Her Final Hour: An absolutely unputdownable mystery thriller

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Her Final Hour: An absolutely unputdownable mystery thriller Page 22

by Carla Kovach


  ‘Can’t wait. Take care of yourself, Georgina.’

  ‘Don’t call me that.’

  ‘Point taken, Harte. I’ll be with you as soon as I’m able. Won’t be long. Get the coffee pot on. It will be a long night.’

  ‘The coffee pot is never off.’ She ended the call and smiled. Things didn’t feel awkward with Briggs any longer. They wouldn’t be the first or last detectives to have a fling and just get on with things after.

  She pressed play on the fuzzy CCTV showing the lead up to Lucia Ramos’s rape and watched as her attacker followed the woman between the two shops. She kept rewinding it over and over again, trying to fix his gait and presence in her memory.

  Sixty-Two

  Darrel stared out at the pastures that backed onto the detective’s cottage. He’d been staring at the same view for a couple of hours and he had no idea how much longer he’d be staring at that same view. He belched, trying to relieve his indigestion, wishing he hadn’t had a greasy bacon sandwich for lunch.

  Darkness fell as the rainy afternoon turned into early evening. Bruce grabbed the blue cord with his gloved hands and began playing with it. Every time he twisted it, Darrel wanted to grab the cord off him and fling it out of the window. Everything had seemed so clear a few days ago. He hated the detective, he really did. His hands shook. Killing a detective was in another league. Cop killer. That label was etched into his brain. Bruce flexed the washing line once again, a grin forming across his face as he anticipated his next move.

  DI Harte lived in the end plot of a nice little row of terraced cottages. They’d backed the car in, along the rough lane behind them. The long gardens ensured that they’d kept their distance from her house and the others in the row. DI Harte’s garden was a little unkempt and mostly paved, and the grey stone exterior was far from warm. When they had been in the back garden earlier, scoping it out, Darrel had noticed how bleak the interior was through the kitchen window. He’d also seen her little black cat. The creature had welcomed him into the garden and enjoyed the leftover bit of bacon sandwich he’d fed it. Part of him had wanted to wring its scrawny little neck, after all, the detective had taken his daughter away from him. He could take something she loved from her. His head was everywhere. He wanted her to pay but the ‘cop killer’ label kept milling through his mind.

  The days had passed in a blur for Darrel. His brother wasn’t speaking to him after he’d seen the bruising on Mia. He’d sworn it was Melissa in her drunken state but Alan had remembered the way he’d been treated by his brother when growing up. Darrel thought of the times he’d get Alan in a headlock and force him to eat a spoonful of mustard or the times he’d pulled his shorts down and kick him into the brook. Alan knew him more intimately than anyone and, deep down, Alan knew that he was the bully he pretended not to be. He’d tried to call and ask how Mia was but his calls had been blocked. All this because of Melissa. If only Melissa had been the good wife she’d promised to be when they had married. But no, she had to shag a stupid drama teacher and neglect their daughter and home, the home he had worked so hard to provide.

  Bruce wrapped the blue cord around his wrist, coiling it until he ran out of length. ‘Can you stop doing that?’ Darrel snapped as he watched the house. The detective’s house remained deserted.

  Bruce unravelled the cord and placed it in his lap. ‘Feeling a bit nervy, are we?’

  ‘What do you think? I shouldn’t be here. If I’m seen here, we’ve all had it. Did you think about that when you stuffed up?’

  ‘I didn’t stuff up! Everything I did was to protect the group – to protect you.’

  Darrel shook with anger as he stared at Bruce. ‘Protect me. More like protect yourself. I don’t know you—’

  ‘You were happy with me helping to take care of your wife problem. She’d been drinking and disrespecting you, not looking after your kid. Well, the deed has been done and it’s payback time. Did you think it was all about you? This society we live in, it’s diseased. Rob puts it so well. Melissa was a part of that decay, we dealt with her and we’re all in the clear. We’ll deal with the detective and we’ll all be in the clear. After all, you were at the pub with Rob and I’m not even on the scene yet. Lee will also swear I was with them. It’s all going to be fine. Anyway, you could be enjoying this rather than looking so tetchy. Remember the other night, when the detective was outside your house, how angry you were? You wanted me there, teaching the bitch a lesson. You wanted it. Don’t pretend you didn’t. After all, you made the call to Rob.’

