by Robert Innes
“If you think she’s got eyes for anyone other than you, then you’re more of a dipstick then I thought,” Blake told him lightly as he turned the steering wheel in the direction of the train station. “Just talk to her. She’s got things she needs to say to you and you need to listen and be there for her.”
“Is it anything I’ve done? Is she alright?” Mattison said quickly, looking worried.
“No and yes, she’s fine,” Blake reassured him. “Just promise me, you’ll show her how much you love her.”
Mattison nodded. “I do, I just think that – there!”
Blake’s eyes shot to where Mattison was pointing. Across the road from the train station was Jamie Salford. He had a hood up and was clearly doing his best to look inconspicuous, but it was definitely him. He walked quickly down the street towards them, but had not yet seen them.
“Right,” Blake said, quickly unbuckling his seatbelt. “Let’s go.”
They got out of the car and began walking towards Jamie. The traffic was busy on the roads around them, giving Blake hope that if he did try and make a run for it, he was limited in where he could go.
Then, he looked up and spotted them. For a few moments, he did not move, clearly weighing up his options. But then, in the blink of an eye, Jamie turned on his feet and ran in the opposite direction.
There were two roads to cross between them and the traffic was heavy. As Blake and Mattison sprinted towards the fleeing Jamie, they held up their ID cards and shouted “Police!” in the hope that the drivers of the car would notice and allow them to cross.
All the time, Blake kept Jamie in his sights, but he was a lot faster than he looked. In front of him was another busy road, but the cars were slowing to stop at a traffic light. He danced between them, and hopped over a barrier, almost getting hit by a lorry as he ran into the path of oncoming traffic in the opposite lane.
All the while, Blake and Mattison were getting closer. But as Blake looked to where Jamie was headed, his heart sank. He was running straight towards the train station.
As they pursued him, Blake hurriedly called for backup into his radio, though he was unsure if there was any point if Jamie managed to get on a train.
They ran into the station forecourt, just as Jamie disappeared through the entrance.
“There’s a train on the platform ahead, Sir!” Mattison cried.
Clackton station was in the middle of the main line, meaning that fast trains often passed through it, and trains that did stop here quickly picked up speed once they were underway.
As they ran into the station, they saw Jamie glance over his shoulder and sprint towards the platform. There were people bustling everywhere, alighting from the train that had stopped and briefly Blake lost sight of him. But then, they saw him again as he vaulted over the ticket barrier. The security standing by shouted out to him and tried to stop him, but he was too quick for them.
Through the gaps in the crowd, they saw Jamie dive into the train, just as the doors were closing. Blake cursed loudly as they pushed their way through the crowd, holding their IDs up at the security team and yelling to be let through the gate.
Finally, they reached the platform, but the train was now moving.
“Stop the train!” Blake yelled, with Mattison in close pursuit.
The guard on the platform realised what was happening and ran after them along the platform, blowing his whistle frantically to try and attract the driver’s attention, but it was too late. At the end of the platform was a large fence. As the last carriage clattered past Blake, he reached the fence and kicked it.
But, as he turned to Mattison so they could find out where the train was going, and try and get it stopped at its next station, a blur ran past him.
“Matti!” shouted Blake.
Mattison could apparently not hear him. He had vaulted himself over the fence and was now sprinting as fast as he could alongside the track, to catch up to the train.
Panting wildly as his heart thumped in his chest, Jamie sank into his seat, trying to catch his breath. He could not believe how much trouble he was in, and the suspicious looks of his fellow passengers were not helping his paranoia either. He was trying to work out what his next move should be. Whatever the next stop was, he decided, he would get off there, try and avoid any police, and lie low until they hopefully forgot about him.
His knuckles were still throbbing from where he had punched Marcus, so he wrung his hands together to massage them and looked out the window. What he saw made him forget about the pain in his knuckles. Mattison running towards him, alongside the track, his legs almost a blur to keep up with the train.
