mistake. I am aware of his temper, how easily he could injure me. The sensation creeps along my spine like a spider crawling on bare skin.

  Afterwards, he falls asleep next to me, chained to my ankle. I look at his white cheesy body asleep on its back and listen to the wet gurgling in his throat. His right arm hangs down over the side of the mattress and his left hand is touching my thigh.

  I do not sleep. I want to be awake. I want to put my hand over his mouth and nose until he stops breathing. I want to drive a knife into his heart. For the moment, I lie still next to him, listening to him gurgle, thinking how fear is different when it’s real. I used to love those fairground rides that take you higher and drop you faster, but that was a fear that came wrapped in pleasure. This sort of fear has no upside or happy ending.

  He’s awake now. Stretching. I force myself to snuggle up against him. His breath smells like sour milk.

  He strokes my cheek. “You missed me?”

  “You were away so long… I got frightened.”

  This pleases him.

  “Can’t I come with you? I won’t try to run away.”

  “That’s not possible, my little monkey.”

  I ask about Tash. Is she close? When can I see her?

  His mood suddenly changes. It’s like flicking a switch. He slaps my face, knocking my head against the wall. He raises his hand again, showing me his palm, challenging me, daring me.

  “Forget about her.”

  “I’m lonely.”

  “I’ll find you another friend.”

  “What?”

  “Someone to keep you company, eh?”

  My mind suddenly stops. Is he suggesting what I think?

  “No… who?”

  “I can find someone.”

  “No! No! Please don’t!”

  He takes a photograph from his wallet. “How about if I bring her?”

  My throat closes. It’s a picture of Emily. I have seen it before. We were mucking around in a photo booth at Oxford Station, pulling funny faces.

  “She’s your friend?”

 
“No!”

  “You wrote a letter to her.”

  “I don’t want a friend.”

  Even as the words come out of my mouth, I know a part of me isn’t convinced. I want someone to talk to. I don’t want to be alone. I push the thoughts away. Horrified. Hating myself.

  “I just want to see Tash. Nobody else,” I say.

  “That’s not possible. She’s still being punished.”

  He takes me back to the trapdoor and kisses me. Then he lowers me down until my feet touch the ladder.

  “If you want a friend, I promise I will get you one.”

  “No. Please let Tash come back.”

  The trapdoor is closing.

  “That I can’t promise.”

  31

  It’s been sixteen hours since the fire. I slept through most of them, waking to more snow, which has bleached the pavements and parks, dipping the world in white. The newspapers are full of headlines about mob justice and public lynching.

  Ironically, for perhaps the first time in his life, Augie Shaw has become a sympathetic figure, a victim not a villain. The police are to blame according to the Guardian. They took too long to react. The Daily Mail says Augie Shaw should never have been granted bail; the judge was clearly out of touch or deranged.

  Putting aside the newspapers, I arrange a dozen photographs around the hotel room, propping them on chairs and the TV cabinet. I take a seat in the middle of the room, directly in front of an image of Natasha and Piper sitting side by side in a class photograph, light and dark, blonde and brunette, salt and pepper.

  Radiating an odd mixture of vulnerability and sensuality, Natasha has a classical beauty. Piper, by comparison, looks almost boyish and angular.

  I am beginning to understand this crime. The details have been floating just out of reach, but are now falling into place. The person responsible is no longer a figment. No longer a mystery. No longer a part of my imagining. I can see the world through his eyes; hear what he hears.

  He’s a collector. He enjoys owning things, rare objects, valuable artifacts, things he’s been denied in the past. Some collectors fall in love with great works of art. A few arrange to have them stolen to order, knowing they can never hope to resell such a famous artwork or put it on public display. That doesn’t matter. It is about possession not largesse; owning something unattainable and bathing in the brightness of its perfection.

  He’s an aesthete, who craves control and order in a disordered world. A man of strong discipline, trained to reason and compute, yet he has no moral base. He doesn’t believe he is bound by the same rules as other people but is willing to abide by the law because it helps him conceal his desires. Others wouldn’t understand what it feels like to “own” something, to have complete control over another human being—life, death, light, darkness, warmth, cold and sustenance.

  What causes this yearning? Where does it begin? A powerless childhood, a chaotic past, impossible expectations; it could be any number of things, but along the way he developed a sense of entitlement or an anger at being denied his right.

  Closing my eyes, I try to picture him, not his face, but his mind. There you are! I see you now! You’re a clever thief, bold as brass; you snatched two teenage girls who had known each other since infanthood—same hospital, same primary school, same classes. You planned this in advance, first in your fantasies, then adding elements from the real world.

  But why choose these girls? Surely a prostitute would have suited your purposes. Easier to acquire, more anonymous than most, prostitutes are always disappearing but they rarely earn headlines or have a nation on alert. Missing schoolgirls aren’t forgotten. They’re cherished and prayed for and expected home.

  You chose Piper and Natasha because they meant something to you, or represented someone. Possession and ownership, that’s how it began, but later the motive changed. Perhaps the luster wore off. You grew bored, or the girls weren’t as compliant as you wished. The reality was never going to match up to your fantasies.

