by Ellis, Tim
‘It must have slipped off.’
‘What about Kev helping to deliver the grandfather clock?’
‘If we ask for information about him, it will give the game away. The Chief will cotton on to the ugly fact that we’ve been to Hastings, so we’ll keep that to ourselves for the time being.’
‘Good idea.’
After they’d been up to the Press Office, they went down to find that the Chief and her secretary had gone home.
‘What time is it?’
‘Twenty to six.’
‘We’re ten minutes late and she’s gone home.’
‘Maybe she forgot we were coming.’
‘Maybe I should ring her at home and get her to come back.’
‘That’ll boost your promotion prospects.’
‘This has really been a crappy day. I suppose we could go home now.’
Stick yawned. ‘Yes, I’m about ready for home. I’m hungry as well. For some strange reason, I didn’t have any lunch.’
‘So, tell me about this girlfriend...’
***
It was the worst journey she’d ever been on. Either Shrek or Romeo kept laying rotten eggs, but she couldn’t work out which, and neither of them would admit to the heinous crime. In the end, Harley was forced to open her side window, but driving above ten miles an hour in a 2CV with the window open was like leaning into a hurricane dressed in your underwear.
They arrived outside The Dungeon in Colchester at quarter to eight. Harley squeezed into a parking space across the road. There was a rather large man in a suit and bow tie standing outside the door oozing menace.
Shrek looked nervous because Harley kept slapping her right hand into her left hand, and it sounded like a horse whip on a bare arse.
‘Will you stop that?’ Shrek said. ‘I can’t concentrate.’
Harley grinned.
‘Remember,’ Cookie said. ‘You two need to be on your own in that room. Position the cameras quickly. It would be a shame to go to all this trouble only to find out afterwards that we can’t see a damn thing. I’ll let you know anyway. Switch the hearing aid on...’
Shrek did as Cookie said.
‘Testing... one, two, buckle my shoe.’
‘Yeah, I can hear you, Roger and out.’
‘Roger and out!’ Romeo said laughing. ‘You’re a plankton. You haven’t got a microphone, so it’s no good speaking in Morse code. Communication is one way. Cookie’s said that a gazillion times. You can hear her, but she can’t hear you.’
‘I was only joking.’
‘Yeah, okay.’
‘Right,’ Cookie said. ‘Are you two ready?’
Shrek nodded. ‘God, I can’t stop my hands from shaking.’
‘Stop being a wimp,’ Harley said. ‘And don’t forget to bring your reptile with you.’
Shrek gave a nervous laugh.
‘And remember, Romeo and I are just out here. The sooner you place the cameras, the sooner I’ll be able to see you on my laptop. If there’s any trouble, we’ll come in and get you. When you’re ready, just tell them you’ve changed your minds. They can’t force you to do anything you don’t want to do.’
When Shrek and Harley were walking across the road towards the entrance to The Dungeon Romeo said, ‘I thought that was the whole point.’
Cookie grinned. ‘I’m looking forward to watching the fireworks.’
‘Yeah, if they position the cameras first, it’ll be like being a fly on the wall. You don’t think they’ll... you know... get it on, do you?’
Cookie shook her head. ‘They hate each other.’
‘Hmmm.’
They stared at the blank screen on the laptop. The two remote cameras were in Shrek’s jacket pocket. They didn’t have to wait long though.
The first thing they saw was Shrek – up close and personal – grinning into one of the cameras. He gave the thumbs up, and then positioned them high up looking down into the room. Cookie had explained to him about angles and coverage, but at the time he didn’t look as though he’d understood. Maybe she’d judged him harshly – the arcs were perfect.
They could see Harley standing guard at the door.
‘Perfect,’ she said into her microphone. ‘Okay, you want to get out now.’
They saw him nod and head towards the exit.
But then the door flew open.
A man and a woman, dressed in shiny PVC costumes consisting of wide straps, large buckles, and studs burst into the room.
Shrek looked as though he was pleading to be let out, but the muscular man shook his head.
‘It’s a shame we can’t hear anything,’ Romeo said.
Cookie grinned. ‘I don’t think we need to hear the sound effects.’
It appeared as though both Shrek and Harley were being forced to take off their clothes.
Romeo snorted. ‘Maybe we shouldn’t watch.’
‘Maybe we shouldn’t.’
But they both continued to stare at the screen.
‘Maybe we should go in and save them?’
‘Maybe we should.’
But neither of them moved.
‘You’re not recording this, are you?’
‘As if I would,’ Cookie said, pressing record.
Shrek and Harley didn’t come out of The Dungeon until ten to nine, just minutes before Kennard Barrett-Croft arrived in his Mercedes.
‘You were gone a long time,’ Romeo said.
Shrek had turned a whiter shade of pale, and was staring out of the window. ‘Yeah,’ he said.
‘He’s sulking because that woman in there punished his reptile,’ Harley said. She was flushed, still breathing heavy, and her pupils were dilated as if she’d been snorting crack cocaine.
‘From what I could see and hear,’ Shrek threw back at her. ‘You were being severely punished yourself.’
‘Was I!’ she said, licking her lips. ‘Now that guy had a reptile. That place was worth every penny.’
