by Vicky Jones
Max heard the unmistakable sound of a match being struck. The next thing he felt was a searing pain as heavy blobs of liquid dropped onto his bare chest. Drip after drip after drip. Through the tiny gap by his nose, Max saw Amanda holding a lit candle.
“The pain only lasts a second,” she purred. “Then you feel euphoric. Like you can take anything that touches you.”
“Amanda, stop. I’m not enjoying this.”
Amanda ignored him and pressed her palm into his wax-covered chest. “Stop being a pussy, Max. It’s just a little fun. Get a grip and live a little, will ya?”
“It’s not fun. It hurts. Can you let me go now?”
“I’m having fun.”
Amanda sank lower and took him inside her mouth again, sending him into a writhing mix of pleasure and pain as she pinched at his balls with her nails. Again, moments later, she stopped.
“Fuck’s sake, Amanda,” he groaned.
“Oh, I’ve only just begun with you.”
Seconds later, Max let out an ear piercing scream.
“Thank God we live in a detached house,” Amanda said.
“Take this off me now!” Max screamed breathlessly, wriggling his head to try and remove the blindfold. “I wanna know what you just did that hurt so much.”
With one hand, Amanda took off his blindfold and saw tears in his beautiful brown eyes. These eyes widened in horror when they saw the ten-inch carving knife Amanda was holding.
“Jesus Christ!” Max cried. He looked down at his chest, where now there were thin streaks of blood running in between the now-dry blobs of candle wax. It was a mess, but Amanda laughed.
“Sex games. It’s just me branding you. Nothing life threatening. Yet,” she added.
“Amanda… This ain’t right. This is fucked up. I never had you down for doing this shit.”
“Well, maybe I can change that for you,” Amanda said. Hitching her dress up, she positioned herself just right, then sank down on him, moaning as he entered her. “How about now?”
Max groaned also and bucked his hips, but again she pinned him back down. “Amanda, no.”
Max closed his eyes and grimaced, the feeling of what Amanda was doing almost unbearable mixed with the blistering pain from his chest. Feeling her rise and fall on top of him, over and over again, made every second harder to bear, until Amanda began to pant, now riding him hard. Finally, she cried out, her own climax reached. Max looked up in her direction as she pulled his exhausted manhood out of herself.
A long ten seconds later, she pressed her palms down on the wounded parts of his chest and kissed him hard. “Now you can come,” she whispered into his open mouth. When he didn’t out of terror, Amanda used her hand to help move things along. Moments later it was all over.
“I need to get a shower now,” Amanda said, looking down at her wet thigh. She unclipped his handcuffs and threw them back on the bedside table. “You can let yourself out, can’t you?”
“Wait, what?” Max stuttered. He shook his head in confusion.
“You tell your mates about that and you’ll be a fucking hero.” Amanda walked towards the ensuite. She turned to look back at him. “Look, let me get a wet cloth and I’ll clean up your chest. It’s not as bad as it looks.”
“Don’t fucking bother. Fucking hell, look at the state of me,” Max replied. He reached down to the side of the bed for his clothes and dressed as quickly as he’d been stripped.
“Suit yourself,” Amanda said, leaving him to finish tying his shoelaces as she closed the bathroom door behind her.
Chapter 16
Rachel gripped the steering wheel and wrenched it to the left, swerving the car across the road to a halt, narrowly missing the Fiesta that had suddenly cut across her path.
“Fuck’s sake!” she exclaimed. “I should bloody book you for that.”
The other driver waved furiously back. As she was about to get out of her car to give him an earbashing, Rachel looked up through her windscreen and saw the no entry sign bearing down on her. Realising her mistake, she nodded her apology and backed up.
“Get a grip, Morrison,” she chastised herself as she rubbed her eyes to wake herself up fully.
Making it to the station without any more incidents, she bumped into Michelle who was carrying her usual coffee order.
“I got you a double shot,” Michelle said, smiling. “You’re gonna need it when you find out how much CCTV footage we’ve gotta wade through.”
