Truth or Die

by Katerina Diamond

  Looking through the files, he didn’t see anything particularly interesting. Abbey’s assignments were in among the others, she hadn’t been singled out for any special treatment in any way. He opened the email folder. The inbox was clear, apart from one or two interdepartmental emails. He looked through each folder, but there was nothing out of the ordinary – letters to and from other colleges, other teachers.

  He clicked on the search bar within the email account and typed in ‘Abigail’ to see what came back. There were twenty-six emails about Abbey – that couldn’t be right. He started at the beginning. The first couple were standard messages about her entry onto the course. One mentioned her previous UCAS application to Exeter University for the same course. The next email was sent from Coley to an H. Lassiter asking for information on Abbey. Lassiter had come back almost immediately; the email header was ‘candidate material’. Parker frowned. A candidate for what? Lassiter told Coley that Abbey would be a great fit for ‘the programme’ and that she had some more information on her that she would reveal in time.

  When pushed for information in further emails, Lassiter told Coley about a serious sexual assault claim that Abbey had made, which the university had tried to make go away. There had been photographs of her in a compromising situation that could be construed as evidence of consent on the university social website and Abigail had left the college without pressing any charges. Lassiter had copies of the pictures, which were attached in a zip file. Parker had always suspected that Abbey had been through something traumatic, but he had never pressed her for the information because he didn’t see what difference it made, and she could speak to him about it if she wanted to, when she was ready.

  He understood that it took time to open those wounds; it clearly hadn’t been long for her, she was still dealing with it on the inside, and he would be there if she ever decided to talk about whatever it was. But reading this enraged Parker; Lassiter was telling Coley how easy Abbey would be to manipulate, how she had been easy to dissuade from bringing her attackers to justice. She didn’t say it in so many words, but Parker could feel the excitement and camaraderie between them.

  Parker moved the cursor to the zip file and hovered; he couldn’t open it, not least because it wasn’t fair to Abbey. He knew from the documentation of his own assault that every time a person looked at the photos, you were plunged back into the shame; as long as the photos existed, you could never get away from what happened. As if that were even a possibility. He deleted the email without looking. He didn’t need to see Abbie that way, not that he would love her any less, but it didn’t matter, it wasn’t an itch he needed to scratch.

  Lassiter proceeded to say in further emails that her candidate was a wily tomcat who was up to any task put in front of him. Candidate for what? Further emails mentioned other candidates, but no one by name. There were several different people involved; this was obviously bigger than Parker had first thought. If Parker hadn’t searched for Abbey specifically he wouldn’t have found these emails. He found two other accounts that spoke about what had happened but nothing that could be construed as anything other than concern for a new student.

  Anger pulsed through Parker; he hadn’t felt this incensed in a long time. He struggled to concentrate, to stay in the present. Since Abbey had fallen pregnant he had been concerned about this side of himself, he wanted to prove he could keep it at bay. He worried that this badness he had was genetic, passed from his grandfather down through his father who had died when he was young. He had a fear that this child would be born broken, something he had often felt about himself. He had never been formally diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder because he never trusted anyone enough to subject himself to psychotherapy. He knew though. It was always there, in the background, the ability for the switch to be flipped and suddenly he was being pulled backwards into a place where he had no control over himself. It always started with an excess of saliva in the mouth, then a swirling head, not a pain so much as a jumble of thoughts and bad memories all shouting to get to the surface first. If you were lucky, you got a memory that was unpleasant but manageable; if you were unlucky, you were thrust into a nightmare where it was impossible to hide from yourself. He gripped onto the desk, trying to stay in the moment, trying not to disappear into the past, where he was vulnerable and weak. Exposed and alone. Like looking for shade in a desert, impossible to get respite for even a second.

  Footsteps approached and Parker slammed the laptop shut. Darkness descended. The doorknob twisted, but then a conversation started on the other side of the door. Coley was telling the cleaner that he didn’t need his office servicing tonight and that he had just forgotten something. Parker stood up as quietly as he could and slipped behind a large mahogany bookcase situated in the corner of the room. He heard laughter from the other side of the door, which only seemed to exacerbate his fury. The men said their goodbyes. Parker’s chest was heaving, and he was still trying not to have a flashback.

  The door opened and Coley walked in, still laughing until the exterior door closed. After the cleaner had left, Coley closed the door and locked it before exhaling and throwing his folders onto the workbench at the back of the room. He rested his walking stick against the wall next to the door and turned the lamp on. Parker peered at him from the darkened corner. His nerves were finally settling as he felt his focus come back; he had gone from prey to predator yet again.

  He moved forward silently and waited for Robert Coley to spot him. This was risky and not something he would ordinarily do, but he was just so angry. He couldn’t live with this anger; he needed to act. He hadn’t touched anything with his bare hands and he knew he hadn’t been seen on the way in.

  ‘Hello,’ Parker said.

  ‘Jesus Christ!’ Coley jumped. ‘What are you doing in here? How did you get in? The door was locked!’

  ‘You should keep your voice down,’ Parker said.

  ‘You need to leave. Who are you? I’ve seen you in my lectures. Are you a student here?’

