Follow Me: A chilling, thrilling, addictive crime novel

by Angela Clarke

  She looked up as Tibbsy walked into the room, white shirtsleeves rolled up, pink tie flung back over his shoulder from his pace, the door reverberating off the wall behind him. The photographs on the incident board quivering. His face set in a scowl, his eye bags jiggling: ‘She’s out.’ He turned a grey plastic chair round to face Freddie and slammed his body onto it.

  ‘What?’ Freddie said. There must be some mistake.

  ‘Paige. She lawyered up. Real nasty ones. Alibied-out for the murders. She was in Rio for Sophie’s: hundreds of people saw her in a string bikini on the catwalk. They had her out of here within an hour.’ Tibbsy folded his arms across his chest and kicked his legs out. Beaten.

  ‘What about the drugs?’ This couldn’t be right. Freddie would bet anything Paige’s agent, Magda, was behind it.

  ‘Claims they’re not hers,’ snorted Tibbsy, his wiry arms conducting his frustration. ‘Refused a drugs test.’

  ‘What?’ Freddie couldn’t believe this.

  ‘She’s a minor. We can’t test her unless we charge her. And thanks to her lawyers we can’t do that. Without a test, we’ve no proof of drug use,’ Tibbsy spat.

  ‘You found her with enough coke to revive Amy Winehouse! What about Folland and the other cop? They saw it!’ Freddie heard her voice getting high. What if Paige was Apollyon? Then he…she…was back out there.

  ‘That performance she gave to the press has damaged our ground. Her lawyers are pressing for charges against Folland for assault.’

  ‘What? Can they do that?’ What if it was her? What if…? This couldn’t be happening.

  ‘Oh they have! Claiming it’s a vendetta. That he deliberately threw her to the ground.’ Tibbsy rocked forward and slammed his fist on the table. ‘The idiot. We should have gone and brought her in. With them pushing for charges, we can’t progress with the drugs case: it’s become her word against ours. Her team are saying we planted the drugs.’

  ‘Jesus.’ This was bad, thought Freddie.

  ‘Hamlin and now Klinger – we’ve lost both. This case just won’t cut us a break.’ Tibbsy dropped his head into his hands. His dark hair a curtain to the truth.

  ‘Where’s Nas and Moast?’ Freddie asked. Tibbsy losing it like this did not fill her with hope.

  ‘They’re going at Noel Richards, the guy at the arrest who jumped on PC Folland to save Paige. Turns out he’s got form for stalking and harassment. Remember Josie and Rosie?’ Tibbsy pushed his hands against his knees to straighten up, his voice calmer.

  Freddie remembered some godawful pop duo when she’d been at school. Videos and songs liberally sprinkled with artificial sweets. ‘The pop singers?’

  ‘Yeah, seems he was a bit obsessed with Rosie. Broke into her house and cut himself so he left a heart shape from his own blood in her mother’s room.’

  ‘Holy crap. Why her mother’s room?’

  ‘Thought it was hers,’ said Tibbsy. ‘He has several restraining orders out on him.’

  ‘Great, so he’s creepy and stupid.’ Is that what it took to be a serial killer? It was pretty messed up to break into someone’s house and cut yourself.

  ‘The guy’s clearly unhinged,’ said Tibbsy.

  ‘Could he have done it – the murders – out of some crazy loyalty to Paige?’ Freddie asked. Could he be Apollyon?

  ‘No history of actual violence – apart from against himself. But he doesn’t have an alibi for any of the three murders. He can’t tell us where he was on those days at all. We’re tracing his cards. His Oyster card. Seeing if anything shows. We’ll hold him till then,’ said Tibbsy.

  ‘What about his phone – if he is Apollyon, the account might be on that,’ said Freddie.

  ‘It was smashed during the arrest – the tech boys are piecing it back together now. But it doesn’t look like it’s encrypted or blocked,’ said Tibbsy. ‘We’re applying for a warrant to search his digs for a computer.’ Tibbsy’s shoulders slumped.

  ‘It’s okay,’ Freddie heard herself say. She reached out and squeezed his arm. ‘We’ll get through this.’

  They both looked up as the door to the incident room opened again. Nas stalked in. A look of thunder on her face. Moast appeared, a step behind, scowling. Freddie still had her hand held out. She felt like an hourglass, like her very self was sinking down and collapsing through a hole into her feet. Now what?

