And he knew exactly who was to blame. He’d seen that face before, remembered it vividly. Another favourite of the journalists, that one, but he was with the police now. He was the key to finding his freebird.
If he got to Jason Carr, he could have his freebird once more.
Chapter Forty-Eight: I Don’t Like Mondays
“I’m heading back to London.”
Bryn looked up from his desk to look at Eleanor questioningly. She was dressed in another sharp suit, this one in mauve with a frilly white blouse. And his ex-wife said he didn’t notice these things. “Already? You don’t want to wait until the thing is done?”
But Eleanor shook her head with a small smile.
“You’re doing a good job,” she said with surprising honesty, and Bryn felt his cheeks flush with pride. “Don’t let anyone above tell you otherwise. Besides, you’re close to him now and the girl’s safe.” Her face settled into an expression of disgust. “There’s word of a copycat in Manchester. I’m going to try to nip it in the bud before the situation escalates.”
Before there are three dead bodies and a hostage, Bryn thought grimly. He’d always be twitchy about missing persons from now on.
“Any last insights before you head off?” he asked, genuinely interested in what she had to say. She might be a bit odd and a bit English, but her heart was in the right place, and she was smart in ways he could never hope to be.
She studied the whiteboard carefully before gesturing towards her profile of the killer. “He’ll be in work today. He’ll have to be. But he will make a move for Carla, either today or tomorrow. He may have been patient before, played hard to get, but he’s had a taste of her now—he’ll be back for more.”
A chill crawled down his spine at her words and his hand unconsciously reached for the phone, thinking about adding another officer to Carla’s hospital room. Eleanor nodded to him and waved as she left, and Bryn watched her go with a sadness that surprised him.
But then he was back to the work, and she soon faded into the background of his memory, like old marks on a chalkboard.
* * *
All around her were dead ends and windows not yet open. It was a miserable day to be alive.
Amy stewed on the sofa, counting down the minutes until Jason came back and made lunch. Then he could get started on the list of places to visit on Laurie’s schedule. She’d shaded in the details since she’d handed the copy to Bryn, even going so far as to devise a route through town that would most efficiently cover the places Laurie visited before she died.
But first Jason had some errands of his own—picking up a few things to put in the room downstairs, stopping his benefits, checking in with his mother. Amy liked Gwen because she clearly cared about Jason. She’d stuck by him even after he stole that car, after prison. She was resourceful and she was tough and, if Amy ever grew up out of this shadowed half-life, she wanted to be a woman like Gwen Carr.
Amy had still been working on the CCTV composite when he left, mumbling complaints about the phone signal on the ground floor. She’d barely acknowledged him, putting the finishing touches on the killer’s face. It still wasn’t perfect and she was uncertain about the width of his eyes, but it was better than nothing. She’d sent it off to Bryn with a deep sense of satisfaction.
However, her productivity had left her with nothing to do. Melody’s phone, now slightly less soggy, was still transferring data to AEON but Amy wasn’t convinced anything workable would come out of it. And once she’d accessed Jason’s police statement and noted the reference to ticket machines, she had started work on accessing their records only to discover their servers were painfully slow and surprisingly resistant to an enterprising hacker. She’d given up on the personal touch and was now throwing her suite of cracking tools at it in the hope that something would penetrate. Meanwhile, Bryn was trying to gain the intel through old-fashioned policing—she had six spring rolls riding on his failure.
AEON beeped at her, then trilled again. Two alerts—almost worth getting off the sofa. Amy made a halfhearted effort to move, then sank back down. In a minute. Maybe when Jason got back.
She pulled her dressing gown closer around her. Jason would have to investigate the heating—it was too damn cold in here. There must be a draught coming in from somewhere, and he would probably know how to do something about that. It was useful having an assistant.
He would be disappointed, though, if she hadn’t finished this when he got back. Especially if he found her in exactly the same position on the sofa. He’d started going on about deep vein thrombosis and not drinking enough fluids, and she’d eventually relented and had another cup of tea. It was worse than having a mother. In fact, that particular paranoia had likely originated with Gwen.
Amy prised herself off the sofa cushions and shuffled over to AEON’s flashing screen. Melody’s phone data, such as it was, was ready for perusal, and the creaky old train ticketing system had finally relented and let her in. Lured by the hope of a man stupid enough to use his credit card, Amy went for the train tickets first and remotely connected to the little machine at Cardiff Queen Street.
AEON beeped again. Amy flicked open the alert—one of the external perimeter wires had tripped. It was the bloody pigeons again. She had been tempted to order a crossbow to rid herself of that menace once and for all.
The alarm beeped again. With a growl of frustration, Amy switched off the feeds from the perimeter sensors. How was she meant to work with all these unnecessary beeps?
While the ticketing machine data slowly loaded, Amy opened Melody’s data in a phone emulator and tried to make sense of the files. Some were corrupted beyond all recognition and she might have to go down into the raw data to find anything useful in them. A handful of contacts had both name and number, and a smattering of old text messages were available, but none particularly recent or relevant. Amy made a note of her most frequent text contacts regardless, but didn’t expect them to yield much. Bryn and Jason had already exhausted those avenues.