The passengers started murmuring around him as they spotted the policeman, wondering what was going on. The train was starting to pick up speed, but Mattison just ran faster. For a moment, their eyes met. Jamie’s wide in horror, Mattison’s narrowed in fury and determination. He pulled out his ID card and held it up the air, screaming at the top of his lungs for the train to stop.
“Oh! It’s a policeman, Mildred!” an old man in the next seat to him said. “I think he wants us to stop.”
“Should I press the emergency button?” Mildred asked him, watching Mattison with interest.
“No!” Jamie yelled.
It was the worst thing he could have done.
“He’s after that guy,” another voice said. “Quick! Press the button.”
“I’m not getting a fine! You do it!”
“It’s only a fine if it’s not an emergency, quick!”
“Don’t!” yelled Jamie, but it was too late. The train jerked forward, the brakes screeching. Jamie put his head in his hands.
As the train finally ground to a halt, it did not take long for Mattison to attract the driver’s attention. The doors shuddered open. The passengers pointed Mattison in direction of Jamie’s seat. Mattison yanked him up and cuffed him. Jamie saw Blake pull himself up to the train, followed by a few other police officers.
“You are very under arrest,” Mattison said to him, but changed his tone when he saw Blake.
“Jamie Salford, I’m arresting you for the murders of Marcus Langton and Kerry Nightingale,” he said loudly, frogmarching him along the corridor of the train as the passengers clapped around him.
The interview room in Harmschapel police station was cold and draughty, and now he was sat here, alone, and now able to comprehend what lay ahead of him, Jamie was scared. He had been arrested for two murders, neither of which he knew whether he had committed or not. He could not see any way out of his current situation.
The door opened and Blake strolled in. Behind him, Mattison also appeared and sat down.
“I don’t want him in here,” Jamie snapped.
Blake glanced at Mattison. “Why not? Because he arrested you?”
“He was going to punch me in the bar the other night. His girlfriend had to hold him back. I don’t feel safe with him here.”
Blake raised an eyebrow. “There’s only one person in his room with knuckles that make you look like you’ve done a few rounds with Mike Tyson, Jamie.” He pressed the record button on the machine.
“Interview commencing at eleven thirty five AM. Present in the room are Detective Sergeant Blake Harte, Police Constable Billy Mattison, and Jamie Salford.” He paused and looked up at Jamie.
“You’re getting nothing out of me,” Jamie snapped, glaring at Mattison.
“I’d like to start with your housemate, Marcus,” Blake said, ignoring him. “How long had you lived with him?”
“No comment,” Jamie replied. He had seen this sort of procedure on enough television shows to know it was the only hope he had whilst he tried and thought of some sort of alibi for himself.
“Have you known him long?”
“No comment.”
“What happened to your knuckles, Jamie?”
“No comment.”
“Did you get in a fight?”
“No comment.”
“A fight be
cause you found out that Marcus had been seeing Kerry behind your back?”
Jamie glared at him, the fury from the revelation rearing its head again.
“No comment,” he said, through gritted teeth.
Blake rolled his eyes, an action that annoyed Jamie further. “See, the whole ‘no comment’ routine only really works when we don’t have any evidence, Jamie. And, unfortunately for you, we do. We know that Marcus was in a secret relationship with Kerry, we know that you confronted him, we know you battered the life out of him, and then whacked him in the back of the head with a vase for good measure, and we know that –”
Jamie’s head shot to him, frowning. “What?”
Blake stopped mid-sentence. “Sorry?”
“What are you on about? Whacked him round the head with a vase?”
Blake glanced at Mattison. “The vase that is in your house, of which we found fragments embedded in his skull, Jamie. The vase that you used to kill Marcus after you had finished giving him a beating.”
“I didn’t use a vase? All I did was beat him up. It’s true! Don’t pull that face at me,” he snapped, pointing at Mattison who had raised his eyebrows in disdain.
