Reach (The Blake Harte Mysteries Book 4)

by Robert Innes

  “Yeah,” Blake replied, scratching the back of his head. “I don’t think I’m going to be around much tonight.”

  “Oh, okay.” Blake could tell he was disappointed. “Something come up?”

  “Yeah, you could say that,” said Blake. “I’ll ring you. I promise.”

  “No worries. I’ll speak to you later.” He kissed Blake and walked off down the road, a definite spring in his step.

  Blake sighed and he watched Harrison disappear around the corner. He was cursing himself for not telling his boyfriend about what had happened, especially now they were moving forwards. He knew all too well that for their relationship and his work to be compatible, Blake would have to be honest. But he had a thought that was going around his head, an unavoidable truth that Blake knew would worry Harrison, who could be quite an anxious person at the best of times due to events in his own life. But Blake knew that, for the moment, he was better off not knowing. Because for him to have any hope in working out how Kerry Nightingale was killed, Blake was going to have to pay another visit to Thomas Frost.

  Jamie was lying in bed staring up at the ceiling, his clothes from the night before in a crumpled pile on the floor. He thought that the walk home from Clayton Apartments had sobered him up somewhat, but the hangover he had thumping around his body suggested otherwise. He only had extremely vague recollections of what he had done the previous night.

  The one thought he remembered having before he had passed out was that the hope that the events of the night would be too blurred for him to remember properly, but the conversation he had had with Kerry was crystal clear and his fury had not diminished.

  He had disturbed himself last night with the thoughts of what he had wanted to do to her to make her feel even a small amount of the pain that he felt at this moment. How could she be so heartless as to abort his baby without even telling him, then run away to Spain? Right now, she would be on the plane, probably relieved that she had left him and all other problems behind.

  “Cowardly bitch!” he shouted, kicking out his foot into a pile of boxes at the end of his bed. They were full of old CDs and DVDs that he had been planning to sell, and as they crashed to the floor, his head throbbed wildly again.

  His mobile rang and for the fifth time that day it was Sonia. He had ignored her calls ever since they had woken him up earlier that morning and had been unable to fall asleep again. Like it had all the other times, the ringing stopped followed by a brief pause and another notification that she had left him a voicemail. Jamie had absolutely no intention of speaking to her today. Somebody could have died and she would not hold his attention today.

  His bedroom door opened and his housemate, Marcus, poked his head around the door. His tall and lanky frame, scruffily waxed hair, and boyish grin irritated Jamie more than it normally would this morning.

  “Alright lad? You trashing your room again?”

  “Yep. You never heard of knocking?”

  Marcus scoffed and stepped into the room. The smell of his aftershave wafted towards Jamie and it was not an odour that went well with his hangover. “You missed a good night last night mate. I had this bird ‘round. Gorgeous, she was. She even brought her mate, and she was proper fit. You’d have been in there, bro.” “

  “I’m not interested,” Jamie replied, turning on his side.

  “Ah, come on man,” Marcus said, prodding his back. “You’ve got to get over that Kerry lass. There’s nothing she’s got that tons of other women out there haven’t got. You wanna forget about her.”

  “That easy, is it?”

  “Course it is. You’ve just gotta move on. Accept that she’s not that into you anymore.”

  The words stung like nettles around Jamie’s mind. He sat up and stared at Marcus angrily. “Yeah. You’re right. And do you know how I know that?”

  Marcus looked nervously back at him. “How?”

  “She was pregnant.”

  Marcus’ eyes widened. “What?”

  “Pregnant. Emphasis on was. I went to see her last night and found a leaflet from the abortion clinic. She was pregnant with my baby and she got rid of it. That’s how I know how little she cared about me. She wasn’t even going to tell me. And right now she’s sunning herself in Spain, ‘cause she’s ran away.”

  Marcus’ stunned expression had not faltered. “Pregnant? Are you sure?”

  “She told me,” Jamie said, slightly more calmly. “I pretty much had to force it out of her.”

