Killers

by Laurence Gough

  Killers

  Laurence Gough

  © Laurence Gough 1993

  Laurence Gough has asserted his rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.

  First published in 1993 by Victor Gollancz Ltd.

  This edition published in 2016 by Endeavour Press Ltd.

  Table of Contents

  Author’s Note

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Author’s Note

  There is a Vancouver Public Aquarium, and it does indeed have a board of directors as well as a large salaried staff, many enthusiastic volunteers and the two captive orcas; Finna and Bjossa. But with the exception of the above-named whales and a marmalade cat named Barney, the inhabitants of Killers are mere figments of my imagination and are not intended to portray real insects or animals or persons. Any resemblance to real insects or animals or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Chapter 1

  Homicide detective Jack Willows tested the blade of the carving knife against the ball of his thumb.

  Fellow detective Claire Parker watched him over the rim of a wine glass that had been recently topped up with a more-than-decent Australian burgundy, but was now somehow almost empty again. Parker’s skin was pale, her shoulder-length hair jet black, her chocolate eyes lively and bright. When she had first walked into Inspector Homer Bradley’s office, back in ‘85, she’d been twenty-eight years old, stood five foot seven and weighed one hundred and seven pounds. Time hadn’t passed her by, but she still considered herself a reasonably young woman. She had managed, mostly due to the stress of the job, to keep her weight down. Perhaps it was the wine, but at the moment she was feeling pretty good about herself.

  She and Willows ate together fairly frequently, but he rarely invited her to his house. So this was a bit of an occasion, and she had dressed accordingly. She was wearing a beige suede skirt and a low-cut black silk blouse. She looked very good, and she knew it. Her self-awareness and confidence showed in the way she held herself — loosely, but very much in control.

  As Parker raised her glass, Willows noticed that the wine was just slightly darker than her lipstick. He sliced into the roast the way he did almost everything else — with manic, calculated energy. The cut meat, as it fell away from the joint, smelled hot and rich.

  Parker drank a little more wine. There were birch logs in the fireplace, candles burning on the table. Moonlight shone through the mullioned french doors that led to the sundeck, and the backyard lawn was frosty and gleaming. The weatherman had predicted snow and it looked as if he might be right. The westerly that would bring cloud to blanket the city was already snatching the last dead leaves from the tossing branches of the apple, plum and cherry trees that Willows and his children had planted so many years ago.

  Parker watched but said nothing as Willows served her exactly the right amount of paper-thin slices of rare roast beef, oven-glazed roast potatoes, fresh-cut green beans imported from California. She watched his wrists and hands as he worked; the graceful play of tendon and shadow, bulge of vein and flex of muscle, the ridge of scar tissue and permanently swollen knuckles of his left hand — the memento of a punched-out windshield.

  Willows filled his own plate, and sat down. He raised his glass in a toast. “Happy birthday, Claire.”

  Parker smiled. Willows was two days early, but it was the thought that counted. Hard to believe, but she was thirty-six years old, had been crime-busting with Jack for eight years. A long time.

  Longer than most marriages lasted, for example.

  Willows chewed and swallowed. “I’m not going to ask you what you’re thinking about, but I will tell you this — you look awfully damn serious. Something wrong with the food?”

  Parker helped herself to a little horseradish. “No, everything’s fine. I was just thinking about how old I’m getting. Imagining the hands of a giant clock spinning round at dizzying speed. Pages blowing off a calendar.” She smiled. “Stuff like that.”

  A violent gust of wind shook the house. Curtains flared nervously. The candles guttered, and then held steady.

  Willows said, “Morbid.”

  “Very.”

  He smiled. “Eat some red meat. It’ll perk you up. Stop you from getting maudlin.”

  Parker ate some roast beef, a forkful of potato, a string bean.

  “Everything okay?”

  “Delicious.”

  Willows gave her a doubtful look. He emptied his glass and poured himself a generous refill. A birch log snapped in the fireplace, chasing a flurry of sparks up the chimney. Another gust of wind rattled the french doors. Willows sneaked a carnal, slightly feverish look at Parker. Maybe it was the weather, but he felt a desperate need to do a little hibernating.

  Parker said, “Now it’s my turn.”

  Willows gave her an enquiring look.

  She said, “What are you thinking about, Jack?”

  “Dessert,” said Willows quietly, in a tone of voice they’d arrest you for, in some parts of town.

  Parker felt her temperature shoot up; a dusky rose suffused her skin. She drank a little more wine, took refuge behind the glass. She was pushing forty and had the complexion of a chameleon: she was blushing like a child.

  In the kitchen and entrance hall and upstairs in the den, telephones rang stridently.

  Parker said, “When are you going to buy some decent phones — something made in the twentieth century, that warbles?”

  “Never.”

  “Those things sound as if they need their diapers changed.”

  All three telephones rang five times, and then the answering machine picked up.

  Willows said, “You ready for a little more roast?”

  “I’m just fine, thanks. Aren’t you going to find out who that was?”

