I’m here. Fire’s lit, mince pies in the oven, brandy snaps at the ready. Thought we could watch that film you recorded last week ☺ see you soon. Drive safely. Love Mum xx
Steph smiled and let the tears run down her cheeks unhindered.
Her headlights lit up the road and the woods to her right. The snow was lying like a blanket at the base of the trees. As she began to pull away she saw the truck up ahead, tucked into the side of the road. She pulled her car forward a few feet until her headlights illuminated the 4x4. She braked. It looked parked. She hadn’t noticed it before, its white paint camouflaged by the snow. Her pulse jumped in her neck. She couldn’t take her eyes off it. She held her breath, waiting for the lights to come on, to blind her as the car raced towards her – but nothing happened. The car remained dormant, its owner nowhere in sight. She let out the breath she was holding and reached for her phone. She tapped out a reply to her mother:
I’ll be home in ten. Love you too xx
She pressed send and tucked her phone into her handbag.
Her door was open and she was being dragged out by her hair before she knew what was happening. She could feel the snow and mud soaking into her jeans as she slid along the ground. She twisted and thrashed, trying to free herself but the hand gripped the top of her head like a vice, her hair straining at the root. The pain was excruciating. She flipped over until she was looking down at the road. It was soon replaced by a grass verge buried deep in snow. It covered her face, water trickling into the corners of her mouth, and then she was in the wood. She could see the tree roots passing her, the leaves bunching up at her waist as her body cleared a path behind her. She opened her mouth and screamed with every ounce of energy she could muster. The punch came hard and fast into the side of her head. The ground blurred beneath her. She could taste blood. Another blow rang in her ear, sending pain right down her spine. She reached up and held on to the hand that was holding her. Her scalp was on fire. She pulled herself towards the hand and felt a moment of relief as her hair slackened, but then she was flying through the air, landing on her back with a thud, the air rushing out of her lungs. Before she could take a breath he was on top of her, his knees pinning her upper arms to the ground, his body sitting heavy on her chest, crushing her. The blows came one after the other after the other, until she lost count and consciousness.
When she tried to open her eyes she found she couldn’t. She couldn’t breathe. His hands were around her neck, pushing her throat into the ground. She kicked and bucked, her hands finding his face, her nails raking the soft skin of his cheeks over and over. He cried out as he shifted his weight. She could feel his legs entwining with hers as he tried to restrain her. His grip around her throat loosened. A voice inside her head screamed at her, it’s now or never, Steph. It’s now or never. Fight or die. Fight or die. She balled her hands into fists at her side, taking as long a breath as his hand allowed as she brought her knee up hard into his crotch. He grunted like a wounded animal and rolled off her. She willed her body to move, but she felt welded to the floor. It’s now or never, Steph, the voice said again. Fight or die. She pushed herself up and onto her side. He was curled up in a ball next to her, moaning. She took a breath, then another, then another. She could almost feel the oxygen filling up her red blood cells, reviving her. She turned onto her knees and used a tree to drag herself to her feet. She took one step and steadied herself. Her head felt like a bowling ball weighing her down. She felt his hand around her ankle. She didn’t think. She didn’t look back. She just kicked and kicked until her foot fell free.
And then she was running and stumbling between the trees. The sound of her feet was deafening but she wouldn’t stop. She pushed herself to keep going, to put as much distance between her and the devil as she could. She slipped and fell to her knees. She could hear him grunting somewhere off to her right. He was calling out to her but it wasn’t her name he was calling.
‘Annie,’ he growled. ‘Annie.’
Steph turned away from his voice and kept going, slipping and tripping over and over again. She wanted to cry out, to scream her name, to tell him she wasn’t Annie, she wasn’t the one he wanted, but her mouth felt welded shut, her tongue swollen and useless. His shouts were angrier and more insistent. Whoever Annie was, Steph realized she was going to die in her stead. Her knee struck something, a pain shooting into her hip. She pushed herself up but collapsed back down, lying on her side, her left leg useless. She held her breath and listened. She could hear him cursing, spitting and sniffing. He was coming for her.
She pulled herself back towards the base of a large tree, another lying dead on its side next to it. There was a gap between them of a few feet. She pushed her legs in first and then wriggled and shuffled backwards, the pain in her leg making her bite down on her lip, drawing fresh blood. She couldn’t make a sound. She couldn’t give away her position. That’s all he would need. She was injured. She couldn’t run and she couldn’t fight him.
She tucked her head under the roots of the fallen tree and dragged leaves and snow around her as best she could. She kept her breathing shallow and quiet. She was trembling, her eyes wide with terror. She could hear him.