“Well, why don’t you tell us what did happen?” Blake suggested, holding his arms out.
Jamie sipped from the plastic cup of water on the table and shrugged. If he could convince them that he genuinely had no idea what they were talking about with the vase, maybe he could prove that he had had nothing to do with Kerry’s death either.
“Come on, Jamie,” Blake continued. “Two people you cared about are dead. If it wasn’t you that was responsible, don’t you want to help us find out who is?”
Jamie hesitated, then nodded. “Marcus wasn’t home when I got back last night, he was on one of his benders, probably out pulling some other bloke’s bird.”
He and Mattison exchanged looks.
“Go on,” Blake urged.
“So, I had all night to sit and think about it. All that did was make me angrier, cause I realised how many lies he must have told me. All the times he listened to me upset after she dumped me, and it was because of him the entire time!”
“Did he tell you that?”
Jamie nodded. “When he finally got back the next morning, I confronted him about it. Not gonna lie, I was really mad. He started giving me all this crap about how I was too intense for her, she just wanted a fling before she went to Spain, and how he was so perfect for her. Then I asked him about the baby, and he didn’t even have the nerve to look me in the eye. He just looked down at the floor and mumbled about how sorry he was.” He looked up at the ceiling, remembering the emotions he had been feeling at the time and shrugged. “Then I just lost it.
“Sonia came round then, panicking about what I was gonna do to Marcus, but obviously I’d already done it. He was in a pretty big mess by the time she got there. I’d just seen red and let my fists do the talking. I’ve been trying to get a control over my anger, but nothing seems to be working.” He looked up at Blake, hoping that what he was saying would act as some form of defence. “I’ve not had what most people have had. Y’know, a loving upbringing, people to comfort me. I had Kerry, and I had Marcus. But even they stabbed me in the back. I loved that woman. I’d have done anything for her. But she just didn’t care. Anything she wanted, I’d have done it for her. Even going to some of her really boring restaurants, ‘cause she couldn’t go in any of the bars because of the lights.”
Blake was frowning at him, as if something was not making sense to him. “What happened when Sonia arrived?”
Jamie shuffled in his seat. “She walked in and Marcus was on the floor. To be honest, yeah, I thought I’d killed him. He was breathing I think, but he wasn’t moving. She started going on about how I was already up to my neck in it because of Kerry, how it was obvious that I had killed Marcus, and that I better get running.”
Blake leant forwards across the table. “And what about Thomas Frost?”
Jamie frowned. “Who?”
“Thomas Frost. Does the name Thomas Frost mean anything to you at all?”
Jamie shook his head, confused. “No?”
“Interview suspended at eleven forty-one AM.” Blake stood up. “Matti, charge him for assault, and put him in the cell.”
Mattison looked confused and followed Blake out of the room. “Sir?”
Jamie watched them both leave, only vaguely curious by the change of questioning. Whatever happened from this point onwards, he knew his life was going to have to change.
Blake walked out of the interview room, and leant against the wall. Mattison stared at him, looking completely clueless.
“Sir?” he said. “What’s going on? I thought we had him?”
“Matti, he doesn’t know anything about the vase used to kill Marcus. Or anything about Thomas Frost.”
“He’s lying! He knows we’ve got him!”
“Exactly. He was running from us, then we caught him. What’s the point in lying at this stage? We could pin absolutely any of this on him, he’s got motive, means, and the temperament. And he knows that. Why the hell would he lie?” Blake turned on his heels and strolled towards the exit. “Like I said, charge him and put him in the cells for assault. Leave him there till I get back.”
“Where are you going?”
But Blake was already gone.
“Right, thanks, Sally. I can’t say I’m surprised. Frost has been clever, I’ll give him that.”
Blake was sat in his car, outside Clayton Apartments, looking up at the top flat.
“Blake, if you manage to prove that’s how it was done, then you deserve a promotion,” Sally told him. “Good luck.”