  He couldn’t answer Bruce. He had called Rob and Rob had said he’d sort everything, and he had. Had they let their personal feelings go a bit too far? He should’ve played the game, stayed in, let the detective sit and watch. Instead, he’d been angry, wanted to teach her a lesson. He slammed his fist into the car door, rattling its frame. He was just as much to blame for things getting this far and he had to own that failure. ‘Everything is going wrong. This wasn’t meant to happen.’ His hands visibly trembled.

  ‘Look. Just calm it down. I’m going in there, alone this time. I’m going to wrap this cord around her neck until she turns blue. I’m doing this for you too. She’s coming for us. She took Mia from you. She can’t get away with that. After this, the police will have no clue as to who did what. The Cleevesford Killer did it, that’s who.’ Bruce laughed as he grabbed a forensic suit from the back seat. ‘When she gets back, I’m going to watch her until I know I can get in and be in a good position to take her on. All you need to do is have the car ready to pull away. There are three possible routes just down the road. We take the first one and keep going until we reach Rob’s.’

  Through a crack in the trees, they spotted a car rumbling past. The detective’s lights were switched on a moment later.

  Darrel began to shake. All he had to do was drive away as soon as Bruce emerged from the back of the house. They were killing a detective. He shuddered as the fantasy became a reality. ‘I don’t know if we should do this.’

  ‘Too late,’ Bruce said as he pulled the thin red mask over his face and grabbed the cord and forensic suit. ‘There’s no going back now.’

  Sixty-Three

  Gina opened the front door and Jacob followed her in. The air smelled damp and the room was a little chilly. He turned the gas fire and lamp on. She passed him and headed towards the kitchen, knowing she needed Jacob to leave soon. She didn’t want Briggs to turn up with dinner while Jacob was still here. ‘I’ll be okay now. Thanks for the lift.’ She closed her eyes and held on to the doorframe.

  ‘You don’t look so good. I can stay for a while, make you a cuppa. It’s been a long time since we’ve had a catch up. You can tell me about your holiday and all that’s been going on.’ Gina carefully stepped towards the kitchen table and sat. ‘I’m seeing someone, did I tell you?’

  She looked at her watch. Ten minutes and he had to be gone. ‘I hope it all works out for you this time.’ She booted her laptop up.

  ‘It’s early days. I met her on Tinder. She’s called Amber and lives local.’ She could tell he was trying to stick around.

  She ran her fingers through her hair. ‘Good for you. I really could do with being alone. I have a lot to crack on with and I know you have to drop by Darrel Sanderson’s. It’s getting late in the day.’

  ‘We care about you, guv. That’s all. Are you sure you’re okay?’

  She smiled. ‘Stop fussing, Driscoll. I’m a big girl. All these symptoms are normal. I just need to be left alone, in quiet, with my trusty cat, then I’ll feel better. Go and get on with your tasks. We have a killer to catch.’ He paused and smiled back. ‘Go,’ she repeated.

  ‘Anyone would think you’re trying to get rid of me. Call me if you need anything.’

  She gave him a smile. ‘Will do,’ she called as she heard him leave.

  It was almost seven in the evening. Very soon Briggs would arrive with some food. Even though there was nothing between them any more, she still didn’t want Jacob to
hang around. She swallowed. She really wasn’t too hungry. ‘Ebony,’ she called. The cat normally came home to greet her but not today. She walked over to the back door and stared into the dreary brambles and trees that almost covered the back gate. The back door key was fixed firmly in the keyhole. She pulled it out and slotted it back in a couple of times. Fixating on the other night wasn’t getting her anywhere. She’d obviously left it hanging out when she’d locked the door. She turned the key and opened the back door. A gust of wind caught her face, blowing her hair everywhere. ‘Ebony,’ she called. There was no sign of the cat. She closed the door and sat at the kitchen table, booting her laptop up.

