Eye Snatcher

by Ryan Casey

  Jed turned away from the bald man and scuttled down the corridor to the right.

  Footsteps behind Brian. A few sighs and tuts.

  “This twat again.”

  Brian turned around. Faced the three bulky security guards coming towards him, all bald and with similar faces, like they were some kind of bloody clones.

  He prepared for them to grab him. Prepared for them to throw him out of New Blue Brook again. But he wasn’t going anywhere this time. Not until he’d been inside Adrian West’s room. Not as long as Jed Green was in this building.

  Heavy hands on his shoulders, still aching from his confrontation with Darren in the woods. “You’re getting the fuck out of here,” one of the guards, who had onion breath, said.

  “No he isn’t.”

  The voice came from the doorway. A voice Brian recognised. A familiar voice. A voice that made his stomach leap.

  Detective Sergeant Brad Richards was standing in the doorway with a printed-off warrant in his hand. Beside him was Detective Inspector Carter. They were both dressed in formal-wear, Brad in a suit too large for him and Carter in a red dress that looked bloody stunning on her.

  But Brad had a warrant. He actually had a warrant.

  One of the guards tightened his grip on Brian’s aching shoulder. “Who the fuck do you think you are?”

  “I’m Detective Sergeant Richards, this is Detective Inspector Carter. We’re here to search this place inside and out.”

  The guards looked at one another. Grunted.

  “The CCTV?” Brian asked as the officers approached.

  Brad shook his head. “No trace it was ever even recording on bus four.”

  Samantha pulled the guard’s hand from Brian’s shoulder. She smiled at Brian, almost like she was apologising. “Your two balaclavaed pals from Galaxy. They ‘fessed up. Adrian West is Damien Halshaw’s father.”

  The three of them turned around. Looked in through the glass door to the Bridgewater ward. The three guards chatted, disgruntled, amongst themselves.

  “So is one of you goons gonna let us in here or what?” Brian said.

  Brian, Samantha and Brad rushed through the entrance to Bridgewater. The place smelled strong of sweat and disinfectant, and Brian’s shoes squeaked on the tiled floor with every step.

  “He went around here,” Brian said, pointing around the corner and down towards the closed doors of the main ward.

  A woman caught up with the officers. Short, with dark curly hair and a face that looked like it’d never figured out how to smile in her life. “Officers, there’s really no need for all this show at this time of night. It’s potentially upsetting—”

  “I’ll tell you what’s potentially upsetting,” Brian said, staring down at her. “Adrian West butchering another kid.”

  The woman rolled her eyes. “You’ve got the identity of the killer wrong before. Who’s to say you haven’t again?”

  “Adrian’s room,” Samantha said. “Which room is he in?”

  “We’ll be in and out like a flash,” Brad said, smiling at the woman. “No fuss. No upset.”

  The woman shook her head and chewed her lip. “Room 249. You’ll… I’ll let you in. I can assure you Adrian will be in his room. He always is.”

  Brian nodded. “Right. He was in there when Beth Turner was murdered, wasn’t he?”

  “That was different.”

  “Of course,” Carter said. “Always is different when there’s something major at stake.”

  They reached Adrian West’s room. The door was shut. Jed Green, he was either in there or hiding somewhere else. He knew something. He had to know something. His personal patient, he couldn’t just not notice him slipping under the radar when he went out to kill.

  “Stand back,” Brian said to his fellow officers.

  Brad and Samantha looked at him with frowns on their faces.

  “Just in case,” Brian said.

  He didn’t show the same level of protection to the care support worker unlocking Adrian’s door.

  Brian held his breath as she struggled with the key. Watched as she turned it, put all her minimal weight against the door, winced as she tried to push it open.

  Before anyone could step in, the door did open. The care worker nearly tumbled into the room, just about keeping her footing at the last second.

  When she looked inside the room, she brought her hands to her mouth and her eyes widened.

  She started to scream, but it turned into a whimper as her shaking legs gave way and she collapsed to her knees.

