‘You got any idea what that bastard’ll do to us if he hears we’ve been talking to the cops?’
‘I don’t care, Ron, OK? I’m sick of it: I’m sick of being scared all the time. I’m sick of hiding Brenda’s pictures and pretending she doesn’t exist. She was our daughter.’ Ellie took the album back, then slipped the funfair photo out from behind the clear plastic sheeting and handed it to me. ‘She disappeared four days before her birthday. Then that … card arrived, and it was exactly like the ones in the papers…’
Ron scowled. ‘Ellie, I’m warning you…’
She took a deep breath. ‘That’s what he does, isn’t it? He tortures them, and he kills them, then he sends you these sick birthday cards.’
‘Have you still got it?’
Ron snorted. ‘Have we still got it?’
Ellie shook her head. ‘Dawson’s dad took the card when he came over. The only time we’ve ever met him. He said if we told anyone about what happened, if we got the police involved, someone would burn our house down with us in it.’
Ron picked the marzipan off his Battenberg. ‘Don’t forget the rape first, that’s the best fucking bit.’
‘He was only trying to scare us.’
‘He did a bloody good job then, didn’t he? He’s a drug dealer, Ellie, he kills people all the time. It’s what they do.’ Ron wadded his marzipan into a ragged ball. ‘I don’t want to be raped…’
The school was a fancy collection of sandstone buildings on the southern outskirts of Bath, with a coat of arms mounted above the gates and a lodge house. Windows like a cathedral, crenellations, and ten or twelve acres of sweeping parkland, all hidden behind an eight-foot-high wall. Very imposing. Very exclusive. And very expensive.
Dawson Whitaker’s dad must have been shifting a hell of a lot of drugs.
I parked my crappy Renault behind a line of Range Rovers and BMW four-by-fours, none of which looked as if they’d ever seen so much as a muddy puddle. A rugby pitch was laid out in the grounds, and a group of about thirty kids sprinted up and down, passing the ball back and forth every time a bloke in a black tracksuit blew his whistle.
My phone rang. I pulled it out and read the screen: ‘Parker’. I pressed the button. ‘This important?’
Silence from the other end. Then, ‘Embers… Fuck man, I just heard. You OK?’
‘What do you think?’
‘Shite… Anything I can do? You want me to go see Michelle, or something?’
Maybe someone should. ‘She doesn’t like you, Parker.’
‘Aye, I know, but she’s family. Katie’s family. Can’t sit on my arse and do nothing.’
‘It’s not—’
‘I’ll get her flowers or something, yeah?’ A pause. ‘I’m really sorry.’
A woman appeared at my shoulder, wearing a dark trouser suit with the school crest on the breast pocket, silver hair immaculately coiffured. ‘Think we’re going to win next week, don’t you?’
I hung up on Parker, put the phone back in my pocket.
‘Which one’s Dawson Whitaker?’
A little frown. ‘I’m sorry, I don’t think we’ve met. Are you a parent?’
Until five o’clock tomorrow. I pulled out my warrant card. ‘I need to speak to Dawson.’
‘Ah, I see… Is he…?’
‘No: potential witness.’
‘Well, in that case I’m sure Mr Atkinson will be happy for you to have a word. Do follow me.’
Down the hill and across to the pitch. The massive white ‘H’ of the goal posts glowed like honey in the setting sun, the sky a deep and crystal blue.
The whistle blared and the kids changed direction again, getting slower. The guy in the tracksuit made a megaphone with his hands. ‘Come on, pick up your feet! Five more! Jenkins, don’t cuddle it: it’s a rugby ball, not your teddy bear!’
This close it was easy to pick out Brenda Chadwick’s boyfriend: still skinny; still with floppy blond hair; mouth hanging open, showing off the gap between his front teeth.
‘One second, please.’ My guide walked over to the man with the whistle. Talked to him in a low voice, pointing back at me.
He shrugged, then gave an extra long blast on the whistle. Phweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep. ‘Whitaker, over here, at the double! The rest of you: laps!’
Dawson trotted over, all elbows and knees, a rugby ball tucked under his arm. ‘Sir?’ Posh-boy accent, his voice doing that uncomfortable teeter between a wee kid’s and a proper grown-up’s.