He was hunting her.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
14th December – Monday
‘This is a nightmare,’ Lockyer said, dropping his head in his hands. He had hoped time and distance from this morning’s breakfast revelation would make him feel better. It hadn’t. ‘Townsend is meant to be the clueless one . . . not us and yet it took an eight-year-old to tell us how to do our jobs.’ Jane’s son had proved himself quite the historian. His fascination with the Quantocks had involved, up to now, endless tales of dragons and sightings of the ghost dog that was meant to haunt the hills at night. Lockyer had, for the most part, tuned the kid out. That was until Peter had mentioned John Walford. Peter knew every gory detail. He knew more than they did, and therein lay the problem. Lockyer sat back and looked out the conference room window at the winter sun bathing the NHS depot. ‘I still can’t believe you didn’t check.’
‘Why didn’t you check?’ she shot back. ‘I thought you did check. You were the one banging on about local legends.’ He could see that her mood was almost as black as his, so perhaps now wasn’t the time to pass the buck or cast aspersions on her son. ‘You looked up all that stuff about Wayland’s Pool, didn’t you? I assumed if there was something more on Walford, you’d have found out then and told me.’ He could see by her expression that even she didn’t buy her last statement.
‘You’re the one who brought it to me,’ he said. ‘Barney told you about the Evans case and you passed on what I assumed was all the information – all the information, Jane, not just what Barney-bloody-rubble had told you.’ He gritted his teeth as she opened her mouth to argue with him, but then her shoulders dropped.
‘This is pointless, Mike,’ she said, reaching up and pulling on the back of her neck. ‘The fact is, neither of us looked any more into the Walford murder because we assumed . . . wrongly assumed that what Barney had told me and what Townsend told you was the full story – all we needed to know. It’s not like we didn’t do anything about it. We might not have had all the facts but we still did something. We’re looking into the Chloe Evans case in connection to Pippa’s. We’ve spoken to the locals about both girls, about Ashworth and Dead Woman’s sodding Ditch.’
‘Small mercies,’ he said, feeling his anger dissipate. Besides, blaming Jane wasn’t making him feel any better. ‘No wonder the bloody locals were . . . are shitting themselves. If I thought some nut-job was stalking the sodding hills carrying out some sick homage to a two-hundred-year-old murder, I think I’d be more than a bit perturbed as well.’
‘Maybe,’ she said, ‘but I think the question here should be, why didn’t Townsend tell us?’
‘Why would he?’ he said, feeling his anger rise again. ‘As far as Townsend’s concerned, Pippa was killed by a drunk driver—’
‘Who stayed to watch?’ Jane was i
ncredulous.
‘That fact seems to have passed him by, Jane,’ he said, huffing out a breath. ‘He thinks we’re wasting time even looking at the Chloe Evans case, and as far as the legends and John Walford goes? Townsend thinks they’re the very reason his case against Ashworth fell on its arse, so . . .’ The door to the conference room opened before Lockyer could finish. Townsend bustled in, looking sweaty and harassed. His day was about to get worse.
‘Sorry I’m late,’ he said, out of breath. ‘I was just on the phone with South West Forensics. They’ve sent through the results on the tyre tracks and footwear casts taken from the Jones crash site. I’ve got Abbott and Pimbley doing a cross-check on the off chance we get a hit. I had a brief look at the data. The impressions left were from a 4x4.’
‘We already know we’re looking for a 4x4,’ Lockyer said, balling his hands into fists in an attempt to keep his temper. ‘I emailed you and the team with the update I got from Linda at South West Forensics . . . yesterday.’ He bit down hard. Now was not the time to go off the deep end. Depending on what Townsend said, though, it might be soon. ‘I went over it again in the briefing this morning. But of course, you weren’t here.’
‘Traffic was terrible,’ Townsend said. He pulled out a chair and sat down, running his hand through his greying hair. He seemed oblivious to the atmosphere in the room. Lockyer looked at Jane. She opened her hands, palms up in a ‘search me’ gesture.
‘How’s Aaron this morning?’ Townsend asked. ‘I heard there was trouble over at the Farmer’s Arms last night?’
‘He’s very hung-over,’ Lockyer said, not grateful for the reminder of his second run-in with PC Aaron Jones – though what Cassie was playing at, taking him on a pub crawl in the first place, was anyone’s guess. She was asking for trouble. According to Megan, Cassie had as good as dragged Aaron out of the house. ‘I spoke to my daughter on the way down from Clevedon this morning. She said she’d be keeping him in bed for the foreseeable.’ He frowned as the dual meaning of his statement hit home. He pushed away his jam doughnut. He had lost his appetite.