‘You didn’t actually pay anything,’ Romeo said.
‘Which made it even better.’
‘Here we go,’ Cookie said from the back seat.
Barrett-Croft didn’t leave until ten past eleven. By which time they were bored, and had more than enough video footage to make a feature-length movie.
‘We can go now,’ Cookie said.
Harley started the car and turned on the lights. ‘Shrek and I will come back tomorrow and get those cameras for you. Won’t we, Shrek?’
‘If I must.’
‘It really isn’t necessary,’ Cookie said.
Harley pulled out of the parking space, and headed towards the A1124 London Road. ‘Oh, I think it is.’
***
Friday, 29th February
The reception area at the Country Inn Hotel had smelled of sweat when he’d booked in, but he wasn’t particularly bothered. It was only for one night, and this hotel was used to travellers booking in for one night.
The greasy looking unshaven man, who came through from the back office to register him, wouldn’t remember that Mr James Hall – who he’d put in Room 347 – had long black hair, a droopy Mexican-style moustache, a rather long nose, and carried a back pack. As he wrote his name in the book, he made a mental note that Isobella Chase had arrived at four-fifteen, and was in Room 408. He paid cash up front, and caught the elevator up to the third floor.
The room was – as expected – dusty, dowdy, and very basic. He drew the curtains, lay on the bed, and closed his eyes. A couple of hours sleep was just what he needed.
There were no guarantees that he would have seen number six today. He didn’t kill and paint just anyone. The woman had to be right, she needed to look the part, and there had to be some semblance of beauty to generate that spark of interest within him.
He’d been sitting in his SUV across from the hotel when he’d seen her pull up in a bright blue Buick with Colorado plates. She parked up, and walked into the hotel reception. Ten minutes later she came out, collected
her bag from the boot of the car, and went back in.
With all five of his models he’d known straight away. They reminded him of Rebecca – his first love.
He woke up in a cold sweat at two-thirty in the morning. He’d still been in the orphanage. Boris Finn and the Jacoby brothers had him in the toilet. They were laughing as they forced a broom handle into his anus, and calling him terrible names. If Mrs Moggle hadn’t come in when she’d heard his screams, they would have cut his penis off with a pair of rusty pliers.
The cold shower brought reality back. The past couldn’t hurt him anymore. Boris Finn and the Jacoby brothers were dead, he’d made sure of that. He’d paid a private detective to track them down, and then arranged to have the three bullies and the PI executed.
Once he’d donned his disguise, and checked that he had easel and paints, he made his way up to Room 408 and let himself in.
Even before his eyes grew accustomed to the light, he knew she wasn’t there – he couldn’t hear her breathing. He turned to go, but then heard laughter outside in the corridor. The only place he could hide was the closet. He opened the door, stepped inside, and closed it again. Small dark places weren’t his favourite places, but he could control his fear for a short time. The orphanage had a lot to answer for.
He heard the door open, whispered voices and clothes being discarded. Isobella Chase had brought a man back. It wasn’t long before he heard the rhythmic squeaking of the bed springs. He let himself out of the closet, found the knife and bottle of chloroform in his rucksack, and prepared everything.
If he’d been more humane he would have waited until the man ejaculated, but he didn’t. As he pushed the knife into the base of the man’s skull, he covered Isobella’s mouth and nose with the chloroform-soaked rag. There were no screams, no pleas for mercy, no retaliation. He wrapped a towel from the bathroom around the man’s neck to stop blood splattering over him and the room, as he dragged the body to the closet and bundled the dead weight inside.
Now, everything was nearly as it should be. He prepared his materials, and then sat by the bed and waited until the beautiful Isobella began to wake.
He didn’t have to wait long. As she regained consciousness he pressed the pillow over her face. This was what he was here for. The more she struggled the harder his erection became, and when her life began to fade he ejaculated into the condom.
Slowly, his heart rate returned to normal. Once he’d cleaned himself up, he began preparing Isobella. She was naked, and she’d pissed the bed. He couldn’t find a nightdress in her bag, but he always carried one with him – just in case. Slowly, he transformed her. Over her head he put the sheer fabric veil, and in her right hand the hymn book opened at Hymn 26, page 105, Morning has broken, because he’d always liked that hymn.
Then, he was ready.
He laboured for another two hours. Then he packed everything up, took one last look at his beautiful muse, and left.
***
As soon as she opened her eyes she sat up in bed, switched on her laptop, logged onto the Internet via the broadband connection from three doors away, and clicked on the MAP site.
She smiled.
There was her father – Gareth Bunyan – naked, bleeding and very, very scared. She played the video, and listened to him confess to molesting his three daughters and beating his wife for many years, but there was more, much more. He was the train station rapist, had raped at least twelve women, and killed two of them...
‘God! You filthy bastard,’ she said under her breath.
The police had been trying to catch the train station rapist for as long as she could remember, but he only appeared once – maybe twice – a year. Well, now they had the bastard.
Helping the police was getting to be a habit. She’d have to give herself a good talking to – she hated the police, but then she’d hated her father even more.
