Church of Sin (The Ether Book 1)

by James Costall

  “Your friend Omotoso,” he said. “He’s in charge on a ground level, so you believe?”

  “Think so.”

  “Okay well Doctor Edwin Omotoso was struck off by a GMC Fitness to Practise Panel three years ago for serious malpractice and he hasn’t been reinstated.”

  “Okay.” She thought it through. Perhaps that was why he looked so uncomfortable. “But he is practising.”

  “Yeah. Hence why I think that place is a no go area.”

  Alix shook her head. “No. We make a decision, Ash. Here and now. If we take up the reigns and ignore Her Majesty the Queen of Bee-hive Bitchyness we do it properly. We treat it like any other investigation. Yes?”

  “What would Lombroso do?”

  “What’s Baron’s view? I can’t imagine he’s happy just to go along with doing what he’s been told.”

  “The DCI is as unreadable as ever save that he’s mighty pissed. But whether he’d authorise going behind Harker’s back, I’m not sure. There’s some relationship there but I don’t know what.”

  Alix chewed her tongue. She noticed how Ash found it difficult to hold her gaze for very long. “Are the deaths at White Helmsley connected?” she asked.

  “I can’t see any connection, other than everything is very freaky.”

  “Bollocks to it, I’m going back to Innsmouth.” There was a large part of her that was sure that that was the right thing to say, but not so sure it was the right thing to do. The thought also occurred to her that she may have said it to gauge Ash’s reaction more than because she actually intended to go back. In fact, the thought of being back inside Anwick’s cell terrified her.

  “If I say you’re not going you’re going to go anyway,” Ash sighed, shrugging his shoulders and downing the rest of the port. “But I’m coming with you.”

  “That won’t work. I don’t have Harker’s backing so the only way I’ll get in is by sweet-talking Omotoso.”

  “I bet you sweet-talk well.”

  “It’s a particular talent of mine. So, no, you stay here and drink your port. I’ll be fine.”

  She got up to leave. He sat back in the chair and scratched his head, trying to find the right words to say to her but they eluded him.

  In the end he settled for: “call me the moment you’re out,” which seemed so extraordinarily lame in the circumstances. She winked at him on the way out.

  Chapter 40

  She lay awake, regretting the second glass of wine she’d drank hurriedly after she had got back in. The heating system to her flat was complex and required a solid two-one in astro-physics to understand. So far, most days had started with a cold shower and ended with a cold bedroom, there presumably being a hefty chunk of the day in between where the flat and the water were both warm. In fact, alcohol lowers body temperature considerably and that sense of warmth it gives is entirely illusionary but there was a cheapo white on offer at the Co-op which was too tempting to ignore. And drinking it made more room in the fridge.

  But whatever the excuse, Alix knew she wouldn’t sleep. Her mind whirled and churned, recycling the events of the last few days over and over. She was convinced that Anwick hadn’t killed Kaitlyn but she couldn’t work out what the significance was of being able to put Ned at the scene moments before Kaitlyn’s body was snatched. It just didn’t make any sense.

  She also couldn’t help wondering if the killings at White Helmsley were linked to Kaitlyn’s murder and Megan’s kidnapping. There had to be something, some nexus that forged them together. It was just too weird to be coincidence.

  Then there was the Asher Fielding factor. She had enjoyed the evening, as odd as it was, but something was troubling her. Something just didn’t fit; something just out of reach, like the spot on your eye that moves to the periphery every time you try and look at it. She couldn’t help but notice an underlying sadness in him. Like he was... haunted by something. She thought back to those times she would escape the house when she was twelve, just after Zara was taken. Those times were precious to her in a perverse way, her secret escapism. She would do anything to stay out of her father’s way; watching his mind slip slowly away was almost as bad as watching...

  She sat bolt upright, bloodshot eyes staring at the wall, clammy hands gripping the pillow.

  Her blue sky. That’s what he’d said. He’d mentioned her blue sky.