The children thundered past, puffing and panting and groaning. Off in the middle distance, Mr Atkinson and the woman in the trouser suit shared a joke. Giving us a little privacy.
Dawson shrugged, an exaggerated gesture that seemed to haul his arms up at the elbows. ‘I don’t know. It all happened really quickly, we’d been arguing – she wanted to go to the new Disney film on the Wednesday for her birthday, I’d got tickets to an Ingmar Bergman retrospective at the Watershed. It was nothing serious. I mean the relationship and the argument.’
Relationship? He was thirteen; since when did thirteen-year-old boys call it a relationship? ‘But you saw him, right? The man who took her?’
‘It was only ever a casual thing, but she got a bit clingy. Truth be told, I was going to break it off after her birthday. Didn’t want to spoil the day.’
Yes, because nothing said HAPPY BIRTHDAY! like an evening watching Swedish existential cinema.
I pulled out the photo of Katie. ‘She’s my daughter.’
He raised an eyebrow. ‘Very gothic.’
‘The Birthday Boy’s got her and he’s going to kill her tomorrow. Did – you – see him?’
Dawson closed his mouth, looked away over my shoulder. ‘My father doesn’t like me talking to police officers. You shouldn’t have come here.’
‘He’s going to kill her.’
‘I’m sorry. I really, genuinely am.’ A small shake of the head.
And then a hand landed on my shoulder. Big hairy one, attached to a mountain of muscle in an expensive-looking suit. Sunglasses, bullet-shaped head with a crew-cut and a diamond earring. ‘This bloke botherin’ you, Dawson?’
‘Genuinely sorry.’ The kid backed away a couple of steps. ‘I have to get back to practice.’ He turned and jogged away on an intercept course with the rest of the team.
I curled my hands into fists. ‘Move your paw, or I’ll break every finger on it.’
‘You hear that, Ed? Haggis here’s gonna break my fingers for me.’
A rumble, like a bear in an echo chamber. ‘Don’t think so.’ Ed stepped in close. His face was a knot of scar tissue tied around a boxer’s nose, hair greying at the temples.
Shit – two of them. What was the point of taking the gun all the way to Bath and leaving it in the bloody car?
Up above, the sky turned the colour of blood, shadows stretching across the playing field like claws.
One last try at being civilized before the violence started. ‘I just want to know what the boy saw, that’s all. I don’t give a toss about your boss.’
A third voice. ‘Yeah, well, he gives a toss about you.’
They frogmarched me across the car park to a Range Rover with blacked-out windows.
I tried a couple of steps towards my manky Renault. ‘Need to get something from the car.’
‘Don’t be fuckin’ stupid, Haggis.’ The one with the hairy hands plipped open the Range Rover’s locks. ‘Now, you gettin’ in nice and quiet, or do we have to traumatize the little kiddies by stompin’ on your head?’
‘I don’t—’
‘Either way, you’re gettin’ in the car.’
Chin up, head high. I climbed into the back of the Range Rover. Hairy Hands got in behind the wheel. His mates piled into the back, one on either side of me. The throat-catching reek of aftershave was almost overwhelming.
The car drifted out through the gates, onto the main road.
‘Where are
we going?’
‘Shut it, Haggis. You talk when I tell you to, understand?’
Five minutes later we were parked on a tree-lined country lane surrounded by scrubby green-and-brown fields. Not a single house to be seen.
Hairy Hands turned in his seat, and looked me up and down. Smiled. ‘Ed…?’
A fist slammed into my stomach, fast, hard, sending shockwaves of fire rippling through me. I folded forwards, the air hissing from my lungs as the ache spread. Couldn’t breathe in again. Should’ve been ready for it… God…
‘Search him.’
Hands fumbled through my pockets.
Ow…
‘Ho, ho, what we got here then?’
‘Warrant card: our jock really is a cop. Fuck me, thought you bastards would be smarter than that.’
‘Nice chunk of cash in here too. What’s that look like to you: four hunnerd? Five?’
Finally, air rushed back into my lungs.
Hairy Hands pocketed my wallet. ‘You’re well off your patch, Haggis. Hasslin’ Mr Whitaker’s son, pokin’ your nose into stuff what doesn’t concern you, causin’ trouble. Not very bright, are you?’