  “I know who it was.” Willows smiled. “It wasn’t you.” He poured the last of the bottle into Parker’s glass, and suggested she move into the living room and enjoy the fire while he cleared the dishes. He went into the kitchen, and she heard the clatter of the dishwasher. In the living room, Parker kicked off her shoes and curled up on the sofa. The birch logs were burning hot and steady. Parker felt the heat on her face. She shut her eyes.

  What the hell was Jack up to?

  The phones rang again and once again Willows let the answering machine handle the call. Parker opened her eyes as, looking slightly harried, Willows rushed over to the table, scooped up a pack of matches and disappeared back into the kitchen.

  Parker called out, wondering aloud if he needed any help. She was rebuffed. A few moments later, Willows reappeared with a large, gaudily decorated and brightly lit cake. He knelt in front of Parker, placed the cake carefully down on the scarred pine trunk that doubled as a coffee table. He stepped back, and sang:

  Happy birthday to you.

  Happy birthday to you.

  Happy birthday, dear Claire.

  Happy birthday to you.

  Willows had baked the cake himself, and covered it lavishly with chocolate icing decorated with hundr
eds of tiny multi-coloured candies and many artfully designed pink flowers haloed in green leaves.

  Parker said, “I appreciate the effort, but I refuse to count those candles.”

  Willows nodded, smiling. “Hurry up and blow them out, before the smoke alarm figures out what we’re up to.”

  Parker took a deep breath and extinguished every candle on the cake.

  “Does this mean I don’t have any boyfriends?”

  “One only. No extras.”

  “Unless you happen to think,” said Parker, “that a single boyfriend is still one too many.”

  Willows handed her a knife. “Why don’t you cut me a slice while I see if the coffee’s ready.”

  He’d obviously gone to a lot of trouble, so Parker cut a larger slice of cake than she’d ordinarily have permitted herself. Willows was only gone a moment. He came back to the living room balancing two mugs full to the brim of his special blend of freshly ground Colombian and dark French beans, another bottle of wine and two clean glasses. He put the mugs down on the coffee table and then went over to the fire and tossed another length of birch on the coals.

  Parker, watching him, admired his lean, angular frame and the way he used it, with precision and grace. With Jack, there was never a wasted movement, but all the movements were there. A rush of heat washed over her, spilled through her body.

  Willows went over to the stereo. He slipped a Sonny Criss album into the CD player, pushed a few buttons and adjusted the volume. The bass and piano spoke briefly to each other and then Sonny’s alto kicked in on ‘Until the Real Thing Comes Along’, the notes tentative at first, then climbing into strength and slipping all over the scales, tight and silvery, fluid.

  Willows sipped at his coffee, demolished the cake.

  Parker said, “Appreciate your cooking, do you?”

  “I’ve had worse.” Willows opened the second bottle of wine. He sat back while Parker filled his glass and then her own. During the past six months she had spent enough time in Willows’ house to feel comfortable and at home, relaxed. She tucked the suede skirt beneath her to make room as Willows moved a little closer to her. He had pinched the candles on the dining room table, and now the only light in the room came from the birch logs, which burned evenly, bathing the room in a soft, warm yellow light.

  Parker let the music swirl through her. The wail of the saxophone seemed to come at her from everywhere at once. It seemed to her that Criss played as if he was making love, and there was nothing he’d rather do.

  Willows said, “Can I get you anything?”

  “I’m fine, Jack, everything’s perfect.”

  A log snapped, and a bright orange spark hit the fire-screen and rebounded into the hearth. Parker’s wine jumped in her glass. Willows put an arm around her. His fingers traced the line of her neck. Parker turned towards him and he took her glass from her and put it down on the pine chest.

  Parker said, “Am I going to get my present now, Jack?”

  The damn phones started ringing again. Almost as if someone was watching them. Now there was a thought worth repressing. Willows concentrated on Parker. The suede skirt was soft and warm, the black silk slippery as water. Parker’s lips were the colour of wine. Her mouth tasted of wine. She made a small, needy sound and drew him closer.

  The damn phones finally stopped ringing.

  An hour or so later, the moonlight pouring through the bedroom window was extinguished by a rolling front of pillowy cumulus that had moved in on the city from the west, across thousands of miles of open water and then the low-slung hills of Vancouver Island.

  Willows felt the change in light, tactile as a subtle change of air pressure. He raised himself up on an elbow. The moon vanished and then reappeared with a ragged bite taken out of it. The spindly branches of the vine maple that had planted itself below his window less than five years ago and shot up thirty feet in the interval scratched restlessly against the glass.

  The light dimmed again. The perfect white circle of the moon was speckled with grey.

  Willows saw that it was still snowing. Fat white flakes that must have been carried miles from their source and were now spinning down out of a star-spangled sky. He turned to wake Parker and saw that he was alone in bed, experienced a split second of grief and acute loneliness and in that same tiny moment heard the muted thunder of the shower.