  Marcus stood up and paced around the room. “How far gone was she?”

  Before Jamie could reply, there was a loud knock at the front door. After a couple of seconds, the knock came again, louder this time and more frantic.

  “Who the hell is that?” Jamie groaned, sinking back into his bed again.

  “I’ll get it,” Marcus said before quickly leaving the room.

  Jamie closed his eyes and listened for the conversation at the door. Another surge of frustration flooded through him as he heard Sonia’s voice.

  “Is Jamie in?” she asked, sounding out of breath. “I really need to speak to him, it’s urgent.”

  “Erm, yeah,” he heard Marcus reply, much to his annoyance. “He’s in bed – Oi, but he’s asleep! Don’t just –”

  But before Marcus could finish, Sonia burst into Jamie’s room and was stared down at him, her eyes wide and fearful.

  Jamie glared at her. “What do you want?”

  “Go on then,” Sonia said, appearing to be trying to keep her voice steady. “How did you do it? I mean you’re clever, I’ll give you that.”

  “What?”

  “How did you get past us? It doesn’t make any sense. I mean, never mind that, but how could you do it Jamie?” She was sweating even more than usual and looked like she wanted to either burst into tears or launch herself at him. He sat up and shook his head. “What the hell are you on about?”

  Behind her, Marcus appeared in the doorway to watch proceedings.

  “She’s dead, Jamie,” Sonia snapped. “Dead. And you’re the only person who could have done it.”

  There was a deafening silence in the room. Jamie stared at her, unable to comprehend what she was saying. “What? Who’s dead? What are you talking about?”

  “You know who I’m –”

  “Kerry, Jamie! Kerry is dead. Murdered, and you are the only person that hated her that much!” Sonia shouted, tearing up and pointing her finger furiously at him.

  “Wait, hang on a minute,” Marcus interjected from behind her, putting a hand on her shoulder. “He was here all night, I heard him come in!”

  “What, at eight o’clock this morning?” Sonia snapped, pushing his hand away. “It was you, wasn’t it? Why did you do it, Jamie? All because of the baby?”

  Jamie was now sat up and staring at her open mouthed, unable to speak.

  “Mate?” Marcus murmured, looking at him with horror, before turning back to Sonia. “Look, it can’t have been him. I heard his music playing in his room when I got home, he’s been here all night!”

  “She’s dead?” Jamie repeated. He felt absolutely numb. “How can she be dead?”

  “Drop the innocent act,” Sonia snapped, turning on her heels. “The police will be wanting to speak to you. I’d get your story straight if I were you, because the guy leading the investigation is going to do everything he can to bring the killer to justice.”

  “Why?” Jamie asked, his voice faint. “What do they know?”

  “They’ve interviewed me, Jamie!” Kerry replied hotly. “‘Can you think of anybody who might want to harm Kerry Nightingale?’ ‘Oh, well there is the guy who was sleeping with her, whose baby she got rid of without telling him!’”

  Jamie glared at her furiously. “You told them that?”

  “How could I lie?” Sonia shouted back. “Kerry was the nicest woman in the world! There is nobody else who could want her dead! You said she was going to pay for what she did, and didn’t she just?”

  “I thin
k you better go,” Marcus said quickly as Jamie stood up, anger in his eyes.

  “Yeah,” Jamie said quietly, fury pumping through him. “I think that’s a good idea.”

  “Just know this,” Sonia said viciously as she turned to walk out of the room. “If you did do it, there’s no way you’re going to be able to wiggle your way out of it. I told you that the way you were acting was dangerous!”

  “Get out!” Jamie yelled. He picked up the nearest thing he could lay his hands on, and threw it across the room. As it left his grip, he realised it was a mug that his father had given him, the last gift he had ever received from him. It smashed against the closing door, with Marcus and Sonia on the other side.