The ticket machine finally connected and Amy trawled Sunday evening for purchases. Twenty-six people had used the machine after eight o’clock that evening and only five of them had used a card. The rest were cash purchases, mostly to local stations, but Amy plotted all the destinations on a map. She also flagged the stops en route, in case he had both brains and means to purchase beyond his true station stop. The five card purchases traced to one woman and four men. Of the men, one was geriatric, so that left three potentials. Amy started an automated background search on the names, looking for addresses, workplaces, social networking, and returned to Melody’s phone.
She hoped that Jason would be pleased with how productive she was being. Maybe he would make her more spaghetti, or something different. He’d mentioned sausage and mash the other day, and her mouth had watered at the prospect of onion gravy.
Melody had the usual apps, some games, social networks, a few university-relevant items, and a browser with eight open tabs. Amy flicked through what remained of Melody’s notes—books for class, National Insurance number, a postcode, shopping list, university email address. Of all of them, only the NI number and postcode were created in the timeframe between Katie’s death and Melody’s.
She stuck the postcode into her map search and reviewed the background checks. One unemployed divorcé, one single athletic primary school teacher, and...
Amy stopped. She returned to the map search and zoomed in on the one highlighted building in the City Centre.
That was the connection. Of course. How could she have been so stupid? That was what all three of them had in common—it was staring her right in the face. She’d been so bogged down in the who and the why and the where that she’d completely ignored the what.
Suddenly, a terrible thought occurred to her. A painful, twisting thought that made her blood run cold. Jason had gone into
town this morning. What if the killer knew Jason? What if she’d sent him into the lion’s den?
Amy reached for her phone and started texting him. She had to warn him. She had to be subtle, in case the killer was sitting in front of him. Oh God, please let it not be too late—
Hands grasped her from behind and hauled her back out of her chair. Amy shrieked and tried to pull away, but he was strong, seeking out the flesh of her neck. He’d strangled those girls. She was next.
Amy twisted and fought, trying to scream against the pressure on her neck. But he was dragging her backwards towards the kitchen, her feet slipping out from under her.
“I’m afraid no one can hear you,” he said, calmly. “But he’ll be home soon, won’t he? We’ll just wait for him over here.”
This was it—she was going to die. She had to focus, she had to find something strong inside her. She stilled in his arms, dropping her hands from his scrabbling hold on her shoulders. “Good girl,” he said. Her fingers tugged at her dressing gown belt and slid free of the heavy robe. She seized the handle of her chair and swung it at him. She saw it collide and then fled, running for the end of the corridor.
She grasped for the light switch and the lift doors shuddered open. Flinging herself inside, she pressed urgently at the ground floor button. At the end of the corridor, she saw a figure lurch into view. She realised she was somehow still holding her phone and, as the doors closed, she pressed Send.
“Please,” she begged. “Send, please send...”
The lift descended, the sound of banging and shouting coming from the floor above. The doors finally opened and she staggered out, before regaining her mind and shoving her arm in the door. The doors jerked open and she slid down, sitting in the doorway to prevent the lift moving.
She looked at her phone. No signal. She was alone in her house with a serial killer and Jason was walking into a trap.
“Fuck,” she said and banged her head against the door, praying for deliverance.
Chapter Forty-Nine: When the Man Comes Around
The walk from his mam’s to Amy’s was brisk and chilly, wet leaves on the pavement and frost in the air. His broken arm hung uselessly under his jacket, fingers changing from white to blue, and Jason figured it was time to invest in some gloves.
He touched the gun in his jacket pocket, the metal cold enough to burn. He hoped the weather didn’t affect the mechanism. His dad would never forgive him for letting the weapon go like this, unoiled and unloved. Then again, his dad probably wouldn’t have approved of him carrying it through the streets either.
Jason stopped for milk and bread on the way back, wondering if they were running out of tea. It was nice to buy groceries again, not just take what the prison guard gave you or what his mam deemed was good and proper for him to eat. He could get used to this. He juggled the bag, easing it onto his forearm, and clumsily tucked his change into his pocket.
When he was about two streets away, a text came through from Amy. With numb fingers, he struggled to get to his phone to read it. It made no sense. DONT GO 2 JOB CENTRE. THER
It ended abruptly without her usual @, and he guessed she’d sent it by accident. He waited for the rest of the message to come through, dodging left and right to get a better signal, to no gain.
Anyway, he was only five minutes away now. If she needed him to fetch something, he could always go back out—after he’d had a cup of tea and some toast. Wishing he could stuff his freezing hands in his pockets, he continued on his way, whistling “Eye of the Tiger” under his breath. He needed to watch those movies again—they’d been his dad’s favourites. Maybe he could talk Amy into a marathon? Though she might make him watch some shit like AI or Gattaca and those did not have nearly enough explosions or fight scenes for his taste.
As he approached Amy’s house, the door remained closed. She obviously hadn’t moved from the sofa since he’d left. He’d have to give her the thrombosis lecture again. Jason spoke gibberish at the intercom, waiting for it to recognise his voice, and the door clicked open.