  ‘No, but my wife is.’

  ‘Look, I don’t know what you’ve heard, but I don’t do that kind of thing anymore. Whoever your wife is, I promise I didn’t touch her.’

  ‘Abigail Lucas is my wife.’

  Robert Coley’s face changed, he looked confused and surprised. ‘Your wife? She’s not married.’

  Parker held his left hand up and showed Coley the ring. ‘What is she a prime candidate for?’

  ‘What?’ The colour drained from Coley’s face. ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘I’ve been reading your emails. I’m going to ask you one more time, what is she a prime candidate for?’

  ‘I can’t answer that,’ he said, his breath heavy.

  ‘You really should.’ Parker smiled at him.

  ‘You don’t know who you’re dealing with.’ Coley’s eyes darted over to the phone on his desk.

  Parker reached forward and grabbed the phone cord, pulling it out of the wall. ‘Neither do you.’

  ‘I’ll scream, someone will come.’ He looked at Parker’s hands and saw the gloves. ‘Listen, you don’t want to do anything stupid. You can rough me up as much as you want, but I can’t tell you anything.’

  Parker pulled a knife out of his pocket and removed the sheath, exposing the blade. ‘Who said anything about roughing you up?’

  ‘This is insane. What do you want?’ Coley’s eyes fixated on the shiny serrated edge.

  ‘What’s a laminectomy?’ Parker said, knowing it would strike a chord with Coley. He had been inside his house, seen his letters from the doctor. Robert Coley was waiting for confirmation of an appointment after seeing a specialist about his ongoing back problem. He was going to have a couple of the flat bones next to the spine removed in order to stop the pain he was experiencing.

  ‘How do you know about that?’

  ‘I’ve been watching you for a while now; you gave Abbey the creeps and I had to find out why.’

  ‘I’l
l leave her alone. I won’t tell anyone you broke in here.’

  ‘No, you won’t. But you will tell me what’s going on. Who are these candidates? What do you want them for?’

  ‘I can’t tell you that.’

  ‘Why is that? You’re not worried about what I will do to you?’

  ‘I’m dead if I speak to you, so it doesn’t really matter.’

  ‘Death is the least of your worries. If you don’t tell me what I need to know, you will be begging me to take your life.’

  ‘I can’t run, and I can’t tell you what is going on. What you do is up to you.’ Robert Coley seemed to resign to it too easily. Whatever he was afraid of had made the decision for him.

  ‘I found an article in your house, tucked away in one of your drawers. A student died a couple of years ago in freak car accident, he was driving the wrong way up the M4. Was that one of your students? Did that have anything to do with this?’

  ‘I can’t talk about it. Do what you have to do.’ Coley was resolved; even the threat of death didn’t have the desired effect.

  Parker moved closer and pressed the blade against his neck. ‘I warn you, this won’t be pleasant.’

  Parker punched Coley in the stomach with force. Coley recoiled but made no attempt to fight back. Coley’s behaviour was strange, and Parker couldn’t understand it. It was unusual for someone who had no guilt not to plead their way out of a situation. Was he doing the right thing? He had never hurt anyone without being absolutely certain of their guilt before, never without bearing witness to their crimes first-hand. He had a feeling something big was going on, something he needed to get to the bottom of. There was a trail of student deaths going back years, from suicides to car accidents – all seemingly random, and yet they couldn’t be. That in itself wasn’t proof enough of Coley’s involvement, but from what Parker had found during his investigation, at least one of his students every year could have been part of whatever was going on. Parker didn’t understand how or why Coley was doing this, but he would figure it out, hopefully before anyone else got hurt. This was no time for Parker to get a sudden attack of conscience, if that was even possible. He would get Coley to confess, even if he had to torture him to do it.

  With Coley still reeling from the punch, Parker swept the contents of the workbench onto the floor. He would clean it up when the professor was secured. He lifted Coley with ease and threw him face down onto the surface. Parker looked around the room and saw a scarf on the hat stand. He pulled it off and passed it under the table, across the professor’s neck, keeping his head down. He tied the knot hard and tight. The professor groaned. Coley was not a particularly quick or mobile man. Parker pulled his own belt off and looped it around the professor’s ankles before securing it to one of the workbench legs.

  ‘She will look for you. It’s not too late,’ Coley rasped.

  ‘She, who? Lassiter? Don’t worry about her, she will be getting a visit from me, too.’

  ‘Not just Lassiter, there are others.’

  ‘Keep talking. What do you have to do with Exeter University? Why do you have so much correspondence with Lassiter?’

  ‘I used to work there. I moved to Bristol several years ago.’

  Parker took the knife and cut a line through the central back seam of the fabric on Coley’s jacket, then he cut through the shirt with a swift movement, exposing the professor’s back. He could see the nodules of his spine poking through his almost translucent freckled and aged skin.

  ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘It’s going to get messy in here. Where do you want me to start? If I start at the lower section of your spine, then you will most likely be losing the use of your legs. There’s no guarantees I won’t nick your spinal cord though, in which case it’s curtains for you anyway. Or I could start on the fourth vertebra at the top, which controls your neck. Or how about six and seven? They control everything below the top of your ribcage. Death is one thing, but being a quadriplegic is something else entirely.’