“I just want the footage from the doorbell camera, and the one on the fence if possible?” Rachel replied, taking her coffee and swigging it.
“I know, but have to get permission from Amanda for that, and also the neighbour next door whose fence she shares. There’s a public security camera on the lamp post near the Walker’s property. I thought if we got that it might save us another visit to Amanda. I’m pretty sure she’s sick of us by now. It can’t be easy for her knowing her own mother doesn’t give a shit about her.”
“Good thinking. So how many hours have we gotta sit through then?”
“Here he is, the man of the moment. How was your big date last night, Maxi-boy?”
Jimmy, Max’s work colleague, flashed a broad white smile as Max trudged into the coffee shop. His smile faded when he saw the state Max was in. “Blimey mate, what did she do to you?”
“I don’t wanna talk about it, mate.” Max lowered his head as he brushed past Jimmy’s six foot muscular frame and hung his coat up behind the counter, wincing as he did so.
“Mate, you don’t look right.”
“Drop it, will you,” Max barked back. He tried to tie his apron around his waist but the pain in his chest made him twitch. Jimmy edged closer.
“What’s up, mate? You don’t seem yourself. Come on, how long have we known each other, eh?” Jimmy’s kind blue eyes convinced Max to soften. Sighing, he led Jimmy into the back room and lifted his shirt. Jimmy looked at Max’s scratched and blotchy red skin, stunned into silence. “Jesus, mate, that’s a right mess. What’s happened?”
“I don’t know what got into her last night. Yeah, the sex was wild, but she was…was a nutter, mate. She wouldn’t stop.”
“That ain’t right, that,” Jimmy said, pointing at the marks. “I don’t care what she’s going through with her mother being missing, that ain’t right what she’s done to you. Please tell me you’ve ended it with her?”
Max looked at his shoes. “Well…I just wanted to get out of there, Jim. I wasn’t about to break up with a woman holding a knife now, was I?”
Jimmy recoiled. “She did that with a knife? A fucking knife. She is a bloody nutter.” His expression turned more serious. “Text her. Now. Tell her it’s over, mate. Fuck me, next time you may not be so lucky.”
Max sighed and took his phone out of his back pocket, wincing again as he twisted, then typed out the message.
“Anything?” Hargreaves asked as she poked her head around the door of the CCTV viewing room. Both Rachel and Michelle turned around and shook their heads.
“Nope. Nothing,” Rachel answered. “Every camera angle we look at seems to be obscured by a bush or a parked car. The Walkers’ driveway is only half visible.”
Hargreaves heard the frustrated tone in Rachel’s voice. “Right then. Over to Amanda’s house. I want that footage from her doorbell camera, and the one on the partition fence, so knock up the neighbour too, Michelle.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Rachel and Michelle replied in unison, then grabbed their jackets and headed over to the Walker residence.
Going there without a warrant was a bit of a gamble. If Amanda refused to hand the CCTV over and shut the door in her face, Rachel would have no power to force entry in order to seize it, and by the time she came back with a warrant Amanda would have had plenty of time to dispose of it. Rachel had seriously considered applying to the court for a search warrant under Section 8 of PACE, but deep down she was worried that the grounds she currently had, her copper’s instinct being the biggest one, might not be s
trong enough and that the application would be refused. Besides, as long as Amanda invited her in, if she really had to she could seize the CCTV under section 19 of PACE, which gave an officer, lawfully on the premises, the power to seize any property within it, if they had reasonable grounds it was evidence of an offence, without a warrant. Rachel didn’t think it would come to that. She was starting to get a feel for Amanda Walker, and she was confident that she would be able to talk her into surrendering the footage voluntarily.
Amanda’s phone had beeped ten minutes ago. She lifted a heavy arm from her pillow and rolled over to finally check who it was.
“Over? Fucking prick,” she growled after reading Max’s message. Before she could text her reply, the doorbell rang. “Fuck’s sake.”
Throwing on her jumper and jeans, she went downstairs and opened her front door.
“Hello Amanda,” Rachel said. She took in Amanda’s dishevelled appearance. “Is this a bad time?”