  Tibbsy jumped up. ‘What’s happened?’

  Nas, her eyes stony, her voice flat, stopped. Exhaled. Her shoulders mirroring Tibbsy’s minutes before. ‘Richards has been released.’

  Chapter 38

  WTF – What The Fuck?

  21:29

  Tuesday 10 November

  3 FOLLOWING 127,392 FOLLOWERS

  Freddie watched as Tibbsy grew more animated. ‘What? Why? How?’ he said.

  ‘Klinger’s fancy-pants lawyer just came down here and tied us in legal knots,’ Moast said. ‘Seems Richards has a history of mental illness, we violated some EU human rights directive in bringing him in without a guardian.’

  ‘What? Paige’s lawyer?’ Freddie was trying to piece this together.

  ‘She’s just released a statement to the press praising Richards for his loyalty and love,’ Nas said. ‘She’s paid his legal fees.’ They stood, the four of them facing each other in the middle of the room. Freddie looked from Moast to Nas to Tibbsy and back again. ‘Can she do that?’

  ‘She can and she did,’ said Nas. ‘We can’t hold him till we get more. We need to turn something up.’

  ‘Did she actually say loyalty and love?’ Freddie’s head was spinning. ‘That’s like something off a TV show: like a Queen to a subject.’

  ‘Yup, and all to the press,’ said Nas, dropping down to sit on the edge of the nearest table. Tibbsy looked stunned.

  ‘It’s weird. That she’s doing this?’ Freddie was talking with her hands. Each disbelieving word accompanied by a pitch and swoop. ‘Almost like she doesn’t want him here in case he says something?’ She thought of Paige’s performance on the YouTube video. She was believable. Very believable. How many people could be won over by somebody like that? Was this all orchestrated by her? Money and fame making her invincible. Twisting her self-value to make her void of morals? Building a literal army of fans. It’d make a hell of a story.

  Moast seemed to recover all of a sudden. ‘Right. I want everything we’ve got on Richards. I want to speak to everyone who knows him. We need to pin down where he was on those three dates. If he was so much as in the same postcode as any of these victims, I want him back in.’

  ‘Guv,’ Tibbsy practically whispered. Nas had her phone out and was looking at it. Freddie was full of nervous energy, she was walking up and down on the same one-metre spot.

  The door opened and they all turned at once to face a frightened-looking Jamie.

  ‘What is it, Thomas?’ Moast snapped. Freddie tried to smile reassuringly at Jamie. It wasn’t his fault this was happening.

  ‘Sorry, sir, I just, it’s just…’ Jamie trailed off. Looked at his big feet.

  ‘Spit it out, man!’ Moast said.

  ‘There’s been another post,’ Jamie said to the carpet tiles.

  ‘What?’ Freddie’s phone hadn’t buzzed. ‘On Twitter?’

  Jamie looked up, his thin lips stretched into an almost straight line. ‘On Facebook. Sergeant Patel in IT just called me.’

  Freddie sat down on the table next to Nas. Branching out. New forums. Spreading the brand.

  ‘It’s definitely from Apollyon – they’re sure?’ Moast said. He had his back to Freddie but she saw his hands clench into fists.

  ‘It’s a video, sir.’ Jamie’s eyes swam.

  ‘Of what?’ Moast’s words shuddered through Freddie. She felt Nas tense.

  ‘It’s a video of Michael Grape’s murder.’ Jamie’s voice cut through the silence. Red ribbons.

  ‘Oh my God,’ Freddie whispered.

  ‘Richards is out there. He could have done this,’ Tibbsy said.
<
br />   ‘It could be preloaded,’ said Freddie. It was spreading. An epidemic. A virus. They couldn’t control it.

  ‘Why’s he changed platform?’ asked Nas.

  ‘Or Hamlin,’ said Moast. ‘He could have done this too. Don’t suppose Patel has got a trace on the account holder has he, Thomas?’

  ‘No, sir, it’s been rerouted, or whatever they call it, again,’ said Jamie.

  ‘Fucking hell!’ Moast screwed up the papers in his hand and threw them at the wall. Freddie winced.

  ‘Get someone from the Gremlin IT task force down here. I want the video up. I want them to run sound analysis, whatever. Look in every glass surface. Every windowpane. For a reflection. I want something, anything, that can identify who this murderer is,’ Moast shouted.