  That’s when you discovered another form of control. Punishment. Inflicting pain. Look what you did to Tash. What more intimate example is there of punishing a woman than to deny her something that makes her a woman? You removed her clitoris. You denied her sexual gratification. She might still be a sex object, but would never enjoy sex in the same way.

  You expected to be horrified… to feel guilt or remorse, but it didn’t happen. Instead, it was the purest of joys because you had never known anything so intimate or invasive or final. It was the most inspiring and fulfilling moment of your life.

  Now you’ve lost one of your possessions. Tash managed to escape and almost get home. She would have unmasked you and destroyed your elaborate secret life.

  You’ll be chastened. You’ll go to ground for a while. If Piper is still alive she is alone, more vulnerable than ever. The closer we get to you, the greater danger she’ll face. You’ll protect yourself by removing all trace of her.

  Taking a notebook, I begin jotting down bullet points.

  Mid-thirties to late fifties.

  Above average intelligence.

  He will live alone or with an ageing relative or a subservient wife—some form of domestic arrangement where nobody will question his movements or unexplained absences.

  Tertiary qualifications or training that requires discipline and accuracy.

  Knowledge of the area. (The girls disappeared quickly.)

  Knowledge of the victims. (He chose them for a reason.)

  He doesn’t see himself as a monster. He deserves this. This is his reward.

  In the beginning he focused on interaction with the girls, but he has become a sadist.

  He craves order in a disordered world, but is constantly being disappointed because nothing and nobody matches up to his high expectations.

  He is forensically aware. Careful. Practiced.

  The cab drops me at Abingdon Police Station. DCI Drury is in the CCTV control room. He hasn’t been home. Rings of perspiration stain his armpits and his body odor follows him like a noxious cloud. Hayden McBain and his uncle are being held in separate cells. Left to sweat or to cool off.

  The control room has six TV screens and a console that looks like something from an episode of Star Trek. Attention is focused on one screen: forty-four seconds of grainy black and white footage showing a man siphoning petrol from a parked car. He’s wearing a hooded sweatshirt and a baseball cap.

  The spiky-haired operator adjusts the controls. “The camera is only four blocks away from the house.”

  “I can’t see his face,” says Drury.

  “There aren’t enough pixels. Pull it up any further, you lose quality.”

  “Can you try?”

  The operator adjusts the brightness and contrast.

  Drury turns to me. “Is that Hayden McBain?”

  “Could be anyone.”

  “Christ, what a mess!”

  Drury’s team has gathered upstairs for a briefing. Sleep-stung, nursing cups of takeaway coffee, many of them I now recognize, although I don’t know their names. A female DS introduces herself. Karen Middleton. She has wide-apart eyes and too much make-up.

  Grievous is cleaning the whiteboard and making sure the marker pens have matching lids. He has taken a shine to Ruiz and the two of them have matching extra-large cups of coffee.

  Ruiz raises his cup to Drury. “Morning, Columbo.”

  “You’re not as funny as you look.”

  Ruiz grins. “Day’s still early. Wait till the caffeine kicks in. I’m a certified barrel of laughs.”

  Drury enters the circle of detectives, shrugging off his jacket and rolling up his sleeves. The symbolism isn’t missed or necessary. Around him, detectives are perched on the edge of desks and sitting backwards on chairs.

  “You all know what happened last night,” says Drury. “We now have another death to investigate.”

  “You must be joking,” mutters one of the sergeants.

  The DCI tu
rns his head slowly. “You see me laughing, DS?”

  “No, boss.”

  “A man was killed last night. A crime was committed.”

  “Yes, boss.”

  “That crime has to be investigated. If you don’t want to do your job, you can fuck off now.”

  “Yes, boss.”

  The briefing continues with Drury breaking the task force into teams. A dozen detectives will investigate the riot and the fire. The rest are to review the original investigation into the Bingham Girls, based on a new timeline.

  “We now believe the girls may have disappeared on Saturday night instead of Sunday morning. That means rechecking alibis, interviewing suspects and studying photographs for the Bingham Summer Festival.

  “I want the new time frame run through the computer database. Let’s see what HOLMES2 comes up with. Where did they go on Saturday night? Who did they talk to? Who saw them?”

  Chief Constable Fryer appears in the incident room, wearing his full dress uniform, peeling off leather gloves, a big man, full of confidence, on a mission.

  Detectives find their feet. Fryer only has eyes for Drury.

  “Your office. Now!”

  The chief constable notices Ruiz and pauses. “Vincent?”

  “Thomas.”

  “You’ve grown fat.”

  “No fatter than you.”

  The two men stare at each other.

  “We should have a beer,” says Fryer, turning and striding towards Drury’s office. He slams the door with such force it bounces open again, allowing everyone to hear his contained fury.

  “What in fuck’s name were you thinking arresting Hayden McBain? Have you heard the radio? They’re crucifying us. They’re saying we arrested the grieving brother of a murder victim—a teenage girl we took three years to find. Do you see how it looks?”

  The DCI tries to hold his ground. “With all due respect, sir, we can’t let a mob rule the streets. Augie Shaw is dead. Someone threw a petrol bomb through his front window.”

  “Someone? You don’t know who?”

  “McBain and his uncle incited the riot. We have witnesses. He doesn’t have the right to take the law into his own hands.”