“No it’s fine,” Amanda replied, yawning. “What’s up?”
Rachel looked at the doorbell. “I’d like to check your CCTV footage if I may?”
Amanda froze. “Why? Mum’s said she’s OK.”
“To see if we can establish when your mother left, what state she was in, if anyone was around. The usual sort of thing. When PC Barlow spoke to Poppy the other day, she mentioned that your mother didn’t quite seem herself in that message. So, if she wandered off on foot or whatever, maybe this will show that and we can keep the search going for her, as a welfare concern. I’m sure you’d want that?”
Amanda didn’t reply, just flashed a watery smile.
“We’ve checked the local cameras, nothing on those, but it was only the other day that it occurred to me that this,” she pointed at the doorbell, “was a camera too. Modern technology, eh.”
“I don’t know where the footage would be. My mother had it installed, so I guess the app would be on her phone?” Amanda ran a fingernail over a spot of chipped paint on the doorframe.
“I rang the company. They said it was installed on your phone too,” Michelle said, quick as a flash. “Can we check your phone?”
Amanda’s expression changed. “You want to check my phone?”
“Yes. If that would be OK? Or is there a problem?” Rachel asked.
“But if she wants to be alone that’s her right…right?” Amanda replied.
“Of course, she’s an adult, but I wouldn’t be doing my job properly if I didn’t check on her welfare when I think she may not be in the best frame of mind. If I can track her down and she tells me she’s fine then we’ll leave her, and you, to get on with your lives. I’m sure you’ve had enough of us by now, right?” Rachel flashed a wry smile.
“I thought that she said that in the message, that she wanted to be left alone.”
“Please indulge me here. We all want what’s best for your mum.”
Amanda paused for a moment and then smiled. “You know what? I do remember a guy came around to install that doorbell. We do have an app, but they also put it on the computer in the office upstairs.” Amanda laughed. “But I’m such a technophobe, I couldn’t even tell you how it works.”
Rachel stepped forward. “Oh, don’t you worry about that. PC Barlow here is a techno whizz. May we come in?”
Amanda stepped aside. The three of them went upstairs. Rachel made her way over to the nearest open door.
“No, not in there,” Amanda said, with a touch more sharpness in her tone. “In here.” She pointed to a door on the opposite side of the landing.
“Oh, sorry,” Rachel said, entering the office. “Right, Michelle. Get to work.”
“I’ll be back in a moment,” Amanda said, sidling out of the office and into her bedroom.
Michelle sat herself at the office desk and began trawling through the camera footage files. When she found the correct date, she plugged in a USB stick and downloaded it.
“Amanda seems a little twitchy, don’t you think?” Rachel said, looking around the door at the landing. “I might have a little mooch around while I’m here.”
“That copper’s nose again?” Michelle replied.
“Yeah.” Rachel headed back onto the landing and noticed Amanda’s bedroom door now closed. Inside, she heard a toilet flush. Seconds later the door opened. Amanda recoiled, coming almost nose-to-nose with Rachel.
“Everything OK?” Rachel asked, looking over Amanda’s shoulder into her bedroom.
“Yes. Fine,” Amanda replied, wiping away a bead of sweat from her brow. She fidgeted in the doorway, trying to obscure Rachel’s view. “Did you find what you were looking for?”
“Yes, I think so. PC Barlow has downloaded onto a stick the files leading up to the day your mother disappeared, if that’s OK with you?”
Amanda nodded. “I guess so. If you think it will help. Although by now Mother is probably sipping cocktails on a beach somewhere, without even a thought for her worried daughter.”
“Without touching her bank account since she was reported missing? I doubt that.”
“She may have a stash of money with her. She always did know how to survive.”
“Maybe. But let’s be sure, eh? Better that than be sorry we missed something. We’ll see ourselves out. Thanks again.”
After watching Rachel and Michelle descend the stairs, Amanda looked back over her shoulder, relieved that Rachel hadn’t looked across the room behind her to the linen basket, where last night’s bloodied sheets were now poking out of the part-closed lid. Amanda, relief melting into frustration, walked over to her mother’s bedroom and swept her arms across the surface of her dressing table in rage that was now boiling inside of her. She ripped a pillow off the bed and punched it repeatedly.