  A swiftly moving wall of pillowy cloud smothered the moon. Darkness fell into the room. Feathery white flakes of snow spiralled out of the night and crashed mutely into the window, slid down the panes of glass and thickened the mantle on the ledge.

  Willows slipped out of bed and padded over to the window and looked out. The ground was covered in a smooth, glittery blanket of white. At the end of the block a cone of snow fell in the glare of a streetlight, as if it was being poured from a giant funnel.

  He thought about joining Parker in the shower, but decided against it. Claire was in many ways a solitary creature. If she’d wanted company, she’d have let him know. He thought about easing back into the cosy warmth of the bed, and decided against that, too.

  He’d go downstairs, check to make sure the doors were bolted and listen to the answering machine.

  He slipped into a multi-coloured terrycloth robe and left the room, walked silently along the carpeted hall and down the stairs. A riser creaked under his weight but he knew the shower would cover the sound.

  He checked the doors to make sure he’d locked them and then went into the living room. A handful of coals glowed dull orange.

  He went back upstairs. Parker was still in the shower.

  In the den, the answering machine’s red eye winked in sequences of five — there’d been two calls he hadn’t heard.

  He pressed the rewind button and listened to the mildly venomous hissing of the tape as it ran from spool to spool.

  Sheila, confident that he’d recognize her voice, didn’t trouble to identify herself. She said without preamble that she had something important she wanted to tell him. This vaguely ominous declaration of intent was followed by a lengthy pause. Willows thought she’d hung up. Then he heard the rasping of a match and knew she’d started smoking again.

  Sheila exhaled noisily, just in case he’d missed the point. She promised to call back, and hung up without saying goodbye.

  The messages that followed were simply more of the same, but Sheila sounded a little less sure of herself with each call.

  The fifth and last time she left a message, she told Willows it was three o’clock in the morning, Toronto time. She assumed he was on a case, wished him well and then mentioned almost in passing that she and Annie and Sean were coming home.

  Air Canada flight 857, departing Toronto at 6:50 p.m.

  The flight from Toronto to Vancouver was scheduled to take five hours, but because of the three-hour time difference between the two cities, she and the children expected to arrive at the house about ten p.m.

  A match rasped as Sheila lit another cigarette. Willows was staring blindly down at the answering machine when she cheerfully reminded him she still had a key to the front door, and hung up.

  Chapter 2

  The tank held just over ten thousand gallons of fresh seawater that had been pumped in from the harbour and then subjected to the most complex filtration system money could buy. The entire exhibit had been rebuilt only a year or two earlier, and was the largest in the building. The tank was rectangular, about twenty feet long by fifteen wide and ten deep. At one end, the sandy bottom was studded with a jumbled mound of large rocks which, along with a wealth of marine vegetation, provided sufficient cover for the pool’s smaller and shyer occupants.

  A skate with a six-foot wingspan drifted down the length of the tank. The huge fish seemed motionless, yet surely it was moving, its deceptive speed betrayed by a slate-grey shadow almost the exact colour of its body, that rippled gracefully over the sand as the huge fish drifted along.

  A school of bright yellow fish saw the skate coming and darted
wildly about at high speed in a display of stunningly perfect but totally mindless synchronization that defied all logic — if you bothered to think about it.

  Dr Gerard Roth glanced at his watch. Twenty past nine. The aquarium had been closed to the public since six, and the rest of the staff were long gone. Roth sat at the lip of the pool with his thin, hairy legs dangling in the water. He was in a small, comfortably warm room that had been constructed on the roof of the original building when the pool was enlarged. Access to the room was available only through a locked door. A floor-to-ceiling window at one end of the room provided light during the daylight hours, but it was impossible to see into the room either from the ground or inside the aquarium.

  Roth glanced at his genitals. Checking his status, so to speak. He spread his legs slightly and reached down and adjusted himself. He glanced behind him, saw that he was still alone, tilted left and energetically scratched his buttock. Even though it was late November, he still had a pretty decent tan.

  Roth was all scientist, top to bottom. And proud of it too, if anybody cared to ask. But somehow he couldn’t bring himself to swallow all that stuff about ragged gaping lethal holes in the ozone. Maybe the doomsters and gloomsters knew what they were shouting about. Or maybe they didn’t. As far as Gerard Roth was concerned the jury was still out. Too much conflicting evidence. What he did know for sure was that old Mr Sun kicked ass with his arthritis and from early June right through the end of August he had hardly any acne problems at all.

  Dr Roth clawed at his left cheek, his brow furrowed in concentration, then left off to swap hard looks with a black-tailed shark that had swum lazily to the surface and was now gnawing tentatively at his big toe with a view to swallowing it whole. The shark was only a couple of feet long, too immature to realize it was strictly a bottom feeder. It was vexing, the way mere confinement seemed occasionally to alter the behaviour of certain species. It was unpredictable, and it pissed him right off. Dr Roth energetically wriggled his foot. The shark held tight.