  As the anger turned to grief at what he had been told, Jamie sank to his knees, picking up the pieces of the smashed mug and looking at them in his hands. In the past twenty-four hours, he had lost a child he never knew he was supposed to have with a woman who he realised he had fallen head over heels for, more than anyone he had ever met. Through the despair, Sonia’s words rang out. The police were looking for him, perhaps going to be here at any moment. He had been so drunk last night, and so angry, and he knew that in his state, some extremely dark thoughts had gone through his head. As he heard Marcus instructing Sonia to leave the house and the front door slamming behind her, Jamie realised that she could be right. After he had stormed out of the flat, after discovering the abortion leaflet, he had ended up drinking more, meaning everything was a blank. He sat down on the floor and sobbed into his knees, like a small child.

  Maybe he had done it.

  Blake’s eyes ached with tiredness as he watched his officers take their seats in the briefing room. Despite the fact that he had fallen asleep almost the second his head had hit the pillow, he had awoken feeling just as exhausted as he had when he had arrived home.

  “Okay, thank you,” he said loudly over the chatter. “Good evening, everybody. Let’s get started.” He glanced at the empty seat in front of him. Patil, who was in her usual seat in front of him followed his eye line and looked down at her notes uncomfortably.

  “Where’s Matti?” Blake asked her.

  Patil shrugged. “No idea.”

  Before Blake could question her further, the door was flung open and Mattison strolled in. He looked more irritated than Blake had ever seen him. It was unusual to see the normally happy and keen to please young officer not only out of sorts, but late.

  “Sorry, Sir,” mumbled Mattison. He threw a brief glance at Patil, but she did not return it.

  Pushing the question of what was going on between the two of them, Blake picked up his folder and addressed the room.

  “Right, I take it you’ve all been briefed on what’s happened?”

  “Yes,” drawled Gardiner from the back of the room. “You were standing guard over somebody and yet she still managed to get herself murdered.”

  Blake exhaled to stop himself biting his sergeant’s head off. “Thank you, Michael.” He pulled out the picture of Kerry’s body from the forensics folder and placed it on the board.

  “Kerry Nightingale,” he began. “Thirty-five years of age. She was found dead this morning at approximately eight AM.” He pointed to the wound in the centre of her neck, a pang of guilt hitting him as he did so. “Cause of death, as far as we can tell, was strangulation, with a thin piece of rope or wire. And, as Michael has so kindly pointed out, the murder was somehow committed right under my nose. As I’m sure you’re all aware, the door, which myself and one of the security team of the apartment were posted by, was the only way into the flat. Nobody could have gotten in or out with us seeing them. The only other thing that could have possibly been regarded as an escape route was the balcony, the door of which was locked. We found no murder weapon at the scene, or any fingerprints that would indicate that there was anybody else in the flat before we found the body. Everyone with me so far?”

  There was a murmuring around the room.

  “May we ask something at this point?” Gardiner interjected. “Just why you were standing guard outside this woman’s apartment?”

  Blake sighed. “Yes.” He pulled out the next photograph from the file and placed it on the board. His insides ran cold as the face on the photo glowered back at him. “Thomas Frost. Does the name ring a bell with anybody?”

  When there was no answer, Inspector Royale, who was standing in the doorway of his office, watching proceedings, cleared his throat. “Serial killer from a few years back. Went by the name of Jack Frost according to the media.”

  A slight mumbling of recognition rippled around the room.

  “DS Harte was the officer who arrested him,” Royale added.

  “Well, it wasn’t just me, but yes. Frost was the case that earned me my detective rank, as a matter of fact,” Blake said. He reached into the file and pulled out another set of photographs, placing them each on the board, one at a time. “Julie Carlisle, Donna Atkins, Leanne Egan, Grace Hodgekiss, and Suzanne Meyer. All victims of Frost.” The names were labelled underneath each photograph of the women but Blake did not need them. He remembered each name and each murder vividly.

  “I remember now,” Patil said quietly. “‘Frostbitten’ I think the papers went for after his arrest?”

  Blake rolled his eyes and nodded.

  “Commendable as it was for you to bring that nutcase to justice,” Gardiner asked, an air of derision in his voice, “What does any of that have to do with Kerry Nightingale?”