  Brian looked at Brad and Carter.

  And then he walked up to the door. Peeked around it.

  Jed Green was in there.

  His eyes were drooping. A knife rested loosely in his left hand.

  His wrists were slashed wide open.

  A puddle of blood oozed down Jed’s body, across the floor of Adrian West’s room, which was decorated with little jars of pickled onions.

  Except they weren’t pickled onions.

  They were pickled eyes.

  “I think we got our Eye Snatcher,” Brad said.

  THIRTY-SIX

  Brian, Brad and Samantha waited outside Adrian West’s room while the paramedics rushed Jed Green’s wrist-slit body out of the room. There was a mumble about New Blue Brook Hospital. A slight hum of life as night workers peeked around corners, whispered to one another. Through the windows lining the side of the medicinal corridor, blue ambulance lights flickered through.

  “I just don’t understand how anyone could get away with this when they’re supposed to be being watched,” Carter said.

  Brian looked over at her. She’d drifted past the yellow tape and into Adrian West’s room. She was crouching down, peering into the jars of bloodied eyes that rested on Adrian’s desk.

  Bloodied eyes that New Blue Brook had to know about.

  “I mean, do you not even have a cleaner or something?” Brad asked.

  Hayley Meadows, the general manager of New Blue Brook, looked on at the room with horror on her wrinkly face. She plucked at the bottom of her black blazer, shuffled from side to side, her high heels clicking the solid floor. “I… We do. But—our patients. We trust them with… with certain things. We—”

  “You trust them with a jar of pickled eyes?” Brian spat.

  Hayley blinked and flinched back with this. “I—I swear nobody’s ever reported these before. They… they would have seen it. They have to have.”

  Samantha grunted. Tapped her finger against the eye jar lid. “You’d think so, wouldn’t you?”

  Brian climbed over the yellow tape and walked around the room. Got a feel for it. There was a smell of stagnant sweat in the air. Of piss. Piss that had gone stale, like when Brian was younger and a cat had got into his garden shed. Camped in there for weeks. His dad didn’t have a clue where it’d gone, but he knew it was still there. All because of that pissy smell. “When was the last time anyone cleaned this room?”

  Hayley blinked. Shook her head. “I, erm…”

  “Because this room,” Brian said. He wiped a speck of dust from the chipped, badly painted windowsill. “It doesn’t look like it’s been cleaned in a very long time.”

  “Adrian was a difficult patient,” Hayley said.

  Samantha tutted. “Difficult? You’re telling us.”

  “He… Jed. Mr Green. He had a close bond with him. Usually Jed brought him stuff. Like… like fresh bedding. Bedding outside of our price zone. Things like that.”

  Brian narrowed his eyes. “So what? You’re telling us Adrian was allowed free roam, pretty much? As long as goody-two-shoes Jed was there to clean up his mess, you didn’t even have to check on him? What kind of care is this? Might as well have locked him up in the old bloody asylum.”

  “We’re a place like every other mental institution in the country, detective,” Hayley said, looking Brian in the eye now. “Broke. Understaffed. Stretched to the absolute limits. When somebody offers a helping hand—a medica
l professional who knows what they’re doing—we take it. We don’t like to have to take it, but we do.”

  Brian paused a few seconds. Kept on looking into Hayley’s eyes as Brad and Carter both stepped out of the room, still dressed for a date rather than an investigation. “You do know what this means for this place, don’t you? What these findings mean for your patients? Your licence to run? Your career?”

  Hayley didn’t nod. She just kept on staring at Brian, her eyes growing more bloodshot, more tearful. It’s like she’d accepted—like she’d known—that her career and New Blue Brook was finished the moment she’d seen something had happened with Adrian West. Like she knew she’d never get away for allowing Jed Green to oversee him. She was right. Sob story or no sob story, she was right.

  Brian looked back at the desk. Looked at the jar of eyeballs. They didn’t even look real. Or maybe that was just a defence mechanism. A way of detaching himself from the brutality of what he was seeing right in front of him. The reality that those eyes were in the skulls of children just days ago. Those eyes had seen nothing but beauty and fun in the world.