  ‘You wouldn’t do that.’

  ‘With all due respect, you have no idea what I would or wouldn’t do and I can guarantee that I have done much worse than this. Now talk.’

  ‘What is it you want?’

  ‘I want to know what you had planned for my wife.’

  ‘I just follow the rules, I’m not the one you want to speak to.’

  ‘I’m not going to lie. This is going to hurt.’

  Parker pushed the knife against the skin, increasing the pressure until it broke through and the smallest trickle of blood ebbed out. The knife could have been sharper, but that would make this easier on Coley and Parker didn’t want that. He inserted the blade a few millimetres into the flesh in the centre of Coley’s back and pulled the blade downwards towards his waistband; the skin split open as though someone had unzipped him. The blood started to pool and roll away from the cut. The spine was close to the surface and Parker could see the white sheen of the vertebrae. Coley started to sob and Parker waited for the begging to begin.

  ‘I told you, I’m not going to talk.’

  ‘Then I’m going to carry on until you do. No one will be here for at least nine hours. Do you have any idea what I could do to you in that time?’

  ‘Get on with it then.’ Robert Coley spat the words out.

  With that, Parker pushed his knife into an intervertebral disc in Coley’s lower back, the soft tissue between each vertebra that stopped the discs from rubbing together. Coley screamed with the discomfort and Parker tried to ignore the thrill he felt at causing pain. Parker knew all about pain; there wasn’t a part of his body that hadn’t been through it. He hated the people that had hurt him, and he made sure he hurt them back. With everything his abusers had put him through, he had become a master of pain. He knew how much pressure to exert and when, he knew where all the little nerve endings were. He had been prodded, poked, burned and skewered himself enough times to understand the intricacies of pain. He thought that his desire to cause pain had gone when they were no longer alive, but it hadn’t. It wasn’t a compulsion or something that he actively missed, but here, now, doing this felt more right than Parker had felt in a long time. He knew he was messed up, knew that he wasn’t like everyone else. But he wanted to protect Abbey, and this was a part of that, wasn’t it? Or was this his sickness raising its ugly head again? He had been determined to move past the person they had made him, but here he was again and as he watched the blood pool on the floor by his feet, he was excited. Had he really moved on or was this just the excuse he had been looking for?

  He disconnected the vertebra and pulled it out, Coley’s body spasming until he went limp, passed out from the pain. He should stop now, he should just get it over with. If Coley hadn’t spoken up to save himself, then he wasn’t going to talk now. Instead Parker pushed the knife in again and again, methodically removing each of the vertebrae.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Present

  Imogen rang the doorbell to Adrian’s house. She couldn’t remember if he had told her he was going out. There were no lights on downstairs, but it was late. She banged on the door in case he was just asleep. She had tried his phone, but it’d rung through to answerphone. Adrian hadn’t been quite right since the accusations were made against him. She had told him the truth when she said she didn’t doubt him, but she wasn’t sure he believed her. Adrian was full of self-doubt at the best of times, convinced that he was genetically predisposed to be a shithead. The reappearance of Parker was a concern. This could be the end for them. If anyone knew they had concealed his identity from the rest of the force, from the investigation, then they would be in deep trouble, facing not only unemployment but also criminal prosecution and probably prison.

  The hall light came on and Imogen banged on the door again.

  ‘I’m coming, wait!’ Adrian shouted from inside; he sounded drunk. He tripped over something in the hall and swore before opening the door and walking back inside.

  ‘Ni
ce to see you’re behaving like an adult about all of this.’

  ‘Spare me your sanctimonious crap tonight, Grey, I’m not in the mood.’

  Imogen closed the door behind her and stepped over a black bin bag full of used rags that had spilled out onto the floor; the hallway stank of turpentine. ‘What’s wrong with you?’

  Adrian took his mobile phone out of his pocket and pulled up a picture. Someone had painted the words rapist pig on the door in bright red paint.

  ‘When I got home that was on the door. The paint was dry, so God knows when they did it. It was probably there all day.’

  ‘That’s vandalism. We can ask your neighbours if they saw who did it.’

  ‘Do you think my neighbours are going to help me out now? Bad enough being a cop. Not many things less popular than a rapist.’

  ‘But it’s not true. You didn’t do it. You need to snap out of this and start acting like someone who is innocent.’

  ‘Yeah, well, maybe I deserve this. Anyway, I cleaned it off and then decided to drink myself to sleep. Chin chin.’

  ‘You smell awful. Come on, you get in the shower, I’ll tidy up your hallway.’

  Imogen took her coat off and hung it on the end of the bannister. She bent down to pick up the stinking rags and put them back in the bag.

  ‘What if this never goes away? This is one of those things that can’t be taken back once it’s out there.’ Adrian’s voice cracked. Imogen looked up to see tears in his eyes. ‘I would never do anything like that. I couldn’t. You know I couldn’t!’

  ‘People forget things, Miley, this is no different. It might take a couple of weeks, or months, but people will move on to the next thing – they always do. Besides, not all of us believed it in the first place.’