  Jamie bolted out of the door. Tibbsy and Nas followed. Freddie was shaking. Moast put his hands on the back of a chair, leaning into them, flexing his fingers and gripping. Flexing and gripping. ‘We’re not going to catch him are we?’ Freddie said quietly.

  Moast exhaled. ‘First thing they teach you in training, Venton: never make promises you can’t keep,’ he said.

  Sergeant Patel introduced a sour-faced woman in her thirties, with straight bobbed black hair, wearing a black wrap dress and black tights. ‘This is Caroline Arnold, from Digital Forensics.’

  ‘Caroline, I’m DCI Edwin Moast.’ Moast held out his hand to shake before indicating each person in turn. ‘This is Sergeant Kevin Tibbsy and Sergeant Nasreen Cudmore from my team. And this is Freddie Venton, she’s acting as a Social Media Adviser on this case.’

  Caroline looked at Freddie. ‘You’re the one who’s been translating Twitter,’ she said, like it was an accusation.

  ‘I didn’t ask to be dragged into all this,’ Freddie said. ‘I’d much rather leave it to you lot, believe me.’

  Caroline Arnold’s nose crinkled.

  Moast shot Freddie a warning look. ‘Excuse Miss Venton, it’s been a trying case.’

  ‘I can see that,’ said Caroline. ‘Shall we get on with this?’ She turned to the desk on which Sergeant Patel had opened a laptop. ‘This footage was loaded approximately one hour and thirty-seven minutes ago.’

  Approximately? Freddie could just imagine Caroline Arnold ordering all her black outfits into approximate tonal order.

  ‘The name of the group flagged on the search algorithm we utilise.’ Caroline’s fingers flew over the keys as screens of code scrolled down.

  Moast looked like he was concentrating so hard Freddie worried he might have a stroke.

  ‘The source of the account has been rerouted and sent via Tor,’ said Caroline.

  Nas leant forward to look at the screen. ‘The anonymity software? Like he used to block us tracing the Twitter account.’

  ‘Precisely,’ said Caroline. ‘Originally launched as a tool to evade censorship, Tor has mutated and allows anyone to hide from whoever they like online.’

  I said this on the first day, thought Freddie.

  ‘So we still can’t find who bloody uploaded this?’ asked Moast.

  ‘No,’ said Caroline. ‘Whoever has set up these accounts, both Twitter and Facebook, knows what they are doing. We’ve tried almost everything we can. We’re unable to trace them.’

  Try harder, thought Freddie. This is life or death.

  ‘I’ve extracted the video to see if we can find any other digital footprints on it, and I understand you want copies to test for sound or caught images?’ Caroline continued.

  ‘Yes,’ said Moast.

  ‘Okay. Well here it is. I warn you, it is not easy viewing.’ Caroline clicked a key and the screen was filled with a video.

  Freddie gripped the back of the chair in front of her. They watched in silence. The footage was shaky. Soundless. A handheld device. Probably an iPhone. The doctor was tied to a chair in his lounge. The background was dark but you could make out a smashed jug on the floor. The camera came closer and closer. He was gagged, hands tied behind his back, his hair was matted with blood. His eyes grew wide. Panicked. He began to squirm violently. A knife appeared, held in a black-gloved hand. The doctor’s attempts to free himself grew more desperate. As the hand came down and the knife flashed, Freddie instinctively closed her eyes.

  ‘It’s all there: two minutes and thirteen seconds of a man tortured to death,’ said Caroline Arnold.

  Freddie felt sick, she kept her eyes away from the screen. The final shot, a bloodied Michael Grape: frozen. Her insides foamed.

  ‘I reported the video to Facebook immediately,’ said Caroline. ‘Unfortunately they have decided not to take it down.’

  ‘What – how can they do that?’ Nas looked incredulous.

  ‘They sent a standardised reply stating it was not in violation of their community standards,’ Caroline said.

  Freddie’s body shook. Silent, mirthless laughter.

  ‘What the hell does it take to fall foul of their community standards?’ Tibbsy said.

  ‘Nipples,’ Freddie gasped as the word came out, shaking like salt over chips.

  ‘What?’ Nas turned to look at her. ‘Are you all right, Freddie?’

  She was sick with laughter now. Hysteria rupturing her. It was absurd. There was a madman making snuff videos and circulating them online, and there was nothing they could do. ‘Nipples. The American conservative equivalent of the Anti-christ.’ Moast was looking at her strangely. ‘Breastfeeding, mastectomy scars, they’ll all get you suspended.’