  Those eyes had never seen anything but love.

  It was the way they were just placed there, too. Placed there with such confidence, such audacity. Sure, maybe Jed Green had been trying to dispose of them before Brian and the police came through with their warrant. That was a theory. But if not… they were just there for all to see. Sheer confidence from Adrian West that he wasn’t going to be caught.

  And he was right. He still hadn’t been caught.

  Brian walked past a sobbing Hayley and put a hand on her shoulder. “We’ll be in touch,” he said.

  She mumbled a few words but Brian didn’t push her to repeat them. She had enough on her plate ahead as it was without dirtying her conscience any more.

  Brad and Samantha were standing just outside the door. They both had their hands in their pockets and were chatting, smiling even.

  Brian felt a burning in his chest. Not jealousy, just annoyance. Annoyance that they could possibly be smiling after the discovery they’d just made. Annoyance that they could get on with their lives fucking one another—nice surprise, by the way—while Brian couldn’t sleep knowing Adrian West was out there.

  Brad looked at Brian. Tilted his head back. Carter stepped away. Lowered her head. Dropped her smile.

  “Don’t stop your flirting for me,” Brian said.

  “Brian, we…” Samantha started. “We kind of wanted to tell you but—”

  “I’m not your bloody dad. Your business is your business. Just don’t go mushy in work and you’re alreet.”

  Carter met his eyes with her chestnut brown eyes. Smiled at him. “I know you’re not our dad. But Granddad’s approval means a lot more.”

  Brian did his best attempt of a jovial smile but he could tell from the awkwardness of the three of them that he’d fooled no one.

  “What now then?” Brad asked, scratching his head.

  Brian looked back down the ward to Adrian West’s vacant room. “Forensics will be on their way to tell us what we already know. Guess we just put out a search for West. He can’t hide forever. And Jed Green. We need to chat to him.”

  “He just tried to kill himself,” Samantha said.

  “Yeah well, so did us two once upon a time,” Brian said, pointing at Brad. “Here we are still blabbing away.”

  He meant it to be comical. The downward, shifty glances of both Brad and Carter were anything but a rapturous applause.

  Bloody hell. They really were from another generation. A softer one at that.

  The three of them walked towards the Bridgewater exit. They said very little. It was like a knowledge of Brad and Samantha’s dating, or relationship, or whatever, had driven a wedge between them for no real reason. Well, there was a real reason. Brian thought Carter was fit, and he didn’t like Brad ever getting one up on him. That was the harsh, honest truth.

  But he had a girlfriend at home. A girlfriend he loved, and who he wanted to spend the rest of his life with. A girlfriend he’d neglected lately. Who was way too good for him.

  A pregnant girlfriend.

  He was just warming to the idea of a serious conversation about her pregnancy and her planned aborting when he saw DC Arif appear outside the Bridgewater door.

  “Jesus,” Brad said. “Is that Arif I see outside of police HQ?”

  He did look like he’d run a marathon. Sweat dripped down his forehead. He had his glasses on, which were sliding down his nose. Brian could almost smell the sweat off him from here.

  They opened the Bridgewater aisle door. Yes, a wave of Arif’s body odour did cover them.

  “Bloody hell, Arif,” Brian said. “Been for a gentle stroll?”

  “Another kid’s gone,” Arif said.

  It took Brian a few moments to register what Arif said. “Another… what do you mean?”

  Arif planted his hands on his black work’s trousers. Panted.

  “Arif, what—”

  “Missing persons report came in an hour ago. Young boy, Ainsley Pratt. Didn’t think much of it until his mum told me he’d fallen off his bike by the Hoppers and she’d gone to pick him up. Only he wasn’t there.”

  “The Hoppers? What’s that to do with anything?”

  Arif looked right at Brian. “The Hoppers, Brian. Outside the Hoppers. The bus four goes by there.”