  “Believe it or not Michael, that’s an excellent question,” Blake told him. “When we arrested Thomas Frost, he was just about to claim Kerry as his sixth victim. We burst in to her house, where he had been waiting for her, just as he was about to kill her. He had her on the floor and was in the process of throttling her with a piece of rope.”

  “The same way she was killed last night?” Mattison clarified.

  Blake nodded. “And, last night’s death was a similar, if not identical MO to his other victims.” He indicated the lines around the previous victim’s necks on their pathology photographs and then to Kerry’s, before taking a deep breath. He was not sure how well what he was going to say next would be received. “A few days ago, I went to visit Thomas Frost in prison.”

  There was a brief silence before Gardiner piped up. “What on earth for?”

  “Because he asked to see me,” Blake replied, trying not to look Royale in the eye. “And, ever since his arrest, he’s never stopped talking about Kerry. But this time, he made a threat. He said she’d been dead by the end of the week, and here we are investigating her murder.”

  “Hang on a minute,” Gardiner said, closing his eyes in confusion. “You’re saying that this man is still locked up, under constant observation?”

  “Yes.”

  “With no way of getting out of his prison?”

  “Correct.”

  “So, in what possible capacity could he be responsible?”

  “That,” replied Blake, “is what we are going to find out tomorrow.”

  “You’re planning on going back to interview Frost?” Royale clarified from the doorway. “In the prison?”

  “I don’t see how I’ve got much choice, Sir,” Blake replied. “He might be locked up, but he still threatened a murder that ended up coming to pass. A murder he’s been promising for seven years. I’ve got to speak to him again.”

  Royale sighed. “I don’t like it, Blake. This man is dangerous. He’s surely just going to try and play games with you. What incentive has he got to help you? He’s already in prison, what more could be done to him?”

  Blake scratched the back of his head and nodded. “I know. But I’ve got to try. I know Frost, I know how his mind works. Trust me, Sir, if I can, I will get something out of him.”

  The next morning, Blake pulled up outside the prison and stared at the entrance gates. Royale’s doubts about just how helpful the interview was going to be had been bothering him ever since the meeting, despite the fact that he had
been mentally rehearsing his question as well as how he was going to ask them ever since.

  He glanced across to Mattison who was also looking at the gates with an air of trepidation. “Last chance, Matti,” he said. “I won’t think any less of you if you don’t want to do this. He’s a dangerous man.”

  Mattison turned to look at Blake resolutely. “I’m a police officer, Sir,” he replied. “It’s my job. Besides, if I’m being perfectly honest, I’m kind of curious. I’ve never met a serial killer before.”

  “He’s not a celebrity, Matti,” Blake said seriously. “This man strangled five women to death, and in some way is responsible for a sixth death. He’s evil. And he prays on weakness and vulnerability.”

  “I’m hardly vulnerable, Sir,” Mattison replied indignantly.

  “No, sorry, I mean, he’ll be able to sense your inexperience and he’s going to try and play with that. Unless you follow what I’ve told you to do.”

  “I promise you, Sir, I know exactly what you’ve told me.”

  “Tell me again,” Blake said.

  “I’m to be cold and unresponsive. Ideally don’t say anything to him at all. I’m there purely as an extra authority. Don’t humour him, don’t entertain him.”

  Blake sighed. Given the choice, he would never have considered an officer of Mattison’s experience anywhere near Frost, but he had been the only one available. “Okay,” he replied. “Let’s go in.

  Unlike the last time Blake and Frost had met, this time they were in a visiting room. When they walked in, Frost was sitting behind a large pane of glass, so that there was no way he could try anything with either Blake or Mattison.

  As before, a prison guard followed them into the room and locked the door. Blake watched Frost as they approached the glass and sat down opposite him. Frost’s eyes were immediately on Mattison, and Blake did not like it. Even without saying anything, Mattison was naturally young looking with his smooth face and lightly gelled hair.