“Thanks,” Blake murmured. “I’m going to need it.”
He hung up the phone and got out the car. With one last look at the top of the building where Kerry’s balcony could just be seen protruding from the top, he knocked on the glass door. Sonia poked her head over the reception desk, then pressed the release button under her desk to allow him to enter.
“Blake? Everything okay?”
“Hi, Sonia. I’m surprised to see you working, after what happened.”
“I wanted to keep busy,” Sonia replied, shrugging as she placed her book down on the desk. “Besides, with everything that’s happening with Jamie, there’s spare shifts, and who am I to turn down money?”
Blake nodded. “There were just a couple more things I needed to check over in Kerry’s flat. Would you mind letting me in?”
“Sure thing,” Sonia said, heaving her huge frame out of the chair. “Has Jamie been charged?”
“I can’t discuss that, sorry,” Blake said, smiling. “You should know that, being such a fan of crime.”
“True,” Sonia said as they entered the lift. The musty and dirty smell she always exuded smelt worse in the confined lift.
When they arrived at the top floor, Sonia reached to her belt and produced her lanyard, stretching the elastic so that the key reached the keyhole. “Help yourself,” she said, opening the door.
“You can come in with me, if you like,” Blake said. “There was just something I wanted to check in the bedroom.”
Sonia nodded and followed him into the apartment. Everything was much the same as it had been when Blake had last been here. He walked straight to the bedroom and pressed the light switch. Nothing happened. The room stayed dark.
“Oh, is the light gone again?” Blake asked.
“Yeah,” Sonia said, rolling her eyes. “I told you they were useless.”
Blake stood on the bed and pulled down the lampshade. “Do you know what, Sonia? I think I might have solved the light bulb problem in this place. In this apartment, anyway.” He held up the light fitting so that she could see it. “I always find that it helps if there’s a bulb inserted for there to be light. Mind you, what do I know? I’m no technician. “
Sonia did not reply. Blake continued examining the bulb less light fitting. “When did you first get in con
tact with Thomas Frost?” he asked her casually.
Sonia’s face dropped. “What do you mean?”
Blake stepped down off the bed. “Thomas Frost. The man who you masterminded this whole thing with? Actually, that’s not giving you anywhere near enough credit, because Frost had absolutely no part in Marcus’ death, did he?”
Sonia was slowly backing away from, looking slightly horrified, sweat glistening on her brow. “What are you talking about? I have no idea what you’re on about.”
“All the crime books I always see you with. I can’t understand why I never twigged. You’re obsessed with crime. You know all about it. I’m going to hazard a guess at a scenario, Sonia. I think you followed the case of Thomas Frost carefully, all his murders, everything he did, right down to the prison he was incarcerated in. Then, you started writing to him, telling him how much you admired him, respected him, and wanted to start some form of relationship with him.”
“You’ve got quite the imagination, I’ll give you that,” Sonia said, looking less convincing by the second.
“And he reeled you in, because that’s how Frost works,” Blake said, sighing. “He sees a weakness and he prays on it. You could not have come along at a better time. Frost was watching Kerry’s career as a politician bloom, and she was always the one that got away. But of course, you knew that. Being such a devoted fan girl.”
Sonia’s eyes widened. “I know his work, yeah, but –”
“Sorry?” Blake laughed. “His work? He’s an evil serial killer, Sonia. If the circumstances had been different, you could have been just another one of his victims!”
“He would never do that to me!” Sonia snapped, her hand shooting to her mouth before she had even finished the sentence.
Blake shook his head. He almost felt sorry for her, but pity was probably more accurate. “He used you, Sonia. He’s without compassion, without empathy. You were just a pawn to him. I read some of the letters he gets. Do you know how many women write to him every week? You’re not the first, and you sure as hell won’t be the last. But you were the easiest. He sensed your loneliness and your vulnerability, and used you. You lived close to Kerry, and as the months went by, he turned you into his own personal little assassin, didn’t he?”