  She clicked into the information that had been uploaded on Bruce Garrison. The only person they hadn’t managed to interview yet. He graduated in accountancy at London Metropolitan University. She flicked to another window and opened the case notes on the rape in London and re-watched the fuzzy CCTV as the attacker followed Lucia Ramos between the shops. Her attacker was broad shouldered back then, and still was. Quite tall and imposing, he walked with a purpose. She paused the footage and zoomed in. There was no use trying to identify any of his features. She zoomed out and continued playing the clip, watching him walking, trying to commit his movement patterns to memory.

  As she flicked to another page, Ebony crashed through the cat door. The back door flew open and she felt a sickening blow to her head as she toppled off the chair onto the kitchen floor. A distorted version of her own reflection stared back at her in the cooker door. The man standing over her was wearing a red mask – that same red mask she recognised from her attack. Her attacker was back to finish the job. Her reflection began to sway. Don’t lose it, Gina thought, as she tried to drag herself under the kitchen table. Her laptop crashed onto the floor, cracking down the middle. Ebony screeched as her attacker went to grab the cat. She kicked out, catching his shin. No one was hurting her cat! The man yelled. The cat clawed his arm, shredding the forensic suit. Roaring like an angry lion, the man pulled at her feet with one arm and batted Ebony away with the other. As he dragged her along the floor, she tried to grab a chair leg, or anything. He couldn’t get her into the open. She clasped both hands around the leg of a chair and it jammed against the table leg. The room ahead swayed even more as she began to see double. A hint of the same sickly aftershave she’d smelled on the night of her attack assaulted her nostrils, nauseating her. Blood trickled down the side of her head and smeared the tiles. Ebony – she forced her stiff neck up and couldn’t see the cat.

  He struck her hand and she felt her fingers losing their grip on the chair leg. She was in the open. Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted Ebony fleeing. Her cat was okay. Bringing her loose foot back as far as she could, she kicked out, trying to catch him in the groin area, but missed. He forced his leg between hers and pinned her to the floor, fixing her arms above her head.

  Her mind flashed back to a night when Terry had her in a similar position. She’d begged him leave her be but he’d ignored her pleas as she cried her way through the ordeal.

  She wasn’t begging this time. She escaped his clasp, reached out and poked a finger through the mask, piercing the cheek. He retaliated with a punch to her face, her blood smeared all over his gloved hands. ‘Get off me,’ she yelled as she tried to bring her knee up. He had her pinned with his hefty weight. He was at least fourteen stone’s worth of solid muscle. He punched her one more time. She felt her resolve weakening as everything around her went blurry. For a second, she thought he was Terry until she opened her eyes once again. His mask was tickling her face. Every muscle in her body felt like it was made of lead. ‘Let me go. I’m a police detective. You know what that means.’

  She exhaled when he straddled her and sat up, catching his breath. He reached inside his forensic suit and pulled out a piece of blue cord. Her body trembled beneath him. She brought her hands up and began punching him in the neck. He leaned back, evading all her punches. Laughing under the mask, he used both hands to turn her onto her front, then he threaded the cord underneath her chin. She thought of Hannah and Briggs. In her last moments, that was all she could do. She stared into the cooker door and saw him grabbing both sides of the cord. Shaking all over, she closed her eyes. She wasn’t going to plead for anything from this monster.

  Just as she was about to black out, he stopped throttling her with the cord. Her head hit the floor, catching her nose. She inhaled sharply and coughed. Her attacker barged out of the back door and ran. She listened as a car engine started up, followed by her back gate slamming. That same car screeched as it pulled away.

  Light shone through the front bay window. The hum of another engine was halted. She recognised that sound. It was Briggs’s car. Her attacker had seen him pulling up and had fled. Her cat wandered over and began nuzzling her neck. Dragging herself up, she grabbed onto the worktop and stumbled through the lounge towards the front door. Briggs rang the bell. She had to let him in but he couldn’t know how bad things had been. He wasn’t going to take her off the case. Seeing double or not, she was cleaning herself up and getting on with her work but this needed calling in. ‘I’m coming,’ she croaked as she held her neck.