  ‘She’s right,’ Caroline Arnold added without turning around.

  That was it: a stupid patronising woman in black was the last straw. Freddie burst out laughing. Halfway through the second peal something snapped and it turned into a sob. Poor Michael Grape. Poor beautiful Sophie.

  ‘I thought Facebook was photos of kids and Candy Crush,’ Moast was saying.

  ‘Freddie, try to breathe slower.’ Nas had a hand on her shoulder.

  Freddie watched as a tear plummeted onto the carpet tiles. Rage erupted up through her. ‘Don’t you see? He’s turned us all into an audience. This’ll spread like wildfire.’

  ‘Take a breath, Venters.’ Tibbsy reached out to touch her.

  She swatted him away. ‘He’s already got 16,000 Facebook followers,’ she screamed. ‘And there’s nothing we can do.’ It hurt. As if someone had reached inside her and squeezed. Ripped part of her out. Thrown it away. Freddie had only felt like this once before: when Gemma had tried to kill herself and Nasreen Cudmore disappeared from her life. A broken heart.

  ‘You need to calm down, Freddie.’ Nas was in front of her.

  ‘Get away!’ Freddie pushed past her. Past Moast. Out. She had to get out. Red ribbons. Red ribbons all over the Internet. There were faces. People. A voice. Jamie’s? She kept going. Slamming into the fire escape bar released her into the car park; she felt the cold air wrap round and cup her, pain pouring out. She had her phone. Was typing. Blinking. The words blurry:

  Freddie Venton @ReadyFreddieGo • 1s

  @Apollyon you freaking sick fucktard. This is going to stop. I’m going to stop you.

  This was bullshit. Bullshit. Bubbles were coming out of her nose. She wiped at her face. Anger subsided. Bigger gaps between the aftershocks. Her vision cleared. Her breathing slowed. The icy air was making her shake. Her mother always said she had to work harder to control her temper. She swallowed the remnants of tears and snot, as what she’d done settled into her stomach. It was okay, she told herself. It was okay. Other people had tweeted @Apollyon. But she knew this was different. She was the girl on the front of the newspapers. She was the hashtag ho. She closed her eyes.

  Her mobile vibrated in her hand.

  Apollyon had replied.

  Chapter 39

  DIY – Do It Yourself

  21:34

  Tuesday 10 November

  3 FOLLOWING 127,402 FOLLOWERS

  Freddie read the words over and over.

  Apollyon @Apollyon • 1s

  @ReadyFredd
ieGo and what are you with your red fucking fake hair going to do about it?

  Over and over. She had to get help. She managed to open the station door. Head down, walking. Reading her phone. Over and over. Wishing it was a mistake. Wishing she’d misread it.

  ‘Hey! Watch where you’re going!’ a policewoman snapped at her.

  Freddie veered out the way, catching site of a uniform and blonde hair. ‘Sorry.’ Had to get to the incident room. Had to get help. Over and over. The door was open. Caroline Arnold was gone. The room was empty apart from Nas, who looked up from the laptop Caroline Arnold had left behind.

  ‘Freddie, are you all right? Tibbsy went to look for you.’

  ‘I…I…’

  ‘Can I just say, I’m sorry that you had to see that. I think we should have pre-screened it. It was…awful.’ Nas was straightening folders around the laptop.

  Over and over. ‘I…I…’

  ‘You should probably go home for tonight. Have some sweet tea and take a rest.’ Nas was pulling Freddie’s coat from the chair at the back of the room. Scooping her bag out from under the desk with her foot. ‘I’ll square it with the DCI. He was worried about you. I’m sure of it.’

  ‘He tweeted me,’ she forced the words out.

  ‘What?’ Nas stopped. ‘The DCI?’

  ‘No. Apollyon.’ Freddie held the phone up with her shaking hand.

  The colour drained from Nas’s cheeks. ‘Let me see?’ She left Freddie’s bag and coat on a table and took the phone from her outstretched hand, tapping the screen. ‘Oh my God, Freddie, what have you done?’

  ‘I…I…was angry,’ Freddie said.

  ‘Jesus, Freddie!’ Nas sounded uncharacte‌ristically frightened.

  ‘I didn’t mean it. I didn’t mean for this to happen.’ Please don’t look worried. Please tell me it’s going to be okay.