A gurgly laugh from Ed. ‘Not very bright.’
Yeah, they were probably right.
Chapter 43
The Range Rover’s engine changed pitch – we were slowing down. A trickle of sweat ran down the side of my face. It was hot in here, under the black hood, the fabric puffing out with every suffocating breath.
Blood pounded behind my eyes, swirled in my ears. Keep breathing. Deep, calm breaths.
The Range Rover purred forwards, bumped over something, then came to a halt. They killed the engine, leaving nothing but the whine of an electric motor, then a clunk. ‘Here we go, Haggis, home sweet home.’
Someone yanked the hood off my head.
I blinked. Coughed. Dragged in a lungful of cool air.
It was a double garage, big enough for the Range Rover and an Audi R8 – stone walls, shelves of stuff in boxes, and a flickering strip-light.
Hairy Hands turned and grinned at me. ‘We ready?’
‘Why don’t you go and—’
A sharp, stinging pain exploded across the back of my head. The world went yellow, black rushed in from the corners in jagged waves.
‘Gllk…’
Couldn’t move my arms and legs. Nothing worked.
Ed dragged me out of the car, holding me up so I wouldn’t fall and make a mess on the garage floor. He was talking to Hairy Hands, but the words were all jumbled and out of synch.
Don’t be sick. Don’t be sick…
They hauled me down a flight of stairs: bare wooden beams on the ceiling, more buzzing strip-lights, the smell of damp and mould.
And then everything—
‘Gah…’ Cold water rushed down my throat, spilled out the sides of my mouth and soaked into my shirt.
‘There we go. Feelin’ better, Haggis? Thought Ed’d lamped you a bit hard there for a minute.’
I blinked, spat, coughed – every convulsion was like someone inflating my brain with a bicycle pump full of burning oil.
Why couldn’t I move…?
Shite. I was sitting in an ancient-looking wooden dining chair, ankles cable-tied to the legs, arms behind my back, fastened to the supports. So this was how Steven Wallace and Ethan Baxter must have felt: completely screwed.
It was a windowless room with a dirt floor, bare walls, and a single light bulb swinging from the ceiling. Looked as if I wasn’t the only one getting screwed in here – a grey dustsheet was draped over someone sitting in another wooden chair, a single bare foot poking out from the folds. The skin scuffed, bruised and filthy. The dustsheet was flecked with brown stains – dried blood.
Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck…
The dining table that went with the chairs was against the wall, right in front of me – the surface stained and scratched. Hairy Hands settled back against it and folded his arms. ‘You know the rules here, right? Or do you need me to repeat them?’
‘I know the rules.’
A nod. ‘Why you poking about in Mr Whitaker’s business?’
‘I’m not. I told you: I don’t give a toss about your boss, I just want to know—’
Ed’s fist slammed into my stomach again. At least this time I had time to clench. Still stung like a bastard though.
I wheezed in another breath.
Hairy Hands tutted. ‘Said you knew the rules, Haggis. No porkies. Is there an investigation goin’ on? That why you’re down here from…’ He pulled out my warrant card. ‘Where the fuck’s “Oldcastle”?’
‘The Birthday Boy’s got my daughter. I need—’
Another punch drove the air from my lungs, set fire to my stomach muscles, made me retch.
‘Ghhhh… Will you stop doing that!’
Ed grinned. ‘Not very bright.’
‘So come on, Haggis, what they investigatin’? Someone been talkin’, have they? Tellin’ stories out of school?’
‘The Birthday—’
My head snapped to the right. Blood roared in my ears, pins and needles spreading across my cheek. Like being stung by a six-foot-tall bee with a face like a dog’s arse.
‘Not buyin’ it, Haggis.’
‘The Birthday Boy’s got my daughter. He got Dawson’s girlfriend. Dawson saw him. He—’
Back to the stomach again. I curled up as far as I could and let it wash over me, breathing through gritted teeth. ‘Call the … call the station and ask.’
‘Nah, this is much more fun.’
I nodded. ‘OK, OK. I’ll tell you the truth. I’m part of a special task force investigating drug trafficking in the area. The local cops are compromised so we’re using out-of-towners. My movements are being monitored and they know where I am right now. The whole building’s wired.’
‘And who told you about us?’