‘I was more concerned with the man he assaulted.’
‘It’d take a bigger man than Aaron to “assault” Barney,’ Lockyer said. ‘You could run that guy down and end up with more damage to your car than him.’
‘An unfortunate analogy, Mike,’ Townsend said, brandishing a cardboard folder. ‘Anyway, I’ve got the Jenkins file here. It took me a while to get the paper copy because it was in the coroner’s archive rather than CID’s.’ Jane held out her hands and he tossed it across the table to her. She fell on it like Oliver on a bowl of gruel. ‘Pimbley tells me Barney dated Jones?’
‘They went on one date,’ Jane said without looking up. ‘The thing with Aaron was a misunderstanding – gossip from another pub his sister had . . . embellished.’
She dragged her eyes away from the Jenkins file for a moment. It was clear from her expression that the information she was providing was to be taken as fact and not questioned further. Lockyer had tried to play devil’s advocate in the car this morning as to why Barney had underplayed his relationship with Pippa, but Jane wouldn’t have it.
‘He didn’t say anything before,’ she said now, ‘because for one thing, he didn’t see the relevance and for another, he didn’t see the point in wasting police time with something and nothing.’ Neither Townsend nor Lockyer spoke. ‘I made it very clear that it is not his place to decide what is and what isn’t important in a murder investigation. He has apologized and I’ve made an appointment for him to come into the station later today to give a full statement.’ She resumed her appraisal of the Jenkins file. End of discussion, it seemed.
Townsend looked at Lockyer and scratched behind his ear. ‘Right,’ he said, raising his eyebrows. ‘I guess we’ll have to take his word on that.’ Lockyer saw Jane flinch. ‘I was just in with Superintendent Atkinson. He was telling me you wanted the Jenkins file in relation to the Jones case?’
‘Yes,’ Jane said. ‘We were hoping to take a look at it last night, but Atkinson felt it best to wait for you . . . given you are the DI in charge of the Jones investigation.’ She sounded as pissed off as Lockyer felt, although he knew he had no one to blame for his own irritation. Despite Townsend’s title, Lockyer was the DI in charge in all but name. He should have looked into the Walford connection. It was his responsibility, not Jane’s – not even Townsend’s.
‘I know,’ Townsend said. ‘I must have just missed you. I left right after a meeting with Atkinson. Sorry about that.’ He didn’t sound contrite. ‘What’s the issue? Where does it fit in with the Jones case?’ His inquiry appeared genuine.
‘So you’ve not heard of the Jenkins case before?’ Jane asked, sitting back in her chair and crossing her arms. She was wearing her faux-indulgent face. Lockyer was more used to seeing it directed at him.
Townsend turned down his bottom lip. ‘No, should I?’
‘Andrea Jenkins was killed two years ago,’ Lockyer said.
‘Two years ago today, as it happens,’ Jane said, flicking through the file and throwing Townsend occasional looks of disapproval. Lockyer thought she would have made an excellent headmistress. She had that kind of reserved anger that could still a schoolboy’s blood.
‘She was walking home from the Carew Arms in Crowcombe,’ Lockyer said. ‘According to the father, the police said Jenkins was clipped by a passing vehicle . . . it was assumed a 4x4, as they might not have felt the impact and therefore wouldn’t have stopped. She fell into a ditch before climbing out and crawling halfway across a field before she succumbed to her injuries and eventually died of exposure from hypothermia.’ Townsend was nodding as Lockyer spoke, but if anything in what he had said had sparked his interest, it didn’t show on the guy’s face. ‘This happened less than half a mile from where Chloe Evans’s body was found, and just over that distance from where Pippa Jones’s car left the road.’
‘Right,’ Townsend said, frowning.
‘We’re thinking there could be a connection,’ Jane said, not even trying to disguise her irritation.
Lockyer held up his hand. ‘I wouldn’t go quite that far,’ he said, feeling Jane’s eyes turn on him. ‘However, given the proximity, age and sex of the victims, et cetera, we certainly think it warrants further investigation, especially given what we now know about the Evans case.’ There was no getting away from his mistake. If Lockyer didn’t own it now, it would come out later – the truth always did. ‘We only found out the full details of the Jane Walford murder this morning.’
‘I’m afraid you’ve lost me, Mike,’ Townsend said, looking from him to Jane and back again. A ray of sunlight shone through the windows of the conference room and seemed to put the bewildered DI in a spotlight.