  Stumbling to the door, with trembling fingers she fumbled with the lock. ‘I’ve just been attacked. You have to find them. Someone else was waiting in a getaway car at the back of my house. They’ve been gone about two minutes. Go quick or you’ll lose them.’ They’d already lost her attacker and she knew it. Given the three roads that they could have taken at the end of the through road, she knew getting the cavalry onto them wouldn’t happen quickly enough. They could be two to three miles away in any direction now. She slid down the wall, dragging the coats off the hooks as Briggs ran back to his car, pulling his phone out of his pocket. He dialled the station and placed it in the holder on his dashboard.

  ‘I’ll be back in a minute. I’m calling it in as I go. Help is on its way,’ he shouted as he wheel spun the car off the drive.

  As she sat there, in her hallway, fine rain blew into her face and tears meandered down her cheeks. Her attacker had been so close to killing her and she’d had no strength in her, none at all. Despite all the self-defence classes she’d taken over the years, she’d come to realise that when you’re spent, you really are spent. She sobbed, knowing that the only way she had survived that ordeal was because Briggs had arrived. Had he not planned to come over, she’d be a rotting corpse, lying on the kitchen floor, waiting for Bernard and his team to come and assess the evidence. Ebony ran over and nuzzled her once again. She picked her up and held her close, stroking her soft fur. Her mind mulled over the attack. Her attacker had struck twice. Same mask, same subtle aftershave. This was personal.

  Ebony had clawed him. She grabbed the door handle and pulled her aching body up with one hand, almost stumbling back to the floor. She staggered back to the kitchen and fumbled in the cupboard behind the door until she managed to grab hold of the cat basket. Falling to her knees, she pushed the struggling cat in and tied the strap, trapping the cat. ‘Sorry, Ebony.’ Ebony’s claws could contain his DNA. She had to contain the cat until Bernard arrived.

  They couldn’t see her like this. She wasn’t going to hospital. She ran the cold tap and swilled her face, washing the blood away. It now just looked like a bit of a scratch. The mark on her neck was a light pink colour. Her vision began to fade back into normal mode and she winced as she stretched. An ambulance pulled up and blue lights shone through her window. Briggs pulled in behind them.

  ‘I lost them,’ he called as he ran back into her house through the open door. She gazed around her house and it no longer felt like a safe place.

  ‘I can’t be here tonight and I don’t want to scare my daughter. Can I stay at yours?’ A tear slid down her face.

  He nodded. ‘Of course you can. We need to get a statement first. Can you do that now?’ He placed his hand on her shoulder and sat beside her in the living room.

  She nodded. ‘I’m going to
catch that bastard.’ She grabbed a congealed coffee cup from the hearth and flung it at the wall. She was not powerless, she was not vulnerable. She was DI Gina Harte and she was going to find out who did this to her. She was going to find out who had killed Melissa and Ellie and she was going to make them pay.

  ‘You’re not doing anything tonight.’

  ‘Watch me. Get me a new laptop sorted. We’re going to yours and we’re going to stay up all night until we come up with something. I need access to all the interviews, the photos and the evidence. You can help me or you can have a good night’s sleep and I’ll do it all myself.’

  ‘I’m with you on this one.’ She could see her own steely determination reflected in his gaze. As a paramedic entered, he nodded, then left the house to meet Jacob, who had just pulled up.

  ‘That looks like a nasty blow.’ The young female paramedic shone a pencil torch into her eyes.

  ‘I can see perfectly well,’ she said through gritted teeth as she held back her yelps. ‘Please, just patch it up.’

  ‘As a precaution, it would be best if—’

  ‘No. I’m not going anywhere.’ She grabbed the folded snuggle blanket from the back of the settee and wrapped it around her bust. Beneath it, she began removing her clothes. She knew she’d be asked for them. ‘If you want to help me, pass me some more clothes. My wardrobe and drawers are in the first bedroom upstairs. Jeans and a jumper will do.’

  The paramedic gave her a blank look. ‘I must insist—’

  ‘Look, you can help me by getting me some clothes or you can go, but I’m not going to any hospital. Please, look at me, I’m freezing now.’

 

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