  How did he know about her blue sky?

  It didn’t take her long to pull on some clothes before the front door slammed behind her, although even with several tops on it was still cold. At night, the lights in her apartment corridor were controlled by motion sensors. By the time she had hit the lift button, they were on.

  She wasn’t entirely sure what was driving her back through the snow and across the icy paths towards the station. She felt like she had left something behind her, something important. Outside drunken students were falling out of bars and clubs, jostling and pushing each other for space and slipping on the ice. A pale faced girl – fat, goose-pimpled legs buckling under the weight of her disorientated body – stumbled out after the men screaming hysterically. Alix half noticed one of the group staring at her from across the road before his attention turned to the screaming girl. She seemed to believe one of the group – it wasn’t clear who – had cheated on her. A lot of shouting ensued but Alix was making swift progress across the street and the sound of the altercation was already fading.

  “He doesn’t mean it,” her mother said to her in a distant memory.

  She was twelve, thirteen maybe. Scrawny and pale. Her shoulders were still red from where she’d tried to rub off her freckles with a loofah the night before. Her eyes were red with tears.

  “He doesn’t care,” she sobbed and her mother put her arm around her. After a while, Alix realised that she was crying as well. She felt ashamed at her selfishness.

  “He cares in his own way, Alix. About both of us.”

  “Why can’t he just accept what he has left? Why must everything be about him losing Zara? We lost her too.”

  “I know. I know.” Outside she remembered birds singing. And the warmth of her mother’s breath on her cheek. What he’d done, she couldn’t remember. It didn’t matter. That part of the memory was unimportant.

  “She’s not coming back, mum,” she whispered. “I get that. Why can’t he?” She could hear her mother’s heart break in two.

  “We... there is a place, Alix,” she choked back the salty water and took her time. “There’s a place, Alix, that we go when we’re sad, isn’t there? Do you remember? A place where we’re safe and together. Your blue sky, Alix. Your blue sky.”

  Her eyes stung; a combination of the cold and fatigue, but she had to find Ash, ask him how he knew about her blue sky. It struck her that she had never really told him anything about her childhood. The whole thing was marred by what happened to Zara. Memories that she didn’t share. Memories that were too painful, too personal to belong to anyone else. Her blue sky was part of the memories that she had buried deep within her.

  So how did he know about it?

  She flashed some ID at the old WPC at the front desk. She shrugged her shoulders, as if young women wearing scruffy clothes with messy hair wandering through the station in the early hours in the morning was perfectly normal. Apparently, it was a quiet night, save for the guy being sick in the corner.

  It was on the first floor when the idea that this was incredibly stupid hit her. There weren’t many people around at this time of night. The corridor was lit only by the faint glow of lights from rooms where detectives were working late, wading through paperwork and filing. The incident room was on the right, an open plan office with four or five desks and separate offices for Keera and Ash separated by plywood partitions covered in mug shots, posters and rosters.

  She felt suddenly ridiculous, angry with herself. It was coincidence, surely. She found herself in the incident room not really knowing what to do next. She guessed that if she met anyone she could always say she had forgot
ten something but she could see that the light was off in Ash’s room anyway.

  But then again...

  She slid into Ash’s office and slipped behind the desk. She moved the mouse, the tower clicked, a fan whirred and suddenly everything around her was bathed in the light from the screen. It was eerily quiet outside but she knew there were some people around. Notably, there was light coming from Keera’s office. She sat for a while looking at the screen. She was going no further without a password. She clasped her hands to her chin and leant her elbows on the desk, the screen inches from her eyes. Something fluttered inside her; a little release of adrenaline. She was momentarily taken back to the times she used to dare Zara to run into the next door neighbour’s garden and steal the laundry off the line, watching her from the bushes, quivering with excitement and anxiety.

  Enter Password.