The lift doors opened and Jason started planning lunch in his head. Maybe sandwiches? He was sure he’d got some cheese in—
There was blood in the hallway.
Jason paused, every nerve in his body screaming at how wrong the sight was. His mind flashed back to Laurie and Gina’s house, the dead girl stretched out on the bed, staring eyes and dripping blood. He abandoned the groceries, and the gun slid into his hand like it belonged there, his unsteady left hand suddenly sure.
He inched down the corridor to the first patch of blood, inky dark. It seemed someone had staggered down the hallway to the very end, retreating into the darkness. Suppressing his instinct to follow the blood, Jason edged closer to the living room doorway and peered round.
The office chair was on its side on the floor, blood spattered on the wall, and the end table upended on the sofa. He crept through the living room, his heartbeat steady, his breathing quiet. He had stalked people on the street for money. He could do it again for Amy.
Jason studied the kitchen from his vantage point by the sofa. No breathing carried through, no motion disturbed the air. He looked inside—empty, untouched. He turned and retreated back the way he came, finally able to follow the blood trail through Amy’s flat. He both hoped and feared to find her at the end of it.
As he got closer, he could see that the blood led to the concealed lift, red smears on the wall that made up its hiding place. Had she made it inside? Was the lack of body in the corridor due to the fact that she had escaped in the lift? Had she shut the killer on the outside? And, more important, was he still here, waiting to finish her?
The bathroom door was closed. Bracing himself beside the door frame, he counted to three and then kicked it open. Clear. The sound echoed, loud and sharp, and Jason was aware he’d given away his position. Shit, this wasn’t Call of Duty. People could die if he fucked this up. There were no bonus lives. There were no second chances.
Only the bedroom door remained before he ventured towards the lift. It was slightly ajar and, as Jason inched closer, he noticed a smear of blood on the door handle. It didn’t make sense. If she’d run for the lift, why hadn’t she used it? If he’d caught her there, he would’ve cornered her—there would’ve been no escape. It made no sense for there to be blood on the bedroom door handle.
He didn’t have time for a logic puzzle. He only had time for Amy, to find her and get them both out alive. Jason stepped forward, raising the gun to head height and pushing open the door with the back of his hand.
The bed was in its usual disarray, but the heavy curtains were flung open, daylight streaming into the room through the floor-to-ceiling windows. The low wintery sun was blinding and Jason squinted against the light. He belatedly realised that they weren’t windows at all but doors, flung wide to the tiny balcony beyond.
A rope was tied to the balcony rail. There was blood on the tile. Jason could only think the worst, a vision of Amy sprawled on the ground below, neck at an impossible angle. Like that photograph of Melody, forever seared into his mind.
He hurried forward, crossing the room with great strides until he reached the edge of the balcony, and dared to look down. No Amy. Just a rope tied to the balcony, hanging to the ground. She wasn’t dead. “Thank fuck—”
A savage blow against his back sent him crashing forward into the railings, his ribs and shattered arm screeching their agonised protest at the impact. Jason twisted and tried to get the gun up, but it was knocked out of his hand, skittering across the tile. He met his attacker face-to-face and, for a split second, froze completely. But he knew this man. He’d seen him only this morning—at the Job Centre.
“Martin?” he said, disbelieving, before ducking a punch, pulled back into the struggle for his life. The man clawed at his neck, trying to strangle him, but Jason shouldered him back, givi
ng himself some space. If he could stop Martin from herding him against the rails, he had a chance. If Amy had called the police, he might survive this.
But where was Amy? The thought distracted him enough for Martin to grab his broken arm and twist. Jason screamed, fire and lightning tearing through his arm and shoulder. He wrenched his arm away from the man’s death grip and kicking out at his shin.
Martin was faster, smarter, and wrapped his arm around Jason’s neck, wringing the life from him. Jason kicked out, but his efforts were futile, the agony from his arm rendering him useless. He was going to be victim number five. Dead body number four. His struggles were weakening, his vision greying as his windpipe fought to suck in air past the pressure of Martin’s arm.
Then, out of the corner of his eye, Jason saw her. Her pale, pyjama-clad figure hovered by the open door, blinking into the sunlight as if she’d never seen it before. Jason wanted to tell her to run, to get the hell out, but she was in a trance, one foot in front of the other like a tightrope walker until her last step hovered over the door frame.
Jason wanted to cheer her on, but he could barely hold his own weight. His eyes focussed on the arch of her foot, the long slender line as the ball sank down onto the tile, and Amy took her first step outside for ten years.
She released a long, slow breath. She stretched out her arm and picked up the gun.
Martin saw her. “What are you doing?” he said softly, menacing. “Put it down. You’ll only hurt him, won’t you?” But she held it steady, pointing it levelly at Martin’s head. He loosened his grip, nervously readjusting his hold enough for Jason to hook his fingers over the arm and give himself a centimetre to breathe.
Binary Witness (The Amy Lane Mysteries) Page 24