Replay! She watched the video through again – right to the end – watched her father bleed to death. Maybe the nightmares would stop now. She downloaded a copy of the video onto her hard drive, and sent a back-up copy to her online storage vault. When she was feeling low, she’d watch the bastard get it time after time after time after...
As she padded down to the kitchen in her thick patchwork dressing gown to make her breakfast, she racked her brain for anyone else she might recommend to the MAPs for termination. No one immediately jumped out and bit her, but no doubt she could find some more deserving recipients given time. Wasn’t there a register somewhere? A register with all the child molesters on it? Hmmm, she’d hack into that later, and see what she could find. The MAPs were doing society a valuable service. Filling a gap in the voluntary sector market. It was her duty – as a concerned citizen – to help them maximise their assets.
She took her two pieces of toast and black coffee back up to her bedroom, and sat cross-legged on the bed. It was half-past seven. At eight o’clock she’d ring Charlie, tell him what she’d discovered, and arrange a meeting to get the rest of her money.
First though, she’d check the echo of Erin Donnelly’s computer. Every keystroke that Erin made was echoed – copied – into a ghost of her machine. And the ghost was under Cookie’s control.
Erin Donnelly had been trying to find the MAPs. Well, Erin Donnelly wouldn’t be around much longer, and Cookie hadn’t finished with the MAPs just yet. The program Erin Donnelly had written – although long-winded and amateurish – had done its job. It had found the location of the MAPs.
No, no, no, that would never do. Cookie sent the program off on a never-ending story. It would keep looping – over and over, wider and wider – until someone physically stopped it. Well, it wouldn’t be Erin Donnelly – that was for sure.
‘Hmmm?’
‘You’re a lazy bastard, Charlie.’
‘If I didn’t know better, I’d say that was the beautiful and charming Cookie.’
‘I hope you’re not spanking your monkey while you’re talking to me?’
‘You’re so lovely.’
‘Well, get out of bed. I’d feel a lot happier talking to you if you weren’t lying in your bed with a hard on.’
‘How did you know?’
‘There’s a hidden camera.’
‘There isn’t.’
‘Maybe there is, maybe there isn’t, and maybe you’ll never know.’
She heard grunting, rustling, clanking and clinking.
‘I’m now in the kitchen making coffee.’
‘Okay. I have a video of Barrett-Croft in The Dungeon’s Naughty Room Three in Colchester with two ladies of the night getting beaten within an inch of his life, and shooting his load all over the floor.’
‘You’re too young and innocent to talk like that.’
‘I stopped being young when I was five years old, and nobody gets any prizes for being innocent.’
‘At five to eleven send copies to everyone: The Police Commissioner, the Home Secretary, the Police Complaints Committee, Greenpeace... Is there anybody I’ve forgotten?’
‘Barrett-Croft himself, his wife, some people I know who hate the police...’
‘Yeah, anybody who’s anybody. Oh, and let’s not forget Dee Cullen in the Child Protection Team at Chingford Social Services, and Mrs Vanessa Brechin-Lewis, Justice of the Peace, sitting in the family court at Redbridge Magistrates Court at eleven o’clock this morning.’
‘You know this video could go viral?’
‘The more the merrier. What else?’
‘The person at Hoddesdon Police Station trying to ruin Kowalski is called Erin Donnelly. She works in the computer lab in forensics. Apparently, Kowalski put her father behind bars fifteen years ago, and he committed suicide. She was five years old at the time. Her father’s name was William Oldfield, and her real name is Shona Oldfield. I’ve sent the evidence to your email account.’
‘You’re brilliant.’
‘I already know that. What I don’t know is when I’m going to get the rest of my money.’
‘You don’t want to...’
She heard laughter. ‘I’m only joking.’
‘You want to be careful about jokes like that, Charlie Baxter...’
‘We could meet later in a motel...’
‘You’re old enough to be my grandfather.’
‘Less of the grandfather comments. I’ll have you know...’
‘Yawn, yawn, yawn. I’m only interested in the money.’
‘Chigwell station at three this afternoon.’
‘I’ll be there.’
She ended the call. If there was anyone she might have slept with, it was Charlie Baxter. But as she wasn’t ever going to do it with anyone, there was no point in thinking about it. Now, where did they keep that sex offenders register?
Chapter Twenty
They didn’t have far to go. The conference room was sign-posted from reception, so they merely had to follow the other delegates along the corridor, and get ticked off the list by two smiling women at the entrance.
He wasn’t keen on leaving Angie on her own with Jack, but she reassured him that she still had shops to conquer.
‘Because of the time we arrived at Monument Street, because you wanted to eat, because I felt guilty about leaving you standing outside all on your own, because... Well anyway, there were shops Mary and I missed out, so I’m going back today.’
‘I have no idea what you women find so fascinating about a pair of shoes. They hide the ugliest parts of your body, and you walk in them. As long as they’re comfortable... what more do you need?’
‘You talking about shoes is like me talking about serial killers... although, I probably know more about them than you know about shoes.’
‘I’ll get Gus to chaperone you.’
‘Meaning what?’
‘Humour me. It’s all right you wandering round the shops with Mary, but I’m not happy about you being on your own.’
‘What do you think is going to happen to me?’