  Did he have a girlfriend? She didn’t even know. She’d heard a rumour about a girl called Penny but Ash had always been such a private person. Or she was a very uninteresting, self-indulgent person. Probably a mixture of the two.

  She typed in Penny but was quickly declined. She was offered another go.

  Frustrated, she threw back the chair and got up, knocking the desk as she did, annoyed with herself for being stupid enough to even bother getting out of bed. Something clattered to the floor and she heard the sound of a crack. Shit. She bent down to retrieve whatever it was; something had fallen underneath the desk and rolled round behind the bin. She felt the floor and her hand closed round something cold: a smooth half sphere with a flat, plastic base.

  She took it slowly out from underneath the desk, held it close to her chest. It couldn’t be. She examined it carefully, running her fingers over the top, down the sides of the smooth glass and to the chip in the corner. The picture inside was faded but the face unmistakable. It just couldn’t be.

  Alix had bought the snow-globe when she was eight and given it to Zara the day she turned five. It had, until Zara had disappeared, sat dutifully on her sister’s windowsill; a prized possession and one of the few things they both agreed on was precious. The picture inside was Alix grinning insanely wearing a swimsuit and arm bands, although the sides were worn away now so that really only her face was visible.

  The snow-globe belonged to Zara. Why the Hell was it here?

  She turned back to the computer and closed her eyes. Images rushed by her, some faded memories of her childhood, the few lucid recollections of her sister, but also of Ash, of her mother, of her father. What was going on? She needed to find out. Nothing else mattered.

  What would Lombroso do?

  She knew exactly what he’d do. He’d type his name into the password box.

  Her fingers fumbled at the keys, a combination of trepidation and cold. She hit the return key, the computer thought about it a while, deciding whether she was worthy of entry, and eventually the gate lifted and she was presented with the desktop. Finding what she wanted was easy. Once into the system, she found her name in hundreds of documents, realised that they all formed part of a folder named “Alix”. The contents were voluminous. Reams of information: about her, her father, Zara. Her family tree traced back over five generations, extracts from her father’s journal (which might explain how he knew about her blue sky – he’d always scoffed at the idea), floor plans to her house, title deeds, wills and correspondence, her parents’ divorce papers, her mother’s death certificate. It was all here. Her life compacted into electronic form.

  “You don’t look as though you ought to be looking at that.”

  Alix looked up sharply, her heart rising to her throat. She recognised the gruff voice before she saw Keera standing in Ash’s doorway. She closed down the folder she’d opened and flicked off the monitor.

  “Just checking the CCTV footage again,” said Alix, trying to disguise the quiver in her voice as best she could.

  “At three o’clock on the morning after the DI’s gone home.”

  “I’m going to Innsmouth tomorrow morning. I wanted to be sure about something.”

  “You’ve got clearance from Baron to go to Innsmouth tomorrow?”

  She hesitated. Not by much, but enough to show uncertainty. “Yes.”

  Keera looked at her long and hard. It was as if she was trying to bore into her brain with her eyes to expose the lie. Alix stood up and picked up her coat. Keep it casual, she said to herself. Like you’re doing nothing wrong. After what seemed like an age Keera finally spoke.

  “Make sure you come back with some fucking answers this time.”

  Inwardly, Alix let out a gargantuan sigh of relief. As she passed Keera in the doorway, she managed a curt smile.

  Part III

  The Twenty-first Law of the Ether

  The destruction of an innocent shall open a Portal

  Chapter 41

  There had been no sign of the snow relenting around the Victorian courtyard. If anything, the white powder lay even thicker on the ground and crunched under Alix’s feet as she trudged across it towards where she thought Omotoso had emerged from last time to greet her. She looked up at the walls around her. She felt small; like a miniature doll in an enormous wooden play house.