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  Adrian West dragged the little boy through the trees by his limp, unconscious arms.

  His knees ached. He couldn’t see far ahead. The sound of cars whirring past on the main road just behind him was still strong, still close enough. Somebody could walk past off the pavement. Look to their left or their right.

  But he was blanketed by darkness. He was disguised.

  And being so close to society gave him a kick.

  He dropped the boy down into the dirt.

  Pulled the grey masking tape that his idiot social worker had very kindly acquired for him, amongst all the other nice things he’d done for him.

  Wrapped it around the boy’s drooling mouth.

  Adrian wanted the boy to be awake for what happened next. Sure, he’d knocked him out to get a hold of him, but that was just part of the procedure.

  He wanted him to experience the same level of pain as the exhilaration he felt.

  He straightened his back. Took in a deep breath of the crisp late autumn air.

  He reached into his pocket and pulled out a knife.

  The red mist settled around Adrian’s thoughts once again, and he loved it more than any feeling in the world.

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  “Put your bloody foot down.”

  “I’ve got my bloody foot down!”

  Brian tried to keep his breathing steady and his thoughts clear as he sat in the passenger seat of Brad’s car. It reeked of aftershave, which no doubt Brad had topped up on before his date with Samantha.

  But more than anything, it reeked of Brian’s sweat. The sweat that always came when he was anxious, panicking.

  The sweat that always came with the urgency to catch a killer.

  “Quicker to take a left here or—”

  “Straight ahead,” Brian said.

  Brian looked out at the streetlamps as they passed by but he didn’t register anything else. Another kid, Ainsley Pratt, had gone missing an hour ago. Gone missing near a fucking bus stop that the number four bus called at. Shit. It must’ve been the same bus Brian was on not long ago. Must’ve gone up to Longridge, picked Adrian up, looped back around…

  “It could be nothing,” Brad said. He glanced at Brian—a look of attempted reassurance.

  Brian didn’t even give him the benefit of a nod in return. “It’s something. And if you don’t put your fucking foot down, it’ll be another dead kid on our hands.”

  Brad looked like he was about to bite back, but instead he closed his mouth and focused back on the road again. “We couldn’t have stopped it. We… There’s nothin
g we could’ve done to stop this.”

  Brian tensed up inside. Wanted to lambast Brad and the whole fucking department for not taking his number four bus claims seriously enough. Yes, they could have frigging well stopped this kid going missing if they’d kept their eyes on the bus, on the bus route.

  Instead, they had a half-dead Jed Green and a missing Adrian West Missing with another bloody kid.

  The lights of Preston Grasshoppers rugby club appeared on the left. The rain was pattering down again, spraying through the spotlights that surrounded the rugby pitch. At the other side of the road, opposite the rugby club, a little blue bus stop.

  Behind that, thick, dark trees.

  “Stop here,” Brian said.

  Brad did a double take at him. “We’re not going in alone.”

  “We’re doing what we have to do. The Pratt kid went missing an hour ago. Be bloody amazed if he’s still alive. We have to start searching right now.”

  Brad slowed down but he didn’t seem too impressed about it. “We wait. Ten minutes, we’ll have a search team down here.”

  Brian unclipped his seatbelt. The rain came down heavier now. “Ten minutes is too long. We go in there and see if we find anything.”

  “Brian, you’re gonna jeopardise this entire—”

  “Don’t talk to me about jeopardising a fucking thing,” Brian shouted.

  His heart pounded. Brad looked back at him with a meek expression across his face. A lack of recognition of the anger inside Brian.

  Brian felt immediately guilty for snapping. Brad was only trying to do his job. No—more than that. He was looking out for a friend. After what had happened when Brian had gone into the Avenham house that time—the way Brad had seen Brian after the cellar captivity—he didn’t want anything like that happening again.

  “I’ll go it alone,” Brian said.

  Brad shook his head. “Don’t be stupid Brian. There’s being urgent and there’s being stupid.”

  Brian got out of the car. The cold rain showered over him. “It wasn’t a question,” he said.