“That fucking COPPER!” she raged.
“You don’t like her, do you?” Michelle asked with a mischievous grin.
Rachel looked over at her, then back at the road. “No… It’s just something I can’t put my finger on.” She flicked on her indicator and turned into the police station car park. “A few weeks ago she was adamant that her mother had been kidnapped, or worse. Then we find out she’s left of her own volition, to get away from everything, and Amanda, no doubt. And now Amanda seems to be quite bitter about it all. Saying her mother’s probably on a beach somewhere living the good life.”
Michelle nodded. “Yeah, I’ve thought from the start her emotions have been all over the place. Probably ‘cos she’s an only child. Brought up in a broken home, perhaps could be a reason for her behaviour? I mean, this case hasn’t been the most straightforward, has it?”
“No, you’re right. Let’s go and check this footage. See if it sheds any more light on what the hell happened to Diana Walker.”
Three hours into the mind-numbingly boring CCTV viewing, Michelle blew her cheeks out and stood up.
“I need caffeine. Usual?”
“Cheers,” Rachel replied, running her palm over her eyes.
As Michelle clicked the door shut, Rachel took out her phone and began flicking through her Facebook feed. Then Instagram, then finally Twitter. Every time she looked at a photograph of either her with Adam, or her and her mother, her sighs fluttered out of her, more pained than the last.
“I need to sort this shit,” she murmured to the latest photo of her and Adam sat on the white sandy beach in Penzance looking out on the turquoise ocean. Their smiling faces belied the emotion of the day when Adam had told Rachel he’d had enough and was leaving her. The pain of hearing his words in her memory sliced through her heart again.
Rachel had a thought. She typed ‘Amanda Walker’ into the search bar at the top of her Facebook page. Finding the correct one, she opened up the page to see Amanda’s latest exploits. The first picture she saw made her narrow her eyes.
“Here you go,” Michelle announced, placing a black coffee in front of Rachel, who was completely transfixed by what was on her screen.
“What do you make of this? Amanda’s Facebook page is s
et to public, not private,” Rachel said, passing the phone to Michelle.
“Blimey. Good looking fella. Looks a bit like Zac Efron, I think. That must be Amanda’s boyfriend then?”
“I think I’ve already worked that one out, Shell. He’s lying in her bed.”
“Sexy Mofo,” Michelle said, reading out the photo’s caption. “Can’t argue with that. But why would Amanda be posting something like this when…”
“Exactly. Her dear mother has up sticks and left her, making everyone think she’s come to harm, putting Amanda through all that worry, and now she’s having wild passionate nights with some fit bloke. This is what I’ve been saying. It just doesn’t fit. For example, I checked Poppy’s feeds too, and all she posts are pictures of Diana Walker’s missing poster. It’s almost as if it was her mother that had gone missing.”
“Yeah, she’s pretty cold. Hey, this hunk works in the Costa in town. He’s written it in his profile bio, see?” Michelle pointed at the phone screen then looked down at their mugs. “Fancy a proper coffee?”
“You OK, mate?” Jimmy asked across the counter. Max was rubbing a cloth unenthusiastically over one of the coffee machine spouts. Jimmy put down his sandwich. “She texted back yet?”
“Hmm? Oh, no.”
“She took it well then. I had her wrong. Least you’re not getting earache from her. So, why is your face tripping you?”
“Mum texted me before. Buster’s gone missing.”
Jimmy stopped chewing and sighed. “Ah, mate, what? How did he get out?”
“Mum said she was sure she’d closed the gate properly, but it must have been open a bit.”
“I’m sure he’ll turn up. You wanna get an early finish and go look for him? I’ll cover.”
“Thanks, mate. I might just do that.” As Max lifted his apron over his head he winced again.
“And get some Savlon on those cuts as well,” Jimmy said as he walked into the back to bin his sandwich wrapper.