I glanced at Ed, and back again. Licked my lips. ‘I can’t tell you that.’
A slow clap came from somewhere behind me. ‘Oh, bravo.’ A woman’s voice, soft and flowing. ‘I loved the bit where you looked at Edward. Like you were trying not to drop him in it? Very smooth.’
She walked over to the table. Tall, elegant, wearing a black dress and high heels, long brown hair spilling down to the small of her back. High cheekbones, eyebrows plucked to a delicate line, dark-red lipstick on a small delicate mouth, diamond earrings. A plain gold wedding ring on her finger. ‘Eugene, be a darling: take the gentleman’s credentials away and check them out. Oh, and while you’re there, let’s have the party starter kit.’
‘No problems, Terri.’
She leaned back against the wood, gave me a dazzling smile.
Dawson Whitaker’s dad must’ve been doing better than I thought if he could afford a trophy wife that good.
‘You didn’t really learn about our little operation from Edward, did you. You were having Eugene on.’ The smile faded a little. ‘I do so hate deception, don’t you?’
‘They wouldn’t believe me when I told them the truth.’ I tensed, ready for Ed’s fist, but it didn’t come.
Terri reached over and took hold of the dust sheet, then whipped it off: as if she were performing a magic trick.
A woman was tied to the chair, in her bra and pants, her torso covered in bruises, swollen mouth crusted with blood. Broken nose and two black eyes. The hair hacked off on one side of her head.
‘Take Virginia here. Virginia’s a post-operative transsexual, she works as an escort: the kind that negotiates optional extras. For a fee you can fuck a woman who used to be a man.’ Terri ran a finger along the battered woman’s collarbone. Virginia flinched…
Terri raised an eyebrow at me. ‘Would you like that? Would that be something new and exciting for you?’
‘No.’
‘Only Virginia isn’t really a post-operative transsexual, is she? She’s just an ugly whore.’ Terri’s hand flashed
out and Virginia’s head rocked back. Fresh blood dribbled bright red from the corner of her mouth. ‘Pretending she used to be a man. Conning her clients. Taking their money and lying to them.’
Paging Mrs Psycho…
‘Can you believe anyone could be so dishonest?’ A frown marred Terri’s smooth forehead. ‘To lie like that…’
Virginia hung her head, shoulders trembling, making little gasping sobs.
‘Oh, stop whining you little bitch, it’s your own fault. Kenneth paid you good money for your filthy lies, how could you take advantage of a man IN A FUCKING WHEELCHAIR?’ Face scarlet, spittle flying.
A thump behind me and a draught of cool air on my back, then Eugene Hairy Hands appeared, holding a sports bag in one paw and a cheap-looking mobile in the other. A burner. Pay-as-you-go. The kind of phone that could be used and ditched. He placed the bag on the table.
Terri straightened up, wiped a hand across her chin. ‘Eugene?’
‘Detective Constable Ash Henderson, Oldcastle Police, used to be a DI but got busted down ’cos some paedo got killed. And the Birthday Boy really did grab his daughter. My mate says it’s all over the jock papers.’
Finally. ‘That’s what I’ve been telling you!’
The frown was back, but this time it came with a little pout. ‘So all that nonsense about a task force and everyone knowing where you are… That was a lie.’
‘They wouldn’t believe the bloody truth! What was I supposed—’
A left to the face, hard enough to make the chair groan beneath me. Everything tasted of blood. I spat out a mouthful of scarlet.
‘Yeah.’ Hairy Eugene dumped my wallet beside the holdall. ‘And that’s not the only thing: he’s bent. Works for some local hood called Andy Inglis.’
‘Oh, don’t look so glum, Constable Henderson, we’re only teasing you.’ Terri smiled. ‘We’ve been expecting you all day.’ She held out a hand. ‘Eugene: phone, please.’
Eugene handed it over and Terri punched in a number. Waited.
‘Hello, Maeve? … How are things up there in sunny Oldcastle? … Yes… That’s right…’ She looked at me. ‘Yes, he did: thanks again for the tip-off… I know… He does a bit. Do you want a word?’ A nod. ‘OK, here you go…’ She handed the phone back to Eugene. ‘Maeve would like a word with our guest.’
Birthdays for the Dead Page 34