‘No surprise there,’ Jane said under her breath as she turned another page in the Jenkins file. Even Lockyer was surprised by her attitude. He wasn’t having the best morning, but she seemed livid. He was more used to being the hothead. He wasn’t sure how to handle this new side of her. It was unnerving.
‘Bill, given what happened to Jane Walford, the manner and method of Chloe Evans’s death was at best a cause for concern, at worst, evidence of a ritualistic killing . . . a copycat,’ Lockyer said, choosing his words with care. He didn’t know why, but he felt like he wanted to at least give Townsend the chance to explain himself. ‘It’s standard procedure with a case like that, like Chloe’s, to cross-reference for any similar deaths to ensure you’re not looking at some kind of serial offender.’
‘Serial offender?’ Townsend said. ‘Are you being serious?’
‘Of course,’ Jane said, unable, it seemed, to hold her tongue any longer. ‘Chloe Evans’s murder wasn’t just similar to Jane Walford’s back in . . . seventeen-whatever-it-was.’ She held up her index finger on her right hand. ‘Chloe was heavily pregnant.’ Another finger shot up to meet its neighbour. ‘She had a contusion on the back of the head –’ and another – ‘and her throat was cut.’
The final finger made four. ‘And . . . she was dumped in Dead Woman’s Ditch. It’s damn near identical.’
Townsend closed his eyes for a second, and then opened them again. ‘Detective Bennett, I know who killed Chloe Evans,’ he said, ‘and I assure you it wasn’t John Walford or someone trying to emulate his work.’ It was clear he was now the one trying to control his temper. The sun disappeared behind a cloud and his face was thrown into shadow. ‘Ashworth is a local boy and despite playing the fool, he’s anything but. I’ve no doubt he knew what would happen when he set that poor girl up . . . staged her body as if it was some kind of sick tribute or copycat, as you put it.’ He turned his gaze on Lockyer. ‘Trust me when I tell you it was all theatre. I’ve met the boy.’ He sighed, closing his eyes again. When he opened them he seemed to have regained his composure. ‘I know, I know, you’ve been out to speak to the local residents. I understand. The same exact thing happened to me. I suppose you’ve heard about strange goings-on . . . that the land is cursed – animals disappearing, or dropping down dead for no reason?’ he asked, raising an eyebrow. Lockyer thought about Goodland’s sheep’s head story. ‘I can see by your face, Mike, that you have. You are being dragged into the same dead-end Bermuda triangle nonsense I was.’ He huffed out a laugh. ‘It’s a relief, if I’m honest.’
‘A relief?’ Lockyer asked, feeling the tendrils of doubt creeping into his mind. Jane, in contrast, was so focused on the Jenkins file it was as if Lockyer and Townsend weren’t even in the room.
‘Yes,’ Townsend said with a smile. ‘I thought it was just me. But if they can throw two seasoned London detectives off with their tales of the supernatural then at least it goes to show I’m not crazy.’ He paused. ‘Do you seriously think there’s someone prowling the Quantock Hills wreaking Walford’s revenge, seeking out victims, Mike?’ Lockyer sniffed and pushed his tongue against the back of his teeth. The way Townsend put it, it did sound ludicrous. ‘I looked at the file. Andrea Jenkins died of exposure after being knocked down, no doubt pissed, on her way home from the pub. Hardly the stuff of legends. And Pippa Jones?’ He raised his eyebrows even higher. ‘She was run off the road by another car. Not very eighteenth-century, is it?’ He held up his hand as Lockyer opened his mouth to speak. ‘The recording,’ he said. ‘You’re going to tell me I’m ignoring the fact that we heard the other vehicle in the background . . . that whoever it was appears to have waited, to have watched.’ Lockyer found himself unable to interject. In spite of himself, he wanted to hear what Townsend had to say, as so far the guy was making sense. He didn’t sound crazy. If anything, he was the calmest one in the room, if Jane’s huffing and puffing was anything to go by. ‘If you had just driven someone off the road either in a rage or pissed, Mike, wouldn’t you stop? Wouldn’t you sit in your car thinking, fuck, fuck, what have I done?’ He stopped, as if waiting for Lockyer to agree. With reticence, Lockyer nodded. ‘So he drove off?’ Townsend said. ‘He – or she – realized what they had done, and drove off. Even pissed out of their minds they would know that death by dangerous driving carries a prison term. How many people have you arrested in your career, Mike, who panicked and left the scene of a crash . . . a fight, a murder?’
The Night Stalker (Detective Jane Bennett and Mike Lockyer series Book 4) Page 22