  She hadn’t slept well, the discovery she had made on her return to the station had played on her mind all night. Too many unanswered questions buzzing around her overworked mind. Suddenly, she wasn’t quite sure who to trust anymore. She felt hollow, a little numb. She had even thought about quitting. But it wasn’t as simple as that. For one thing, there was this place. Innsmouth. The thought that it even existed was enough to stifle her desire to walk away; she felt drawn to it, like it was her providence to be here. The thing with Ash would have to wait.

  The institute wrapped itself around the courtyard like a giant crab, its pincers curling their way around a patch of earth in front of its eyes. The windows were nothing more than tiny slits of blackness set against the red brickwork. Here and there, ivy had managed to curl half up a wall but in every case the last two or three feet of plant drooped lifelessly where the cold had defeated its ascension. It was nothing more than a ruin; an illusion, a tourist attraction. Any minute now, she’d be ambushed by a gaggle of volunteers – bright stripy sweatshirts and head bands – selling overinflated tickets and handing out insipid literature. She stopped and listened hard; something on the breeze, some distant sound above the rustling and creaking of the leafless trees.

  “Guess you just couldn’t stay away.” Alix jumped. Omotoso was stood beside her, having emerged noiselessly from the eeriness as if out of nowhere. He wore a light grey suit and a pleasant enough smile.

  “Doctor,” Alix stammered, “you startled me.”

  “I beg your apology, doctor Franchot, but startled or not, it is a pleasure to have you back. In fact, I’ve never known anyone to actually come back here.”

  She smiled back wanly, not really knowing what to say and for a while nothing happened. She was beginning to think he might not be as accommodating as last time, especially considering her return presumably wasn’t on his schedule, but eventually he turned away and walked back into the white haze.

  “You comin’?” he called back over his shoulder.

  Much to the obvious disgust of the guard at the kiosk, Omotoso managed to persuade him that Alix didn’t need to go through the same routine as last time with as much diligence but she still had to surrender her bag along with its limited contents. This time, she had left her phone and purse in the car having found the receipts stuffed into one of the purse’s many complex compartments out of order when she had picked up her bag the last time around. In fact, her bag now contained hardly anything but it was good to have something to leave at the door. Alix had noticed that Omotoso hadn’t addressed the guard by his name. The conversation had been curt and awkward. There was no locker-room comradeship here.

  He led her in silence through the first security checkpoint and down into the labyrinth of corridors beyond until he was satisfied that no one cou
ld overhear them and it was safe to talk.

  “You don’t have clearance for a second visit, doctor Franchot,” he remarked as they walked slowly through a large hall that was perhaps once a canteen.

  “No,” she admitted. “But apparently you let me in anyway.”

  Omotoso smiled, opened a door at the end of the room and showed her through.

  “Why was that?” she asked. He stopped, turned to her.

  “I think to myself: I’ve been here three years and I can count the number of visitors to the institute on one hand and I work in a place that’s so secret I can’t even tell my wife about it and then you show up not once but twice and I reckon that would be for a pretty good reason. So, I think what-the-Hell and here you are.”

  “Where does your wife think you work?”

  “She thinks that I am at the University lecturing,” he chuckled. “But who cares? We’ve been separated for years and she’s one mean bitch so lying to her comes pretty naturally.”

  “I guess so,” she laughed. There was a gentleness to Omotoso that Alix was in danger of warming to. But she remembered Ash telling her he’d been struck off three years earlier. So how did he end up here? But then again, could she really trust anything Ash had told her?

  “You’re here to see Professor Anwick,” he said as they continued their trek through the institute.

  “Yes. And to ask you a few things, if I may.”

  “Well, you can ask,” he said. “But I’m not sure I can help you much.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Because you want to know about Innsmouth. You want to know why-oh-why would the state commission a psychiatric hospital on a shoestring budget to house only a few patients and keep everyone in the dark about it, right?”

  “Yeah. I want to know that.” And, if you were struck off, how come you’re still practising? But she kept that question to herself.

  “Well I have absolutely no idea.”

  “Oh, doctor, you can do better than that.”